A tangential historical quibble: the founding myth of modern epistemology - since time immemorial philosophers all thought knowledge was JTB, but then Gettier destroyed a thousand-year orthodoxy in 1963 - is not quite true:
A major theme of transgender activism is the project of redefining the word "woman" away from "human possessing an XX chromosome," so that MtF transgender people can be included. It doesn't seem like arguing in bad faith to ask someone who wants to redefine a word, what their proposed redefinition is.
Also, there's meaningful disagreement among people who reject the biological definition. Examples of competing widely held definitions are: "a woman is a person with a sufficient number of feminine traits" (goated); "a woman is a member of the set of people who identify as women" (avoids infinite regress); "a woman is a participant in the performance of womanhood, which is a patriarchal construct that falsely represents the gender/sex spectrum as a binary" (bespoke!).
I agree that in general, demanding precise definitions is cheap trickery. But in the case of womanhood, where the definition itself is the point of debate, I think it's pretty fair.
Or referring to a particular woman, "what a mensch" or technically for a woman "menschlichkeit". But the issue of the day is not about whether people have integrity (we don't care much anymore) but rather public bathroom access.
I strongly agree, as you probably already know. Really wish there was broader understanding of the fact that most words we use don't have simple definitions that can accurately capture edge cases. Knowing this prevents a messy definition from wrongly seeming like a gotcha, but it also helps you see that when different people use a term, the attributes they associate with that term and their weighting may be different. Because of this, I think that is is actually sometimes very helpful to clarify terms when not used as a gotcha, though I don't think it's common to do so. For example if you're discussing capitalism vs socialism, it's essential to at least take a bit of time to make sure you are talking about the same thing. The "woman" and "woke" examples are not cases of this though, how each side defines those is common knowledge.
You say “the left-wing conception of what a woman is or the right-wing conception of what wokeness is” but I don’t think these conceptions are left or right wing, unless you redefine left and right. See for instance Susan Neiman’s “Left Is Not Woke” plus the fact that some of the strongest opponents of including transwomen in the category of women are on the left.
What you've said in this post is all true, but I do think that asking people to define "woke" is often legitimate because they use the term as a motte-and-bailey. To show how bad "woke" is, conservatives will use a restricted definition that refers to the excesses of social justice politics (basically, the same definition that you gave in your previous post). But these same conservatives will then use the word "woke" as a cudgel against anything vaguely liberal. Support gay marriage? Woke. Think we should do something about climate change? Woke. In this mode, it appears that "woke" just means "anything conservatives don't like."
Asking for a definition prevents them from misusing the word in this way. If they say they use the former definition, then we can discuss things that actually are woke and agree that woke things are bad. But if they try to use the word "woke" to criticize things that do not have the bad qualities that the word "woke" is meant to represent, like gay marriage or action on climate change, I can just point out that the things they're calling "woke" aren't actually woke.
On the other hand, if they say they use the second definition, then I have no reason to take their accusations of wokeness as a serious criticism. It's equivalent to saying, "It's bad because I don't like it."
Either way, it defuses a fallacious attempt to somehow make the badness of social-justice-taken-too-far rub off on reasonable liberal politics. Of course, I agree with you that the first definition is preferable because it allows us to discuss the actual problems associated with wokeness, and if someone is using the term exclusively this way, there's no need to ask for an exact definition as a gotcha.
If you accosted a generic reactionary / progressive in the street and made them define these words for you, it would in fact be a cheap gotcha, but if you are any kind of public figure with positions on the issue (or even bothering to actually debate the issue in any context) it should in fact be expected that you are able to define these words, if only because failing to do so means you haven't actually bothered to think the issue at all.
A tangential historical quibble: the founding myth of modern epistemology - since time immemorial philosophers all thought knowledge was JTB, but then Gettier destroyed a thousand-year orthodoxy in 1963 - is not quite true:
https://kclpure.kcl.ac.uk/portal/files/119519046/The_Benefit_to_Philosophy_Acc4Oct2014Epub5Nov2014_GREEN_AAM.pdf&ved=2ahUKEwit0Yi75ouHAxVKYEEAHSutAL0QFnoECCIQAQ&usg=AOvVaw0D03Zfl3SRut_0ukVS3876
A major theme of transgender activism is the project of redefining the word "woman" away from "human possessing an XX chromosome," so that MtF transgender people can be included. It doesn't seem like arguing in bad faith to ask someone who wants to redefine a word, what their proposed redefinition is.
Also, there's meaningful disagreement among people who reject the biological definition. Examples of competing widely held definitions are: "a woman is a person with a sufficient number of feminine traits" (goated); "a woman is a member of the set of people who identify as women" (avoids infinite regress); "a woman is a participant in the performance of womanhood, which is a patriarchal construct that falsely represents the gender/sex spectrum as a binary" (bespoke!).
I agree that in general, demanding precise definitions is cheap trickery. But in the case of womanhood, where the definition itself is the point of debate, I think it's pretty fair.
"Now that's a woman!" "A fine example of one. And I don't mean just her looks." How would that fit into the conversation?
Or referring to a particular woman, "what a mensch" or technically for a woman "menschlichkeit". But the issue of the day is not about whether people have integrity (we don't care much anymore) but rather public bathroom access.
We have a whole essay that does not even attempt to clearly state what a "definition" is.
I assume this is a joke?
I strongly agree, as you probably already know. Really wish there was broader understanding of the fact that most words we use don't have simple definitions that can accurately capture edge cases. Knowing this prevents a messy definition from wrongly seeming like a gotcha, but it also helps you see that when different people use a term, the attributes they associate with that term and their weighting may be different. Because of this, I think that is is actually sometimes very helpful to clarify terms when not used as a gotcha, though I don't think it's common to do so. For example if you're discussing capitalism vs socialism, it's essential to at least take a bit of time to make sure you are talking about the same thing. The "woman" and "woke" examples are not cases of this though, how each side defines those is common knowledge.
You say “the left-wing conception of what a woman is or the right-wing conception of what wokeness is” but I don’t think these conceptions are left or right wing, unless you redefine left and right. See for instance Susan Neiman’s “Left Is Not Woke” plus the fact that some of the strongest opponents of including transwomen in the category of women are on the left.
What you've said in this post is all true, but I do think that asking people to define "woke" is often legitimate because they use the term as a motte-and-bailey. To show how bad "woke" is, conservatives will use a restricted definition that refers to the excesses of social justice politics (basically, the same definition that you gave in your previous post). But these same conservatives will then use the word "woke" as a cudgel against anything vaguely liberal. Support gay marriage? Woke. Think we should do something about climate change? Woke. In this mode, it appears that "woke" just means "anything conservatives don't like."
Asking for a definition prevents them from misusing the word in this way. If they say they use the former definition, then we can discuss things that actually are woke and agree that woke things are bad. But if they try to use the word "woke" to criticize things that do not have the bad qualities that the word "woke" is meant to represent, like gay marriage or action on climate change, I can just point out that the things they're calling "woke" aren't actually woke.
On the other hand, if they say they use the second definition, then I have no reason to take their accusations of wokeness as a serious criticism. It's equivalent to saying, "It's bad because I don't like it."
Either way, it defuses a fallacious attempt to somehow make the badness of social-justice-taken-too-far rub off on reasonable liberal politics. Of course, I agree with you that the first definition is preferable because it allows us to discuss the actual problems associated with wokeness, and if someone is using the term exclusively this way, there's no need to ask for an exact definition as a gotcha.
If you accosted a generic reactionary / progressive in the street and made them define these words for you, it would in fact be a cheap gotcha, but if you are any kind of public figure with positions on the issue (or even bothering to actually debate the issue in any context) it should in fact be expected that you are able to define these words, if only because failing to do so means you haven't actually bothered to think the issue at all.
This is blasphemy. I won’t let you drag plato under the bus like this
What is a “Cheap Gotcha”?
Oof
It's fine to disagree that gender can differ from sex, but troon seems like a really mean word to use and I wish you'd be nicer.