A sacred philosopher rapper, that’s how many English-speaking newspapers have been talking about it since this weekend: “Philosophy has a new champion” headline the British weekly The Spectator, “A rapper rehabilitates the thought of the philosopher Michel Foucault”, precise The Times. Who are we talking about ? From MC Hammer, the rapper who made the booms of the 1990s dance with his hit Can’t Touch This. Thirty years later, he is still a small celebrity, still a music producer, and followed by 3.2 million people on Twitter, a platform on which he enjoys lately to share his readings, his thoughts, his flashes.
MC Hammer has encouraged his fans to read everyone from Nietzsche to Baudrillard, writes Hal Hobson https://t.co/8Y5scxoMiv
— Spectator Life (@Spectator_LIFE) February 26, 2021
Last week he urged his subscribers to read an article published in the journal Nature on the need for scientists to take an interest in the philosophy of science. In other words, to question themselves, to study themselves: why do they embark on such or such studies, how, and with what bias? Suggestion to which one of his subscribers replied: “Philosophy only flirts with ideas, while science is a commitment to truth.” Big controversy … Or rather big anything, retorted the rapper: “You tire us with this kind of reasoning, he writes, especially since we are not going to count the number of errors defended by scientists throughout history … No. We must not pit science against philosophy, but make the two work together (…) when we measure something, we include the one who measures. “
You bore us. If science is a “commitment to truth” shall we site all the historical non-truths perpetuated by scientists ? Of course not. It’s not science vs Philosophy … It’s Science + Philosophy. Elevate your Thinking and Consciousness. When you measure include the measurer. https://t.co/hsZzHNwJ0M
— MC HAMMER (@MCHammer) February 22, 2021
To study something, you also have to ask yourself who is studying. Who asks the questions, which questions and why. Which is one of the major lessons that Michel Foucault left us. Not only to find this on the account of a rapper is quite unexpected, but the impact that this tweet had is even more: 80,000 likes, and thanks by the thousands from students, teachers, researchers, writers. As if two worlds suddenly meet.
MC Hammer, him, did not stop there, multiplying the reflections on the existence, the being, and especially the interest for all, whatever his background, to have an intellectual life. So, part of the internet has discovered that rap produces thought thanks to MC Hammer. At the same time, wasn’t it obvious? When we know since Nietzsche that it is necessary to do philosophy with a hammer, and that “hammer” in English is called “hammer”?
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