Noam Chomsky - Which Philosophers Have Influenced You?

[JASmith-oydb]

Elsewhere I believe that Chomsky cites Russell and Dewey as major thinkers who contributed "substance and direction" to his thought. Seems Descartes made some impact on his views too.

[PappyMandarine]

"Nobody influenced me, I influenced them".
- every intellectual ever

[MW-iclr]

Chomsky makes it sound like he's never had his fundamental assumptions challenged nor been wrong about his way of looking at the world. That's effed up. To be as old as Chomsky and obviously intelligent yet never to have discovered an idea outside of himself is not good. He believes that his ideas were formed at a young age and he looked for sources to confirm and deepen those beliefs. And he views others through that worldview. Being an anarchist and holding such a deterministic belief is weird. Are we to believe he never actively searched for and read opposing viewpoints? He never read a philosopher and was struck by something they said? A philosopher never challenged him to challenge his own assumptions? Wtf?

[kennyprice]

Avoids answering the question entirely typical Chomsky.

[cp]

He's said before in a interview that the cambridge platonists of the 17th century (Cudworth specifically) are some of the richest sources of psychological insight he knows of.

[johnnonamegibbon]

He's giving a complex answer to a simple, overly narrow question

"I don't think we are influenced so much as we have our own views and look to people who agree with them and can add to them." Is what he basically said.

[mattzx]

pretty hilarious coming from the guy who wrote "manufacturing consent" to suggest that his opinions were never influenced by anyone but himself

[TheJonnyEnglish]

Russel, Hume, and Kant seem to be big influences

[ulquiorracries]

It's even funnier once you notice that he dislikes the notion of being influenced because that would conflict with his preferred identity as a highly original creative genius, which--in the land of Henry Ford, Kanye West, and Walt Disney--is one of the most coveted forms of social recognition

[williamjc]

the answer I hate to say this but he sounded very much like a politician.

[tartanhandbag]

guys, he's not dodging the question, he's just making the (personal and valid) point that he's not the kind of guy who got all his ideas by reading other people's ideas. he got ideas by thinking about stuff. that's pretty much his "rationalist" stance. this is also a short excerpt. he's been asked it many times. elsewhere he comments on having grown up in an intellectual environment with his dad who was a famous Hebrew scholar, in a family where robust discussion was encouraged and a daily feature of life, frequenting radical NYC bookshops from an early age and that these discussions influenced him more than the philosophy stuff he read later. bear in mind this is a guy whose dad had him editing his manuscripts and who published linguistic essays at the age of 12. so yeah, he had ideas early. later he read people like Hume and was like, yeah, i like this guy, he seems to talk sense, or Dewey, or Russell.

personally, i had a similar experience; most of my philosophical interests were formed in my teenage years through discussion, rather than having read philosophical tracts (and any that came my way were avoided as being boring and stuffy). given that philosophy is broadly theoretical, it lends itself to a child's interest. like i said, Chomsky also had the unusual advantage of having a good understanding of linguistics before he was a teenager due to his dad being an influential Hebrew scholar.

[slmjkdbtl]

some people think before read so it's more like "agree" not "inspired"

[charlesdahmital]

A better question may have to ask who challenged his perceptions more.

[vikramtalreja]

he always want to awaken the listener. So he want us to find these philosophers by your own exploration. He very honestly trying not to influence. Although in several interviews he said name of David Hume, Russel Bertrand, Dewey, Aristotle, newton, Galileo

[gabrielajonczyk]

This is the point of Internet that shows how interpretation can be damaging.

[nhboy]

Ya it’s a tough question. Think if you have been immersed in some field long enough, there simply are not going to be just a couple of names. They all contribute in many ways. He has made a lot of references to a lot of people over numerous interviews; Russel, Descartes, Dewey, Hume, … and so on and on. Also, it seems odd to suggest, but this is clearly not your average scholar. He probably stands along with some of those very people in terms of intellectual contribution. Finally, this is a small part of longish interview, so a bunch of context is completely lost

[alexc]

Would be nice if Chomsky would actually answer these types of questions, rather than deliver his typical runaround. I really don't see what's so misleading or difficult about the question.

[fede]

I find his answer more anodine than the comments make it up to be. It doesn't sound like arrogance, it's more like a take on how we generally form our outlooks on life. There is something to the notion that we tend to make up our minds before we grab our first book.

[frimports]

Nice to hear an academic low-key admit I don’t actually read that shit, no one does. I made up my mind then went out to find my camp, duh.

[zzRider]

I wonder if Chomsky’s view of William James is similar to John Dewey?