Received: by alpheratz.cpm.aca.mmu.ac.uk id QAA22754 (8.6.9/5.3[ref pg@gmsl.co.uk] for cpm.aca.mmu.ac.uk from fmb-majordomo@mmu.ac.uk); Tue, 18 Jul 2000 16:24:30 +0100 Message-Id: <4.3.1.0.20000718090318.0217f260@popmail.mcs.net> X-Sender: aaron@popmail.mcs.net X-Mailer: QUALCOMM Windows Eudora Version 4.3.1 Date: Tue, 18 Jul 2000 10:17:49 -0500 To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk From: Aaron Lynch <aaron@mcs.net> Subject: Re: Memes and sexuality In-Reply-To: <4.3.1.0.20000717130443.021fd100@popmail.mcs.net> References: <39731605.F7B3705F@pacbell.net> <000001bfedb7$f067dd40$13281e8c@ultracom.net> <4.3.1.0.20000714113715.01eea1e0@popmail.mcs.net> <4.3.1.0.20000716080355.01fa0820@popmail.mcs.net> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1"; format=flowed Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable Sender: fmb-majordomo@mmu.ac.uk Precedence: bulk Reply-To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk
At 01:45 PM 7/17/00 -0500, Aaron Lynch wrote:
>At 07:19 AM 7/17/00 -0700, Bill Spight wrote:
>>Dear Aaron,
>>
>> > The article by James Côté points out that Freeman was successful in
>> gulling
>> > many intelligent and famous people into believing his story about Margaret
>> > Mead being fooled by natives making up stories about their sex lives.
>> >
>>
>>What does Cote say about the video interviews with Mead's informants, in
>>which they say that they were having fun telling Mead about fictional
>>sexual encounters, which she obviously wanted to hear?
>>
>>Thanks,
>>
>>Bill
>
>Bill,
>
>Cote describes a late 1980s interview by Freeman with one supposed
>informant who claimed to have been part of a pair who hoaxed Margaret Mead
>back in 1926. Cote points out several things wrong with the way Freeman's
>interview was used. First, he says that the interviewee apparently does
>not correspond to anyone described in Mead's work, although Freeman
>presents this interviewee as a cornerstone of Mead's work. Second, he says
>that Mead had too many interviews for the whole thing to have been refuted
>by a single recantation, and that Freeman woefully misrepresents the
>extent of Mead's interviews. Third, he says that the person interviewed by
>Freeman contradicted herself in important ways when interviewed yet again.
>He also points out that this interviewee would have been elderly by the
>late 1980s, (Probably in her 80s by my reckoning.) The simple passage of
>over 60 years allows for forgetfulness, while her sheer age would be a
>risk factor for conditions that impair cognitive functioning.
>
>Numerous other misrepresentations of Mead's work are described in the
>article. Assuming that Cote did not get away with some kind of hoax on
>_The Skeptical Inquirer_, I would say that the professional thing for
>Freeman to do is to issue a long list of retractions and stop promoting
>his 1989-1998 writings about Mead's work. However, as I have not studied
>either Mead or Freeman extensively, I am not the one to formally call on
>Freeman to change his ways--not that I am convinced he would respect such
>a call even a great authority on Mead's work. I do, however, recommend
>reading the whole article by Cote.
Bill,
When I said that "Cote points out several things wrong with the way
Freeman's interview was used. First, he says that the interviewee
apparently does not correspond to anyone described in Mead's work, although
Freeman presents this interviewee as a cornerstone of Mead's work," I was
referring to her anthropological published on the Samoans, not her letters
or diaries. Cote finds only on page 166-167 is there a character who could
possibly correspond to the interviewee (Fa'apua'a) who claimed in the 1980s
to be recanting statements made in the 1920s. Cote does not find anyone
resembling Fa'apua'a in the approximately 25 other informants Mead lists in
Coming of Age in Samoa. Getting these details is why I strongly recommend
reading Cote's article rather than relying upon a listserver discussion.
You should be able to find _The Skeptical Inquirer_ in most libraries. If
you do not trust Cote and Shankman and the _Skeptical Inquirer_ reviewers
to have finally gotten to the bottom of the issue, then you will have to
carefully study all the writings by both Freeman and Mead that are involved
in the dispute. I should note that regardless of who is right, it only
takes one person working up a sensational falsification or distortion to
impose all the extra work of detailed readings onto people who want to know
what someone actually said and whether an extremely damning criticism has
any merit. This should be seen as one of the possible damages of
Machiavellian behavior in the sciences, and a form of damage that may have
increased from the resurgence of lay and scientific interest in Machiavelli
during recent decades. (Machiavelli does, after all, advise people on how
to behave, rather than presenting a "pure science" type of treatise.)
None of this means that we should regard Mead's work uncritically. Cote
does recognize that there are flaws and limitations to Mead's work. As
scientists, we would prefer to see such works as Coming of Age in Samoa
honestly criticized for what it actually said, rather than dishonestly
criticized for what it was incorrectly purported to have said. I presume
that Mead herself would have welcomed criticism based upon what her books
and scholarly publications actually said. Cote points out, however, that
criticisms based on severe distortions of what Mead said in Coming of Age
in Samoa resulted in Freeman gaining far more attention than he would have
gotten merely by criticizing what the book actually said.
Criticisms of false statements, mistakes, invalid hypotheses, reasoning
errors, and other real flaws in someone's work can be avoided by an author
striving for greater accuracy. However, when one's work is criticized for
things it does not even say, it has a chilling effect on discourse: there
is no straightforward way to prevent such cretinism by way of honest work.
So if Mead were still alive and doing work, I suspect that she would have
second thoughts about making her new works known to Freeman or to the
publications that carry Freeman's writings. She would have to be concerned
that conveying her new works to Freeman and the journals used by Freeman
might lead to more people being misinformed about what Mead writes than are
being correctly informed about what Mead writes. Likewise, anyone whose
findings are similar to Mead's might also hesitate to reveal those findings
in an environment that accepts severe distortions and falsifications. In
order to reverse that kind of chilling effect, someone who has actually
published falsifications or distortions of a scientist's work would have to
give a satisfactory indication that he will be more honest or more careful
in the future. Indications that one should expect more of the same, on the
other hand, tend to maintain the chilling effect on collaboration and the
collegial exchange of information.
--Aaron Lynch
===============================This was distributed via the memetics list associated with the
Journal of Memetics - Evolutionary Models of Information Transmission
For information about the journal and the list (e.g. unsubscribing)
see: http://www.cpm.mmu.ac.uk/jom-emit
This archive was generated by hypermail 2b29 : Tue Jul 18 2000 - 16:25:20 BST