Jonathan Rauch on how to know what's true

Dialogues with Richard Reeves

How do you know what's true? Who do you trust? These are questions that are no longer academic, philosophical ones, but at the heart of our politics and society. My friend and colleague Jonathan Rauch has a brilliant new book out, The Constitution of Knowledge: A Defense of Truth, and that's the basis for our dialogue here. He describes the CoK as "liberalism’s epistemic operating system: our social rules for turning disagreement into knowledge" - and describes how it works - or should work - in the four cornerstones of academia, journalism, government and law.

We discuss the threats to the CoK from the "troll epistemology" of the political Right and the "cancel culture" of the political left, and how institutions, groups and individuals can work to defend and restore our truth-generating systems. As Jon writes:

"Both constitutions rest, ultimately, on versions of what the American founders thought of as republican virtue: habits and norms like lawfulness, truthfulness, self-restraint, and forbearance. If anything could ruin the American constitutional experiment, they believed, a failure of republican virtue would be the most likely culprit".

We also discuss the most important philosopher you've likely never heard of, Charles Sander Pierce (and why his name is pronounced so weirdly), as well as how lockdown has been for a man famous for his introversion...

Jonathan Rauch

Jonathan is a Senior Fellow at the Brookings Institution working in the Governance Studies program. He has written numerous books and articles on politics, economics, government, sexuality, and free speech. He also serves as a contributing editor of The Atlantic. Among other awards and nominations, Rauch is the recipient of the 2010 National Headliner Award and the 2005 National Magazine Award.

More Rauch

• Read his impressive new book The Constitution of Knowledge: A Defense of Truth, which builds upon his previous work Kindly Inquisitors: The New Attacks on Free Thought
• His popular 2003 essay, Caring for Your Introvert
• Follow him on twitter here: @jon_rauch

Also mentioned

• For more on the greatest philosopher you should know about: Charles Sanders Peirce
• In 2018 Steve Bannon was quoted saying “flood the zone with shit”
• PolitiFact’s scorecard on the truth value of Trump’s statements shows that he lied the majority of the time.
• A new Yahoo News/YouGov poll shows that 44% of Republicans believe the conspiracy theory that Bill Gates is implanting microchips in the COVID-19 vaccine.
• Read more on the concerning election audit currently happening in Arizona
• We spoke about the case of Brandon Eich, the former CEO of Mozilla, who was fired for his previous political contributions against gay marriage.
• Cato reported that 62% of Americans have political views they’re afraid to share
• I mentioned the story of the Ku Klux Clowns that appeared in Knoxville, TN in 2007.
• Four lions, the satirical movie we mention.
• We referenced this video of a Georgetown Law professor making racist remarks.
• Rauch referred to the grass-roots organization Braver Angels which adopts counselling techniques to reduce political polarization in communities.
• I quoted Martin Luther King Jr.’s statement that “11 o’clock on Sunday morning is the most segregated hour in American life”
• Rauch referred to Abraham Lincoln’s Lyceum Address
• I quoted Mill in On Liberty (Ch V): “The worth of a State, in the long run, is the worth of the individuals composing it”

The Dialogues Team

Creator: Richard Reeves

Research: Ashleigh Maciolek

Artwork: George Vaughan Thomas

Tech Support: Cameron Hauver-Reeves

Music: "Remember" by Bencoolen (thanks for the permission, guys!)