I used to really like Sam Harris. Actually, I still do like Sam Harris in the same way that I still think Polanski is a great film director. Have you seen Rosemary’s Baby? Whoa!
But Polanski turned out to be a bit of a pedo creep and well … that kind of removes you from being celebrated in any polite company. Of course Sam didn’t do anything as atrocious as that. So maybe that’s a bit harsh. I guess I still like Sam more than Pedanski.
I owe Sam a debt of thanks. I would credit his meditation app ‘Waking Up’ with really helping me through a difficult patch in my life. Sam pretty much taught me to meditate, which led to some genuinely amazing insights in my life.
I also really enjoyed Sam’s dissertation on free will. I found it wholly convincing and whilst the thrust of the argument - Sam argues for a hard determinist perspective, that is, there is no free will, may seem a little pointless, it was his resultant conclusion that really impressed me.
Sam argues that if there is no free will then we are morally blameless for our actions. Of course this flies in the face of our judicial system that seeks to burden people with the consequence of every misdeed in their lives. Where Sam really shines is, in by saying that we are blameless, it opens a door to universal compassion. It is the confirmation of the proverb:
“There but for the grace of god go I.”
Or as Sam once said, to a man of god ironically- “How much credit do you take for not being born a psychopath?”
Out of a seemingly nihilistic framework Sam renders a beautifully compassionate understanding of the fallibility of humans; that if we cannot be ultimately responsible for our misdeeds then it seems prudent to treat each other with the greatest of compassion. This is the Sam Harris that I grew to respect and admire.
So what happened?
If you don’t know the story I’ll outline it briefly. Sam went on the Triggernometry Podcast and when questioned about the Hunter Biden laptop affair he said … ahem … and I quote:
“Hunter Biden could literally have had the corpses of children in his basement - I would not have cared.”
If this needs context for you, what Sam is saying is that he feels that there is nothing that could have swayed him from thinking that the suppression of the Hunter Biden laptop story from Twitter wasn’t worth the coverup. That is to say, that removing Trump from office was such a high priority that even the discovery of dead children in Hunter’s basement would not have warranted the release of the story.
You can watch those words come out of Sam’s mouth in his fetching dulcet tones right here:
Yeah …
So I think there’s a couple of things going on here and I’m not in the business of psychoanalysing Harris but allow me to postulate further.
Sam has a HUGE case of Trump Derangement Syndrome (TDS).
It is no secret that Sam hates Trump. I mean he really hates the guy. Why? Well because Trump is not of his world. You can point to the policies of the Trump administration. You could argue that it is his demeanour. You could say it is his misogyny. You could make the case that it is Trump’s fourth grade vocabulary. You could point to a whole raft of things but what it boils down to is that Harris is white collar educated and Trump is a blue collar slob.
And I agree!
But this does not give you carte blanche to censor crucial information. This is nothing but rule by decree. This is classist behaviour that reeks of privilege. It’s ugly to behold.
Unfortunately this isn’t Harris’s first foray into the domain of fascistic tendencies. He has in the past argued for preemptive nuclear strikes on Muslim countries.
But this is a new low for Sam.
And it has hurt him. There has been considerable blowback from his recent comments and he has recently left Twitter, no doubt at least partially, as a result.
Sam’s sanctimonious ramblings are likely the product of living in the echo-chamber of monied success and his laser sharp wit and intellect are formidable. Sam is used to being right and as such it has convinced him that he has superpowers of smarts. Sam probably thinks Sam knows best.
In essence, what has occurred is that Sam Harris has ‘tribalised’ his understanding of the situation. Rather than appeal to fairness and logic, Sam is running with the “anything but Trump” line of argument. This is a common theme nowadays where we see a prevalence for a tribal delusion over what is ostensibly the truth. We see it in the Covid narrative where the Covidians will contort their beliefs into all manner of shapes to fit the prevailing reality. Examples:
Young healthy people have always died of myocarditis
Vaccines don’t stop you from getting the thing you are vaccinated against
Masks are effective against an airborne virus
Staying 1.5 metres away from someone will keep me safe
The government cares about me
And other such absurdities …
So I am coining the tendency to choose the herd over reality “The Harris Effect.”
I know it’s not a new phenomenon but it sure is in vogue at the moment!
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Determinism, like evangelism. Both promise comfort of freedom from the responsibility of bad behavior. Atheism is not better than Deism in this respect. People are always attracted to charismatic or intellectual speakers that give them that free pass, whether by hard determinism or the blood of Jesus.
NDEs lead to each being responsible for the pain they inflicted. This and karma appear more valid than Harris playing the intellectual card trick to remove the stigma from perversion.
I appreciated Sam Harris many years ago for his willingness to be an outspoken atheist, along with Richard Dawkins and Christopher Hitchens. Gotta say I don't have a lot of patience for philosophical argument, and it seems, to me, arguing yourself into a position where determinism is a thing seems…silly.
Anyway, as you point out he is yet another victim of tribalism, like almost everybody else on the planet today. Unfortunately this tendency is evolutionarily hardwired into us, but can be overcome with conscious effort, one hopes.