My last post on the International Journal of Roleplaying brought up (without much surprise) the question of its value, and in a related way the value of much of the current academic approach on matter the subject.
Jeff Rients mentioned the Sokal Affair, a case where a professor of physics successfully (and intentionally) published a paper containing nothing but nonsense to a peer-reviewed journal. All that was required was the 'correct' political and ideological bent and keywords.
Even beyond this (and other similar examples), there's a reason our langauge includes such phrases as "it's academic" and "Ivory Tower". There's a long standing and commonly known disconnect between academic research and the real world.
This has impact far beyond RPGS, and I'd to recommend a current book on the subject, Intellectuals and Society by Thomas Sowell. This work explores the results of that disconnect and examines how and to a degree why the results of the failures (sometimes huge) don't reflect back upon such thinkers. For those wanting a quick taste, here's the first of five video interviews with the author of the book (as I write this only the first two are online, the rest will appear through this week).
There's much here that explains such nonsense as Forge Theory, how it begins and how it continues. RPGs are insignificant, but small things often reflect the path of far more important subjects.
Now the wise reader will note that Thomas Sowell himself is basically an Intellectual, and for that matter I suppose that with a bit a reach I could be given the same label (although I think the label 'commentator' is a better fit in my case). A producer of ideas, with no real 'product' beyond that (although I've done game designs, they are unpublished). Thus shouldn't the same suggested skepticism be applied to Sowell and myself as we'd would be subject to the same problems?
And the wise reader would be correct.
This is not to say that ideas are always wrong, and that all academic research is meaningless. Far from it. History shows that such a wide rejection is not only unfounded, but indeed harmful in the extreme.
It just means that one needs to be skeptical first, looking to determine what is wrong before assuming its right. The skills needed to do this used to be taught in schools, but I find them nearly unknown in today's world of moral relativism and post-modernism. Indeed, adherents of those mindsets are by definition incapable of avoiding repeating the Sokal Affair in their lives on matters small and large- because to them everything is equally true or false depending upon how you want to look at it.
So my advice on the International Journal of Roleplaying is skepticism first, you're likely to be diving for pearls in a rather barren ocean. But dive anyway. You never know, someone may come up with a valid and useful thought.
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17 comments:
Can it be? A fellow fan of NRO? :)
I imagine the IJR is going to be more useful to game designers than players, as with much existing theory (from the Forge and elsewhere).
I haven't seen any existing theory (most especially that from the Forge) be of use to anyone. Designer or not.
Ideally it (or at least parts of it) would be useful to players, to determine which styles of games they'd be interested in at the very least.
However given the nature of the hobby, I don't think this will ever be the case. Even if good solid work was done in the field.
Still, I may be wrong. So I'll keep an eye on the IJR just in case. At least a few people working with it are well intentioned. We'll see what they find.
Zachary The First:
That would be a reason guess, given that I've have link to them here since I created the blog :)
To be more exact, a fan of some of their stuff but not all of it. They have a few writers I don't think much of, which is to be expected.
I'm pretty sure the Forge theory has been useful to the Forge designers at least!
But really most of the interesting games of the last few years (again, at least) have been influenced by PRG theory. Obviously the truth of that statement is going to depend on your definitions of Interesting and Theory.
The whole point of this blog post Anarchangel was to point out how foolishly Theorist deceive themselves as to their value of their (and thus similar) theories are.
Your faith in Forge theory and the insignificant and worthless games it has 'produced' marks you as one of this class of people.
I feel sorry for you.
If you're interested in my opinions of the Forge (unlikely, people like you aren't interested in much outside their tunnel vision)- see the links at the right: Why RPG Theory has a Bad Rep, and Flaws of GNS.
Then you're definition of theory is simply too narrow. Just like anything, theoretical thinking can be good or bad. Your RPGnet column is a good example of useful theoretical thinking about RPGs; there are plenty of others. GNS is tricky because it is a useful (but limited) avenue of thought to consider during the design process, but has been liberally and badly applied to all sorts of areas. The worst thing about GNS though is that its defenders constantly redefine it and point to long Forge threads in which it changes meaning, so it's effectively impossible to discuss in a meaningful way.
Deriding all theoretical thought because some people do it badly is not sound practice.
I also disagree with your characterisation of your post. I think the main take-away point is that we should always read critically. I heartily agree.
Your faith in Forge theory and the insignificant and worthless games it has 'produced' marks you as one of this class of people.
The only thing I have faith in is that Forge theory helped Forge designers. I make no claims as to the quality of those particular games.
I would say you can only claim it *helped* after you've decided that result was good.
If that's not the case, please change your phrasing from *helped* to *influenced*.
Word choice is important.
I'm an academic, and I do think there's some value to RPG Theory.
My quibble is the notion that using the word "help" connotes approval of Forgeite terms or Forge games.
I've pretty intensely disliked virtually every Forge game I've played (don't get me started on how much I hate Dogs), but I don't think there's any reasonable linguistic rule that suggests the word "help" carries a positive connotation.
I can say "The collapse of democracy in Germany helped the Nazis solidify their hold on power" and not connote approval of that turn of events. So too can Anarchangel discuss GNS theory helping Forge game designers.
-neal
I say that your example is flawed, as the word Nazi already contains the value judgement. Saying X helped created horror Y is perfectly acceptable.
Your examle also represents an outside influence that by itself was unrelated.
Try something like this instead:
"The rise of eugenics helped Germany alter the role of goverment."
That is basically a way of concealing the truth of the horrors of the Nazi goverment in nice friendly neutral terms. Like Anarchangel used with respect to the Forge.
At the very least, I think that communities like the Forge have pointed, however crudely at times, to the possibility that games could be designed in radically different ways, compared to that which had come before.
I think some really excellent games have come out of the Forge community. I also think that the Forge forums are some of the most Byzantine and strange (and of course, heavily moderated) that I've encountered. And yet, among all the drek and excessive chatter, some people have been inspired by *something* to write some good games.
Whatever it was that moved Ben Lehman to write Polaris (and whatever gave him the theoretical framework to do it in) was a good thing; whatever inspired Vincent Baker to half-write Otherkind, which was the direct inspiration for a very enjoyable game of my own design, was a Good Thing.
It all comes back to fun, right? When we leave the forum-wankery behind and engage in some Actual Play (which has always been a huge thrust of the Forge forum leadership, regardless of the "rank and file"'s behavior), we can agree that plenty of people have really enjoyed what has come out of that community.
As to the utility of theory-for-its-own-sake, I daresay we're on the same page. Marx entreated us to use philosophy towards the end of action, not merely talk!
I think that the value of a Unified Role-playing Theory cant be weighed until the question of; what the crap do people mean by "RPG theory" in the first place, is answered.
Is it a Design Theory?
Is it a Sociological Theory?
Is it a "Why does anyone find this fun?" Theory?
I've read your post on Layers of Design. Clearly this is a Design theory. It says so in the title. It is very well written, clear, and makes no pretense to know what it is that every gamer wants.
I've read your posts on GNS. Its the first I've ever heard of this crap. It claims to be a design theory, and isn't. It appears, at first, to be a Sociological Theory, but isn't. In the end, i guess, it was just one man, furiously jacking off onto the Internet, and then boldly proclaiming that the mess he just made was, "the most brilliant thing anyone will ever read. Ever!" And it never produced anything other than a few predictably perverted RPGs, and forum trolls.
Why where they "predictably perverted" RPG's? Because the kind of person that would be a "Narrativis" as its described by Ron Edwards, is the same kind of person who writes creepy fan fiction about Kirk and Spock having sex with each other. All fiction writers are also forum trolls.
IMO, Design theories are valuable. however they will very, and thats probably a good thing.
Sociological theories are worthless. as they already exist... in sociology, and can be applied to any social gathering. the existing once might be learned from, but we don't need a gaming specific socio-theory.
And the last one. "What attracts people to gaming?" should be left alone. Knowing why people are attracted to an art form, and subsequently how to attract them to it, breeds mediocrity. When record producers figured out the "formula" for a hit song; the radio was/is flooded with crap. When TV Networks figured out how to separate us into demographics and reduce that down to trend based stat blocks; 500 channels of trite.
That should read;
"All FAN fiction writers are also forum trolls.
BTW, I agree with your overall premise; not to let bullshit, intellectual cock waving, be passed off as something of value. However your choice of source might need to be a examined a bit.
The National Review is a self proclaimed Republican/Conservative news source. The site had a banner add asking for people to help stop Obama from destroying the secret ballot, and an article on how we are all going to lose our liberty under Obamas health care plan. This is relevant because one of the tactics used in the 08 elections was to label Obama as an Intellectual, and then explain why thats a bad thing. and here's a book explaining why intellectuals are bad. And Obama is brought up twice during the interview as an example of the evils of intellectualism.
Noam Chomsky, an avid sporter of Workers Unions, is against the war on drugs, and stands a whole host of other non republican views, is single handedly dismissed as a vocabulary teacher who overstepped his bounds. regardless of the fact that Chomsky is widely excepted as being one of the most influential speakers on the subject of social and political inequality of the late twentieth century. "His work in politics?" "absurdity", that would be the most asinine statement of the entire interview if it was not immediately followed by a claim that "intellectuals" only think of things to become famous.
Their very definition of intellectuals is absurd. People who's sole product is thought. so Albert Einstein, and Isak newton, and Pythagoras are all intellectuals, wasting our time, who produced nothing of value?
Oh no they where mathematicians, not intellectuals.
Then Fredric Niche, Carol Marx, and Plato... worthless bullshiters?
No no, they where philosophers.
So their definition of intellectual boils down to; some one who is currently alive, and holds views counter to the GOP.
This last bit is Wiki-info and so HIGHLY suspect as hearsay. But Thomas Sowell seams to kick out a lot of books that are in line with the republican view;
Markets and Minorities, Ethnic America, Race and Culture - black people being pore, and women being paid less has nothing to do with racism or sexism.
Race and Culture, Migrations and Culture and Conquests and Cultures - 3rd world countries are not struggling because white people beat the ever loving crap out of them in resent history.
etc.
etc.
I cant speak for certin, having never read his books (oh, but i will), but those interviews seemed like the GOP's mouth piece dragging out the parties Uncle Tom to bagg on Obama. Because if a white dude did it, it would be racist.
p.s. i love your rpg articles. sorry for getting political. I'll try not to do it again.
IAmError: I'm not so sure that I'd call all fan fiction writers trolls. There's almost always an exception to 'all'. But I understand why one would want to...
I think you're on-target with your split of RPG theory, and thanks for the comments.
Politically, we're worlds apart and I couldn't disagree with you more.
But you are also correct that this blog is not the place to debate that. It's enough to say that I consider Sowell's concepts to apply fully (no matter it's other worth)to the people at the Forge and other similar types and leave it at that.
I have this terrible... terrible habit of lurking on a blog or form for weeks, and then making some hugely opinionated, sometimes off topic, editorial post. Its internet foot-in mouth.
Seeing as I admitted to having never read Sowell's book, what i did there could have been pointed out a weak excuse to go off on a political tirade. Thank out for, if not forgiving, then politely handling what could have been taken offensively.
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