The Responsibility of the Communicator

18,604 characters2009.05.22

Today, while riding my bike in the rain on the 21st, as usual my thoughts drifted about, and I connected up a few threads I had recently run into, and so I wrote this essay.

As for my attitude toward plagiarism and literary theft, I already made it clear in my undergraduate post “Why Suixuan Is Not Afraid of Plagiarism and Theft.” Now that I compare my own writing to excrement, that too signals my attitude that I am not afraid of plagiarism. And yet, of course, I have always held a deep contempt for paper plagiarism. In a certain sense, plagiarism or theft in academic papers is, in my eyes, one of the most unforgivable crimes, because as a pluralist, I can tolerate any set of values different from my own, but that does not mean that people can act entirely without standards or reasons. Everyone can and should establish standards or reasons for their own behavior, and everyone should take responsibility for themselves; this is the prerequisite of value pluralism. In this sense, then, plagiarism in academic papers is unforgivable even from within my pluralist line of thought. This is especially true of articles that involve the author’s value judgments: if you seize at will the value judgments and ideas belonging to others and make them your own, then you are in effect giving up your qualification to establish your own value judgments and ideas. Since you have trampled on your own freedom, I am going to despise you and blame you. If you want to defend yourself, you must say words that are your own.

I will not dwell on these points for now. What I want to discuss is this: if plagiarism is a crime, then if I openly post all my papers online and thereby make it easy for others to commit that crime, how can my own action be exempt from guilt?

Of course, this question is also of typical significance, and there are many similar questions. For example, when people use hammers to smash others, should the producer and seller of the hammer bear responsibility for this? Besides hammers, as well as drugs, knives, guns, atomic bombs, and other such instruments, certain ideas may also be used for evil. For instance, methods for making weapons, historical records of criminal activity, and so on, can all be used to facilitate the smooth carrying out of certain crimes.

It seems that when assigning responsibility, one needs to consider the nature of the “product” itself. A hammer, for instance, seems neutral; it is mainly designed to drive nails. If you insist on using it to strike people, then that is the user’s responsibility, not the maker’s. And things like atomic bombs seem to be designed precisely for killing, so the maker needs to bear greater responsibility. But this line of thought is still a bit too simplistic. For one thing, things like atomic bombs are not made by a single person acting alone. Whether on the theoretical side or the technical side, there is a kind of assembly-line structure: each participant is responsible for only one link in the chain, and the output of each of these parts is not the atomic bomb itself. The products of this process, besides being usable to make atomic bombs, can also be used to make other “good” things, such as nuclear power plants. Scientists or engineers who are only responsible for tackling one small subproblem, as well as a technician at some point on the assembly line, can all excuse themselves in this way: I did not make the atomic bomb; what I produced through my work is neutral. So then, who actually made the atomic bomb? — From the head of state all the way down to every taxpayer, countless forces can be said to have participated in the making of this one atomic bomb. Does that mean we cannot hold anyone responsible for the making of the atomic bomb? But would examining the other end, where the bomb is dropped, make things any clearer? So then, who actually dropped the atomic bomb? The bomber pilot? But he is only a low-ranking soldier carrying out orders, and behind him there is still a whole chain of command transmission.

Thus, in modern society, the occurrence of an event is often a tiny node in a vast, tangled, and inextricable network of relations. Each participant is like a little worker on an assembly line, and this huge factory has no real owner at all; the nominal factory owner is always obeying the logic of capital, and in the final analysis still the logic of the machine. Once the assembly line starts moving, no one can stop it.

Without noticing, I have drifted into questions in the philosophy of technology; next week’s report on Winner will probably involve these as well, so I will not stray too far from the topic here for the time being. In short, in such a machine-like society, assigning blame for any particular affair is not easy. In the end, one should not let the “machine” or the “mechanism” bear responsibility on behalf of human beings. Who is to be held responsible is a question of jurisprudence and political science; and in all this, what responsibility can “I” bear? That is a question of philosophy and ethics.

So what I want to discuss is: how should I be responsible — specifically, in matters such as plagiarism in academic papers?

The preceding discussion has already pointed to certain problems: when we focus our attention on the two ends — the maker and the user — we find that their existence is either ambiguous or trivial. But the existence of a third role draws our attention, namely the transmitter or disseminator, who serves as the intermediate link.

In many discussions, the intermediate medium is often regarded as neutral, or simply ignored; only in certain extreme situations do people focus on the disseminator. Take drug trafficking, for example: compared with the producer and the user of drugs, the transmitter of drugs — that is, the trafficker — is the focus of attribution and punishment. We think that a drug trafficker cannot excuse himself by saying that he neither manufactures nor consumes drugs. Compared with a mere carrier who has no understanding of the harm caused by drugs, if a drug trafficker knowingly knows that drugs are harmful, does not take them himself, yet spreads these harmful things to others, then morally he would seem to deserve even greater condemnation.

Can a drug trafficker excuse himself in this way — “I neither manufactured nor consumed it; I merely conveyed some neutral things, which can be used both to harm people and also for medical treatment and scientific research, from one party to another. As for the harm caused by these things, that is the responsibility of the maker or the user; it has nothing to do with me”? Yet the harm of drugs is precisely manifested in this transmission link between manufacture and use. If the use of certain dangerous items is neutral — for instance, a knife can be used to cut vegetables or to kill people; drugs can be used for medical anesthesia or for consumption and ruin; papers can be used for reference reading or for plagiarism and theft… — that does not mean that their transmission is naturally neutral as well. It is true that a knife can be used to cut vegetables or to kill people; that depends on the user’s choice. But the transmitter is also making a choice — do you really want to pass the knife on to the hands of a chef or housewife, or do you deliberately want to pass it on to a thug or villain? Of course that is a completely different matter. If you know full well that you are handing a knife to a hooligan who may fight at any moment but absolutely will never cook, or handing drugs to an addict who obviously intends to use them, or handing a paper to someone who is more likely than not going to use it for plagiarism or theft, then you can no longer pretend to be innocent and stand apart from the matter.

Just like the influenza virus, the harmfulness of some things is not manifested merely in a concrete individual’s single instance of suffering. For example, the harm caused by this flu to a specific infected person does not seem especially severe; however, its harm is manifested more in its spread. When it breaks out in a specific person, it is controllable; but once it spreads among the entire population, its danger becomes increasingly uncontrollable. The harm of drugs and papers is similar. Of course, the consequences brought by heroin and other drugs to a single person are also terrible, but substances like methamphetamine, for a particular individual user, may not be especially disastrous. The problem is that once their spread among the population is allowed to run free, their destructive power to the entire social order becomes visible.

However, I am not trying to argue that there is always a need for some higher power mechanism to intervene in and restrict dissemination activities, such as the Broadcasting Bureau banning “vulgarity” the way drugs are banned. On the contrary, what I want to emphasize is precisely the “freedom” of the disseminator, because freedom means responsibility, and only the free can be said to be responsible. If a disseminator only needs to obey orders from “superiors,” transmitting whatever the “superiors” are required to have transmitted, then the disseminator still has no freedom or responsibility, and can push responsibility onto the “superiors” who compelled them to disseminate. What I want to emphasize is this key point: a free disseminator should neither simply push responsibility onto the “superiors,” that is, the source or maker of the disseminated item, nor should he push responsibility onto the “audience,” or the recipient of the disseminated item. And these two kinds of evasion are precisely the general form of today’s mass media — either willingly letting themselves be dominated by the official line, or else proclaiming themselves to represent public opinion and public interest. But both attitudes evade the independence of the disseminator. The disseminator either submits to politics or submits to the market; either he says: what I disseminate is determined by the government; or he says: what I disseminate is determined by audience preferences. But the disseminator himself seems not to have to make decisions, does not need to bear the responsibility of freedom. People overlook the fact that the disseminator is not merely a neutral medium for transmitting information but an independent acting subject — medium itself is a kind of message. It not only processes and shapes the information it transmits, but also participates in shaping the roles played by the parties connected through it within the whole network of relations, and thus participates in the construction of the entire social culture.

The dissemination of information also involves the question of freedom of thought and speech. For example, suppose a certain scholar has an astonishing set of claims. If these claims spread and incite destructive actions among some members of the public, then what responsibility should the speaker and the actor respectively bear for such consequences? Should the scholar bear responsibility for his freedom of speech? Even leaving aside some obviously extreme and implausible remarks, suppose that what I say is responsible and truthful, but once this speech is transmitted to the public it is very likely to provoke intense reactions or serious misunderstandings, leading to destructive consequences. Then must the speaker also bear responsibility for this?

What I have overlooked in these reflections is precisely the role of the disseminator. In fact, the main force that brings about destructive consequences is neither the original speaker nor the final actor, but the intermediary disseminator. If scholars argue with one another in a relatively closed space of communication, then no matter what strange notions they utter, as long as they provide their own defense, there is nothing blameworthy about it; indeed, speaking freely is precisely the scholar’s duty. And if the people act as individuals, their destructive power is limited, and they too may carry out certain intense actions in accordance with their own principles; this is also their freedom. What truly brings about destruction is neither freedom of speech itself nor the actions of concrete individuals, but the process of dissemination. In that process, the speaker’s freedom is suppressed, because the speaker often can no longer participate in the process of dissemination at all. What the audience receives is fixed information shaped by the media, and when they interpret that information, they can often no longer engage in interactive exchange with the speaker. In this situation, the speaker can no longer defend or explain himself; he is left to one side. On the other hand, the influence of individual actors is unified and concentrated through dissemination, forming a considerable destructive power. If free speakers sometimes also need to bear guilt for the consequences of their speech, that is because speakers are often simultaneously disseminators as well, and the destructive consequences caused by disseminating one’s speech in inappropriate places and in inappropriate ways also contain one’s own fault. But this fault is not because of the speech itself; it is still because of the way one disseminates one’s own speech.

Therefore, throughout the entire process, it is in fact the disseminator who is steering the development of events — although no single force can fully control the whole situation, if one were to speak of the most dominant force within the situation, it may well be the disseminator.

Once again, let me emphasize: I am not arguing for the introduction of any external norm or power to constrain the disseminator’s behavior; that would be precisely a denial of the disseminator’s responsibility. To bear the responsibility of dissemination, the disseminator must play an independent and self-determining role. The disseminator should have a conscious reflection on dissemination behavior; he needs not only proactively to identify, understand, and reshape what he disseminates, but also proactively to distinguish and probe the direction of dissemination. The purpose of these distinctions and inquiries is not merely to help one’s dissemination become more “effective,” but rather to make one’s dissemination more responsible.

To give another example, suppose someone thinks that as long as you pay money, you can go to bed with her. What should we make of such a thought? We may oppose her, and we may sneer at it, but we should not impose punishment on her simply because she holds such a thought or expresses such a view. As a free thought and free speech, the way she “takes responsibility” for her words is precisely to carry them out. If those who meet her conditions really can go to bed with her, and if she can consistently defend her own words and actions, and can also acknowledge others holding the same standards as she does, then in the sense of freedom, she is responsible. And if you do not agree with her thought, but insist on carrying out your own standards, that is of course also good. But this “carrying out” should not be limited to your own not acting like her; it should also permeate your own dissemination of her words and actions. If, on the one hand, I proclaim that I oppose this frivolous attitude, but on the other hand I transmit her information to others and collect a benefit from it, then I am organizing prostitution. Compared with directly participating in it oneself, standing apart as an information provider is a more irresponsible attitude. In the sense of freedom, a person who supports prostitution in thought and speech and also practices prostitution in behavior is consistent and responsible, whereas a person who opposes prostitution in thought and speech but actively transmits information that facilitates prostitution for others is irresponsible or evil. By evil, I mean knowingly harmful yet still promoting or tempting others to do certain things that one oneself is unwilling to do.

Returning to the earlier question, in the matter of plagiarism in academic papers, how should I be responsible? First, as thought and speech themselves, I can continually interpret and defend myself; this is the way of being responsible. Second, as a disseminator who at the same time openly posts on a web blog, this action requires additional reflection — what meaning does such a medium of dissemination have for me, and what impact might it produce? Of course, if I were to post my papers in a place specifically used for exchanging plagiarism materials, or actively advertise them to plagiarists, then such dissemination would certainly be incoherent or irresponsible; but posting them on Yiku Blog in the current way may not yet make me feel too guilty. It is true that posting on the internet necessarily means providing a certain degree of convenience to many plagiarists, but on the other hand, through my words, every line of which is soaked in sincere feeling, I may also be able to offer some power of inspiration, even enabling some potential plagiarists to dimly feel just how exciting and joyful it can be — to think and read independently like I do, and to freely pour out words that truly belong to oneself! Do not plagiarize, do not steal, cite your sources, say the words you want to say, let words flow freely — if, through my blog, I can to some extent convey to individual readers a similar idea of freedom, then I can also feel a little relieved in my heart. If this is only my wishful thinking, then perhaps I should adjust the way my blog is open at the appropriate time. In fact I have also been paying attention to more suitable blog platforms, such as ones that allow different access permissions to be set for each article, so that I can more independently control the audience of different articles. Such blog sites do exist, but neither posting nor commenting is as open and free as on Yiku; either there are very strict word limits, or there is keyword blocking and censorship, and so on — they are always unsatisfactory. If anyone knows of a suitable platform, I hope you can pass this information on to me~

Finally, let me make clear that this article is absolutely not aimed at criticizing any individual person, but is rather a concentrated sorting-out of some long-standing concerns about freedom, politics, media, and related issues. What is written here merely records the most superficial initial thoughts; there are still many tangled problems involved, awaiting gradual clarification in the future.

May 22, 2009

Latest comments

unic

2009-06-12 15:58:44 Anonymous 115.155.143.90

“Second, as a disseminator who at the same time openly posts on a web blog, this action requires additional reflection — what meaning does such a medium of dissemination have for me, and what impact might it produce? Of course, if I were to post my papers in a place specifically used for exchanging plagiarism materials, or actively advertise them to plagiarists, then such dissemination would certainly be incoherent or irresponsible; but posting them on Yiku Blog in the current way may not yet make me feel too guilty. It is true that posting on the internet necessarily means providing a certain degree of convenience to many plagiarists, but on the other hand, through my words, every line of which is soaked in sincere feeling, I may also be able to offer some power of inspiration, even enabling some potential plagiarists to dimly feel just how exciting and joyful it can be — to think and read independently like I do, and to freely pour out words that truly belong to oneself!”
The process of dissemination is a process of selecting the audience. Does publishing your article on a blog itself carry a selective character? We can analyze the paths by which people come to your blog. First, people who are already your friends and come because of your oral recommendation; second, people who search for related content, and this search behavior is spontaneous. Third, people who click in through other people’s friend links. — Apart from those who come because of your promotional points, the others are basically spontaneous. I feel that within the internet itself, if we take all the information resources on the internet as 1, then you seem not to exclude any segment of netizens from the scope of obtaining your blog address; your choice is 1-0=1. Seen this way, what you basically need to reflect on is merely the way you strengthened those promotional points for Suixuan in the form of advertising. And if we step outside the internet, then the people you exclude are basically those who do not go online. So it seems that what you should reflect on is the internet’s selectivity.

Gu Du

2009-06-12 22:13:07

I had already reflected on my choice of the internet: this is a brand-new medium, and I believe its significance lies not only in accelerating the speed of text circulation and expanding its reach, but also in bringing about new textual forms. Just as when writing and printing emerged, it will reshape the way philosophers write. So I am very honored that I will become the first generation of philosophers to take blogs as the “original text.”

Also, you say that regarding all the resources of the internet as 1—I don’t know what this “1” is. All the people who might possibly read my blog online? But that is an abstract possibility. In fact, if I publish my words in a newspaper, then all the people who might potentially see my words via the internet could also potentially get hold of that newspaper, and some additional people who cannot go online could also potentially get hold of that newspaper. So does that mean that by choosing to publish in a newspaper, I am choosing an audience larger than the internet’s? That does not seem to be the case. Theoretical possible readership is one thing; actual readership is another. What is this “1” that you just toss out? I can plainly see that my blog’s total number of hits is “274453”; considering that more than half of them are search-engine spiders, the actual readership probably does not exceed four digits. But it is not “1.”