Rich Men North of Richmond

Joe Rogan & Oliver Anthony ROAST Rainn Wilson And Libs For Criticizing Rich Men North Of Richmond

 
Oliver Anthony on Joe Rogan #2027 08.30.2023



Oliver Anthony is a singer/songwriter whose song "Rich Men North of Richmond" recently became a viral phenomenon. He's the first songwriter to debut at the top of the Billboard Hot 100 with no prior chart history in any form.

www.facebook.com/people/Oliver-Anthony-Music/100085643337139/

https://open.spotify.com/episode/68AVuziUVdUJhJZkClegOZ
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Swordsmyth said:
Intrepid said:
Swordsmyth said:
I can't prove it.
But it fits with the rest of the facts.
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Only when you want to squeeze the facts into the narrative.
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Yes, I find facts to be superior to narrative.
But you can feel free to prefer narrative to facts.
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It is not a matter of facts being "superior to" or "prefer[ed]" over narratives.

Narratives are the only means through which facts can be interpreted and understood.

Theory always precedes analysis - always - and facts do not ever "speak for themselves".

If facts "speak" at all, it is only ever from within the context of some theory or "narrative".

"Squeez[ing] the facts into the narrative" is ultimately all that anyone ever does, or ever can do (though some facts may be a tighter fit than others, depending on the narrative).

Your statements are a perfect illustration of these things. You admit you are unable to establish as a fact that Anthony ever actually made such a Facebook post - but since it "fits with the rest of the facts" you have adopted to compose your preferred narrative, you'll run with it anyway. IOW: You regard the alleged Facebook post as being "truthful", even if it is not "factual". This is not a criticism. Everyone does this kind of thing. No one can avoid doing it. But it belies your declared preference for "facts" over "narrative".
 
Occam's Banana said:
"Squeez[ing] the facts into the narrative" is ultimately all that anyone ever does, or ever can do (though some facts may be a tighter fit than others, depending on the narrative).
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And, ultimately, the difference between research using solid processes that conform to the scientific method, and things like Teh Science™, is that the former tries to view the facts as they are, and change the conclusion (the "narrative") to fit them. The latter twists, bends and squeezes the "facts" to fit the theory.

That's the whole point of peer review, or it was originally. We all need a little help staying on the logical side of that line. Provided, of course, that we're at all interested in the truth of the matter.
 
acptulsa said:
And, ultimately, the difference between research using solid processes that conform to the scientific method, and things like Teh Science™, is that the former tries to view the facts as they are, and change the conclusion (the "narrative") to fit them. The latter twists, bends and squeezes the "facts" to fit the theory.
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I'm not sure what "facts as they are" means, unless it is "facts as they are presuppositionally interpreted and understood". Any "view" of "the facts" - whether scientific, political, philosophical, literary, etc. - is always made from some theoretical standpoint or "narrative" frame. To borrow a term from Kant, there are no "noumenal" facts - i.e., mere facts "in themselves, period" or "as they are, full stop". Every identification of a thing as a "fact" - from "2 + 2 = 4" to "Napoleon invaded Russia" to "God does [not] exist" to "substance X causes disease Y" to "Trump did A because B", and so on - is freighted with presuppositions. Whether one accepts or rejects any proposed "fact" depends upon one's presuppositions, and not upon any mere "factualness" supposedly presented or possessed by the "fact" itself.

Even the conduct of science (as distinct from "The Science[SUP]TM[/SUP]") occurs subject to the (explicit or implicit) theoretical assumptions and presumptive biases of scientists. Science, when properly conducted, does allow for corrective feedback by way of empirically and reproducibly observable phenomena - but nevertheless, even such corrections to and adjustments of theory are themselves still determined by presumptive theories/narratives concerning how science ought to be done (and why it ought to be done that way, and not some other way).

Physicists are in agreement on the facts of quantum mechanics, but despite that they all start from the same collection of agreed-upon facts, they vary widely on what they interpret those facts to actually mean, and upon what they suppose those facts "really" signify. (For example, one can choose from among the Copenhagen interpretation, the "many worlds" interpretation, Einsteinian "neo-realism", "transactional analysis", and so forth.) And proper science has quite a narrow scope, constrained as it is by the aforementioned "empirically and reproducibly observable phenomena" (among other strictures). When you add politics to the mix (where facts are often not at all agreed upon), things become even more fraught ...

(... and that's how you end up with something like "The Science[SUP]TM[/SUP]".)
 
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Occam's Banana said:
I'm not sure what "facts as they are" means...
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I was indeed referring to empirically and reproducibly observable phenomena, some of which are harder to misinterpret than others. And, yes, it becomes scarce when politics, or for that matter, when humans, enter the chat. Which is why psychiatry has so much difficulty making a science of itself.
 
Occam's Banana said:
It is not a matter of facts being "superior to" or "prefer[ed]" over narratives.

Narratives are the only means through which facts can be interpreted and understood.

Theory always precedes analysis - always - and facts do not ever "speak for themselves".

If facts "speak" at all, it is only ever from within the context of some theory or "narrative".

"Squeez[ing] the facts into the narrative" is ultimately all that anyone ever does, or ever can do (though some facts may be a tighter fit than others, depending on the narrative).

Your statements are a perfect illustration of these things. You admit you are unable to establish as a fact that Anthony ever actually made such a Facebook post - but since it "fits with the rest of the facts" you have adopted to compose your preferred narrative, you'll run with it anyway. IOW: You regard the alleged Facebook post as being "truthful", even if it is not "factual". This is not a criticism. Everyone does this kind of thing. No one can avoid doing it. But it belies your declared preference for "facts" over "narrative".
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Any narrative that contradicts the facts is provably false.
I squeeze facts into a narrative to see if they fit.
Others tend to exclude any facts that do not fit their chosen narrative.
 
Swordsmyth said:
Any narrative that contradicts the facts is provably false.
I squeeze facts into a narrative to see if they fit.
Others tend to exclude any facts that do not fit their chosen narrative.
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Whether a fact is deemed to contradict a narrative depends on the narrative, not on the fact - and the only way one can ever "prove" something to be "false" is by making reference to some presuppositional framework - i.e., to some theory or "narrative". IOW: Theory or "narrative" is what makes "proof" possible in the first place. Or, as I said in my previous post:
Occam's Banana said:
Whether one accepts or rejects any proposed "fact" depends upon one's presuppositions, and not upon any mere "factualness" supposedly presented or possessed by the "fact" itself.
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As I also previously noted, you yourself demonstrated this when you asserted that Anthony's alleged Facebook post "fits with the rest of the facts" (as you see them, in terms of your preferred theory of what is or isn't "true"), regardless of whether it is a fact that he ever actually made that post. IOW: You fit proposed facts into to your chosen narrative, or you reject them because they don't fit - just like everyone else does.
 
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Occam's Banana said:
Whether a fact is deemed to contradict a narrative depends on the narrative, not on the fact - and the only way one can ever "prove" something to be "false" is by making reference to some presuppositional framework - i.e., to some theory or "narrative". IOW: Theory or "narrative" is what makes "proof" possible in the first place. Or, as I said in my previous post:As I also previously noted, you yourself demonstrated this when you asserted that Anthony's alleged Facebook post "fits with the rest of the facts" (as you see them, in terms of your preferred theory of what is or isn't "true"), regardless of whether it is a fact that he ever actually made that post. IOW: You fit proposed facts into to your chosen narrative, or you reject them because they don't fit - just like everyone else does.
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The other facts are not in dispute, they come directly from him or from the others involved.
The screenshot is in dispute so I would not include it if it didn't fit with the other facts.
 
Swordsmyth said:
The other facts are not in dispute, they come directly from him or from the others involved.
The screenshot is in dispute so I would not include it if it didn't fit with the other facts.
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You and dannno sure love to pronounce everything people say that suits you gospel, and everything that doesn't mendacity.

No wonder you two love Trump. He is on every side of every issue sooner or later. He flip flops like McCain did. He has put out a tweet at some point or another that could be used to back up every hare-brained theory ever conceived.
 
Swordsmyth said:
The other facts are not in dispute, they come directly from him or from the others involved.
The screenshot is in dispute so I would not include it if it didn't fit with the other facts.
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Even if "the other facts are not in dispute" (i.e., even if everyone agrees that all those "other facts" are indeed facts), the meaning, significance, and proper interpretation & understanding of those facts are certainly in dispute.

But what is or isn't a meaningful, significant, or "proper" interpretation & understanding of those "other facts" depends entirely upon one's preferred theory or "narrative", and not at all upon those "other facts" in or of themselves. (That is because, as I previously noted, facts do not ever "speak for themselves".)

You say those "other facts" mean one thing, while others say the same facts mean something else - and no fact, in or of itself, will ever be sufficient to "prove" any of you wrong. (That is because, as I have also previously noted, "proofs" are produced by and come from theories or "narratives", not mere facts.)

This is what motivated you to say the Facebook post attributed to Anthony "fits with the rest of the facts", even though you acknowledge the disputed authenticity of the item. If the item is real, then there you go - "QED". If the item is fake, then that's just as well, too - regardless of whether you explicitly "include" it or not [1]. Either way, it "fits with the rest of the facts" as you interpret and understand them, in terms of your preferred narrative.

I should reiterate that I am not making these observations as criticisms. Everyone does this kind of thing. It cannot be avoided. The ultimate point is simply that your stated (but not really actual) preference for "facts" as being "superior to narrative" gets things just exactly backwards. People like to indulge the notion that if they just make a presentation of "the facts" and nothing but "the facts", the puissance of those facts will somehow incontestably "prove" the desirability of this policy over that policy; or that Oliver Anthony is sincere, or some kind of "controlled-oppo psyop plant"; or that Trump is Orange Man Bad, or Orange Man Good; or that libertarianism (or socialism, or conservatism, or progressivism, or whatever-ism) is right and true and good, above all others. But that is just not how it works - because facts are the servants of narratives, not the masters.



[1] Because in this case, you deem the item to be "truthful", even if it is not "factual". This is an illustration that theoretical or narrative "truth" will always supersede mere "facts".
 
The Beltway Libertarians Are Too Smart for Oliver Anthony
https://odysee.com/@mises:1/the-beltway-libertarians-are-too-smart:c
Mises Media | 08 September 2023

Ryan McMaken joins Bob to discuss the surprisingly negative reaction (from a Reason writer and Tyler Cowen) to Oliver Anthony's hit song, "Rich Men North of Richmond." Ryan and Bob defend the lyrics, arguing that Anthony doesn't say anything objectionable from either a libertarian or economic perspective.

Listen to Oliver Anthony's "Rich Men North of Richmond": https://Mises.org/HAP412a

Christian Britschgi's article in Reason on Oliver Anthony: https://Mises.org/HAP412b

Tyler Cowan's Bloomberg Editorial: https://Mises.org/HAP412c

Chapters:

00:00 : Against Our Limitless Regime
01:00 : Introduction
02:33 : Articles on Oliver Anthony's Song
05:40 : The Downplaying of Real Issues Mentioned in the Song
14:18 : An Economist's Critique of "Rich Men North of Richmond"
32:59 : Intellectual Dishonesty
44:22 : Conclusion
​

 
Occam's Banana said:
...
Christian Britschgi's article in Reason on Oliver Anthony: https://Mises.org/HAP412b
...
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Article Translation: Ugh, deplorable right wingers, conspiracy theorists, and paleo types like this song, so we need to take it down a notch. And "Anthony has the musical equipment and technology", which proves he (and the rest of society) have it made today. Besides, rich men north of Richmond pay our salaries.
 
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