Meeting Polemics with Irenics in the Science Wars

Abstract

According to Webster's, a polemic is "an aggressive attack on, or the refutation of, others' opinions, doctrines or the like." In today's academy, professors and students often have cause to be polemic, but seldom have cause to remember that polemic has an opposite.1 Webster's defines that opposite, irenic, as "fitted or designed to promote peace; pacific, conciliatory, peaceful." Recent skirmishes in the Science Wars have seemed to me so polemically bitter on all sides that rather than sending back another volley intended to hurt and destroy, I want to try moving irenically toward common ground. I will do this by discussing a few recent occasions in which I have been involved in the Science Wars. The first was an occasion when