Chapter 6: Self-Publishing and Other-Publishing
2. Weaknesses and abuses of the system
3. On academe
1. A bit of history
Publishing a piece of writing means making it public, so as to share its contents, to disseminate it, and in some
cases (if it is considered timeless) to perpetuate it. Originally, in ancient
times, when an author put his thoughts or ideas down on paper (or any other
material medium), he might simply allow or encourage his friends and neighbors,
or his pupils or disciples, to read the text, or he might just read it out loud
to them. Later, he might have made a copy or two for others,
or allowed others to make a copy of his manuscript. Eventually, this
gave birth to the profession of copyist, when authors hired scribes to make
copies, and usually to bind them. Eventually, this in turn gave rise to the
profession of publisher, when an employer hired
scribes for diverse authors. Obviously, in view of the difficulties involved,
generally not many copies were made, and many works were lost due to this.
Copyists still exist today, by the way; for example, they write Torah scrolls.
This state of affairs lasted for centuries,
indeed millennia, till the advent of printing. At first, authors went directly
to printers to duplicate their works. But soon, no doubt, printers dealt more
often with publishers, who thus served as intermediaries between authors and
their public. At first, no doubt, authors took charge of distribution, either
giving or selling copies of their works to individuals, bookshops, schools or libraries. But eventually, this marketing
function was also taken over by publishers. The publishers would thus provide a
service, or a set of services, and financially profit; they were businessmen.
Sometimes, publishers required payment from the authors for their service; this
was eventually called self-publishing. Often, publishers were capitalists, who
covered all printing and distributing expenses, and collected all incomes,
giving the authors a share of the profits (usually relatively small, but
optimistically labeled ‘royalties’).
Obviously, once publishing became a business, the publisher
would select the works he considered potentially profitable. Either the author
would have to pay a fee for the services rendered, or sales would have to be
sufficient to cover costs and yield a profit. The publisher thus became an
arbiter of what could and would be published, largely on business grounds.
Universities eventually got involved in publishing past or present works they
deemed interesting or important. They published not only whole books, but also
shorter essays on specific topics, which they might collect in journals or in
books. In principle, profit might not be their motive; but they too had usually
to look at the bottom line.
In any case, when universities, and indeed, publishers in
general, considered material for publication, they would also decide whether it
fell in line with their academic standards and beliefs, since their own
reputations were at stake. Publishing thus became an authoritarian service.
Authors who self-published were gradually regarded as inferior to
other-published ones, because they were not given a stamp of approval by
acknowledged (“accredited”) publishers. Self-published authors would also
probably sell much less, not having the resources of professional publishers at
their disposal. For these reasons, authors generally preferred to have their
works other-published. Today, the situation has changed a bit due to the
emergence of instant online self-publishing. This has been made possible not
only because of the Internet, but also thanks to the new technologies of
automated printing and binding.
Nowadays, an author can self-publish with a few clicks of
his mouse, and the print-on-demand publishing companies then take care of all
printing, binding and distribution (including advertising), not to mention the
e-book edition, for a very reasonable cut of the profits. Sales occur online as
well as through traditional outlets. And of course, there is not even real need
for a hardcopy; posting material on a blog or website, in html or pdf or
flipbook format, constitute forms of self-publishing. In my opinion, all this
may well spell the death soon of traditional publishing, i.e. of publishing through a selective investor, producer and seller. Nevertheless,
in the meantime, attitudes have changed little, and a work published through a
traditional publisher is still given more credence than one self-published off-
or online. This attitude should be vigorously questioned.
2. Weaknesses and abuses of the
system
Let us not forget the purpose of it all – the basic purpose
of publishing is to get people to read a work. The readership, the type and
number of readers a book or journal article musters, is indicative of
popularity but not necessarily of quality. Large popularity may generate
profits and fame, but is not a sure proof of value and
truth. Publication by a prestigious publisher is not sure proof of value and
truth; all it does, at best, is show the publisher to be an able investor or
speculator. Publishers through their selections of works control the narrative;
but this practical power does not logically make them authorities in the
theoretical subject at hand.
Many of the very good or great
books and articles in the history of philosophy or science were self-published.
Not only in ancient history, but also in more recent history. To be
self-published should not be regarded as a slight. On the contrary, it should
be viewed as a mark of commendable independence and enterprise. Self-published
works should be touted as: ‘proudly self-published’. Of course, many books and
articles that are other-published are also very good
or even great. Conversely, many self-published books or articles are of little
or no worth. But it is also true that many books and articles published by
publishing houses, even prestigious ones, are found on closer scrutiny to be of
very middling worth if not shockingly worthless.
This is testimony to the ignorance, dimwittedness and vanity
of many reviewers hired by publishers
(or the editors the latter appoint).
People who take this job can’t be very intelligent,
anyway: if they were, they would have better things to do, namely write their
own material; if one is richly creative, one has no time for such sideline
occupations. When one is a reviewer, one is generally not obligated to disclose
one’s name or qualifications. A reviewer is given great power to control an
intellectual dialogue simply by accepting material that conforms to his
opinions and refusing that which does not, without any need to publicly argue
his case, or any danger of being contradicted and shown up to be ignorant or unintelligent.
So, the reviewer is godlike and authoritative, imposing what
he regards as orthodoxy. He will likely reject anything unfamiliar to him,
anything above (or of course below) his level of intelligence and knowledge.
This pretty well ensures that the lowest common
denominator is maintained indefinitely in the field concerned. Of course, there
must be some informed and intelligent reviewers out there somewhere, since a
lot of good stuff is being published anyway. But go find them; it is a lottery,
causing authors much time-waste and vexation.
The publisher won’t contradict his reviewer; he does not know any better
himself, which is why he picked (for whatever reason) someone else to do the
job. If he has any doubts, he may ask for a second opinion; but all he will get
is the same low quality of personnel (and second opinions cost money). All he
cares about, at the end of the day, is whether his business flourishes and he gets as much reflected glory as he can. It must be said and
should always be remembered that other-publishing is
basically a racket for money and power.
The problem is that many authors,
who are themselves of lesser ability, need publishers to receive third-party
confirmation of the value and truth of what they have written; they are what
Ayn Rand has characterized as ‘second-handers’. First-handers know the value
and truth of their work; they do not need external confirmation. But
second-rate authors feel vindicated and legitimatized when others publish the work they submit to them. There is therefore a strong market
for other-publishing from the standpoint of the
authors. Personally, I do not feel the need to ‘be published’; it is too much
trouble pursuing this goal; I am quite happy with self-publishing.
Authors seeking to be other-published will naturally tailor their views and tone to fit the standards set by the
publishers concerned, which are usually the current mainstream views. If they
submit a manuscript which is close enough to those standards, but not quite up
to them, they may be asked by the reviewers to adjust their position or style
as a condition for acceptance; and generally, since they yearn to be published
more than they care to defend their opinions, they will comply with the
reviewers’ demands. For many academic writers, being published is a necessity
for professional survival and advancement. They are basically employees, and are willing to make sacrifices accordingly.
Of course, some have no principles to sacrifice; they are glad to be published
even if what they wrote is wrong or silly.
(It should be said that some authors need editorial
assistance, because they lack the time or cannot be bothered to proofread and
their own work, or are perhaps unable to do so because
of language difficulties. Such editorial assistance is of course quite
legitimate, whether the work is finally other-published or self-published.)
There is also, of course, a strong market for other-publishing from the standpoint of the readers. If the material has been
published by some known publishing house, they imagine that this means that
competent people have verified it and confirmed its value and truth. This
potentially saves the readers time, since they do not have to wade through a
work only to discover halfway through it that it is worthless. It also saves
them having to think and judge things for themselves; they can rely on the
reviews for their opinions. Of course, man is a social animal: following the
opinions of others is to some extent part of human nature. For my part, I do
not read or judge on such basis.
Needless to say, it is not my purpose
here to oppose the practice of peer group review. The idea of peer group
review is basically sound, for philosophy as well as for science; but this
should be understood to mean free and
open public debate of philosophical or scientific theories, and not behind-the-scenes manipulation of
information by a privileged minority. Of course, too, I do not deny that
publishers of books or journals have every right to select the works they want
to publish. But such centralized selection should not be considered decisive;
it should not be taken to signal the lack of value or truth of works not
selected[1].
Works should be judged by the public on their merits, and not on the basis of who published them.
It should be added that the meme of peer-group review is
more appropriate in special fields like mathematics or physics, where there is
an overall consensus among participants as to how to settle disputes (e.g. by experiment), than in more general fields like logic
and philosophy, where opinions vary much more widely. Consensus in logic and
philosophy is theoretically conceivable in some distant future, I suppose; but
in practice today it is impossible, due to the fact that there are many participants who do not even admit of rational standards and
methods in principle. So, the idea that there might be a peer group that can
authoritatively judge works in logic and philosophy is misleading and
dishonest. The arbiters in these fields can only be self-appointed mandarins.
In truth, they have no intellectual authority; their claim to such authority is
a con game.
I shudder to think of the number of great texts that have
not been published, and have eventually disappeared from mankind’s literary
heritage, or even that have not been written, as a result of the current system of book and journal publishing by an elite. Just think about
it… how many great thoughts and discoveries have been thrown into obscurity
because the publishers and their chosen gatekeepers had the power to block
their publication. This is at least true up to the creation of the Internet;
thanks to that, and many allied technologies, most authors are now able to
publish their own works in some way or other. But still, think of the waste of
human potential and achievement that the other-publishing system is somewhat
responsible for.
3. On academe
The world of publishing – as regards logic and philosophy,
and of course mathematics and the special sciences, and even general literature
– is intimately bound with the academic world, needless to
say. Most intellectuals, nowadays, are holders of university degrees,
and some continue thereafter to work part- or full-time in or with
universities. The authors, reviewers, editors and
publishers we are here talking about are mostly college graduates. This is as
it should be, since competence, if not excellence, in our fields of choice are
what we should all be aiming for.
College degrees of course constitute one level of proof of
competence; but this is only an introductory demonstration, which must
constantly be renewed and confirmed through written works. Ironically, some
written works are admitted by publishers of books or journals mainly on the basis of the authors’ academic credentials. I say
‘ironically’, because this means that the editors or reviewers thus effectively
give the responsibility for the decision to the universities; i.e. to other people. But the value of college degrees necessarily depends on
the competence of those who dish them out; and the competence of the latter
depends on the competence on those who awarded them a degree, and so on, to the
founding of universities in the Middle Ages and thereafter.
Thus, ultimately, it is always humans deciding according to
their inner capacities; there is in reality no guarantee of competence through a diploma. Even the prestige of the university
or faculty staff awarding the diploma cannot be regarded as sure proof of
competence. There are many authors out there who have doggedly gone through the
motions of the academic curriculum, and thus earned their degree(s), but who in
reality are not genuine logicians or philosophers, or whatever they claim to
be. Their capacity is attested on paper; but it is not in their blood, in their
DNA. They are obligated to routinely churn out papers and even books, to appear
active and knowledgeable, but it is evident from what they write that they do
not really understand the subject. They know inside themselves that it is so,
and that is why they desperately seek confirmation through other-publishing.
The same holds true for the mandarins of the publishing
world, i.e. the reviewers, editors and publishers.
Their having these jobs, presumably on the basis of their college backgrounds, is not a guarantee of their competence. For these
reasons, one must always judge the content of what is written independently of
‘learned’ verdicts. Note well that I am not a relativist; I do believe that
some academic texts are better than others and deserve more attention than
others. But based on my reading experience it is evident that many texts
published as books or as papers in journals are incredibly shallow, and very
often filled with obvious empirical and intellectual errors. The authors are,
of course, primarily to blame for their sloppy research and thought. But the
reviewers, editors and publishers are also much to blame; if they had been
intelligent and careful, they would have readily spotted the deficiencies.
I have no intimate knowledge of the publishing world and can
only guess how it actually functions. What I do see
from the outside is that it is, at least nowadays, closed-minded, petty and gloomy. This is surely not generally true, but it
is probably largely true. Some books or journal articles are admittedly
excellent, but many are shockingly inferior and most
are far too ‘average’. No doubt these adjectives equally apply to the authors
behind the texts. Logically, the publishing world cannot be better than the
people who compose it; most are unremarkable conformists.
Universities were initially, in the European Middle Ages,
until well after the Renaissance, religious institutions, don’t forget. They thought and taught religious dogmas, and any individual who
swerved from the authorized doctrine was sanctioned. Sometimes, as in the case
of Giordano Bruno, they might be killed off. Some of this doctrinaire mentality
has persevered into modern times, even though religion per se is no longer the
guiding light. Instead of the “religiously correct,” we are now (in Western
countries) ruled by the “politically correct.” Academic authorities may not
literally execute dissidents, but they do try to smother them and shunt them
aside when it suits them.
In the past few years, many universities seem to be going
quite nuts, imposing on their faculty and students some absurd rules of speech
and behavior, forbidding free debate, and so on[2]. This
is not as in times past a “conservative” trend, but on the contrary now a very
“progressive” trend. Its roots are deep in logic and philosophy dating from the
very start of the modern era, when reason began to be
put in doubt and attacked; but it has taken time to evolve. By the 20th Century, the irrational was considered glamorous, and in the early 21st Century it is virtually sovereign. This naturally affects the other-publishing
world, which seems to regard any defense of reason as passé if not downright
horrible. Certainly, if an author’s thought does not fit into the world-view of those dominating publishing, he has little
chance of being published through them.
Universities in modern times were meant to defend the ideal
of knowledge for its own sake, free from the control of powerful groups, be
they religious, political or commercial. But this
ideal has visibly eroded, and seems less and less
likely to survive[3].
It is like the mainstream news media today: the ideals of objective reporting
and even-handed editorializing have all but disappeared; nowadays, journalists
are in-your-face propagandists, mainly for the ideological postures of the
left. The same applies to today’s universities; leftists have gradually
infiltrated them and taken them over, and they are rapidly forming students in
their twisted image and likeness.
Publishing, being an offshoot of academe, is obediently
following the party line in every field. In logic, for instance, this means
symbolism and superficiality; in wider philosophy,
skepticism and materialism. It matters little whether such conformism is
conscious policy or unconscious adherence to postmodern intellectual fashion;
what matters is the behavior pattern.
4. Publishing attempts
I did, once in my life, send one of my books to a publisher.
I happened to meet, while on vacation abroad back in 1999, an employee of a
well-known Dutch publishing house, Kluwer Academic Publishers; and she kindly
referred me to one of their young editors, to whom I submitted a copy of my Future Logic (written several years
earlier as a Ph.D. dissertation). The book was presumably sent on to some
reviewer for consideration, but was returned to me
quite soon after (maybe a couple of months later, as I recall) with a refusal.
This is, mind you, a book (several hundred pages long) that
boasts of many important discoveries relating to modal categorical and
conditional propositions, including a thorough analysis of deductive aspects,
culminating in the formalization of
induction by generalization and particularization. Yet the reviewer
rejected it, without giving me any explanation that would confirm to me he had
read it (in the short time he had it in hand) and understood its achievements
(yet found them wanting in some way). He was evidently not required to defend
his case or give me a chance to defend mine.
Understandably, after this experience, I decided not to
submit any of my books to any publishers again, unless of course one came
asking me for it (which has not occurred to date). I could not see myself, hat
in hand, more or less begging some intellectual
inferior to please take a look at my book. I do not write in
order to publish, but in order to know. If I do want to publish, it is
because I kindly want to help other people (in the present and in the future)
to know too. Happily, a couple of years after this episode, the Internet was
developed and I started (in 2001) publishing my works online in my own website,
TheLogician.net; so, I was finally not prevented from publicly sharing my
knowledge.
Another publishing experience of mine was the resort,
earlier, in 1997, to professional self-publishing through the Geneva firm of
Editions Slatkine. In exchange for a hefty cash
prepayment of Sw. Fr. 7’000, this publisher undertook to produce and market 800
copies of my Judaic Logic (written a
couple of years before). I was given a small number of free copies and allowed
to buy others at a reduced price. My royalties on sales were to be a measly 8%
of the sale price, which was unnecessarily high at Sw. Fr. 50, even though I
had effectively (I assume) covered the production costs and more, not to
mention written the book.
I accepted these harsh terms because I wanted to kick-start
my publishing career. But, while two or three hundred copies were sold (I do
not remember the exact figure), it soon became clear to me that the publisher
was actually making zero effort to market the book. A
couple of years later I discovered, after a bookshop told me they had tried
unsuccessfully to order a copy or two, that the publisher had in fact recently
destroyed 400 copies, leaving only a few dozen copies in stock. I was, upon
asking, given some of these copies for free as compensation for my losses; but
still, I had not been forewarned, or even been informed after-the-fact.
This experience taught me the vanity of using this paid-for
publishing mode; it is exploitation of desperate authors. Maybe that is the
real reason why it is called ‘vanity publishing’.
With regard to journals of logic or
philosophy, I have made no attempts to publish any articles in them during my
career. I did actually send an extract of my book Judaic Logic, soon after its publication
by Slatkine, to the editors of a small Israeli
journal called Higayon,
and they kindly immediately published it; but apart from that have made no
efforts in that direction, although I have dozens or maybe hundreds of essays I
could have submitted. I did recently submit, after being invited to do so by
the editor, a paper based on my work A
Fortiori Logic (2013), but this was rejected, due I suspect to its
criticism (albeit very mild) of Talmudic logic[4].
More recently, I was invited to submit a paper for a
collection to be published by Springer. The paper I submitted (the same paper
as above) was apparently welcomed by the editors, but I had to withdraw it when
I found out that the publisher refused to sign a legal document acknowledging
my continued ownership of the copyright. In other words, the publisher was not
satisfied with my lending him a work of mine free of charge; but wanted me to
give up ownership of it! Apparently, some authors are willing to get used like
this, out of sheer vanity.
Brief essays of mine have been other-published (in 2010) in a couple of collections, one called Logic in Religious Discourse and the other called Judaic Logic (not to confuse with my
earlier book with the same name), following invitation to contribute by their
editor. But frankly, I found the interaction with the editor rather unpleasant
and the final product embarrassing. Many of the contributions in these
collections, and indeed in many of the journals currently being published that
I have looked at, even prestigious ones, are so low-level that I prefer to
remain out of them. Call me conceited, but I do not perceive most of the
editors or most of the other contributors as my “peers.” Really, I think my
works deserve better platforms.
Happily, the Internet again came to my aid, with the advent
of instant self-publishing through firms like Lulu.com and CreateSpace.com, who
provide a print-on-demand service to individual online buyers. The author
uploads a text file, chooses the desired format and cover, decides on pricing,
and presto! the book is published. There’s no long wait as occurs in other-publishing; and further benefits are that one can
update the text at will, one has immediate sales statistics, and the book is
never out of print. This is definitely the way of the
future in my view: no interfering intermediaries between the author and
eventual readers, in a fair and transparent business deal. The author
concentrates fully on writing, without having to worry about publishing. I
started publishing my works like this in 2008, and have found the experience very rewarding. I recommend it.
5. On librarians
To be sure, some people resist progress, and insist on
viewing self-publishing as a medium good only for second-rate writers. In truth
(I read the figures once, but I have forgotten them) only a small fraction of the hundreds of thousands (or is it
millions?) of works written every year are other-published.
Most books submitted to publishing houses are rejected. After all, they are in
it as a business venture; they cannot be expected to publish all written
material, the market is simply not that lively. Even if they are subsidized by
private or public monies, subventions are never unlimited. Similarly, I would
say (without seeing statistics), most papers submitted to journals are left out
of them; they have to be. This should not be taken to
mean that what is published is necessarily the cream of what is written; what
is published is, in truth, what the publishers believe will sell and generate
profits for them, or at least will increase their prestige in some way. It is,
objectively speaking, a reflection of their opinions, and not, as many people
seem to think, a sure criterion of quality or veracity.
In 2014, I decided to spend a few thousand dollars
distributing copies of my main books to many university and public libraries in
the world (mainly English-speaking countries, but not only). I thought: why
wait for them or their readers to discover my works? I’ll speed the process up by making them readily available to present and future
researchers, students and general readers, free of charge. Actually,
I have been sending free copies to a few libraries every time I write a
new book, to make sure that, should something happen to me, the work lives on.
But here, what I had in mind was a more systematic and widespread dissemination
effort, made possible by online print-on-demand services. I had CreateSpace.com
produce and send several hundred books to over a hundred libraries.
Most of the libraries seem to have welcomed the material
contributions to their collection, and duly catalogued them; but to my surprise
some did not. For instances, a library in South Africa, and another in
Lausanne, Switzerland, told me, when I asked them why they had not catalogued
them, that they had destroyed the copies they got offhand, because they were
self-published. Another librarian, at Tel Aviv university, mockingly pretended
to refuse my books because they did not have a bibliography; when I pointed out
that A Fortiori Logic did not need a
bibliography, being a study where every author on the subject is not only
mentioned but also analyzed within the text, she simply did not reply, and did
not change her mind (as I expected). I find such ignorance and stupidity
plainly evil.
After all, what is the function of libraries, and
particularly of university libraries, if not to respectfully collect and
preserve knowledge, and make it available to all comers? They are supposed to
be custodians and transmitters of knowledge. How is it that someone, who
probably knows close to nothing of logic or philosophy, or maybe has some
knowledge but no time to read many books so as to evaluate them, has the chutzpah to refuse gift books merely because they are
self-published? I cannot understand this mentality. It is true that libraries
have limited space and must therefore be selective; but is self-publishing in itself a sufficient reason for exclusion? Note that in
the case of the TAU library, this could hardly have been the case, since they
already had copies of most of my books, and I was only asking them to use the
more recent editions; they kept the old editions and refused the better new
ones. Clearly, there is an irrational prejudice at play, or at least
disgraceful laziness.
Once again, however, the Internet has come to the rescue.
Digital libraries like the Internet Archive and Google Books, to name but two
that I have used, have vowed to collect the totality of human knowledge in
their online libraries. This is really a fantastic contemporary initiative.
Surely, all human writings are interesting in some way or the other, as
creations of the human race, and should be perpetuated
for present and future use or even merely as curiosities.
In antiquity, thanks to the famous Library of Alexandria,
many valuable works (and no doubt also many less valuable ones) were made available and preserved for centuries. Unfortunately,
when barbarian hordes destroyed it, many of these works were lost forever to
mankind. Let’s hope that today’s digital libraries are
not someday likewise destroyed in some nuclear holocaust. I hope the people in
charge of them are taking all necessary precautions, with backups in different
locations and the lasting technology to read the memory contents.
6. On historians
This brings me to the subject of histories and encyclopedias
of philosophy, including logic. What is the task of historians? It is surely to
observe and show, to survey, comprehend, and summarize, to the best of their
abilities, the real state of affairs in the world of
logic and philosophy, at any and every given time and over time. This is a
sacred task, when it relates to logic and philosophy, because this field aims
for a cumulative total, including for consideration all thought to date, and
not like (say) physics for the latest results, leaving behind the past as mere
curio.
The job of historians of logic and philosophy is not in
principle selective, though of course all historiography may well be critical. Historians should not ignore or discard material, simply
because it does not fit into their own view of things at the time concerned;
they are duty bound to be exhaustive, and to compare and
contrast everything, in order to demonstrate the breadth and depth of
their study. They should look for, find out, record and understand what has actually been proposed in the field researched, and not
merely what suits a certain ideology or group. They may, of course, express
doubt or disagreement with some of it, provided they give their reasons for
such criticism. But in the latter case, they are entering the fray as involved
participants in the great public debates of logic and philosophy; they are not
acting as detached observers.
The following anecdote illustrates this reflection. Having
read a few articles in the online Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, and
found them wanting, I wrote (this was in 2016) to the editor so
as to draw his attention to some my works. I first pointed out the
absence of an article on a fortiori argument, and recommended my book on the subject. He kindly answered me as follows:
“Thanks for your message and for
the suggestion. Unfortunately, the SEP has limited resources; we don’t charge our readers for the high-quality academic
content that we deliver freely on the Internet, and the key to our survival
therefore is to operate on a small budget. So we can’t
have entries on every concept or person that is deserving. One of the important
criteria for commissioning an entry has to do with whether the topic is of
central importance to current academic philosophers, as evidenced by a large
and active literature on the topic for which it would be useful to have an
introduction. I’m afraid that an entry on a fortiori
argument doesn’t meet our criteria. Sorry the news isn’t better. Thanks for your understanding.”
While I found his reference to budgetary limitations
understandable, I found his reference to “whether the topic is of central
importance to current academic philosophers” much less convincing, as it seems
to exclude in advance all innovation that has not captured the fancy of the
well-placed few. This is a formula for stagnation; it is bureaucratic and
lacking in initiative. So, I replied: “There are a lot of new ideas and
approaches in my works on various logical and philosophical topics, yet unknown
to most academics,” and I gave him as example my latest essay of the Russell
Paradox, adding a link to it and a brief abstract of its contents. He replied:
“If you get your work published in
accredited, peer reviewed, philosophy/logic journals or by similarly-accredited book publishers, our authors will then have an obligation to consider the value
of your work and the likelihood of it being cited in the SEP will increase.”
To which I replied: “No – I won’t do it, ever,” and then
explained my negative views concerning book publishers and journals (roughly as
above done in the present essay, but much more briefly), concluding: “What I
expect is that people like your authors, who are no doubt sincerely interested
in progress in logic and philosophy, to make the effort to look at the actual
field out there (not just the conventional in-group) and see what is going on
really. How can they claim to write a history of philosophy,
when they ignore very relevant material? Is their history a history of
familiar names and thoughts, or a history and objective account of what is
really happening here and now? Are they true historians or just make-believe
historians?”
I went on: “I have pointed you towards my 2013 essay on the
Russell paradox. This is just one example among many. How can the SEP article
on the Russell paradox be credible if you have not checked out this novel and
significant contribution to the subject? Look and see for yourselves – that is
your job, to seek and find what is really being said out there.”
I also referred him to my book Hume’s Problems with Induction,
pointing out that it is of great relevance to many articles in SEP, since I
show in it that “the so-called Problem of Induction, which has so deeply and
negatively affected modern Western (particularly Anglo-Saxon and German)
philosophy from the start, is just a load of sophistry, instead of which we
should be teaching the Principle of Induction.” I added: “This is just one
topic treated in this book. Read the table of contents – everything in it is
new and important. If your historians do not read this, and claim to describe philosophy as it has been to this day, they are failing in
their vocation. Look at it yourself and judge for yourself.”
I went on: “Again… look at The Logic of Causation. For the first time in the history of philosophy, someone has written a
systematic work on the logic of causation (over ten years), covering every
possible form of causative argument! And thus incidentally proving once and for all that skepticism about causation is based
on ignorance. This cannot be put in a
mere journal article – it can only be put in a massive and very technical book,
which most people are too lazy to read and study, so that publishers will
not publish it because they know it won’t sell. That has nothing to do with the value of its content” (bold added now).
I of course gave him links to these books, and even offered to send him paper
copies of them at my expense. After that, he did not reply to me anymore; no
doubt he did not like my comment about “make-believe historians.”
Note well my argument to him, which I reiterate here: there can
be no excuse for alleged historians not-doing the
necessary research when preparing an article for an encyclopedia, or a journal
or a book, on the accumulated thought regarding a certain logical or
philosophical topic. If they willfully bypass work that is actually
present on the market of ideas, if they are lazy and do not even bother
to read it if it is not published by what they regard as an “accredited”
publisher, they are not real historians, but merely rapporteurs of the current
philosophical clique and their tired clichés. This is unscientific on their
part; it results in fake history.
Such pseudo-historians do not think and judge for themselves, but give other people (a selection of book and
journal publishers that they refer to for a relevant research material) the
responsibility to do so in their stead, paying no attention to the tortuous
ways of a publishing business which is not focused on history. Who, after all,
are these “accredited” geniuses that they have so much faith in? Just unremarkable,
conventional people, themselves “accredited” by other unremarkable,
conventional people, and so on ad nauseam.
Of course, I do understand the reluctance of the editor to
engage in independent research. The ideal presented here of an all-inclusive
effort by historians of human thought is so enormous that it is virtually
impossible. It is certainly not something that any individual can do in a
single lifetime, or even many individuals in many lifetimes. Therefore, in
practice historians are very selective, and their selections are mostly
second-hand.
This was recently brought home to me when I received a very aggressive e-mail from someone, demanding that I read
his work, to which he gave me a link[5].
Although very busy with my own writing, I followed the
link very briefly and was amazed to see it included thousands of pages of
complex diagrams and formulas. Obviously, it would take someone years to read
all that, let alone verify the truth and value of what is said. I wrote back to
the guy, telling him I simply did not have the time to do that. He was very angry with me and I had a hard time getting him off my
back. This made me better understand why editors are so unwilling to consider
unknown work; the needed investment of human resources is just too much.
Maybe one day this issue will be resolved, or at least
facilitated, through artificial intelligence. Or maybe some billionaire will
finance such a massive project, putting thousands of idle college graduates to
work. Meanwhile, without a doubt, many valuable and even important works will
remain in obscurity, cruelly lumped together with many valueless ones. And many
valueless works will continue to be given more attention than they really
deserve, because editors and historians prefer to deal with familiar material
that others have already approved of.
[1] Note also that authors who
self-publish are not only often held in low esteem and mocked for that reason,
but also sometimes plagiarized by other-published authors, who imagine them as
having no copyright protection since they do not exist in the ‘official’ world
they inhabit.
[2] Do read some of the
hair-raising articles posted on this blog on current events in universities: https://www.blazingcatfur.ca/category/batshit-crazy-universities/.
[3] It will definitely die for
centuries if not forever if Islam is allowed to prevail in the West. But even
without the Islam factor, it seems doomed thanks to rampant progressivism.
[4] See chapter 5 of the present
book, where this episode is described and discussed in more detail.
[5] Here is the link for those
interested: https://archive.org/details/AUL070416.
The author is called John Clark and he describes his work as “a universal
language”. Don’t ask me what it is worth: I have not examined it.