For Polarization

"Seek out argument and disputation for their own sake; the grave will supply plenty of time for silence." -- Christopher Hitchens

If there is one unassailable claim in our time, believed by all, without question, it is equality — everyone is equal, in fact everyone is exactly the same, and all other conclusions should flow from that sameness. Of course I agree with this wholeheartedly, as do you, as does everyone.[*]

If there is another unassailable claim in our time, it is that polarization is BAD and consensus is GOOD. Moral people of proper intent come together and agree, they do not dispute, in fact they certainly do not argue that disagreement is better than agreement, in fact they never argue that disagreement is better than agreement.

But is this true?

For a very long time I thought so, but then Christopher Hitchens talked me out of it:

I have a dear friend in Jerusalem, that home of rectitude and certainty that is so often presented to us as “holy” for no better reason than its unenviable position as “home” to three (highly schismatic but self-described) “mono”theisms. His name is Dr. Israel Shahak; for many years he did exemplary service as chairman of the Israeli League for Human and Civil Rights. Nothing in his life, as a Jewish youth in pre-1940 Poland and subsequent survivor of indescribable privations and losses, might be expected to have conditioned him to welcome the disruptive. Yet on some occasions when I have asked him for his impression of events, he has calmly and deliberately replied: “There are some encouraging signs of polarization.” Nothing flippant inheres in this remark; a long and risky life has persuaded him that only an open conflict of ideas and principles can produce any clarity. Conflict may be painful, but the painless solution does not exist in any case and the pursuit of it leads to the painful outcome of mindlessness and pointlessness; the apotheosis of the ostrich.

Only an open conflict of ideas and principles can produce any clarity.

Hitchens later summed this argument up as:

Polarization and the dialectic are what clarify things.

The key is in the dialectic, the process of argumentation intended to arrive at conclusion. To quote Wikipedia:

A dialectic comprises three stages: a thesis, giving rise to its reaction; an antithesis, which contradicts or negates the thesis; and the tension between the two being resolved by means of a synthesis.

This gets to the most basic process of determining the truth, and to Shahak’s point. The dialectic — any argument — cannot get to the truth unless the opposition — the antithesis — is stated as strictly and rigorously and forcefully as possible. Otherwise, the synthesis will simply be the thesis. The thesis will steamroll the antithesis and that will be that. No actual progress will have been made, the process will have been fake, and the result will be a lie. This happens constantly.

And when people say or hint or give you that look that says “surely you agree”, that’s what they mean — you should simply go along with the thesis, pretend a real discussion has happened, and stop being so troublesome.

And what that means is that one side just… wins. Specifically the side that is in a position to set the thesis — we used to call them kings and priests, now we call them experts and fact-checkers.

I don’t know about you, but I’ve had it with the experts and fact-checkers, and the people who constantly cite them, in pursuit of a singular agenda.[**]

We clearly have too much consensus in our time; we need more disagreement.

There are some encouraging signs of polarization.

[*] I know, I know. Bear with me. I’m foreshadowing.

[**] See?

[Hitchens quote from Letters To A Young Contrarian; references captured from this blog.]