Justin E. H. Smith

Folks, I know way more important things are going on in the world. But I honestly find it nuts that so many people in the serious reaches of academia and the thoughtful left are simply dismissing Sokal Squared. Here’s my response to the main criticisms. (Thread.)

The main pushback I’ve seen: 1) The journals they pranked aren’t serious 2) No control group 3) Other academic fields are also bad 4) It’s unethical to make people do work under false pretenses 5) They are tools of the right in the culture war I’ll take these in order. 2/n

I'm torn. I think the defensiveness among academics is ridiculous. But, I think it's crucial to distinguish btwn the true problem of publications defending positions taken up a priori for ideological reasons, & the largely illusory problem of frivolous choice of research topics.