Chomsky basically says that intellectuals have a responsibility to expose the lies said by those in power. Hard to argue with, but maybe kind of a platitude.
I think I’d answer this question differently in 2026. The responsibility of intellectuals to society at large today, in an era overwhelmed with information, propaganda, immensely complex issues, etc. is – communicate the issues of the day in a way that is clear and accessible. With the assumption that intellectuals are “experts in ideas.”
I say this because so many contemporary debates seem really mangled and unclear, which makes them basically impossible to solve intellectually. Instead they just turn into battles of will where one side seeks to defeat the other in toto, not actually arrive at a solution that overcomes the conflict.
Unfortunately the academic system is explicitly designed to create specialists, not people that can effectively communicate to the Everyman.
The article was hilarious to me. To whom are we responsible? And who manages the "truth" supply?
If we're assuming a postmodern stance that there is no objective truth, or even a utilitarian stance that truth is a consensus, then life is reduced to some extended chemical reaction, and there is no difference between a Stalin and a Mother Theresa.
If one posits some religious definition of an objective truth, then at least there is a definition to measure against beside "Do as thou wilt".
I'm not a huge Chomsky fan anyway. Despite his appeal to truth, he tends to ring false for me.
I agree with your suggestion, but I wonder if it is enough. Look at what happened today. Moments after the shooting, there was a coordinated campaign to flood the zone with misinformation. Twitter accounts for Trump, DHS (Kristi Noem), Vance, Miller all said someone tried to assassinate ICE officers and was shot in self defense. This was completely the opposite of what happened and given how quickly they put out these messages, they had no way of knowing either.
They simply put it out there because no matter what, this is what they will say in response to an ICE shooting. It is a way of confusing the messaging and preventing their side from being convinced by anyone else or any evidence. Once their base form that initial opinion, it is very hard to change their mind. So will intellectually actually reach those people effectively?
Remember, this base has been told to distrust the academics and distrust science and distrust the news media.
The reason exterminate always go after academics is because they make things harder. The vast majority of academics could make more money than they do as a professor. The authoritarian relies on the religious nature of followers and it's harder for those followers to have faith when it's constantly being questioned. It's why your mental model of an authoritarian regime is where people are afraid to speak freely.
You're right that the strategy is to confuse and overload. It's difficult to counter and I think you're exactly right to say "enough". We need to adapt to this strategy too. I think it's important to remember that truth has a lower bound in complexity but lies don't. They have an advantage because they can sell simplicity. We have the disadvantage when we try to educate. But what we need to do is remind people of how complex reality is while not making them feel dumb for not knowing. It's not easy. Even the biggest meathead who is as anti academic as they come will feel offended if you call them (or imply they're) stupid (are you offended if they call you weak?). We need a culture shift to accept not knowing things and that not knowing things doesn't make one stupid. I have a fucking PhD and I'm dumb as shit. There's so much I don't know about my own field, let alone all the others. I've put in a lot of hard work to be "smart", but the smartest people I know say "I don't know" and that's often the most interesting thing you can hear.
It's no easy task to solve. Don't forget, we're a species that would rather invent imaginary invisible wizards than admit we don't know. We're infinitely curious but also afraid of the unknown.
battles of will where one side seeks to defeat the other in toto, not actually arrive at a solution that overcomes the conflict.
The deeper issue is immigration policy, which is a topic that displays the pattern I mentioned: no real attempt to solve the issue by addressing both sides/various parties, and instead boils it into an us-them struggle of political wills.
The responsibility of intellectuals in this case should be IMO to clearly analyze the immigration debate and discuss the benefits, downsides, likely consequences etc. of various actions.
But we don’t get that. Instead everyone just has an opinion already formed, including the intellectuals. And unfortunately unbiased rational approaches seem to lose (in money, attention) to the loud and opinionated.
So as the problem gets more complicated, people get further and further away from actually solving it.
I would say that one has as much responsibility to society, as that society accepts for the individual.
As a previously homeless veteran, I'd say that is zero. Why should intellectuals, or in fact anyone have any duty to help a system that doesn't help them?
Now I know a lot of people will grandstand and say that if people just started taking on responsibility, then that would improve the system so that it would help more, but again, I did my part and was promised to be taken care of by society with its fingers crossed behind its back.
This only results in a race to the bottom. A self fulfilling prophecy. The unfortunate truth is that if you want the world to be better you need to be better to it than it is to you. It's the only way that can even work.
You can just do nothing and things will get better when others do more than they get, but by you doing nothing you've just shifted your burden to others. The burden of each individual is small. Almost insignificant even. It's not hard to be kinder to others than they are to you. But the burden accumulates and compounds. You don't have to pick up the slack, but you do need to do your part. The future is made by all of us
Of course, anyone always has the option to volunteer to make the world a better place; but the idea that anyone has a responsibility, or moral obligation to help a society that is actively hostile towards them is insanity.
I'll add that this is the whole purpose of a society. The social contract is that of a coalition. Our combined utility is greater than the sum of our individual utility.
To not have an obligation to society is to be a drain on it. Even if you don't recognize it you still get a lot of benefit from society. It could be better. It should be better. But that will never happen if you never put in your part.
Get off your high horse. This person bled for their country and once their service ended, was discarded without a second thought. They are entitled to feel the way they feel and have earned the privilege to voice their outrage. It is our duty to listen.
Their service is commendable and I'll even go so far to say that they were betrayed. But I still don't agree. We all have a duty. Being betrayed gives you every right to be angry, but it is what you do with that anger that matters. Do you use it as an excuse to be self centered or do you recognize that if you're betrayed so have others. That those that betrayed you can only do so because you do not band together. That you do not use your anger to band together and tell them to fuck off. To make them fuck off.
I'm personally very anti war. But I also am very dissatisfied with how we treat our veterans. To send them to, as Hawkeye says: "worse than hell", and then just abandon them?! That's a high moral sin. Outright unconscionable. But recognize they can only get away with this because we let them. I'm not okay with it, are you?
It isn't our duty to listen and do nothing. It is our duty to get mad and do something. Which is exactly what Droopy said
Responsibility of intellectuals, or wise men/women, has always been to guide the tribe towards security, happiness and prosperity. Not to sow dissent inside the tribe by moralizing, while completely ignoring all the ills in other tribes.
So called "intellectuals" who do it just to further their own selfish goals, should not be awarded high ranking positions.
One of the major lessons of the 1900s is that the moral ills of your own tribe are more important than the problems other people might have. You don't live in some other country, you live in your own. Local concerns are by far the #1 issue.
Even in the 2000s, one of the most ironic outcomes is that US hegemony forced a bunch of countries into really dominant regional positions (thinking especially of Japan, China and Germany) because they had nothing else to do but fix their own internal problems and it turns out that is a dominant strategy over militarism. Moral positions like peace, law, consistency and fairness aren't vague nice-to-haves, they are principles that lead to better outcomes for the people who stick with them.
"You know, I ran into Henry Kissinger years ago and I asked him if he enjoyed the intellectual stimulation of the work, and he said in effect, 'I am working with the ideas that I formed at Harvard years ago. I haven't had a real idea since I've been on this; I just work with the old ideas."
Sorry. I see responsibility of the intellectual is first of all to enjoy the stimulation. If not, putting quotes around the term, as you did, is correct.
How far are you prepared to go with the "loyalty to the tribe" argument? If your "tribe" is 1942 Germany and you know about the ongoing Holocaust, does your line of thinking imply that you should keep quiet about it? You know, not to sow dissent by moralizing.
I think I’d answer this question differently in 2026. The responsibility of intellectuals to society at large today, in an era overwhelmed with information, propaganda, immensely complex issues, etc. is – communicate the issues of the day in a way that is clear and accessible. With the assumption that intellectuals are “experts in ideas.”
I say this because so many contemporary debates seem really mangled and unclear, which makes them basically impossible to solve intellectually. Instead they just turn into battles of will where one side seeks to defeat the other in toto, not actually arrive at a solution that overcomes the conflict.
Unfortunately the academic system is explicitly designed to create specialists, not people that can effectively communicate to the Everyman.
If we're assuming a postmodern stance that there is no objective truth, or even a utilitarian stance that truth is a consensus, then life is reduced to some extended chemical reaction, and there is no difference between a Stalin and a Mother Theresa.
If one posits some religious definition of an objective truth, then at least there is a definition to measure against beside "Do as thou wilt".
I'm not a huge Chomsky fan anyway. Despite his appeal to truth, he tends to ring false for me.
They simply put it out there because no matter what, this is what they will say in response to an ICE shooting. It is a way of confusing the messaging and preventing their side from being convinced by anyone else or any evidence. Once their base form that initial opinion, it is very hard to change their mind. So will intellectually actually reach those people effectively?
Remember, this base has been told to distrust the academics and distrust science and distrust the news media.
The reason exterminate always go after academics is because they make things harder. The vast majority of academics could make more money than they do as a professor. The authoritarian relies on the religious nature of followers and it's harder for those followers to have faith when it's constantly being questioned. It's why your mental model of an authoritarian regime is where people are afraid to speak freely.
You're right that the strategy is to confuse and overload. It's difficult to counter and I think you're exactly right to say "enough". We need to adapt to this strategy too. I think it's important to remember that truth has a lower bound in complexity but lies don't. They have an advantage because they can sell simplicity. We have the disadvantage when we try to educate. But what we need to do is remind people of how complex reality is while not making them feel dumb for not knowing. It's not easy. Even the biggest meathead who is as anti academic as they come will feel offended if you call them (or imply they're) stupid (are you offended if they call you weak?). We need a culture shift to accept not knowing things and that not knowing things doesn't make one stupid. I have a fucking PhD and I'm dumb as shit. There's so much I don't know about my own field, let alone all the others. I've put in a lot of hard work to be "smart", but the smartest people I know say "I don't know" and that's often the most interesting thing you can hear.
It's no easy task to solve. Don't forget, we're a species that would rather invent imaginary invisible wizards than admit we don't know. We're infinitely curious but also afraid of the unknown.
battles of will where one side seeks to defeat the other in toto, not actually arrive at a solution that overcomes the conflict.
The deeper issue is immigration policy, which is a topic that displays the pattern I mentioned: no real attempt to solve the issue by addressing both sides/various parties, and instead boils it into an us-them struggle of political wills.
The responsibility of intellectuals in this case should be IMO to clearly analyze the immigration debate and discuss the benefits, downsides, likely consequences etc. of various actions.
But we don’t get that. Instead everyone just has an opinion already formed, including the intellectuals. And unfortunately unbiased rational approaches seem to lose (in money, attention) to the loud and opinionated.
So as the problem gets more complicated, people get further and further away from actually solving it.
As a previously homeless veteran, I'd say that is zero. Why should intellectuals, or in fact anyone have any duty to help a system that doesn't help them?
Now I know a lot of people will grandstand and say that if people just started taking on responsibility, then that would improve the system so that it would help more, but again, I did my part and was promised to be taken care of by society with its fingers crossed behind its back.
You can just do nothing and things will get better when others do more than they get, but by you doing nothing you've just shifted your burden to others. The burden of each individual is small. Almost insignificant even. It's not hard to be kinder to others than they are to you. But the burden accumulates and compounds. You don't have to pick up the slack, but you do need to do your part. The future is made by all of us
I'd add a quote from the beginning of a famous sci-fi*:
You have to create Good out of Evil, because there is nothing else to create it from.
Roadside Picnic by Boris and Arkady Strugatsky, famous Russian anti-system science-fiction brother duo. Their other notable book is Snail on a Slope.
If the person you are responding to hasn't screwed society over, then it sounds like they have easily cleared that bar, even by doing nothing.
That's your society, not all societies. People, veterans or not, aren't homeless in mine.
Then, sir, it would be foolhardy to contribute any part to that service because soon it will all collapse.
That's, in a historically commonplace fashioned see today, is what the top 10% are doing when seeing the top 1% abdicate all responsibility.
Low or no taxes? Sounds good ... but it's going to burn down soon.
To not have an obligation to society is to be a drain on it. Even if you don't recognize it you still get a lot of benefit from society. It could be better. It should be better. But that will never happen if you never put in your part.
I'm personally very anti war. But I also am very dissatisfied with how we treat our veterans. To send them to, as Hawkeye says: "worse than hell", and then just abandon them?! That's a high moral sin. Outright unconscionable. But recognize they can only get away with this because we let them. I'm not okay with it, are you?
It isn't our duty to listen and do nothing. It is our duty to get mad and do something. Which is exactly what Droopy said
So called "intellectuals" who do it just to further their own selfish goals, should not be awarded high ranking positions.
Even in the 2000s, one of the most ironic outcomes is that US hegemony forced a bunch of countries into really dominant regional positions (thinking especially of Japan, China and Germany) because they had nothing else to do but fix their own internal problems and it turns out that is a dominant strategy over militarism. Moral positions like peace, law, consistency and fairness aren't vague nice-to-haves, they are principles that lead to better outcomes for the people who stick with them.
"You know, I ran into Henry Kissinger years ago and I asked him if he enjoyed the intellectual stimulation of the work, and he said in effect, 'I am working with the ideas that I formed at Harvard years ago. I haven't had a real idea since I've been on this; I just work with the old ideas."