This does not pretend to be
the definitive work on denial; it would take a book-and-a-half to
cover the topic. It's just a look at three different types of denial.
Deny, Deny,
Deny
The
famous advice given in the 1967 movie A Guide for the Married Man
is the resort for all guilty persons who are afraid of being found
out (in this case, of infidelity): “Deny, Deny, Deny!” It's the
stonewall defense. Even with a smoking gun in your hands and a
bleeding corpse at your feet--admit nothing at all costs. “What are
you talking about?” “Oh this. I can explain.” And so on and so
forth. The best exponent of the this ploy is Falstaff in
Shakespeare's Henry IV, Part One (Act
II, Scene 4).
We two saw you four set on four
and bound them, and
were masters of their wealth. Mark now, how a
plain
tale shall put you down. Then did we two set on you
four;
and, with a word, out-faced you from your
prize, and have it; yea,
and can show it you here in
the house: and, Falstaff, you carried
your guts
away as nimbly, with as quick dexterity, and roared
for
mercy and still run and roared, as ever I heard
bull-calf. What a
slave art thou, to hack thy sword
as thou hast done, and then say
it was in fight!
What trick, what device, what starting-hole,
canst
thou now find out to hide thee from this open and
apparent
shame?
Come,
let's hear, Jack; what trick hast thou now?
By the Lord, I knew ye as well as
he that made ye.
Why, hear you, my masters: was it for me to kill
the
heir-apparent? should I turn upon the true prince?
why,
thou knowest I am as valiant as Hercules: but
beware instinct; the
lion will not touch the true
prince. Instinct is a great matter; I
was now a
coward on instinct.
Falstaff doesn't just deflect the
shame from his being branded a coward, but he turns his cowardice
into a positive quality. The “coward on instinct” is the champion
of “Deny, Deny, Deny!”
***
Deny, Deny!
It's easy to understand that the
guilty (in thought and/or deed) will readily turn to the stonewall
tactic. Without a confession the accusers have a lot of work to do to
prove their case. But what if there is absolutely irrefutable
evidence of guilt. Well, first of all, you just deny that it is
absolutely irrefutable proof of
guilt. Take, for example, the photograph of the teeth mark on the
shoulder of Italian defender Giorgio Chiellini inflicted by the bite
of Uruguay's Luis Suarez in a World Cup match this past week. (It
should be pointed out here to those who don't already know that
Suarez is now a bi-continental biter with multinational tastes,
having chomped a Dutchman in Holland, a Serb in England, and now an
Italian in Brazil.)
The denial project was
essentially a three-step process.
First step: Denial that the proof
is indeed proof. There is a simple explanation for the photograph
showing teeth marks, according to Suarez's home country defenders in
the media and the Uruguayan Football Association--the picture was
Photoshopped!
According to newspaper reports in
Uruguay and Spain, when submitting its evidence in defence of Suárez,
who has now been banned by Fifa from football for four months and
nine international matches for his actions, the Uruguayan FA planned
to argue that digital manipulation of images has been rife and that
they cannot be trusted.
The Guardian,
UK
Which brings us to the second
step: Did you note where the above quote came from? The whole
incident is a conspiracy concocted by the British (with a little help
from the offended Italians and the Brazilians, who, according to the
Uruguayans, would supposedly have an easier chance of winning the
tournament if Uruguay were out of it).
The
Uruguayan Football Association has gone on the offensive in an effort
to save Luis Suarez from a lengthy ban for biting Giorgio Chiellini,
claiming he is the victim of a smear campaign by the Italians,
the English media and the Brazilian hosts.
Oops,
sorry, that's from the conspiratorial Guardian,
again. Here's an obviously unbiased reaction—from Tenfield.com, the
website of the corporation which broadcasts Uruguayan
football:
Los británicos, en la
conferencia de prensa, en tres ocasiones preguntaron a Oscar Tabárez
sobre la incidencia, afirmando que “Suárez mordió a Chellini”.
Inclusive señalaron que la FIFA debería intervenir y expulsar a
Luisito de la Copa del Mundo.
(British reporters, in the press
conference, asked Óscar Tabárez [Uruguayan team manager] three
times about the incident, saying that: “Suárez bit Chiellini.”
Their intention was Fifa should expel Luisito.)
Sorry
once more, that's a Guardian
translation.
The Tenfield response segues into
the third step of defense. It concludes (in translation):
It would be good if these
Englishmen remember how they won the World Cup in 1966 with a ball
which was not a goal.
This should be called the “Na
Na Na Na Na” fallback: You benefited from something perhaps
not-quite-right about half-a-century ago, so you have dirty hands and
should keep your mouth shut about other people's misdeeds (metaphor like James Bond's martinis—shaken, not stirred).
***
Deny!
Whereas
Denial Type 2 is a tactic to defend the emotional side of life, Denial Type 3
is employed in the worlds of punditry and politics, by those who
purport to be engaged in serious debate on intellectual issues or
legislation.
The
National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration has concluded, “Human
influences are having an impact on some extreme weather and climate
events.” Now consider
the following two statements on this issue:
1--“There
is . . . no evidence for the increase in extreme weather. . . . I
own a home on an island in South Carolina looking south in the
direction of hurricanes, and after Katrina I was really interested
when they said this is a harbinger of increased hurricane activity,
which since then has plummeted."
2--“I
don’t agree with the notion that some are putting out
there—including scientists—that somehow, there are actions we can
take today that would actually have an impact on what’s happening
in our climate. I do not believe that human activity is causing these
dramatic changes to our climate the way these scientists are
portraying it.”
The
first statement, which offers an anecdote as a supposed rebuttal of
scientific evidence, is a clear violation of an old Yiddish proverb
(and nobody wants to violate
one of those) that goes (in English, since none of us are up to snuff
in Yiddish): “'For instance' is not proof.” But I guess we
shouldn't expect much from the speaker of the first statement, our
old friend the pundit George Will (we met him in the previous post,
“Stinking to High Heaven”), who does not score high in
Yiddishkeit.
Will feels that he can pit his anecdote against the overwhelming
scientific evidence because “Scientists are not saints in white
laboratory smocks.”
The
second statement is a clearer presentation of the stance that Will
takes. It's by Marco Rubio, the Republican senator from Florida.
Rubio's key words are “I do not believe.” As
Amanda Marcotte noted in a Salon.com article,
Rubio
isn’t disagreeing with the opinions [my
emphasis] of scientists; he’s disagreeing with the
conclusions derived from the evidence. Even if all the climate change
scientists died tomorrow, the planet would still be heating up. This
isn’t a matter of one person’s opinion versus another. It’s a
man being presented with facts and refusing to believe them.
Perhaps
what we can call people like Will and Rubio is “scientific
philistines,” analogous to artistic philistines, who “know what
they like.” Scientific philistines know what science (and the
technology that flows from that knowledge) they like and deny the
validity of the science they don't like. Thus, they can wear digital
watches, use computers, fly in airplanes, take antibiotics, etc.
without bothering to consider the fact that the differing sciences of
metallurgy, physics, chemistry, etc. are interconnected. Decades ago,
I first came across a famous scientist (I don't recall who it was,
though) suggesting (tongue-in-cheekily) that people who don't believe
in evolution shouldn't be allowed to fly in airplanes. Here, more
recently, is William Hirstein's take on the subject:
To
be consistent, extreme science skeptics such as creationists should
not trust any existing technology. They should not use computers,
drive modern cars, fly on airplanes, or have an MRI done, since the
same science that tells us that animals evolved created these
technologies. But of course these are reliable technologies. The best
explanation for this fact and the fact that our cars go, our bridges
do not fall down, hospital patients get better at ever-improving
rates, and so on, is that the science behind these achievements
correctly describes the world.
But
like Rubio, other politicians will go on proposing legislation that
ignores scientific findings, while gloating about their philistinism.
John Becker, Republican member of the Ohio legislature, defended his
bill on birth control devices thusly, “This is just a personal
view. I’m not a medical doctor.” And like Will, other pundits
will deny evidence when it displeases them (e.g., Charles Krauthammer,
on the same television show as Will: “I'm not impressed by numbers.
I'm not impressed by consensus”).
Should
we call this type of denial intellectual dishonesty? Or is there
another term that might be used?
*
I
learnt a new word today: 'solipsism'
Reader
“JimKent”
commenting
on a Guardian article
May
24, 2012
*
Maybe
that's it: Scientific philistines are so wrapped up in their
subjectivity that no other truth can exist in their world. Some
comedian (again, I heard it many years ago and can't name the person)
once put down artistic philistines with the analogous retort: “I
don't know much about medicine, but I know what I like.”
Unfortunately, as John Becker has shown, the laughable has become
reality. And reality for too many, is no longer determined by
evidence.
*
In
the Principles
and the Three
Dialogues
[Bishop] Berkeley defends two metaphysical theses: idealism
(the claim that everything that exists either is a mind or depends on
a mind for its existence) and immaterialism (the claim that matter
does not exist). His contention that all physical objects are
composed of ideas is encapsulated in his motto esse
is percipi
(to be is to be perceived).
"Internet
Encyclopedia of Philosophy"
In
his Life of Samuel Johnson, James Boswell relates the following
story:
After
we came out of the church, we stood talking for some time together of
Bishop Berkeley's ingenious sophistry to prove the nonexistence of
matter, and that every thing in the universe is merely ideal. I
observed, that though we are satisfied his doctrine is not true, it
is impossible to refute it. I never shall forget the alacrity with
which Johnson answered, striking his foot with mighty force against a
large stone, till he rebounded from it -- "I refute it thus."
*
Epistemology
(by Richard Wilbur)
I.
Kick
at the rock, Sam Johnson, break your bones:
But cloudy, cloudy is
the stuff of stones.
II.
We
milk the cow of the world, and as we do
We whisper in her ear,
“You are not true.”
***
Some
Sources:
Jonathan
Chait
William
Hirstein,
Amanda Marcotte,
http://www.salon.com/2014/05/23/how_right_wingers_are_amping_up_their_war_on_science_partner/
Amanda Marcotte,
Luis Roux,
http://www.theguardian.com/football/2014/jun/28/luis-suarez-uruguayans-hurting
*
And for another angle on denial
(and, this time, those who believe in global warming):
Emmett Rensin,
http://www.thebaffler.com/blog/2014/07/cigarettes_and_climate_change
