Obscurantism

Obscurantism (/ɒbˈskjʊərənˌtɪzəm, əb-/ and /ˌɒbskjʊəˈræntɪzəm/) is the practice of deliberately presenting information in an imprecise and recondite manner, often designed to forestall further inquiry and understanding. There are two historical and intellectual denotations of Obscurantism: (1) the deliberate restriction of knowledge—opposition to disseminating knowledge; and, (2) deliberate obscurity—an abstruse style (as in literature and art) characterized by deliberate vagueness. In short, my concern over the spread of subjectivist thinking is both intellectual and political. Intellectually, the problem with such doctrines is that they are false (when not simply meaningless). There is a real world; its properties are not merely social constructions; facts and evidence do matter. What sane person would contend otherwise? And yet, much contemporary academic theorizing consists precisely of attempts to blur these obvious truths—the utter absurdity of it all being concealed through obscure and pretentious language. Obscurantism (/ɒbˈskjʊərənˌtɪzəm, əb-/ and /ˌɒbskjʊəˈræntɪzəm/) is the practice of deliberately presenting information in an imprecise and recondite manner, often designed to forestall further inquiry and understanding. There are two historical and intellectual denotations of Obscurantism: (1) the deliberate restriction of knowledge—opposition to disseminating knowledge; and, (2) deliberate obscurity—an abstruse style (as in literature and art) characterized by deliberate vagueness. The term obscurantism derives from the title of the 16th-century satire Epistolæ Obscurorum Virorum (1515–19, Letters of Obscure Men), that was based upon the intellectual dispute between the German humanist Johann Reuchlin and the monk Johannes Pfefferkorn of the Dominican Order, about whether or not all Jewish books should be burned as un-Christian heresy. Earlier, in 1509, the monk Pfefferkorn had obtained permission from Maximilian I, Holy Roman Emperor (1486–1519), to burn all copies of the Talmud (Jewish law and Jewish ethics) known to be in the Holy Roman Empire (AD 926–1806); the Letters of Obscure Men satirized the Dominican arguments for burning 'un-Christian' works. In the 18th century, Enlightenment philosophers applied the term obscurantist to any enemy of intellectual enlightenment and the liberal diffusion of knowledge. In the 19th century, in distinguishing the varieties of obscurantism found in metaphysics and theology from the 'more subtle' obscurantism of the critical philosophy of Immanuel Kant, and of modern philosophical skepticism, Friedrich Nietzsche said: 'The essential element in the black art of obscurantism is not that it wants to darken individual understanding, but that it wants to blacken our picture of the world, and darken our idea of existence.' In restricting knowledge to an élite ruling class of 'the few', obscurantism is fundamentally anti-democratic, because its component anti-intellectualism and elitism exclude the people as intellectually unworthy of knowing the facts and truth about the government of their City-State. In 18th century monarchic France, the Marquis de Condorcet, as a political scientist, documented the aristocracy's obscurantism about the social problems that provoked the French Revolution (1789–99) that deposed them and their King, Louis XVI of France. In the 19th century, the mathematician William Kingdon Clifford, an early proponent of Darwinism, devoted some writings to uprooting obscurantism in England, after hearing clerics—who privately agreed with him about evolution—publicly denounce evolution as un-Christian. Moreover, in the realm of organized religion, obscurantism is a distinct strain of thought independent of theologic allegiance. The distinction is that fundamentalism presupposes sincere religious belief, whereas obscurantism is based upon minority manipulation of the popular faith as political praxis; cf. Censorship. In the 20th century, the American conservative political philosopher Leo Strauss, for whom philosophy and politics intertwined, and his Neo-conservative adherents adopted the notion of government by the enlightened few as political strategy. He noted that intellectuals, dating from Plato, confronted the dilemma of either an informed populace 'interfering' with government, or if it were possible for good politicians to be truthful and still govern to maintain a stable society—hence the noble lie necessary in securing public acquiescence. In The City and Man (1964), he discusses the myths in The Republic that Plato proposes effective governing requires, among them, the belief that the country (land) ruled by the State belongs to it (despite some having been conquered from others), and that citizenship derives from more than the accident of birth in the City-State. Thus, in the New Yorker magazine article Selective Intelligence, Seymour Hersh observes that Strauss endorsed the 'noble lie' concept: the myths politicians use in maintaining a cohesive society. Shadia Drury criticized Strauss's acceptance of dissembling and deception of the populace as 'the peculiar justice of the wise', whereas Plato proposed the Noble Lie as based upon moral good. In criticizing Natural Right and History (1953), she said that 'Strauss thinks that the superiority of the ruling philosophers is an intellectual superiority and not a moral one ... is the only interpreter who gives a sinister reading to Plato, and then celebrates him.' Leo Strauss also was criticized for proposing the notion of 'esoteric' meanings to ancient texts, obscure knowledge inaccessible to the 'ordinary' intellect. In Persecution and the Art of Writing (1952), he proposes that some philosophers write esoterically to avert persecution by the political or religious authorities, and, per his knowledge of Maimonides, Al Farabi, and Plato, proposed that an esoteric writing style is proper for the philosophic text. Rather than explicitly presenting his thoughts, the philosopher's esoteric writing compels the reader to think independently of the text, and so learn. In the Phædrus, Socrates notes that writing does not reply to questions, but invites dialogue with the reader, thereby minimizing the problems of grasping the written word. Strauss noted that one of writing's political dangers is students' too-readily accepting dangerous ideas—as in the trial of Socrates, wherein the relationship with Alcibiades was used to prosecute him.