The Creativity and Connections of James A. Lindsay

Lindsay is a "pro-American, anti-communist" famous for his debunking of critical social justice. He fell out of favour with some of the skeptical community, but was it fair?

James Lindsay has done some impressive work. In his now-famous collaboration with Peter Boghossian and Helen Pluckrose, they orchestrated what is now call “Sokal Squared” which was a series of hoax papers written in the terminology and theory of postmodernism and critical theory. This “Grievance-Studies Affair” hoax revealed a sickening rot within many humanities journals that focused on a critical social justice approach to subjects such as race, body positivity, feminism, sex, and gender roles.

With some hilarious hoax papers, they managed to be published in a few journals, and in the process revealing a rancid rot in these subfields—including bizarre encouragement from peer reviewers to take the absurdity even further. It, for me, was the most important contribution to academia in the 2010s. It needed to be exposed: thousands of students were being indoctrinated into a neo religion in a number of grievance-oriented subjects that tended to end in the post-fix “-Studies.” The harm these students may go on to do in their own lives, their families, and in society was shocking to realise. Lindsay, Boghossian, and Pluckrose exposed something that explains so much to some many of us trying to figure out what we were then calling “social justice warriors.” Michael Nanya documented some of the affair here:

Lindsay and Pluckrose went on to co-author an excellent and recommended book called Cynical Theories in 2020. The depth of reading and hard work behind that book was impressive, and it still holds up today. It is the kind of book that I have privately been recommended to read from a few top academics in my network in emails whenever the topic of critical social justice comes up (I already had the book, but still). It is impressive work by Lindsay and Pluckrose, such that I have cited it in a book chapter.

In the years since then, Lindsay has gained a lot of followers on social media, but also come to be criticized by some others on the unwoke side. He decided to explain at length why he would vote for Trump in late 2020, and many sympathetic to his earlier work were not impressed, including Jerry Coyne. This was the first part of a split between Lindsay and those on the left wing of the “unwoke” movement. Nevertheless, beyond Coyne’s quick condemnation, a deeper analysis shows Lindsay at the time had a nuanced set of ideas:

Later, Claire Lehmann of Quillette, and others, became increasingly disappointed that Lindsay’s great earlier work was being overshadowed by what she saw as uncareful posts on social media. Her argument was that the good work done by those exposing terrible ideas in grievance studies work would discredit the whole effort. Nevertheless, looking at Lindsay’s work over time, there seems little evidence in 2024 that he held some of the views Lehmann assumed he had at the time. So, some of that criticism of Lindsay from other free-speech folks seems unfair, and even felt unfair at the time, because wasn’t this new free-speech movement supposed to accept people of all views? He continued to gain followers, though, and continued to appear on large podcasts, but he later acknowledged that his honesty about his views had cost him invites to some mainstream events.

Do I think the critiques of Lehmann or Coyne were fair? No, not really. I think the unwoke or free-speech space is a competitive place, and while I think constructive critiques are needed, I think Lindsay has been maligned in a way that strikes me as ungenerous and quite unpleasant. Coming out of these harsh criticisms that don’t really hold up over years, Lindsay strikes me as more likeable, active, and creative than his detractors.

There are some legitimate critiques of Lindsay’s work, though. Unchecked by a peer review process, or friends who might give critical feedback, Lindsay has both been incredibly creative of a large amount of ideas and connections, but also uncareful in some of those connections. He is, in effect, lacking in encouraging skepticism and a colleague who might check his ideas and help moderate them before he makes his claims. Nevertheless, his theorized connections between Gnosticism, Hegel, Marx, and critical theory are absolutely intriguing, and raise questions that might be more carefully checked after his certainty has declined a little. I would love to see Lindsay withdraw some assertions he comes to disagree with, and clarify which ideas survive closer scrutiny.

Lindsay got his doctorate in mathematics and has demonstrated over years a remarkably creative intelligence for detecting patterns, memory, and speaking ability. He has a good eye for terrible theories in subjects much less rigorous that mathematics. Nevertheless, he does think more like a mathematician than a scientist, and he lacks in skepticism towards his own ideas. He is a pattern seeker, and when he thinks he sees a pattern he tends to report that in podcasts and online posts, without a kind of self-skepticism that is the hallmark of the Enlightenment. He becomes sure, for example, that Kamala Harris’s phrase "What can be, unburdened by what has been" is related to similar patterns of ideas in Karl Marx’s work. He may be right, and it is entertaining to listen to, but I actually cannot be sure of connections such as this.

It may be that Lindsay sees a connection such as that, becomes sure of it, and then actively seeks out confirming evidence for his ideas. This may lead to potential errors, but I simply have not the time to check for errors in this domain. It just sometimes sounds unlikely, so I file the idea as “perhaps so, but let’s look for new evidence as it comes up later.” It is probably healthy for his followers to also be unsure as well, because the hype and the panic it may induce in followers who are less intelligent than Lindsay (or myself), may lead to a negative life experience in those who come to worry that neo-communism is about to take over America.

Lindsay’s pattern seeking is highly motivated by a deep belief, it seems, that American liberalism (classical) and freedoms may be lost forever if one fails to identify the critical social justice rot in academia, the media, and in politics. It is not unreasonable to have some concern about history repeating itself, but to be too sure that it will to the point that you force connections between modern events and poor-theorizing of the critical theorists, may lead to making connections that are not solid. There is a danger that in an effort to warn the public of critical social justice, some insights might not hold up if rushed to, and some rhetoric may emerge that does not hold up when viewed 10 years later.

Despite my main criticism that Lindsay is too sure of his own pattern-finding, and lacking in the deep self-skepticism of a classically trained scientist or classical historian, I am impressed in the texts he has read, examined, and exposed. He has done more than most academics in this area of debunking. What people should value him for is exposing the utter farce of the excesses of postmodernism and critical theory, as well as his brilliant insights as to how incentives to publish or perish led to a rancid legacy of terrible academic work in many of the grievance subjects journals (and books). Some of his hard work helped explain the odd critical social justice theories infiltrating science departments in the 2010s and 2020s. It explained the compelled speech, the making sacred of the marginalized, the hierarchy of oppression, the decolonize rhetoric, and the self-flagellation in some western subcultures. Explanation alone does not mean the theorizing is true, so let’s see if Lindsay’s ideas last the test of decades.

Even if Lindsay got some things wrong in his years of intense pattern-seeking since the grievance studies affair, many of us would agree that the sciences should reject critical social justice nonsense coming over from the captured humanities departments. The scientific method, rationality, and empiricism should help us determine claims in the realm of the social justice, with all the necessary caution when trying to ascertain cause and effect from correlations and patterns.