On 28-Feb-12 8:35 PM, Chew Lin Kay wrote: > > We dislike people of other cultures, other races, other income levels, > or in short, we dislike the other because we don't understand it > sufficiently, and it feels too much like work. > > "Anything that is not like me must be abnormal/bad/to be avoided"
"The opposite of a profound truth if often also a profound truth." As one example, I cite what David Brin calls "the dogma of Otherness" http://www.crackaddict.com/~nalgas/David_Brin-Dogma_of_Otherness_Intro.html The Dogma of Otherness by David Brin It all began when my publisher sent me out on what used to be called a Chautauqua circuit--public seminars and panels and rubber-chicken dinners--to promote my books. That's when I began noticing something very strange about the way people have started thinking these days. Publicity tours can be pretty tedious at times. Even science-fiction conventions start to blur after too long an exposure. Maybe that's when I started seeing things I otherwise would have ignored. It started innocuously enough: my second novel was about genetically engineered dolphins, and it's no secret that--next to unicorns--those friendly sea mammals are just about everybody's favorite creatures. People at these gatherings seemed mostly to like the way I handled them. Inevitably, though, someone in the crowd would ask what I think of porpoise intelligence here and now, in the real world. It's predictable. There is something compelling about a species that so obviously (for lord knows what reason) /likes us/. People want to know more about them. They ask how much progress had been made in teaching dolphins to speak our language. Or have researchers yet learned to talk to them in theirs? Such questions are based on so many implicit assumptions . . . I really hate disappointing folks, but there is a duty to tell the truth. "I'm not a real expert," I tell them. "But the data are pretty easy to interpret. I'm afraid real dolphins simply aren't all that smart. Those foldtales about high cetacean intelligence, at or above our level, are just stories. It's a shame, but they just aren't true." This, apparently, is not how a lecturer remains popular. Not once has the reaction varied. /"But you can't know that!"/ A universal mutter of agreement. Angry, nodding heads. /"If we can't communicate with them, it must be because we're not smart enough!"/ I reply as best I can. "Well, Professor Luis Herman of the University of Hawaii has worked for a long time with the deppwater species /Steno bredanensis/--widely recognized as one of the brightest breeds. Dr. Herman has, indeed, proved that the higher dolphins are pretty smart animals. They can parse four- and even five-element command 'sentence' signals at least as well as those famous 'sign-language' chimpanzees. In fact, the evidence for dolphins is more rigorous than it is for chimps." This has them smiling. But I make the mistake of going on. "Nevertheless, the basic problem-solving skills of even the brightest porpoise cannot match those of a human toddler. I'm afraid if we want 'other minds' to talk to, we're going to have to look elsewhere . . . or construct them ourselves." Again, instant protests. /"But . . . but there may be other ways of dealing with the world intelligently than those we imagine!"/ /"Right!"/ another person agrees. /"Those problems the dolphins had to solve were designed by human beings, and may miss the whole point of cetacean thought! In their environment they're probably as smart as we are in ours!"/ How does one answer statements like those? I've listened to recorded dolphin "speech," transposed in frequency. The sounds are repetitive, imprecise . . . clearly filled with emotional, not discursive, information. Subjective opinion, to be sure. So I'd patiently describe the brilliantly simple experiments of Herman and others, which had forced /me/ to abandon my own early optimism that it was only a matter of time until we learned to understand dolphin speech. But this only seemed to deepen the questioners' sullen insistence that there must be /other varieties of intelligence/. Finally I gave up arguing. "You know," I said, "every group of nonscientists I've talked to reacts this way. It's really had me wondering. But now I think I've figured it out." They looked puzzled. I explained. "Anthropologists tell us that every culture has its core of central, commonly shared assumptions--some call them zeitgeists, others call them dogmas. These are beliefs that each individual in the tribe or community will maintain vigorously, almost like a reflex. "It's a universal of every society. For instance, in the equatorial regions of the globe there's a dogma that could be called machismo, in which revenge is a paramount virtue that runs deeper even than religion. >From Asian family centrism to Russian pessimism, there are worldviews that affect nations' behavior more basically than superficial things like communism, or capitalism, or Islam. It all has to do with the way children are raised. "We, too, have our zeitgeist. But I am coming to see that contemporary America is very, very strange in one respect. It just may be the first society in which it is a major reflexive dogma that /there must be no dogmas/!" The puzzled looks have spread. This is quite a departure. I hurry on. "Look how you all leaped up to refute me. Even though I'm the supposed 'dolphin expert' here, that hardly matters, since you all assume that any expert can still be wrong! No matter how prestigious his credentials, /no expert can know all the answers/." This is a bit of a revelation to me, even as I say it. "Think about it. 'There's always another way of looking at things' is a basic assumption of a great many Americans." "Yeah?" One of the fellows up front says, perhaps with a bit of a chip on his shoulder. "Well, isn't that true? There /is/always another way!" "Of course there is . . . or at least I tend to think so. I /like/ to see other viewpoints." I shrug. "But you see, I was brought up in the same culture as you were, so it's no surprise I share your dogma of otherness." I roll the phrase over on my tongue, then repeat it, perhaps a little pontifically. "The Dogma of Otherness insists that all voices deserve a hearing, that all points of view have something of value to offer. "Your reactions reflect this fundamental assumption. Having been raised in the same culture, I believe in it as fully as you do. Recall how reluctant I was to decide, at last, that dolphins aren't superintelligent. Most of us here believe in diversity of ideas. "But think, for a moment, how unique this is . . . how unusual this cultural mind-set has to be! Throughout history nearly every human society has worked hard to ingrain its children with the assumption that theirs was the only way to do things. Oh, we still get a lot of that here. It probably comes automatically with flags and nations and all that tribal stuff. But where and when else has the societal dogma also included such a powerful counter-indoctrination to /defend/ otherness?" A man in the front row speaks up. "That's a culturally chauvinistic statement!" There are agreeing nods all around the room. "I mean, what's so special about our culture? We're no better than, say, Asian civili--" "You're doing it again!" I cry; I can hardly sit still. (Perhaps from being too impressed with my own cleverness?) Several members of the audience blink for a moment, then smile faintly. "I don't see--" he tries to continue, but I'm too excited and hurry on. "Look, it may be true that there's something to be learned from all points of view. /But it might also be true that that's just the bias our heterogeneous, melting-pot culture has imposed on us!/ "Answer truthfully. You all believe that widely diverse points of view have merit, right?" "Right," the young man answers firmly, his jaw set. "And your insitence could be called a declaration of faith in a 'Doctrine of Otherness,' right?" "I suppose so. But--" "And you'll agree that as a truly pervasive set of assumptions, it's pretty much a liberal Western, even American, tradition, won't you? Think how strange this Doctrine of Otherness would seem to an ancient Roman, or to the dynastic Chinese who thought the world revolved around Beijing, or to Tudor England, or to most of the peoples of the world today." "Well . . ." He doesn't want to admit it, but after a moment's thought the fellow finally nods. "All right, so that's just our way of looking at things. But you can't say it's actually /better/ than any other way. We have this so-called Doctrine of Otherness. Other people have their own cultural assumptions, of equal value." "Aha!" I smile. "But by saying that, by stating that those other points of view have merit, you are insisting that /your/ cultural dogma--this Doctrine of Otherness--/is/ the best! You're a cultural chauvinist!" He frowns and scratches his head. A woman on the left raises her hand; then slowly lowers it again. >From the back a voice calls. "That's a tautology . . . or a paradox . . . I forget which. It's like when I say--'This sentence is a lie.' You've got him trapped either way he goes!" I shrug. "So? Since when are deep-seated cultural assumptions ever fair? They're adaptions a society makes in order to survive . . . in our case, dictated by being a nation of immigrants who had to learn to get along together. Dogmas don't have to be entirely logical, as long as they work. "Still, perhaps we ought to be proud of America as the prime promoter of a dogma of different and choice--" Ooh. They react quickly to that! "Why proud?" an elderly lady remarks vehemently. "That doesn't make us better than anybody else! It's no great shakes to measure our own culture by /our/ culture's standards and come out with the answer that we're okay! We worship diversity, so by that token we see our worship of diversity as virtuous--" "/That/ is a tautology," I point out. Fortunately, she ignores the rude interruption. "--But that doesn't mean that our culture doesn't come up lacking by some /other/ set of standards," she insists. "Other cultural dogmas could be just as valid." I sigh. "You're doing it again." This time a few in the audience laugh. The woman glares for a moment. "Okay, So I'm a product of my culture. But that doesn't necessarily mean I'm right. I mean it doesn't necessarily mean I'm wrong. I mean . . " When the laughter spreads, she breaks down and smiles. "I--I think I see what you're getting at now." "I only wish /I/ did," I reply. But we're starting to get into the spirit of this now. More hands rise, and we're off. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ This is the introduction of the essay /The Dogma of Otherness/, by noted science-fiction author David Brin. The full text is contained in the book Otherness, a collection of essays and short stories on the subject of, strangely enough, otherness. -- ((Udhay Shankar N)) ((udhay @ pobox.com)) ((www.digeratus.com))
