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It's not our fault that society can't bear to look at itself in a mirror. Postmodernism broadly consists of only two tools. The first, as you mentioned, is the

It's not our fault that society can't bear to look at itself in a mirror. Postmodernism broadly consists of only two tools. The first, as you mentioned, is the deconstructive POV, the ability to look at an object as-is and to understand its origin, its design, its footguns, its flawed narrative, its social excuses, its secret hatreds. But there's more. We also get the curse of relativity, the understanding that all epistemic sources are relative and that we ultimately choose to believe what we believe. This was definitely frustrating, coming on the heels of modernism, and that's why postmodernism has its name: modernism is clearly wrong and serves only to mislead and enslave via narrative control. But in return, we get something good: Concepts can become relativized too, and so we get many simple metaphysical statements as ways to understand what things are. What is a proof? Well, it's whatever convinces you that something is true. We lose absolute proof, but each of us gain a deeper understanding of what it means to prove something to somebody. What is art? Well, it's an expression in some medium. We lose art galleries, but now we can be artistic just by expressing ourselves any time we find new media, such as video games or graffiti or atomic layer deposition or selfies. We get another good thing: A more precise understanding of how the various pieces of knowledge fit together. By talking of theories and evidence and logic as objects in their own rights, rather than as absolute facets of the universe, we can connect the various sciences and reunify the entire philosophical endeavor under a single umbrella, just like Quine always wanted with his semantic web of science. Maths is logic is metaphysics. [0] Edit: Formatting, examples. [0] https://philpapers.org/archive/ALVLIM-3.pdf https://philpapers.org/archive/ALVLIM-3.pdf

cristianpascu 8y ago
All I can think about when reading post-modernists, with their critique narrative of western science and rational authority, is that they just want more sex. No surprise, since the most prominent post modernists are French. Kidding here and sort of not. What are you left with if you critique the West as a phallocracy, patriarchal oppression of women, and ALSO objective knowledge? Something like: "Let's get together and feel alright!"
golergka 8y ago
> modernism is clearly wrong and serves only to mislead and enslave via narrative control No, it shows something completely different: modernism is merely subjective, just like anything else. I wholeheartedly agree with the subjectivity part of post-modernism, but I don't see how it contradicts or disproves the modernist concepts; if anything, it only strengthens the objectivits approach, where each person or a collective is assumed to act out of his own, subjective, self-interest. The only thing it destroys is utilitiarian "universal" ethical system, which is completely deserved.
lmm 8y ago
It's not that we can't bear to look at ourselves in a mirror. It's that objective reality, truth and all of that do exist, good art is better than bad art in ways that aren't purely relative, and so on. Postmodernism loses you more than you gain.
- ThomPete 8y ago
  Just saying they exist doesn't make them exist. Good art vs. bad art isn't an argument against postmodernism. Whenever I meet people who claim there is an objective truth I always ask them to give any examples. So far I have not met anyone who can come up with an objective claim that isn't merely basing that on a frame of reference which can be deconstructed or shown to be based on a set of apriori assumptions itself.
  - zxcmx 8y ago
    I am reminded of the “brick in the face” argument against solopsism. Tell me whack more about your whack frame of reference... I see postmodernism and extreme relativism as a sort of awesome stage of society where we get to make up reality because we are freed from mundane concerns like knowing where our water comes from or where our sh%t gets flushed to. It is quite wonderful that many many people get the luxury of never even being curious about these things. Meanwhile, the engineers, doctors, carers, labourers (I am missing a lot out here) who ultimately keep people alive tend to have quite definite opinions about critical aspects of reality. Granted these are still not objective truths because all experience is subjective. All I can say is that a sophist who believes that rent is not an objective truth is nonetheless likely to find themselves (subjectively) on the streets if they don’t pay it.
    - ThomPete 8y ago
      With regards to rent. That's a human construct not something that exist out there that I cannot ignore. I could ignore it and if I am strong enough I can take it away from you. So rent is in fact highly subjective. Not the definition but the reality of it.
    - 8y ago
forgottenpass 8y ago
>modernism is clearly wrong and serves only to mislead and enslave via narrative control And when postmodernism is used as a toolkit to deploy different narratives, with the same amount of misleading and control, pointed a in slightly tweaked directions? What exactly did we get? A new way to set down a foundation of bullshit, but perpetrated by a group that pulls up the ladder behind them. Excluding anyone who doesn't know how to play their semantic games from having an opinion about consensus reality.

cristianpascu 8y ago

All I can think about when reading post-modernists, with their critique narrative of western science and rational authority, is that they just want more sex. No surprise, since the most prominent post modernists are French. Kidding here and sort of not. What are you left with if you critique the West as a phallocracy, patriarchal oppression of women, and ALSO objective knowledge? Something like: "Let's get together and feel alright!"

golergka 8y ago

> modernism is clearly wrong and serves only to mislead and enslave via narrative control No, it shows something completely different: modernism is merely subjective, just like anything else. I wholeheartedly agree with the subjectivity part of post-modernism, but I don't see how it contradicts or disproves the modernist concepts; if anything, it only strengthens the objectivits approach, where each person or a collective is assumed to act out of his own, subjective, self-interest. The only thing it destroys is utilitiarian "universal" ethical system, which is completely deserved.

lmm 8y ago

It's not that we can't bear to look at ourselves in a mirror. It's that objective reality, truth and all of that do exist, good art is better than bad art in ways that aren't purely relative, and so on. Postmodernism loses you more than you gain.

ThomPete 8y ago
Just saying they exist doesn't make them exist. Good art vs. bad art isn't an argument against postmodernism. Whenever I meet people who claim there is an objective truth I always ask them to give any examples. So far I have not met anyone who can come up with an objective claim that isn't merely basing that on a frame of reference which can be deconstructed or shown to be based on a set of apriori assumptions itself.
- zxcmx 8y ago
  I am reminded of the “brick in the face” argument against solopsism. Tell me whack more about your whack frame of reference... I see postmodernism and extreme relativism as a sort of awesome stage of society where we get to make up reality because we are freed from mundane concerns like knowing where our water comes from or where our sh%t gets flushed to. It is quite wonderful that many many people get the luxury of never even being curious about these things. Meanwhile, the engineers, doctors, carers, labourers (I am missing a lot out here) who ultimately keep people alive tend to have quite definite opinions about critical aspects of reality. Granted these are still not objective truths because all experience is subjective. All I can say is that a sophist who believes that rent is not an objective truth is nonetheless likely to find themselves (subjectively) on the streets if they don’t pay it.
  - ThomPete 8y ago
    With regards to rent. That's a human construct not something that exist out there that I cannot ignore. I could ignore it and if I am strong enough I can take it away from you. So rent is in fact highly subjective. Not the definition but the reality of it.
  - 8y ago

forgottenpass 8y ago

>modernism is clearly wrong and serves only to mislead and enslave via narrative control And when postmodernism is used as a toolkit to deploy different narratives, with the same amount of misleading and control, pointed a in slightly tweaked directions? What exactly did we get? A new way to set down a foundation of bullshit, but perpetrated by a group that pulls up the ladder behind them. Excluding anyone who doesn't know how to play their semantic games from having an opinion about consensus reality.