"Post-modernism"

[Propertarian]

Can anbody convince me to read this stuff? What and why should I read?

[luckyme]

[ QUOTE ]
Can anbody convince me to read this stuff? What and why should I read?

[/ QUOTE ]

Read about the Sokal Affair ( Wiki covers it), that's a good grounding in post-modernism.

[Propertarian]

That leads me to not want to read it. Does anybody have anything good to say about it?

[madnak]

Don't do it! It's a trap!!!

[Phil153]

Postmodernism is basically the idea that everything is a social construct, and that no perspective is inherently favored over another.

It's a knee jerk reaction to the dogma of the 18-20th century, the arrogance of white colonists and the events of World War II. Kind of an intellectual equivalent of a teenager becoming an anarchist just to piss of his parents. I consider it a cancer of the mind that promotes solipsism and erodes the boundaries of truth and objectivity.

As to why you should read it, it's a good case study of the fallacies that can arise in human thought and the dangers of overthinking. If you approach it from the perspective of spotting its flaws, it'll probably make you a clearer thinker.

This wikipedia article is a pretty start:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Postmodernism

[Propertarian]

Thanks for the thoughts; I know what it is and what I think of it (not very highly)-I just want to see if anybody can make a good case for it

[hmkpoker]

Postmodernism will rot your brain.

I have friends that refuse to do their laundry, because laundry is a social construct. I'm not kidding.

[yukoncpa]

[ QUOTE ]
Read about the Sokal Affair ( Wiki covers it), that's a good grounding in post-modernism.



[/ QUOTE ]
Great article. I don't recall Bill O'reilly, et al, bloviating on this particular Duke University scandal.

[bobman0330]

[ QUOTE ]
Postmodernism will rot your brain.

I have friends that refuse to do their laundry, because laundry is a social construct. I'm not kidding.

[/ QUOTE ]

Really? That's awesome.

[luckyme]

As a few have commented, it's worth a bit of study simply because it has a big influence on our society, just as we'd study McCarthyism or even Catholicism.

When I first ran across it I thought it'd be a good reminder to take claimed truths with a grain of salt. Turned out to be based on subsisting on salt alone, by the barrelful, and you can watch people brains shrivel up like a tablespoon of salt on a slug.

It's a nice study in what happens when the hippies inherit their parents wealth or too many artists are taught to read and write.

[wacki]

One thing I hate about postmodern people is they use simple words in big ways to make them sound smart. For instance:

"One of the most significant differences between modernism and postmodernism is the concern for universality or totality. While modernist artists aimed to capture universality or totality in some sense, postmodernists have rejected these ambitions as "metanarratives.""

"Postmodernists tend to emphasize the cultural contingency or relativity of different forms of intellectual production and may be critical of those who attempt "pure," "objective," or "disinterested" intellectual endeavours."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Postmodernism

I have no clue what any of that [censored] means. I understand the words in a vacuum but put them together I'm like WTF?!? Anyone have a link written in non-retarded english?

[Propertarian]

You just haven't sucessfully deconstructed laundry yet.

[evolvedForm]

Um, if everything is a social construct, and they don't do anything that is a social construct, then what do they do? /images/graemlins/confused.gif

[hmkpoker]

[ QUOTE ]
Um, if everything is a social construct, and they don't do anything that is a social construct, then what do they do? /images/graemlins/confused.gif

[/ QUOTE ]

I guess they don't think that weed is a social construct

[hmkpoker]

The goal of postmodernism is to confuse people as to what exactly postmodernism is.

[luckyme]

[ QUOTE ]

Um, if everything is a social construct, and they don't do anything that is a social construct, then what do they do

[/ QUOTE ]
Mostly criticize the people who are doing the hard work that provides these eggheads with their pampered lives. I'm always tempted to pick up a brick and toss it at their head and say, "you don't have to duck, bricks and the scientific claims about them are simply social constructs.. simply think 'marshmallow'. "

[wacki]

[ QUOTE ]
The goal of postmodernism is to confuse people as to what exactly postmodernism is.

[/ QUOTE ]

Please add this into the wiki.

[evolvedForm]

Actually, they are right on that one. Weed is an herbal construct, i believe, that utilizes the method known as "gravitational," (Newtonian construct), "bonging" (engineering construct), or "blunting" (ghettofabulous construct).

[Jordan Olsommer]

[ QUOTE ]
Postmodernism will rot your brain.

I have friends that refuse to do their laundry, because laundry is a social construct. I'm not kidding.

[/ QUOTE ]

The most effective counterpoint to this line of reasoning is a punch to the face, preferably a jab - something that won't hurt too much. When they express displeasure at your retort, ask them why, since, after all, your fist is simply a social construct.

[Scotch78]

I have a feeling that my friend was plagiarizing this description, but he liked to call post-modernism "The Glorification of Confusion".

My personal opinion is that postmodernists are a bunch of people who don't understand existentialism. First, Frenchmen like Derrida and Foucault reduced digestion to deconstruction, then Americans confused destruction for deconstruction.

And if you would like a more concrete explanation, imagine that life is a bunch of Legos. Essentialists are offering those pretty pictorial instruction booklets. Existentialists point out that the Legos are already put together, and the better ones take them apart piece-by-piece so that they can build something else. Post-modernists smash the Legos with a hammer and then wonder why they can't make anything out of the pieces.

Scott

[bearly]

well phil, you nailed it in a very generous way. i was going to answer propertarian by pointing out that his work would be one more adventure in a study of what passes for "thinking" among some folk...............b

[Phil153]

[ QUOTE ]
One thing I hate about postmodern people is they use simple words in big ways to make them sound smart. For instance:

"One of the most significant differences between modernism and postmodernism is the concern for universality or totality. While modernist artists aimed to capture universality or totality in some sense, postmodernists have rejected these ambitions as "metanarratives.""

"Postmodernists tend to emphasize the cultural contingency or relativity of different forms of intellectual production and may be critical of those who attempt "pure," "objective," or "disinterested" intellectual endeavours."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Postmodernism

I have no clue what any of that [censored] means. I understand the words in a vacuum but put them together I'm like WTF?!? Anyone have a link written in non-retarded english?

[/ QUOTE ]
Reading the Sokal Hoax (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sokal_Affair) is a great introduction to the topic. He pretty much owns these commie clowns.

The quoted paragraph basically means:

(1) Postmodernists seek relatives over absolutes. They deny humans are capable of absolute objective truth. Everything is colored by social perspectives.

(2) The second paragraph means "everyone's perspective is equally valid. No method of obtaining knowledge is more correct than any other.

Obviously when stated like this these ideas are either trivial, or blatantly false. Which is why they dress it up with big words such as "hegemony" and "metanarratives" and "transgressive" - inventing words to embody concepts which are otherwise made of air. They end up convincing themselves of the truth of their own arguments, and get to feel powerful for intellectually deriding the "metanarratives" that dominant white males brought to the world (such as truth, objectivity, sketpticism and the scientific method).

It really is that sad.

[MidGe]

[ QUOTE ]
Obviously when stated like this these ideas are either trivial, or blatantly false. Which is why they dress it up with big words such as "hegemony" and "metanarratives" and "transgressive" - inventing words to embody concepts which are otherwise made of air. They end up convincing themselves of the truth of their own arguments, and get to feel powerful for intellectually deriding the "metanarratives" that dominant white males brought to the world (such as truth, objectivity, sketpticism and the scientific method).


[/ QUOTE ]

I think this is a hegemonical white male transgressive metanarrative. /images/graemlins/smile.gif

[ QUOTE ]
Can anbody convince me to read this stuff? What and why should I read?

[/ QUOTE ]

Here's an exemplary first read, Propertarian: a short 1-page essay with footnotes.

Your mission (should you decide to accept it) is to read the brief essay (and probably some of the footnotes), and then address the following:

1) contrast the relative avantages and disadvantages of the following two approaches to deconstructive analysis:

a) the use of subtextual capitalist theory within the context of the dialectic of culture

versus

b) the use of subpatriarchalist material theory within the context of embedded hierarchies.

Which method, would you suppose, is better suited to class analysis with emphasis on the underlying influences of the collective unconscious, and its hidden role in forming class divisions?

2) Given certain similarities between Marx's "postcapitalist culture" and hypothetical implementations of some of the views of Rawls, Dworkin and Walzer (following capitalist deappropriation), in what way would the presemioticist paradigm of reality (see Marx's essay) affect existential efforts to modify class? In what ways might this principle lead to a confounding (yet not necessarily insuperable) effect when combined with certain inherent biases of the collective unconscious?

The short essay, with footnoted authors, is linked to below:

http://www.gingko.ch/cdrom/jwrandom/postmodernism/index.html

[halt i am reptar]

What does presemioticist mean? When reading these threads, I have to frequently look up words to keep up (not that I am familiar with any of those guys' views on social interworkings anyhow). But I could not find anything on the definition of presemioticist, nor any alternate spelling. Could you please help me out here

[luckyme]

[ QUOTE ]
What does presemioticist mean?

[/ QUOTE ]

The attraction of postmodernism is that words or ideas don't "have" a meaning. You supply the meaning, not the author. ( why they bother writing anything or making claims always baffles me, but then I don't smoke anything that strong).

[Phil153]

A quick google search came up with this gem (http://72.14.203.104/search?q=cache:Zi7mFOyneb8J:www.elsewhere.org/cgi-bin/postmodern/7498.76355649477+presemioticist&hl=en&gl=au&ct=cln k&cd=10&client=firefox-a). Not that it answers your question, but it's more quasi-amusing brain rot to go with MMMMM's fine selection.

[ QUOTE ]
Therefore, Lyotard uses the term 'presemioticist narrative' to denote not narrative, but postnarrative. The subject is interpolated into a Baudrillardist simulacra that includes narrativity as a reality.

[/ QUOTE ]

[ QUOTE ]
What does presemioticist mean? When reading these threads, I have to frequently look up words to keep up (not that I am familiar with any of those guys' views on social interworkings anyhow). But I could not find anything on the definition of presemioticist, nor any alternate spelling. Could you please help me out here

[/ QUOTE ]

I would guess it is related to "semiotic":

Semiotic:

"1. Of or relating to semantics.

Main Entry: se·mi·ot·ic
Pronunciation: -'ät-ik
Variant: or se·mi·ot·ics /-iks/
Function: noun
Inflected Form: plural semiotics
: a general philosophical theory of signs and symbols that deals especially with their function in both artificially constructed and natural languages and comprises syntactics, semantics, and pragmatics —semiotic adjective"

http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/semiotic

So..."presemiotic" or "presemioticist" might indicate ______ before the period when semiotics became philosophical theory, or before the period before semantics became a significant topic of formal study or theory?

[Phil153]

That would make way too much sense for a postmodernist's word. From the link I gave above:

[ QUOTE ]
The main theme of the works of Rushdie is not discourse, but subdiscourse. Debord uses the term 'presemioticist narrative' to denote the fatal flaw, and eventually the stasis, of capitalist sexual identity.

In the works of Rushdie, a predominant concept is the distinction between creation and destruction. In a sense, an abundance of theories concerning Baudrillardist simulacra may be discovered. Bataille uses the term 'the postpatriarchial paradigm of expression' to denote not narrative, as presemioticist narrative suggests, but subnarrative.

Therefore, several constructions concerning the role of the reader as observer exist. Derrida's critique of Baudrillardist simulacra holds that language has significance.

[/ QUOTE ]

[madnak]

What's sad isn't that they claim to be relativists. It's that they claim to be relativists and then criticize everyone else on objective grounds. The idea is that relativism justifies hypocrisy. It's almost a matter of, "hypocrisy is unavoidable, so embrace it." I'm not being facetious here, either; many postmodernists believe that directly contradicting themselves is a good expression of how there's "no such thing as truth" or how we rely too much on logic. Some might even consider it their "responsibility" to do logical things in order to "prove logic wrong."

The basic theory of postmodernism is fine. But postmodernists typically choose arbitrarily how to apply it. The earlier example of the punch in the face really is valid, it's not a misinterpretation or a trite metaphor. Death is a social construct, pain is a social construct, etc. But in 90% of what they do, postmodernists will follow the normal "metanarratives" like everyone else. 10% of the time, however, when it's convenient for them and only when it's convenient for them, they'll petulantly refuse. They use postmodernism as a justification for any course of action, because every course of action is equally justified. And hey, if they act like spoiled children, who's to say there's anything wrong with that?

Then there's postmodern culture, which is another exercise in contradiction and nonsense. The postmodern culture could be described, in a sense, as an "anti-culture culture." Again they don't really care that it's a contradiction. Postmodernism suggests that there's no real "quality" in art, and that the viewer determines the content rather than the author. Yet, many artists and philosophers are hailed as heroes. In reality, the writings of Derrida and Foucault should be considered no more valid than the scrawlings of a third-grader. Also, by creating a postmodern cultural hierarchy, what they've done is to create a postmodern "metanarrative." And by the relative standards of postmodernism, their metanarrative is in no way superior to any other metanarrative (such as the ones they're fond of criticizing). In fact, since postmodernists are "supposed" to be against metanarratives, postmodernists "should" be against postmodernism - but it's the postmodern metanarrative that suggests they should be against metanarratives in the first place! Of course, they're insulated from this kind of criticism; anyone who makes sense just "doesn't get it."

A lot of people getting into postmodernism think of it as jumping down a rabbit hole. But in reality there's none of the grace and humor of Carroll, just a lot of mud (http://www.elsewhere.org/pomo).

[The once and future king]

[ QUOTE ]
Postmodernism is basically the idea that everything is a social construct, and that no perspective is inherently favored over another.

It's a knee jerk reaction to the dogma of the 18-20th century, the arrogance of white colonists and the events of World War II. Kind of an intellectual equivalent of a teenager becoming an anarchist just to piss of his parents. I consider it a cancer of the mind that promotes solipsism and erodes the boundaries of truth and objectivity.

As to why you should read it, it's a good case study of the fallacies that can arise in human thought and the dangers of overthinking. If you approach it from the perspective of spotting its flaws, it'll probably make you a clearer thinker.

This wikipedia article is a pretty start:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Postmodernism

[/ QUOTE ]

Spoken like a true modernist.

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
Can anbody convince me to read this stuff? What and why should I read?

[/ QUOTE ]

Here's an exemplary first read, Propertarian: a short 1-page essay with footnotes.

Your mission (should you decide to accept it) is to read the brief essay (and probably some of the footnotes), and then address the following:

1) contrast the relative avantages and disadvantages of the following two approaches to deconstructive analysis:

a) the use of subtextual capitalist theory within the context of the dialectic of culture

versus

b) the use of subpatriarchalist material theory within the context of embedded hierarchies.

Which method, would you suppose, is better suited to class analysis with emphasis on the underlying influences of the collective unconscious, and its hidden role in forming class divisions?

2) Given certain similarities between Marx's "postcapitalist culture" and hypothetical implementations of some of the views of Rawls, Dworkin and Walzer (following capitalist deappropriation), in what way would the presemioticist paradigm of reality (see Marx's essay) affect existential efforts to modify class? In what ways might this principle lead to a confounding (yet not necessarily insuperable) effect when combined with certain inherent biases of the collective unconscious?

The short essay, with footnoted authors, is linked to below:

http://www.gingko.ch/cdrom/jwrandom/postmodernism/index.html

[/ QUOTE ]

Anyone want to take a crack at the questions I posed above?

[Jordan Olsommer]

[ QUOTE ]
That would make way too much sense for a postmodernist's word. From the link I gave above:

[ QUOTE ]
The main theme of the works of Rushdie is not discourse, but subdiscourse. Debord uses the term 'presemioticist narrative' to denote the fatal flaw, and eventually the stasis, of capitalist sexual identity.

In the works of Rushdie, a predominant concept is the distinction between creation and destruction. In a sense, an abundance of theories concerning Baudrillardist simulacra may be discovered. Bataille uses the term 'the postpatriarchial paradigm of expression' to denote not narrative, as presemioticist narrative suggests, but subnarrative.

Therefore, several constructions concerning the role of the reader as observer exist. Derrida's critique of Baudrillardist simulacra holds that language has significance.

[/ QUOTE ]

[/ QUOTE ]

"Language has significance"?

How utterly profound.

Its been said many times before, but it bears repeating: when someone really understands something and is trying to explain it to other people, they make it less complicated, not more. More is the sign of someone who is essentially insecure in his proclaimed expertise, and can be identified by such phrases as "capitalist sexual identity." (what the hell does that even mean? Were the people in socialist Russia boning each other significantly more or significantly less than Americans? Was there some army of Maoist transvestites that I was never told about in history class?)

Oddly enough, if you know a farmer you can get a machine that spouts bullsh*t for only a few grand, and it wont even mind if you don't give it tenure.

[Michaelson]

Just for the record, the text quoted by Phil153 above was unwittingly taken from the Postmodern Thesis Generator and is in fact satire rather than the work of an actual postmodern author.

As it states at the bottom of the page: [ QUOTE ]
The essay you have just seen is completely meaningless and was randomly generated by the Postmodernism Generator. To generate another essay, follow this link.

The Postmodernism Generator was written by Andrew C. Bulhak using the Dada Engine, a system for generating random text from recursive grammars, and modified very slightly by Josh Larios (this version, anyway. There are others out there).

[/ QUOTE ]

Makes it somewhat amusing that the Sokal hoax would be recommended as an appropriate starting point for enquiry into postmodernism.

At least MMMMMM was aware of what he was posting.

But then, this thread is nothing more than self-conratulatory back-slapping so I guess it's neither here nor there.

There's no way I'm going to step in and try to defend 'postmodernism' here, for a couple of reasons. 1) I don't know a great deal about those 'postmodern' authors. And 2) I disagree with much that is argued for in the name of postmodernism.

However, it is disheartening to see people who have clearly made no real effort to engage with certain ideas summarily dismiss them. I can completely understand the frustration people feel when trying to get their head around the incredibly convoluted prose of some of these authors. I can also understand the frustration of trying to make sense of how relativists can justify attacks on "dominant metanarratives" and the like.

However, 'postmodernism' has undoubtedly shaken up the academic world considerably. A lot of what is carried out in its name seems patently absurd, but it has also largely succeeded in drawing attention to absurdities that have dominated western thought since the enlightenment. So often when people antagonistic to 'postmodernism' critique it they ignore this fact and rely on caricatures and strawmen to make their case. This thread is a perfect testament to that fact.

It should also be noted that we're dealing with individual authors who, believe it or not, do not form a part of a homogenous whole. Obviously its easier to discuss if you pigeon-hole them, but it makes it much easier to misrepresent and distort the collective work of those authors to do so. All of a sudden you have "contradictions" because one author's idea is incompatible with another's, and so the whole 'movement' is suddenly invalidated.

I guess all I'm saying is that it would pay many people to be less single-mindedly antagonistic when it comes to 'postmodernism'.

End of rant.

[ QUOTE ]
At least MMMMMM was aware of what he was posting.

[/ QUOTE ]

Well, yes--but I was just trying to have a little fun.

[Michaelson]

That's fine, I'm quite a fan of the post modern generator.

It's just a bit lazy to quote from it as proof that postmodernism is intelectually bankrupt, as Phil did after you.

[madnak]

[ QUOTE ]
However, it is disheartening to see people who have clearly made no real effort to engage with certain ideas summarily dismiss them.

[/ QUOTE ]

It's disheartening to see people assume that anyone who disagrees with them has "made no real effort" to understand their point of view.

[Michaelson]

Well if that's how you interpret what I had to say then so be it.

But I read over this thread and I just see typically aggressive anti-postmodernist postures. No one really offers anything other than the most shallow of representations of what postmodernism actually is (to the extent it is even possible to speak of postmodernism as a unified theory). Except for a couple of token references to Derrida and Foucault no one refers to specific authors. Even when those names are dropped, there's no real talk of their ideas... I mean, I don't expect academic standards of discussion on a bulletin board, but there's no real regard here at all for what's being discussed. People glance at readers, or second hand accounts, or hear about the Sokal affair and all of a sudden their mind is made up. I used to be exactly the same and many people I know and respect greatly still are. I'm not saying everyone in this thread is, but little has been put forward to suggest otherwise.

Take, for example, the notion that laundry is a social construct. That was latched onto that pretty quickly.

I personally would have thought that postmodernists generally argue that notions of morality, or historic truth, or aesthetic value, or power structures, or 'regimes of truth' etc are socially contingent. I've never heard anyone say that laundry is a social construct. My guess is that the friends who won't do laundry because its a social construct have either been horribly misrepresented here or in fact have no idea what they are talking about. In my experience either explanation would make sense equally.

If people wanted to look they could find any number of particularly stupid ideas put forward in the name of postmodern theory. That's not my point. It's just there seems to be no effort in this thread to even try to provide a fair account of the broad themes of postmodern thinking.

[madnak]

[ QUOTE ]
It's just there seems to be no effort in this thread to even try to provide a fair account of the broad themes of postmodern thinking.

[/ QUOTE ]

Such an effort seems almost pointless to me. I don't know that I could coherently describe postmodernism, because my attempts at description would consist primarily of definitions and enumerations of attributes. That doesn't seem like a credible approach where postmodernism is concerned. I think it's impossible to avoid misrepresenting the subject while working from any kind of formal perspective. And I'm not sure how else to proceed.

[Phil153]

[ QUOTE ]
Just for the record, the text quoted by Phil153 above was unwittingly taken from the Postmodern Thesis Generator and is in fact satire rather than the work of an actual postmodern author.

[/ QUOTE ]
You're right. This is extremely embarassing.

[ QUOTE ]
Makes it somewhat amusing that the Sokal hoax would be recommended as an appropriate starting point for enquiry into postmodernism.

[/ QUOTE ]

Quite the opposite. The whole point of the Sokal Hoax is that postmodern writing is so intellectually bankrupt, that even obvious nonsense can pass for scholarly work worthy of publication. The fact that the Social text editors fell for the prank, although very amusing, is not the main point.

The fact that a computer can generate nonsense so similar to some postmodern works as to fool a casual observer, only adds to my point (while also making me look like a complete idiot).

[ QUOTE ]
But then, this thread is nothing more than self-conratulatory back-slapping so I guess it's neither here nor there.

[/ QUOTE ]
I agree. So let's start a discussion about postmodern works you consider worthy of consideration.

[ QUOTE ]
However, it is disheartening to see people who have clearly made no real effort to engage with certain ideas summarily dismiss them.

[/ QUOTE ]
Let's hear which ideas are worthy of discussion. When I read things like Irigaray's assertion that fluid mechanics is poorly understood compared to solid mechanics because of sexism within science (men have hard edges, women have fluids), I tend to throw the baby out with the bathwater.

[ QUOTE ]
However, 'postmodernism' has undoubtedly shaken up the academic world considerably.

[/ QUOTE ]
But what has come from it? Are we wiser as a whole? Are student in the humanities more capable of understanding and dealing with the world's problems as a result of a postmodern education? Are they more insightful, decisive thinkers or more passive and confused?

[ QUOTE ]
I guess all I'm saying is that it would pay many people to be less single-mindedly antagonistic when it comes to 'postmodernism'.

[/ QUOTE ]
There are many perspectives out there, and some of them are actually detrimental. Is there good in postmodernism? Maybe. But does the cost of studying this stuff outweigh the benefits? I argue that it does.

[Jordan Olsommer]

[ QUOTE ]
Makes it somewhat amusing that the Sokal hoax would be recommended as an appropriate starting point for enquiry into postmodernism.

[/ QUOTE ]

Not at all - Sokal showed that absolute nonsense could pass as a postmodernist work worthy enough to be published in a journal, so it shouldn't be at all surprising that absolute nonsense could pass as postmodernist critique to 'laymen'.

It's also one of the most delicious practical jokes that I can recall, and I never fail to crack a smile when I think of it.

[ QUOTE ]

But then, this thread is nothing more than self-conratulatory back-slapping so I guess it's neither here nor there.

[/ QUOTE ]

Bashing postmodernism is about as much "self-congratulatory back-slapping" as it is to brag about kicking an eight-year-old retard's ass.

[ QUOTE ]
However, it is disheartening to see people who have clearly made no real effort to engage with certain ideas summarily dismiss them.

[/ QUOTE ]

One can decide, with a decently high rate of accuracy, whether someone has worthy ideas or is full of [censored] relatively quickly. In some cases the BS-detector happens to be wrong (eg physicists who rejected quantum mechanics when they first heard of it and its implications), but this occurs only after the evidence mounts. I sincerely doubt a postmodernist will ever build a bridge, cure cancer, or even tell you anything about how to live your life (as good philosophers do), so I'll poke fun at them all I want and have an inappropriately large smile on my face whilst doing so, thanks.

[ QUOTE ]
I can completely understand the frustration people feel when trying to get their head around the incredibly convoluted prose of some of these authors.

[/ QUOTE ]

That's called "semantic gymnastics" - it's what people engage in when they want to sound important, feel important about themselves, and make it seem like they have ideas when in reality, if they actually just came out and said what they meant, they would be quite rightly laughed at. You don't see Sokal Affairs in mathematics or physics, and for good reason. In fact, I would speculate that this might be why so many postmodernists seem to be ex- or current Marxists - both academic sects require enormous suspension of belief in the evidence around them in order to keep from collapsing. (not to mention the ideals of Marxism would provide for a healthy, guaranteed income for an (at least in the capitalist economy) out-of-work postmodernist professor)

[ QUOTE ]
However, 'postmodernism' has undoubtedly shaken up the academic world considerably. A lot of what is carried out in its name seems patently absurd, but it has also largely succeeded in drawing attention to absurdities that have dominated western thought since the enlightenment.

[/ QUOTE ]

From a course syllabus in postmodernism (http://www.as.ua.edu/ant/Faculty/murphy/436/pomo.htm):

[ QUOTE ]
Postmodernism is highly debated even among postmodernists themselves. For an initial characterization of its basic premises, consider anthropological critic Melford Spiro's excellent synopsis of the basic tenets of postmodernism:

“The postmodernist critique of science consists of two interrelated arguments, epistemological and ideological. Both are based on subjectivity. First, because of the subjectivity of the human object, anthropology, according to the epistemological argument cannot be a science; and in any event the subjectivity of the human subject precludes the possibility of science discovering objective truth. Second, since objectivity is an illusion, science according to the ideological argument, subverts oppressed groups, females, ethnics, third-world peoples (Spiro 1996).

[/ QUOTE ]

That last sentence alone is a goldmine of BS.

"Science cannot discover objective truth"? Wake me when the first postmodernist on his death bed refuses all medical care. Why not, if his experience is completely subjective and he can't go by what those scientists say? If he truly believed in this tenet of postmodernism, he would have not the slightest, tiniest inkling of an idea whether penicillin would work on him or not.

And subjectivity is being studied by neurologists, most famously in the problem of "qualia." I dont know about you, but personally, between the two, the horse I'm backing is neurology. But hey, if someone earnestly thinks they can cure schizophrenia with "incredulity towards metanarratives," I'm all ears.

So from what I've seen thus far, all postmodernism means is you take the philosophy 101 chewing gum that we've all toyed with at some point in our lives (as a side note, it's quite something to watch someone go from one minute in jaw-dropping awe questioning the very existence of a world behind the sensory input he's receiving and the next minute getting violently angry that Ethan emptied the bong when there was clearly at least one good hit left in it), except these people forgot to take the next step of saying "heh - well, that's something" and landing back in reality.

Based solely on the merits of the core descriptions and tenets of post-modernism that I have viewed thus far, I personally judge it to be completely worthless for my desire to know more about the world. And that's all that is necessary - I don't need to publish a point-by-point retort to an intentionally incomprehensible mess to have a permission slip to make fun of douchebags who have a precious teardrop of common sense floating in an ocean of vocabulary. I can take a cursory glance at their ideas, say "sounds like a bunch of knobs," and then ignore them until given compelling evidence to do otherwise.




"Anyone who believes the laws of physics are mere social conventions is invited to try transgressing those conventions from the windows of my apartment ..on the twenty-first floor." - Alan Sokal

[luckyme]

[ QUOTE ]
No one really offers anything other than the most shallow of representations of what postmodernism actually is (to the extent it is even possible to speak of postmodernism as a unified theory).

[/ QUOTE ]

If you don't see the conflict in the two parts of your complaint then your best recourse is to log into the psychology forum :-)

[ QUOTE ]
I personally would have thought that postmodernists generally argue that notions of morality, or historic truth, or aesthetic value, or power structures, or 'regimes of truth' etc are socially contingent.

[/ QUOTE ]

You simply gotta get out more. If that's what postmodernism was about it's something we would mention while stirring our morning coffee and move on to discussing issues that weren't so obvious. That there are contextual and subjective considerations in situations is not something that will jar the reality of successful poker players. Postmodernist claims uses that 'given' and explode it in an attempt to wipe out all rational approaches to a topic.

You want a logical attack on pm? Why. Logic will repress some one-legged dwarf in Botswahli...haven't you heard?

"I personally would have thought..." cheeez. Nobody was expressing their opinion on your personal hopes for pm, but about the actual claims made by pm writers they have read or attempted to exchange ideas with.

Sure the criticism of pm contains a lot of ridicule, but that's only because pm ( the actual, not your home model) is ridiculous.

[Michaelson]

I will respond to some of these points in a day or two, I haven't responded because I've been particularly busy, not because I'm cutting and running.

However, I will say again that I don't intend to defend pm for the reasons I outlined in my first post.

While I'm here, though. [ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
No one really offers anything other than the most shallow of representations of what postmodernism actually is (to the extent it is even possible to speak of postmodernism as a unified theory).

[/ QUOTE ]
If you don't see the conflict in the two parts of your complaint then your best recourse is to log into the psychology forum :-)

[/ QUOTE ]
My point is that those who rally against postmodernism--which is really a pretty amorphus notion given the application of pomo ideas in various fields of study, and even within various fields of study--usually either provide a one line account of "what postmodernism is" or else they pick and choose amongst the most absurd examples of which they are aware. This is why I emphasised that it is difficult and mistaken to speak simply of "postmodernism" as though if you critique one pomo writer you critique them all. Make more sense?

[ QUOTE ]

You simply gotta get out more. If that's what postmodernism was about it's something we would mention while stirring our morning coffee and move on to discussing issues that weren't so obvious. That there are contextual and subjective considerations in situations is not something that will jar the reality of successful poker players. Postmodernist claims uses that 'given' and explode it in an attempt to wipe out all rational approaches to a topic.

You want a logical attack on pm? Why. Logic will repress some one-legged dwarf in Botswahli...haven't you heard?

[/ QUOTE ] And in all of that you didn't once mention exactly how I got it wrong, just that I did.

[ QUOTE ]
"I personally would have thought..." cheeez. Nobody was expressing their opinion on your personal hopes for pm, but about the actual claims made by pm writers they have read or attempted to exchange ideas with.

Sure the criticism of pm contains a lot of ridicule, but that's only because pm ( the actual, not your home model) is ridiculous.

[/ QUOTE ] "I personally would have thought" was rhetorical, though a poor and clumsy choice of phrase. I've never been a particularly good writer or orator. But my precise point is that the deep seated antagonism toward postmodernism on this thread has been largely unjustified.

Anyway, as a more general comment, my engagement with pomo authors is based purely in the humanities. Politics and philosophy only. I am aware that there are (or perhaps were) postmodernists who would deny the objectivity, and simultaneously the utility, of scientific truth. This to me seems absolutely and without a shadow of a doubt stupid and absurd. As I said specifically in my second post, it's not difficult to find examples of stupidity in postmodern theory, and particularly as postmodern writers have turned there ideas to hard science they leave me for dead (both because I don't have a background in science, and their ideas seem so obviously without foundation.)

In the general humanities, however, the sterotype doesn't really resemble the actual practice of the bulk of postmodern authors or "critical theorists". The best thing I have found from the link posted by Jordan above is this one line summation: [ QUOTE ]
Postmodernism espouses a systematic skepticism of grounded theoretical perspectives.

[/ QUOTE ]This point requires expanding, obviously, but for the moment it will suffice to note that in politics, in philosophy, in history and in aesthetics this is a project that I believe can have distinct value, depending, naturally, on the way it is undertaken. It seems rather more unlikely, however, that it could be a valuable when examining chemistry or physics.

So I guess before I deal with the bulk of the other two responses tomorow, take it on board that I'm as incredulous as anyone else toward the pomo who denies the validity of all scientific enquiry.

P.S. After looking over this, it occurs to me that someone will no doubt point out that I can't work with a one line summation that I quoted from the webpage and maintain what I said earlier in the post. In anticipation, can I just say that "systematic skepticism of grounded theoretical perspectives" will obviously manifest itself differently in different disciplines, which is why I was wary of one line explanations in the first place. Hope that makes sense, or at very least you get my understanding.

[bearly]

another clear thought on the subject......good work....................b

[madnak]

[ QUOTE ]
systematic skepticism of grounded theoretical perspectives

[/ QUOTE ]

That's not postmodernism. Just an extension of Hume. Existentialism, at most. Of course, you could always say Hume was a postmodernist. In which case you're getting so semantically muddy it's hardly worth even having the term.

I believe an idea has meaning based on how it's differentiated from other ideas. So if you're going to try to define postmodernism (unwise IMO), you'll have to explain to me how it's different from mere skepticism or even existentialism.

[Scotch78]

[ QUOTE ]
I believe an idea has meaning based on how it's differentiated from other ideas. So if you're going to try to define postmodernism (unwise IMO), you'll have to explain to me how it's different from mere skepticism or even existentialism.

[/ QUOTE ]

Did you read my lego analogy earlier in the thread? I would be interested in your comments on that as a comparative definition.

Scott

[madnak]

I thought it was a clever analogy, but it's obviously not the kind of definition a postmodernist is likely to accept.

[Scotch78]

[ QUOTE ]
but it's obviously not the kind of definition a postmodernist is likely to accept

[/ QUOTE ]

LOL, did I give you the impression that I give a flying [censored] what po-mos think? Post-modernism is a disgrace to all intelletual and artistic traditions, as well as being a life-denying theory.

Scott