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"Although Sokal and Bricmont focus on the abuse and misrepresentation of science by a dozen French intellectuals, their book broaches a much larger topic--the uneasy place of science and understanding of scientific rationality in contemporary culture."--Thomas Nagel", The New Republic"
"An excellent discussion . . . a plea for a sensible understanding of science and a welcome antidote to irrationality."--Simon Moss, "Houston Chronicle"
"An excellent discussion . . . a plea for a sensible understanding of science and a welcome antidote to irrationality."--Simon Moss, "Houston Chronicle"
Product Description
In 1996, Alan Sokal published an essay in the hip intellectual magazine "Social Text" parodying the scientific but impenetrable lingo of contemporary theorists. Here, Sokal teams up with Jean Bricmont to expose the abuse of scientific concepts in the writings of today's most fashionable postmodern thinkers. From Jacques Lacan and Julia Kristeva to Luce Irigaray and Jean Baudrillard, the authors document the errors made by some postmodernists using science to bolster their arguments and theories. Witty and closely reasoned, "Fashionable Nonsense" dispels the notion that scientific theories are mere "narratives" or social constructions, and explored the abilities and the limits of science to describe the conditions of existence.
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
43 of 45 people found the following review helpful
Format:Hardcover
As a university student of both physics and philosophy, this was certainly a refreshing read. After the many fruitless lessons I've spent trying to get points about physics across to philosophy students, it's nice to see it so well summed up. It's true that Bricmont and Sokal could use greater philosophical training, but their points about the abuse of physics are not lessened for all that.
The most interesting revelation of the book is the asymmetry between the natural and human sciences. While sociologists and philosophers without any scientific training can pontificate about what constitutes valid mathematical proofs and physical theories, any scientist pointing out the philosophers' (to a physicist) very obvious lack of understanding of basic physical concepts is branded as arrogant.
It's funny that while people don't expect the editors of the journal to know the physics involved, they don't care that the philosophical aspects were pure nonsense too. Shouldn't someone conversant with hermeneutics and the like have caught that?
This book should be required reading for anyone starting at a university-level education. Even if you don't agree with it, it will hopefully make you think.
13 of 14 people found the following review helpful
Format:Hardcover
I'm a reader of Lingua Franca and was interested to see Jim Holt's full page review of this book in the NY Times Book Review (Holt writes for Lingua Franca). Sokal and Bricmont have been at the center of the ongoing debate about relativism and whether science can accurately describe certain aspects of the world. In this book they argue against bad science, and specifically against the use of science as "proof" of concepts,theories, metaphors, and shaky arguments about social sciences, psychology, literary studies, and so on. They also argue for the ability of science to establish a truth, to literally prove something (this in response to the postmodern notion that truth is simply a social construct, and is therefore relative to the perspective, language, culture, circumstance, etc. of the person seeking to establish a given truth.) I found the book to be well argued, often funny, at times dense (because the authors take pains to explain why the science of Kristeva, Baudrillard, Latour, etc. is bad),overall lively and interesting.
29 of 33 people found the following review helpful
Format:Hardcover
There are already loads of reviews here, and there's not much that hasn't been said yet - BUT, I would quite like to say something about the reviews. I finished reading the book only a few hours ago and I can state categorically that the reviews dated 10th August 1999 and 20th July 1999 are misleading in their criticisms of this book. The authors do not suffer from the alleged confusions - indeed the preface to the reissue mentions the fact that many detractors criticised elements that were never present in the book. Sokal and friend spell out quite clearly that they are aware of the distinctions of which Mr July and August think they are ignorant.
Having said that, the section on epistemic relativism is a little simplistic but NOT because of this supposed tendency to criticise too diffusely.
It is also true that the Deleuze section is disappointing. The comments on Irigiray, however, are wonderfully amusing. This book does not RELY on the 'point and laugh' technique even if it is present at times. The closing quote from Guatteri had me in stitches; I can't speak for Sokal, but I have NO PROBLEM understanding Wittgenstein, Hegel or Nietzsche (all supposedly 'difficult' thinkers) yet I too would write off much of the material exposed as either pretentious assertions that are hard to refute because they lack argument and substance or, in the immortal words of Patsy from Absolutely Fabulous, (and this applies to Irigiray and Guatteri especially) because they are "nonsense-s**t".
E=Mc2 is sexist, God help us!
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Most Recent Customer Reviews
One of the most important books a 21st Century humanities student will...
For anyone who has read Jacques Lacan, Gilles Deleuze, Bruno Latour,Jean Baudrillard or any other continental philosopher and thought that there was foul play at work. Read more
Published 14 months ago by E.C.Forbes
A brilliant and readable trawl through the unreadable
A brilliant, unpretentious and readable trawl through the unreadable to expose its pretentious and abusive nonsense in modern 'continental' philosophy.
Published 19 months ago by J. Hyland
Fascinating edge of the debate
The great Anglo-Saxon/Continental divide continues, rationalism v. empiricism, 'internal' logic cf. 'external' logic, dare I say it - social democracy v. meritocracy/aristocracy? Read more
Published on 29 Nov 2009 by C. K. Robinson
Entertaining but probably can be misused.
I thought it was entertaining to deconstruct the deconstructionist. But honestly, is it really that big a deal? I like how one reviewer claimed that he/she has a B. Read more
Published on 23 Sep 2007 by Cwyu
Excellent.
Despite the comments of some other reviewers, Sokal does not display any misunderstanding of philosophy. Read more
Published on 25 Jun 2007 by Misodoctakleidist
Keep the aspirin handy!
What an ordeal the authors of this book must have endured in researching the material for it! Even wading through the snippets and samples used to illustrate their arguments is a... Read more
Published on 8 Feb 2006 by Stephen A. Haines
Intellectual Morons
Fashionable Nonsense grew out of the famous hoax in which Alan Sokal published a parody article in the American post-modern journal Social Text. Read more
Published on 19 Nov 2004 by Pieter
News from cloud-cuckoo-land
'But when such solecisms as we find in these writings are confidently put forth as scholarly discoveries, with every assurance that something profound is being uttered, one must... Read more
Published on 17 Oct 2002 by Suetonius
Too reliant on polemic
I agree with those who find the book's argument weak. Considering the claims they make for themselves and the criticisms they level at their targets, these authors are... Read more
Published on 11 Jan 2000
Best part is the discussion on scientific method
While the sections on the French theorists are amusing and/or depressing, the chapter on positivism, empiricism, and induction is the most worthwhile. Read more
Published on 19 Aug 1999
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