Comments on: Which field is on top?

By: Max Clark

Max Clark — Mon, 15 Sep 2008 09:32:01 +0000

shouldn’t this be more a question of what’s underneath what? you know, like the search for the true atom.

btw, i’ll settle this for you. physics wins. math is a language. that or it’s a noble gas.

By: Jesper

Jesper — Thu, 19 Jun 2008 13:14:00 +0000

Pablo, I believe the comic is more ironic than you think – isn’t it making fun of the self-image of different disciplines?

By: Pablo Gaviria

Pablo Gaviria — Wed, 18 Jun 2008 23:50:26 +0000

I think purity is close to absoluteness in the cartoon, I bet whoever made this cartoon is a Platonist. Absolutely, there is nothing closer to truth than mathematics!

By: Jesper

Jesper — Thu, 12 Jun 2008 20:32:41 +0000

Oh, we have entirely overlooked metaphysics which certainly is meant to be on top.

And then Derrida (and Heidegger) are totally on top of that.

By: Jesper

Jesper — Thu, 12 Jun 2008 18:21:38 +0000

On top, definitely.

By: Brennan Young

Brennan Young — Thu, 12 Jun 2008 18:18:06 +0000

Where does ‘epistemology’ fit in to this axis? :P

By: Roger Travis

Roger Travis — Wed, 11 Jun 2008 18:17:46 +0000

I guess on balance it’s probably simply an interesting coincidence. The comic is by a mathematician, no? So perhaps there’s just some sort of underlying psychology of “rightness.” :D

By: Jesper

Jesper — Wed, 11 Jun 2008 17:11:49 +0000

I am not so sure that the fields here are tied to specific political positions (perhaps sociology is often leftist, but it is not really by necessity?)

By: Roger Travis

Roger Travis — Wed, 11 Jun 2008 16:21:24 +0000

I don’t know how to read it, exactly, beyond saying that the comic seems to evoke the perception that those at the conservative end of the political spectrum tend to think of themselves as purer than people elsewhere on the spectrum.

By: Rick Thomas

Rick Thomas — Wed, 11 Jun 2008 16:13:07 +0000

@Roger, How do you read the political spectrum? The Left corresponds to the mathematical idealist and the Right corresponds to the sociological pragmatist? Or some other way?