論工業社會及其未來-18

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Modern leftish philosophers tend to dismiss reason, science, objective reality and to insist that everything is culturally relative. It is true that one can ask serious questions about the foundations of scientific knowledge and about how, if at all, the concept of objective reality can be defined. But it is obvious that modern leftish philosophers are not simply cool-headed logicians systematically analyzing the foundations of knowledge. They are deeply involved emotionally in their attack on truth and reality. They attack these concepts because of their own psychological needs. For one thing, their attack is an outlet for hostility, and, to the extent that it is successful, it satisfies the drive for power. More importantly, the leftist hates science and rationality because they classify certain beliefs as true (i.e., successful, superior) and other beliefs as false (i.e., failed, inferior). The leftist's feelings of inferiority run so deep that he cannot tolerate any classification of some things as successful or superior and other things as failed or inferior. This also underlies the rejection by many leftists of the concept of mental illness and of the utility of IQ tests. Leftists are antagonistic to genetic explanations of human abilities or behavior because such explanations tend to make some persons appear superior or inferior to others. Leftists prefer to give society the credit or blame for an individual's ability or lack of it. Thus if a person is "inferior" it is not his fault, but society's, because he has not been brought up properly.

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現代左派哲學家傾向不考慮理性、科學、客觀事實並堅持所有事都是文化上相對的。確實，可以對科學知識的根基以及如何定義客觀性事實（如果可以的話）提出嚴肅的疑問。但顯然現代左派哲學家不只是頭腦冷靜的邏輯學家，系統性的分析知識的根基。他們在攻擊真相和事實時投入極深的情感。他們攻擊這些概念是出於自身的心理需求。一方面他們的攻擊是敵意的宣洩，且若他們的攻擊成功，還能滿足對權力的欲求。更重要的是，左派厭惡科學和理性是因為它們將某些信念歸類為真（例如成功的、優越的）而某些信念為假（例如失敗的、低劣的）。左派的自卑感太過深厚以至於他無法忍受任何對事物優劣成敗的分類。這也是許多左派抗拒精神疾病這個概念或智商測驗的效用的立論基礎。左派反對以基因解釋人類能力或行為，因為這種詮釋方式容易會使得有些人看起來比其他人更優越或卑劣。左派更偏好將個人的能力或缺乏能力歸功於或怪罪於社會。因此若有一個人比較「低劣」並不是他的錯，而是社會的錯，因為他沒有被恰當的栽培。

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這一段可能是我對 Kaczynski 有最多批判的地方了。前面提到左派的心理狀態導致的如「政治正確」等解釋都算精闢，甚至左派的藝術形式我也無可置喙，但左派因此衍伸出的疑似集體主義的解釋真的那麼不堪一擊？有時候個人主義和集體主義之於左右派的關係可能不是那麼清晰可界定的。以這段左派不進行量化分類的這個主要論點來說，我反而認為這才是個人主義的展現。用分類和量化來當作科學或理性的特徵或許更是自卑感的展現。怎麼說呢？我們真的有辦法定義什麼是精神疾病嗎？哲學家是精神疾病患者嗎？智商測驗更是值得懷疑和批判，根本就是偽科學的經典代表。人類的多元智能能用單一的、線性的數字量化嗎？這種評分制度更像集體主義的特質，例如各國政府對人民進行的信用評分一樣。或許這種說法是出於「左派的情感」，那我們能否檢視智商測驗的科學證據？這些標準化測驗更像是鑲嵌在更大的權力結構下，依某種特定的規則設計的問題，以符合當代社會所期待的價值。這是對於權威的迷信和崇拜。我其實很訝異和許多迷信標準化測驗的人們從來沒有思考過那些標準化測驗是如何形成的。智商測驗是誰創造出題的？那我們要宣稱那些人有最高的智商嗎？語言能力測驗是誰出題的？母語人士語言學者？所以語言是一種亙古不變完全依循理則的產物？這背後正是自卑感引致的服從權威，亟需要一個分數來證明自己在群體中的位置。因此，左派反對量化和分類真如 Kaczynski 所言如此簡單？至少我不這麼認為。