Citation Wars, Good Cheating, and the Free Cultivation of Oral Education

How not being allowed to speak unless we cite dooms us to "citation wars" and the inability to make decisions for ourselves.

“The Net (47)” started with cheating in school, which seems like it’s function will be simply to hold back AI technology. In the real world (which everyone in school always reminds us we’ll eventually face to face), nobody cares if you ask others for help with a project, but in school this is considered dishonorable—but maybe that ethical system only exists to maintain an education institution which brainwashes people to join a Capitalism system that also burdens them with financial debt? Nietzsche warns about how ethics can be used to control people, and perhaps the system of “cheating” in school is an example of a morality which stifles greatness and glory? However, isn’t there something good and noble about not cheating? This lead us into discussions around “good cheating versus bad cheating,” where Jesus for Christians seems to have “cheated” as a Jew in not following all the Torah, but did so (rightly or wrongly) precisely to bring about a “new historic epoch” according to the Holy Spirit. “Good cheating” seems to be generative and creative, while “bad cheating” is deconstructive and nihilistic.

Is it possible to cheat in a Dialogos conversation or as part of a Philosophy Portal anthology? This doesn’t seem possible, which suggests that “cheating” and a “system” are profoundly connected. If anything, we “cheat” in education when we “cheat ourselves out of being human,” and this can be when we learn to memorize what we need to know to pass a test and then forget it all. This isn’t technically cheating, and yet it seems wrong, for we are “cheating ourselves” out of the humanity which learning and integrating with ideas can grant us. And yet it’s not wrong according to the system. In fact, it could be seen as smart, a point which brings us back to cheating: if we are clever enough to cheat and get an A on a test without getting caught, isn’t that “smart” and rational? After all, aren’t we going to forget everything we learned anyway? What’s the point? Notions of “right and wrong” hence come in conflict with rationality, for if the point of learning is to be a doctor, and failing a test will keep us from being a doctor, then failing the next test removes from us the whole reason for why we learn. It only seems rational then to make sure we maintain that purpose by any means necessary. After all, if we as a doctor save someone’s life, who cares if we cheated? Actually, it would be immoral not to cheat, seeing as someone will perish if we do not, because we will not be there to help them (and there is indeed a terrible shortage of doctors).

The conversation then considered “citation” and if failing to cite could be a form of “bad cheating,” and this led to a number of topics involving the ethics of citation and how citation could be used to ruin thought and creative inquiry. We noted again how “good cheating” seems generative, which suggests that humans are “fully human” when creative (which suggests something teleological). This in mind, does the modern system of citation help or hinder creativity? Well, unfortunately, citation can often be moralized in a way that tries to remove the involvement of the subject, which in Hegel we learn is an act which risks self-effacement. Indeed, there is a problem with an “unmeditated subject” who has not submitted his or her self to “the work of thought,” but there is also a problem with believing we can escape subjectivity entirely, seeing as the subject is the source of creative possibility, judgment, “weaving” phenomena together, and the like.  

If we are not allowed to speak or think what we cannot cite, then we cannot speak or think outside “the system,” for the system indeed determines who we can cite and what counts as a “good citation.” This likely falls within the bounds of what the system has determined is not a threat to it but might seem like a threat enough to convince people they have a say in the operation of the system. I mean, if we’re citing Foucault who discusses the trouble with “norms” and systems, aren’t we opposing the system? It can seem that way, but not if the system has determined that Foucault isn’t really a threat because he’s been integrated into the discourse in such a way that his arguments now lack force and “sting.” If this is the case, this is especially a problem, because it genuinely seems like the system is being opposed with ideas that end up making the system stronger. Whenever the system is attacked by an attack that will fail, it’s better for the system than not to be attacked at all (a lack of attack could mean a strong and effective one is being built up).

Generally, what has been called “post-truth” is not really “after truth” but more the logical outcome of a world that believes the only thinking allowed is the thinking of reference and citation. I’ll cite my people; you’ll cite yours; and since my citations don’t cite yours, yours don’t count, for my citations do not claim your citations are valid and can be thought. And so we all end up like that Buridan’s donkey stuck between two piles of equally sized grain: we cannot make a “rational” decision what to think or who to believe other than simply stick to the citations we already have (for whatever reason). And so we starve. And so we fight.

Citation can function as “clothing” in the Garden of Eden, to hide our nakedness, which is unveiled when we speak for ourselves and put forth our own ideas. Perhaps “The Fall” was when we started to cite something outside of ourselves as “good” (God) and “evil” (the snake). Did we “fall” into citation, into a shame of thinking/creating for ourselves? Perhaps, and if motivation and thinking are profoundly linked, then the shame to think will become an inability to gain “intrinsic motivation.” I personally believe the loss of intrinsic motivation is one of the most critical problems in the world today, and it is possible that the stress on “citation” is contributing to a general dependency on “extrinsic motivation.”

“It was the snake’s fault”—with “The Fall,” so seems to be birthed the ability to ascribe responsibility and “origin” to something external. God creates perfections, and so there is “nothing left for him to do”: the work that needs to be done is Adam’s work, and so all responsibility rests with him/her (there is no “Bestow Centrism,” a phrase I use regarding Nietzsche). As Javier Rivera discusses, Adam already “knew” good and evil, and so “The Fall” was for Adam to gain something Adam already had, which means Adam in a sense “wasted time” (which is perhaps what all sin is, ultimately). In this way, Adam looked for something he had internally outwardly, which is to say he looked into creation for something God already gave him directly. All this in mind, can we say that there is something about “citation” which suggests why humanity “fell”?

The temptation for citation is far less and even nonexistent in “Liminal Web”-dialogues, and overall, again, it just seems impossible to “cheat” in them. Perhaps we could fake knowledge of something we know nothing about, and perhaps we could use debate tricks to control a discussion, but neither of these methods would exactly “be cheating” in the sense discussed in school. Furthermore, such “fakery” in a discussions wouldn’t so much be violations of honor or some notion of right and wrong; rather, the person would fail to “help the conversation advance,” and thus the person would be “hindering” the conversation and, in a way, cheating his or her own humanity. The standard of “cheating” then would not be arbitrary relative to a system, but relative to “what makes us humans”—and nothing could be less arbitrary than that, I think. In discussion, we simply don’t want to be “someone who isn’t helping” the conversation advance, as on a work site we want to be “someone who helps get the job done.” Is cheating possible in these circumstances? Perhaps theft if I were to steal money from the boss, but even that seems different from the “cheating” discussed in school systems; rather, it’s just illegal.

“Cheating” and “citation” are not identical topics, but in the school system they are often conflated, perhaps causing subconscious confusion. We are taught that if we do not cite, we are stealing, and perhaps this is why our culture is obsessed with citation; in the back of our minds, there is a lurking concern that if we do not cite, we are doing something wrong. And so we search for authorities to decide what to do, what to defend in conversation—we turn to power to make sure we are not immoral. No, there isn’t a direct connection—but just to be safe…

There are arguments to be made that there is a “good form of citation” which stimulates dialogue and discussion between thinkers, as “good citation” honors the work and creation of others. Not all citation is the same, and arguably both “good citation” and “good cheating” are what they are because they generate and enhance creativity. Cheating which unveils a system as arbitrary, which as a result release creative possibility can be a good thing (though there is a danger of chaos and the “French Revolution” we should never forsake). It is not always easy to tell the difference between “good” and “bad” forms of these, but learning that discernment is an important undertaking. What is cheating to others could be liberation from another point of view, so what others think will not always be a great guide—we will have to go out on our own, which is terrifying.

To return to our Genesis example, it was not until after “The Fall” that Adam became “Adam and Eve”—perhaps the trouble with citation is that it contributes to an “us versus them”-dynamic? Perhaps, and perhaps universities contribute to us ever-participating in “The Fall” through the externalization of valuation (which suggests a movement to “slave morality” from “master morality” in Nietzsche). Perhaps dialogue is inherently more on the side of “master morality” than “slave morality,” precisely because if we choose to talk about x versus y, it means we choose x instead of y, which perhaps helps train us to pick values for ourselves. The act of “speaking up” can also help us overcome anxieties for “saying what we think,” which school can train us out of from an early age. Yes, there is something to be said about “untrained wants” and “childishness,” but those mistakes come out in conversation—everyone in the group knows who hasn’t done the work (as Javier noted in the “The Net (47)”). We feel like we have no right to speak in lacking authority or credentials (but perhaps no one will have many credentials soon, precisely because AI will be “the only authorities”)—but it is good to speak. It is good to face the fear and not use citation as a way to rationalize the fear as responsibility. We should take the leap. “The Fall” has happened, but it doesn’t have to be repeated.

To conclude, AI is developing. AI is coming. AI can cite the entire human race in having the internet at its disposal to quickly search; considering this, if “intelligence is citation,” AI will always be smarter than us. But what if “thinking” were seen as more intelligent than “knowing?” AI “knows” far more than we ever will, but might we still be able to “think” what AI cannot? I don’t know, and I don’t want to make claims about limitations of AI. “Thinking” might lead to “knowing,” but they also are not necessarily identical. AI will always know humanity better than us, but might we always think humanity better? Perhaps—we’ll have to think on it.

.

.

.

For more, please visit O.G. Rose.com. Also, please subscribe to our YouTube channel and follow us on Instagram, Anchor, and Facebook.