Sam Harris Vs Noam Chomsky

1
00:00:00,000 –> 00:00:05,016
Recently Sam Harris was answering some
questions from his fans and he spoke a

2
00:00:05,016 –> 00:00:10,020
bit about his disagreements with noam
chomsky can you comment on your spat

3
00:00:10,002 –> 00:00:13,068
with noam chomsky your initial critique
of him in the end of faith you stand by

4
00:00:13,086 –> 00:00:15,275
it i’m a big fan but I just don’t get
this

5
00:00:16,049 –> 00:00:20,880
well i’m not aware of having a spat with
him I he’s actually taking a few shots

6
00:00:20,088 –> 00:00:25,143
at me online and but I we’ve never met
and i’m not aware of him having read the

7
00:00:26,043 –> 00:00:29,130
end of faith or having notice what I’ve
said about his politics so to some

8
00:00:30,003 –> 00:00:34,352
degree we could just be talking on
parallel channels here but i just think

9
00:00:34,649 –> 00:00:38,820
there is a kind of moral confusion
expressed in his political writing which

10
00:00:38,082 –> 00:00:44,157
ignores intention as a basis upon which
to evaluate certain human behavior at

11
00:00:45,057 –> 00:00:49,128
the end of the day he’s he simply wants
to use body count as the only metric to

12
00:00:50,028 –> 00:00:53,028
discuss the moral stature of two sides
in a conflict

13
00:00:53,789 –> 00:00:57,960
so if we kill a dozen children
unintentionally well that’s every bit as

14
00:00:57,096 –> 00:01:01,104
bad as doing it intentionally to that i
think is a bad way to look at human

15
00:01:02,076 –> 00:01:02,175
conflict

16
00:01:03,075 –> 00:01:07,080
I think the people who are intending to
kill children are different than the

17
00:01:08,025 –> 00:01:12,464
people who are intending to kill the
people who are killing children and our

18
00:01:12,689 –> 00:01:15,330
accidentally killing children in the
process

19
00:01:15,033 –> 00:01:20,046
it’s a huge difference you have to ask
yourself what kind of world is any group

20
00:01:20,046 –> 00:01:24,095
or society want to create how do they
want the world to be what would they do

21
00:01:24,509 –> 00:01:28,538
if they had all the power and when you
ask that question you get very different

22
00:01:28,799 –> 00:01:31,020
answers for specific groups

23
00:01:31,002 –> 00:01:34,017
no matter how much misery and death is
happening on both sides of a conflict

24
00:01:34,017 –> 00:01:36,536
when you look at World War two

25
00:01:36,689 –> 00:01:40,680
he was just a horrific wastage of human
life but the difference between the

26
00:01:40,068 –> 00:01:45,096
Allies and the Nazis was absolutely
categorical what sort of world that the

27
00:01:45,096 –> 00:01:47,285
Third Reich want to create ok

28
00:01:48,149 –> 00:01:51,630
and what did we want to create on our
side we did horrible things the

29
00:01:51,063 –> 00:01:55,092
firebombing of dressed in the atomic
bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki

30
00:01:55,092 –> 00:02:00,821
absolutely grotesque acts of violence
where hundreds of thousands of people

31
00:02:01,649 –> 00:02:06,840
millions of people over the course of
the war died but what sort of world are

32
00:02:06,084 –> 00:02:07,119
we trying to build what

33
00:02:08,019 –> 00:02:11,052
and what were your intentions with
respect to the Germans and the Japanese

34
00:02:11,052 –> 00:02:12,137
really well you

35
00:02:13,037 –> 00:02:16,079
our intentions because after the war we
did not murder everyone

36
00:02:16,079 –> 00:02:21,388
we helped rebuild their societies so it
were not perfect but we were different

37
00:02:22,099 –> 00:02:23,120
from the Nazis

38
00:02:23,012 –> 00:02:26,075
so you can’t just look the body count
merely to judge the rightness or

39
00:02:26,075 –> 00:02:30,904
wrongness of human behavior and and
Chomsky seems to discount intentions

40
00:02:31,579 –> 00:02:33,670
across the board and only look at body
count

41
00:02:34,489 –> 00:02:38,810
and if you do that in any given instance
you come away with a perverse

42
00:02:38,081 –> 00:02:41,159
description of what’s happening in the
world and you come away believing the

43
00:02:42,059 –> 00:02:45,137
kinds of things that people influenced
by Chomsky tend to believe that your

44
00:02:46,037 –> 00:02:49,094
whether it’s glenn greenwald ER and the
other person who’s drunk this kool-aid

45
00:02:49,094 –> 00:02:53,173
and you can end up saying things like
the United States is the greatest

46
00:02:54,019 –> 00:02:57,260
terrorist state in human history right
or some other such nonsense

47
00:02:58,129 –> 00:03:01,177
there’s a difference between the dick
cheney’s of the world and the AL

48
00:03:01,609 –> 00:03:05,780
Baghdadi’s of the world and it is
crucial that people on the Left

49
00:03:05,078 –> 00:03:06,397
understand that

50
00:03:07,099 –> 00:03:12,170
and as far as i can tell Chomsky has
been a source of pure moral confusion on

51
00:03:12,017 –> 00:03:12,946
this point

52
00:03:13,099 –> 00:03:16,147
alright so as often happens when we
discuss these issues

53
00:03:17,009 –> 00:03:21,718
I’m in the unfortunate position of being
a fan of harris and Dawkins and the new

54
00:03:21,799 –> 00:03:27,560
atheists as well as a fan of Chomsky and
Greenwald and Scahill and people like

55
00:03:27,056 –> 00:03:27,125
that

56
00:03:28,025 –> 00:03:33,094
so inevitably when I talk about these
issues are yet people lash lashing out

57
00:03:33,319 –> 00:03:39,530
at me from both camps where they say I’m
too much of an apologist for Harrison

58
00:03:39,053 –> 00:03:42,101
the new atheists are people say I’m too
much of an apologist for Greenwald

59
00:03:43,001 –> 00:03:44,018
Chomsky

60
00:03:44,018 –> 00:03:47,047
so that’s definitely going to happen
I’ve accepted that at this point it is

61
00:03:47,209 –> 00:03:50,150
what it is no matter what I can’t please
everybody when I talk about these things

62
00:03:50,015 –> 00:03:52,564
I’m just breaking it down as i see it

63
00:03:52,699 –> 00:03:57,742
so first of all let’s go directly to his
main criticism is that a legitimate

64
00:03:58,129 –> 00:04:06,500
criticism of Noam Chomsky that noam
chomsky of focuses more on quantitative

65
00:04:06,005 –> 00:04:08,084
issues than qualitative issues

66
00:04:09,029 –> 00:04:13,438
I’d say yes I think that’s a fair
criticism of Noam Chomsky

67
00:04:13,699 –> 00:04:16,762
I mean I also have other disagreements
with Chomsky I think he’s way to the

68
00:04:17,329 –> 00:04:23,210
left of me on domestic and economic
policy but on the idea that he focuses

69
00:04:23,021 –> 00:04:26,030
too much on the quantitative and not
enough on the qualitative

70
00:04:26,081 –> 00:04:32,102
I think that’s a fair point but the
thing that frustrates me about Paris is

71
00:04:33,002 –> 00:04:38,093
that he seems unaware that the criticism
of him is the polar opposite

72
00:04:39,005 –> 00:04:43,013
and I think that’s also merited so I do
think it’s a legitimate criticism of

73
00:04:43,058 –> 00:04:47,096
Chomsky that he focuses too much on the
quantitative and qualitative but Harris

74
00:04:47,096 –> 00:04:53,102
focuses too much on the qualitative and
not the quantitative so up here – let’s

75
00:04:54,056 –> 00:04:59,725
back up Paris for a second so harris is
. is basically yes if you tally up the

76
00:05:00,229 –> 00:05:01,040
body count

77
00:05:01,004 –> 00:05:04,037
it’s true that America has killed more
people than Isis but does that mean that

78
00:05:04,037 –> 00:05:07,336
America is worse than Isis course not
that’s ridiculous

79
00:05:07,669 –> 00:05:11,990
so I agree with him in that respect is
making a good point in that respect but

80
00:05:11,099 –> 00:05:17,105
the deeper idea here the harris is
getting at is the idea that America is

81
00:05:18,005 –> 00:05:20,027
basically altruistic

82
00:05:20,027 –> 00:05:23,072
so in his mind when we kill civilians

83
00:05:23,072 –> 00:05:28,741
it’s always an accident but what people
like myself and i would guess no chance

84
00:05:29,389 –> 00:05:33,020
you’re trying to get across to harris
and other people is that that’s not true

85
00:05:33,074 –> 00:05:36,313
that’s empirically not true we know that
that’s not true i mean we’ve covered

86
00:05:36,979 –> 00:05:43,490
stories on this show just to give one
example where we did drone strikes of a

87
00:05:43,049 –> 00:05:48,113
funeral when we knew that women and
children were at the funeral but we also

88
00:05:49,013 –> 00:05:53,039
knew the Taliban operatives wrap the
funeral and they just decided that

89
00:05:53,039 –> 00:05:56,096
fucking I mean we’ll get the Taliban
guys so there’s some collateral damage

90
00:05:56,096 –> 00:05:58,151
we know we’re going to kill the
civilians fucking let’s do it

91
00:05:59,051 –> 00:06:03,460
so the idea that like it’s always an
accident when we kill civilians

92
00:06:03,919 –> 00:06:10,220
that’s just not correct and those are
issues that Chomsky uh focuses on and

93
00:06:10,022 –> 00:06:14,045
issues that unfortunately I think Karis
doesn’t discuss nearly enough and also

94
00:06:14,045 –> 00:06:20,141
to again to attack the idea that it’s
like well we mean well so therefore it’s

95
00:06:21,041 –> 00:06:22,043
totally different

96
00:06:22,061 –> 00:06:27,155
it is different for sure but it’s not
totally different so for example the US

97
00:06:28,055 –> 00:06:35,057
has openly supported dozens of fascist
dictators during the cold war and after

98
00:06:35,075 –> 00:06:39,096
the Cold War and we didn’t do it because
we’re

99
00:06:39,096 –> 00:06:42,105
benevolent and we want a better system
of government for the people in South

100
00:06:43,005 –> 00:06:47,058
America for example know what we did it
because we wanted more geopolitical

101
00:06:47,058 –> 00:06:50,097
power and control and we wanted natural
resources

102
00:06:50,097 –> 00:06:52,886
I mean the term banana republic comes
from the fact that we overthrew the

103
00:06:53,759 –> 00:06:56,340
government so that our banana
corporations can come in and take the

104
00:06:56,034 –> 00:06:57,143
fucking bananas

105
00:06:57,449 –> 00:07:02,468
so it’s not the case that were all were
altruistic and we mean well and then

106
00:07:02,639 –> 00:07:04,650
once we accidentally killed civilians

107
00:07:04,065 –> 00:07:08,088
no it’s more the case that our focus is
primarily on geo political power and

108
00:07:08,088 –> 00:07:13,217
control and maintaining a grasp on these
things and keeping the order as it is

109
00:07:14,009 –> 00:07:17,940
right now and it taking natural
resources for ourselves

110
00:07:18,063 –> 00:07:20,972
so when we support these fascist
dictators who did all these horrible

111
00:07:21,539 –> 00:07:24,990
things it wasn’t like we expected that
they were going to set up a better

112
00:07:24,099 –> 00:07:27,278
system in that all were helping the
people in these places because of that

113
00:07:28,169 –> 00:07:31,181
we knew that they were doing fucked up
shit and we often looked in the other

114
00:07:31,289 –> 00:07:39,690
direction because our main concern was
not humanitarian and also what Harris is

115
00:07:39,069 –> 00:07:42,078
getting at is the idea of murder vs
manslaughter and what he’s saying is

116
00:07:43,059 –> 00:07:48,060
Chomsky disregard the fact that there’s
a difference between murder and

117
00:07:48,069 –> 00:07:53,138
manslaughter he may Chomsky makes it
seem like America is the worst by far

118
00:07:53,759 –> 00:07:57,824
and away because we murder more people
that then you know regimes that were

119
00:07:58,409 –> 00:08:03,000
outwardly the terrible weather it’s the
Nazis or Isis Sergey other jihadist or

120
00:08:03,000 –> 00:08:06,087
whoever and like I get that Sam I
understand what you’re saying and there

121
00:08:06,087 –> 00:08:10,166
is a fair point there that sometimes
Chomsky might go too far in his

122
00:08:10,949 –> 00:08:14,045
criticism of america and he might not
make a distinction between intentions

123
00:08:14,909 –> 00:08:19,928
but my response to that is Sam both of
those things are crimes murder is a

124
00:08:20,099 –> 00:08:22,103
crime and manslaughter is a crime

125
00:08:22,139 –> 00:08:27,197
so when no charge he comes out and
speaks more about what we do in the

126
00:08:27,719 –> 00:08:28,590
world

127
00:08:28,059 –> 00:08:31,688
the reason he’s doing that he’s spoken
about this before he mentioned in his

128
00:08:32,219 –> 00:08:34,440
debate with William F Buckley a long
time ago

129
00:08:34,044 –> 00:08:38,052
the reason he’s doing that is because he
says we are responsible for our actions

130
00:08:40,026 –> 00:08:43,032
I’m paying for that i’m paying for it
when we do something fucked up

131
00:08:43,086 –> 00:08:46,685
that’s why I’m focusing on this because
i don’t want us to be involved in any

132
00:08:47,459 –> 00:08:50,550
way shape or form with anything like
that whether it’s murder manslaughter or

133
00:08:50,055 –> 00:08:52,146
anything else that might be negative and
affect people in

134
00:08:53,046 –> 00:08:57,081
in a in a bad way I just want Sam to
recognize that

135
00:08:58,047 –> 00:09:03,144
okay we’re good guys they’re bad guys is
not a sufficient explanation

136
00:09:05,028 –> 00:09:11,082
that’s not enough for an Iraqi mother
who lost his son her son or her daughter

137
00:09:11,082 –> 00:09:14,145
or some other family member that’s not
consoling you can’t just throw this

138
00:09:15,045 –> 00:09:20,088
giant blanket this generalization over
what the u.s. does as well we meant well

139
00:09:20,088 –> 00:09:21,114
so it’s okay

140
00:09:22,014 –> 00:09:27,051
no since its us doing it we are
responsible for those actions

141
00:09:27,051 –> 00:09:32,094
so we can at the same time as we slammed
the actions of Isis and al-qaeda and

142
00:09:32,094 –> 00:09:35,169
other jihadist and christian
fundamentalist in the KKK we could slam

143
00:09:36,069 –> 00:09:41,151
all those actions and then also at the
same time say hey the thing we did in

144
00:09:42,051 –> 00:09:45,060
Vietnam when we used Agent Orange and
napalm and killed civilians that was

145
00:09:46,041 –> 00:09:46,110
fucked up

146
00:09:47,001 –> 00:09:50,058
hey when we overthrew the Iranian
government that was fucked up hey when

147
00:09:50,067 –> 00:09:52,152
we support occupation israel-palestine
that’s fucked up

148
00:09:53,052 –> 00:09:56,091
hey what we did in South America that’s
fucked up were able to have this

149
00:09:56,091 –> 00:09:59,154
conversation in a more nuanced way where
it shouldn’t be just us versus them it

150
00:10:00,054 –> 00:10:00,060
should be

151
00:10:01,014 –> 00:10:05,040
these actions they did are fucked up and
these actions we did our fucked up and

152
00:10:05,004 –> 00:10:10,005
let’s just cut out all the areas where
we fucked out so i think what we need

153
00:10:10,005 –> 00:10:14,034
here is a more nuanced conversation and
not just a conversation about us versus

154
00:10:14,079 –> 00:10:19,086
them and intentions were good intentions
versus bad intentions and we shouldn’t

155
00:10:19,086 –> 00:10:23,154
boil it down to the most base-level
conversation because it doesn’t help

156
00:10:24,054 –> 00:10:24,093
anybody

Leave a Reply