National Absurditas

Words can be stretched, or even abused, in the service of a self-serving ideology that is utterly unfair to other people as well as stubborn facts. Nietzsche theorized that ideas are the stuff of instinctual urges tussling for supremacy in the human mind. Against Kant’s love of the fixed laws of reason for their own sake, I submit that Nietzsche’s tussle of ideas can bend even the laws of reason, like the gravity of large masses can bend space (and thus light) and time. The basic framework of the universe is not static. Neither, I believe, are the rules of reason, and reasoning itself. Intense power, such as that of an ideology, can warp both the basic framework and process of reason. This can explain why ideologues can be seen by others to suffer from cognitive dissidence: holding two contradictory beliefs at the same time. A defense mechanism of ideology can block awareness of one of the two. Self-serving applications of the word, national, is a case in point.

An article touting small towns in the U.S. as worthy tourist attractions stresses the importance of “small towns and communities that have long formed the backbone of the nation.”[1] The article features the best small town in every U.S. state, though the importance of small towns is in terms of the nation. The gravity of so much consolidated power at the level of the Union may be behind the bending of the spotlight from the state to the federal level. The towns were selected on the state level and yet they form the backbone of the nation. Cognitive dissidence is present in the tension here. Indeed, the term national can apply to the states, as the U.S., like the E.U., sports a federal system of dual sovereignty. In both empire-level unions[2], the member-states have retained some governmental sovereignty as well as any residual not delegated to the federal level. Also in both unions, cultural and even political-ideological differences exist from state to state. The U.S. state of Vermont differs significantly from the state of Kansas, for example. The E.U. state of Denmark differs significantly from the state of Spain. An empire must have many culturally distinct states (or kingdoms, historically).

It follows that the United Kingdom is not itself an empire. Formerly an empire and later a state in the E.U., the UK post-secession (not post-divorce, as the UK and the E.U. are not equivalent because the UK was a state in the E.U.). Culturally, the Scottish, Welsh, and English regions (and Northern Ireland, whose residents tend to identify themselves as English culturally) are much more similar than are the E.U. states of Greece and Sweden. In fact, were the regions of the UK really nations, they would have been separate E.U. states. Those regions only have delegated power in the UK, and are thus not semi-sovereign, so the regions are not nations. Indeed, the British Parliament could stop the Scottish region, for example, from even applying for E.U. statehood, whether before or after the secession.

Even so, the British refer to their regions as nations. For example, the Church of Scotland “is a Presbyterian church and recognizes only Jesus Christ as ‘King and Head of the Church’,” according to the Royal Family’s website.[3] If this sounds familiar, this may be because Israel before the kings recognized Yahweh as its sole ruler (assuming this is a historical fact used in the faith narrative). Yet someone had to interpret Yahweh’s will. Similarly, according to CNN, the Scottish Church is “entirely self-governing, represented at the local level by ‘kirk sessions’ and at a national level by the General Assembly.”[4] The Lord High Commissioner to the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland is a human being. The Queen annually appoints someone to “maintain the relationship between the State and the Church,” according to the Royal website in early 2020.[5] Although occupants have been from the Scottish region, members of the royal family have also been appointed. In January 2020, the Queen appointed her grandson, William. Hence the Crown is over the Church of Scotland, albeit not as explicitly as in the case of the Church of England. This contradicts the self-governing plank of the Scottish Church, and, more to the point, the claim that the General Assembly is on “a national level,” meaning that Scotland is a nation.

Here, cognitive dissidence and a warping not only of the word national, but also of reasoning itself, can be seen. In the relation between Church and State, the latter refers here to the UK rather than Scotland, and yet the latter is “a national level.” The warping of reasoning itself and the law of reason that mandates that equivalents are equivalent are evident in the further contention that the semi-sovereign U.S. states are not nations while Scotland is. Two contradictory uses of the same word violate the logic of equivalence and invoke cognitive dissidence. In short, the British should not apply national to both Scotland and the United States. That this is done suggests the underlying presence of a questionable motive.  

Moreover, Europeans and even Americans typically treat an E.U. state as equivalent to the entire American union rather than to a member-state therein.[6] I suspect that few Americans even realize how the language is being used, and why. In the case of the Europeans, the ideology seems to involve a self-serving overstatement of the importance of a former or current E.U. state and a diminishment of an empire-level union elsewhere. Power can fuel both the self-aggrandizement and passive aggression. In fact, the latter is definitely present in angry reactions against the few people who try to restore the application of equivalence as if doing so is irrational and haughty! Such is the power of ideological defense-mechanisms manifesting in the political domain.

Although I resist the linguistic reductionism in 20^th century analytical philosophy (e.g., Wittgenstein’s claim that no awareness of an object can precede a word being given to that object), I readily admit that human beings can use language in order to get pleasure from having more power. The fixity of the rules of grammar and of the definitions of words can be mere parchment constraints up against the instinctual urge for power.

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[1] Lissa Poirot, “Every U.S. State’s Best Small Town,” Far & Wide, January 10, 2020 (accessed January 26, 2020).

[2] Skip Worden, British Colonies Forge an American Empire (2017).

[3] Amir Vera, “Queen Appoints Prince William to New Role amid Royal Shakeup,” CNN.Com, January 25, 2020.

[4] Ibid.

[5] Ibid.

[6] Skip Worden, Essays on Two Federal Empires: Comparing the E.U. and U.S. (2015).

On the Impact of Political Rhetoric: From “Global Warming” to “Climate Change”

Words matter in politics. The side that can frame a question by definitively naming it in the public mind enjoys a subtle though often decisive advantage in the debate and thus in any resulting public policy as well. For example, “pro-choice”privileges the pregnant woman, while “pro-life” defines the abortion debate around the fetus. Similarly, “global warming” implies a human impact, whereas“climate change” defines the issue around nature. Even though the shift from“global warming” to “climate change” is more in keeping with the evolving science and won’t be bumped off by a cold winter, political players have been the driving force—language hardly being immune to ideological pressure.

Regarding the weather shifting popular perception on the issue, research published in Public Opinion Quarterly in 2011 claimed that a bad winter can indeed discredit the “global warming” label.[1] The Washington Policy Center claimed two years later that the heavy snowfall during the latest winter had led to “climate change” replacing “global warming.”[2] The cold refusing to relent in March of 2013 and hitting North America hard in January of 2019 seemed to undercut or repudiate the scientific “global warming” hypothesis even though meteorology, a empirical science,  always demands long-term data.

However, in looking back at the name-change, we must consider the influence of political actors, who are prone to manipulate the public's perception in part by using words to frame the debate. In 2002, for example, Frank Luntz wrote a confidential memo to the Republican Party suggesting that because the Bush administration was vulnerable on the climate issue. The White House should abandon the phrase “global warming,” he wrote, in favor of “climate change.”[3] As if by magic, although “global warming” appeared frequently in President Bush’s speeches in 2001, “climate change” populated the president’s speeches on the topic by 2002.[4] In other words, the president’s political vulnerability on the issue was answered by changing the label to reframe the debate. Not missing a beat, critics charged that the motive was political in downplaying the possibility that carbon emissions were a contributing factor.[5] Both Bush and Cheney had ties to the oil and gas industry. In fact, Cheney's through Halliburton may have played a role in the administration's advocacy in favor of invading Iraq under the subterfuge that it had been involved in the attack on the Pentagon and the World Trade Center in 2001. 

The Obama administration likely went with “climate change” rather than "global warming" because the former was less controversial. The corporate Democrat tended to hold to the center politically; after all, Goldman Sachs had contributed a million dollars to his first presidential campaign in 2008. In September 2011, the White House decided to replace the term “global warming” with “global climate disruption.”[6] The administration subsequently annulled its own decision. 
So much attention on the matter of a mere label indicates that just how important what you call something is to its outcome. Labels are not always neutral. For instance, the term "African American," was making inroads whereas "Black American" was hardly ever heard. "African" slips in ethnicity whereas "Black," or negroid, refers to race. Changing the axis on which the controversy had hinged was in favor of the race-now-ethnicity. Meanwhile, the American public didn't notice the artful conflation of ethnicity (i.e., culture) and race. Obama used the ethnic term and applied it to himself even though his mother was Caucasian. He also claimed Illinois as his home state even though he moved to Chicago after college. He could benefit politically from the support of Black Americans and Illinoisans. 
Similarly, Obama could benefit politically from adopting "climage change." As the academic journal Public Opinion Quarterly reported in 2011, “Republicans are far more skeptical of ‘global warming’ than of ‘climate change.’” Whereas the vast majority of Democrats were indifferent to the label being used.[7] With “global warming” carrying “a stronger connotation of human causation, which has long been questioned by conservatives,” Obama stood to gain some republican support simply by changing how he refers to the issue.[8] That support was part of the president's ability to straddle the center in American politics. 
Given the effort that has gone into labels, it is amazing that more time in the Congress has not gone into debating labels. I am also curious why the American people did not realize that they were being manipulated by the choice of label. If "climate change" allows for the contention that human-sourced carbon emissions into that atmosphere have not been a cause of the warming of the oceans and air, then it is possible that the very survival of the species could be in jeopardy because of  the choice of a label for short-term economic and political reasons.

1. Tom Jacobs, “Wording Change Softens Global Warming Skeptics,” Pacific Standard, March 2, 2011. 

2. Washington Policy Center, “Climate Change: Where the Rhetoric Defines the Science,” March 8, 2011.

3. Oliver Burkeman, “Memo Exposes Bush’s New Green Strategy,” The Guardian, March 3, 2003.

4. Ibid.

5. Washington Policy Center, “Climate Change: Where the Rhetoric Defines the Science,” March 8, 2011.

6. Erik Hayden, “Republicans Believe in ‘Climate Change,’ Not ‘Global Warming’,” The Atlantic Wire, March 3, 2011.

7. Tom Jacobs, “Wording Change Softens Global Warming Skeptics,” Pacific Standard, March 2, 2011.

8. Ibid.

American Regional English: Vestiges of an Empire

In 2012, a mere fifty years after the project had begun, the fifth volume of the Dictionary of American Regional English (DARE) was finally done. Sadly, the project’s director, Frederic Cassidy, had died in 2000 at the ripe old age 90. “On to Z” had been his typical way of ending phone conversations. Visiting the dictionary’s offices some years ago—ironically to use their French dictionary—I had no idea of the size of the project. Instead, I engaged a few of the staff on my thesis that regional “Englishes” in the U.S. are only natural, given the empire-scale of the republic of republics. In fact, I would argue that it is unnatural that there are not more linguistic differences from Maine across the continent and up to Alaska and over to Hawaii.

The full essay is at Essays on Two Federal Empires.