Yes. Camus was excellent, Sartre too in his novels. I should've said, by the late 60's something happened that made many of the French intellectuals write poorly.

But, point well made.

True, but not a pomo-specific thing. I think more a French and German thing, right? (I'm thinking of the French and German existentialists in particular.) Lyotard, of what I've read, isn't particularly difficult in the scheme of things. — Kenosha Kid

You're right. Actually, I've read that much of this goes straight back to Kant. He was very, very obscure but quite substantive. Then look at German Idealism, all of it, minus Schopenhauer, was extremely dense. France used to be different, they strove for clarity as seen in Descartes, Diderot and so on.

Something happened post WWII were they became obscure suddenly. I think this is improving now. Lyotard is ok, not particularly hard, but I think you can notice him forming certain sentence structures which appear (to me anyway) to want to impose insight on you. He goes on to say that science is "imperialistic".

Sure, scientists have done quite horrible things. Science itself, or philosophy or any other subject itself is perfectly fine, most of the time.

It's mostly direct quotes from many Postmodernists in which they use well defined scientific terms and use in to speak of power, or politics, in short making connections that don't exist. But it was illuminating to me.

I'm no scientistic person by any means, but if I were to start saying something like masculine power can be seen to be manifested in general relativity, I would be ridiculed, rightly so.

I've seen cases in which people start saying stuff which is not too far from Deepak Chopra, though they seem to think they're being serious.

I did not know that Badiou was subject to a hoax. I'm not against hoaxes per se, but at this point as @Kenosha Kid has pointed out, they can be abused. The point is well established by now.

I think Ecco, Pynchon and Wallace should be included within pomo. It actually makes the case for it as movement have much more substance, in my opinion.

Badiou's popularity in the US is due, in large part, to Žižek no doubt. I think Žižek is quite entertaining and I'd put him apart from the usual crowd, even if he discusses many of the pomos.

Foucault was probably the best of the Parisians, whatever else one may think about how far one should take his analysis. Deleuze, at least for me, is an edge case. I think his vocabulary was on the whole, innovative and his emphasis on difference, strange, but not bad. The problem is that as far as I know, I don't know Deluzians who have actually tried to defend Deleuze in Fashionable Nonsense.

I think those accusations merit serious discussion. And Deleuze's Difference and Repetition is obscure in the extreme. I tried like a few different "intro books' to Deleuze, and I don't think I've ever read worse "introductions to" on anybody.

I know some may like Derrida, I do not. Nor Lacan, who is problematic for many reasons. For these two, I really think they tried to be as obscure as possible.

As for the rest Lyotard, Baudrillard, Guatarri, De Man, Althusser and the rest, I can't say much, other than they share a style and prose which has not been good for literature, imho.

This is true. It's still popular in the US. France has moved on, I think.

I had in mind Sokal and Bricmont's Fashionable Nonsense, which presents a good argument on "pomo science". As for the Sokal affair in general, yeah, I agree it shows many problems in academia/publishing.

What gets me in the willful obscurantism. If they have something to say, say it clearly. Foucault could be quite clear when he wanted to. To say that there are many different perspectives and that one should be critical of what scientists say, is not particularly hard to state or understand, I don't think.

This critique could be made of many: Kant, Husserl and even Aristotle can be very obscure. There's a difference between not being able to write clearly vs. making something hard on purpose. I think Parisian pomo's - with some exceptions - do the latter. It can mislead people into thinking they're being deep. Adding bad science to it makes it worse.

But if you stick to people like Rorty, Wallace and the like, then I perceive something more coherent.

Sure. I mean, it's fine if you want to focus on the skeptical side, or on the problem of "metanarratives", that can be useful.

However, I would think that someone like you would be concerned when serious physicists like Alan Sokal and Jean Bricmont show how many of the figures belonging in this school of thought, make science a total metaphor, making meaningless statements about how math and physics relate to politics or power.

And I personally think that science has several important limits when it comes to what it can hope to explain.

These were already real before the postmodernists got involved. — Kenosha Kid

Exactly.

Except God. And the limitless capability of the rational mind. Perhaps he did doubt these once each, in a perfunctory manner. — Kenosha Kid

Sure, we pick out those things we can still find useful today.

So use radical doubt and see what reason tells you. We know reason is not all encompassing, but if we use it judiciously, we might be able to make sense of the world.

We don't need God anymore - or at least, many of us no longer see it as necessary.

As an aside, not referring to you, but it bothers me that Descartes gets so much crap these days. It's not as if a scientist born in Descartes time would've obviously come up with general relativity, or would've obviously had seen how thought and matter cannot be metaphysically distinct.

I think Descartes is exactly on point highlighting our reason, it's an honorable aspect of being human. It's just that it's not all encompassing, as you rightly say.

I see.

Well, it's a question of dispute to claim that the postmodernists achieved something of which few people have caught up on. I think Susan Haack, Galen Strawson and Raymond Tallis do very, very good work and none of them agree with Kant on much.

Not that agreeing or disagreeing with Kant by itself is worthy of praise or derision. Just more evidence of how influential Kant was, for good or ill.

Postmodernism started as a report on the postwar West. It was empirical first of all, not theoretical. — Kenosha Kid

Maybe you're right. I doubt that anyone coming out of the postwar West would have used that term or even agreed with what it came to mean. If the question is that of information and control of people, the PR industry, was ahead of all of them, clearly. They actually impacted the world to a degree which is hard to conceptualize.

then we're accepting an event prior to which there was a general belief in special neutral, objective frames of reference from which you can judge the truth of certain statements and after which there was a general belief that no such frame exists — Kenosha Kid

You'd have to give one or two examples, otherwise I'm not sure I follow.

Russell was aware about points of view and frames of reference, he went to jail for resisting WWI, one of the very few to do so. When asked later in life why he never commented on the crimes of Communists, he replied by saying "there was no need." That's all the media talked about.

So it's not as if pomo came and suddenly people became aware of different perspectives.

In this regard it seems to me that something like deconstruction is warranted. The lack of a neutral perspective justifies a wariness about accepting the perspective of the author without examination. — Kenosha Kid

Sure. I mean that's a sane attitude.

Maybe now I'm the one being confused but the birth of modern philosophy was with Descartes, who said that it was a good idea to, at least once, doubt everything.

I think that's a fine attitude to have in general, when warranted, of course.

:100:

Posters from the UK here can say if this is the case. I suspect that Trump didn't help in the cases of Brazil and Britain.

Not sure about India.

But when it comes to places like Germany, France and the like, I think they're rebelling despite what Trump said.

I was just looking at some live streams on RT and in France some people are nuts. These anti-vaxers are insane. I understand a small minority of people have legitimate issues with vaccines, but this is overblown.

:roll:

Good riddance. He murdered several hundreds of thousands of his countrymen/woman and yet they are the ones that riot against him losing an election.

But he was not alone, Bolsonaro in Brazil, Modi in India, Johnson in Britain, etc.

And we all pay the price for such sycophants.

Yeah, Fauci could have said what he should have said, but it wouldn't have made a difference. Only Trump could have done that to an extent, in relation to the stupid people. Problem is, outside the US, lots of countries in Europe listen to Fauci, and that could have well helped the deniers.

But outside of totalitarian countries and a few exceptions in Asia and Oceania, there is a segment of the population who just don't listen. I don't know when such attitude could lead to charges of second degree murder.

And who knows if the mutation after the Delta variant will be much worse. Just mind-boggling.

That's the problem. And I understand that people want a life and are tired of confinement and local business are having a horrible time. That's to be granted.

But it's as you say, the carelessness of other people can cost the life of me or my loved ones. And the damn virus would be much weaker by now if everybody got a vaccine.

As long as many people continue to resist vaccination, the longer this will go, quite apart from the severe problems of vaccine distribution in developed vs developing countries, which all but guarantees this will go on for quite a while.

I guess a compromise would be best: keep things partially open, no masks in OPEN places in which other people are far away, that kind of thing. But to have sports stadiums full of people, or in door restaurants, is quite risky.

So, I'm seeing that the Delta strand is now ravaging the world. It's already pretty ugly in the UK, South Africa is a disaster as well as South America and the Caribbean.

It looks like the US will be quite ugly given 6 weeks or so. Damn, this is very long...

As I understand it, Being and Time was extremely influential for postmodernism, that came out in 1927. And also for existentialism and phenomenology. Maybe postmodernism would've arose with Husserl alone, I don't know.

Derrida's De la grammatologie came out in 67', Foucault's Les mots et les choses: Une archéologie des sciences humaines came out in 66'.

So I'd have to know who you have in mind when you say postmodernism. That's just the thing, is postmodernism over? I have no idea. There's talk of post-postmodernism, I don't know what that means.

That comes out of phenomenology, which precedes postmodernism. Merleau Ponty died in 1961, whereas post-modernism came out in the late 60's early 70's.

It also depends on if it is correct to label Heidegger as a postmodernist, which is not clear. But then he would be the very best of pomo, in my opinion.

Zahavi is a Husserlian phenomenologist. I was just reading him the other day.

And that's a fair analogy. But behind the heavy verbiage, what's new in postmodernism? If you want to say that it arose in combination with a certain type of mode of production, sure, that's fine.

And its good and sometimes useful to see the power dynamics behind prisons and psychiatry or to perhaps look at knowledge as component of markets. That was better stated and established by the development of the PR system in the early 20th century. But still, it was good work.

It's also good to analyze the various aspects of states ideology and it is also useful to point out that aboriginal people's often get left out.

But to claim that science is too "arborescent" and not rhizomatic enough or to say that what's missing from analytic philosophy is that they "do philosophy" as if nothing has happened in 20th century history, as Derrida said, or to say, as Lacan that "Thus the erectile organ comes to symbolize the place of jouissance, not in itself, or even in the form of an image, but as a part lacking in the desired image: that is why it is equivalent to the square root of -1.", doesn't look to me as any kind of advance at all.

So, yes, I do take issue with the verbiage and the use of legitimate scientific concepts in an illogical manner. At the same time I think some value can be found in most people.

But I don't see what's new about the thought, besides the jargon.

Excellent post. :up:

Ah. I think part of it has to do with one's attitudes towards the Parisians: Foucault, Derrida, Lacan, Deleuze, Lyotard, Baudrillard and so on. If this is what is meant by "pomo", then I can see the many disagreements coming in.

If you have in mind Nietzsche, Heidegger, Rorty and then you add in the novelists, then I think it's interesting.

Mostly my feeling is that pomo was fundamentally accurate, but no one really knew what to do with it, much like existentialism which I think of as early postmodernism. A lot of it also seems to come down to matters of taste, or rather of distaste of things held beyond criticism being criticised. — Kenosha Kid

Yes. But I ask you, what aspect of pomo had not been articulated previously by other people many, many years ago? I mean the sophists were a kind of postmodernism.

The taste factor is crucial, I agree.

In short, there's something there, and it deserves a fairer shake, both by people outside of it and by its researchers (pomo needs a better class of postmodernist). — Kenosha Kid

I think this is quite sensible. Perhaps David Foster Wallace was the best proponent of pomo, in terms of articulating many of its peculiarly modern concerns, in ordinary language. Not only in fiction, but also in non-fiction and in interviews as well.

So you're sympathetic to postmodernism?

That sounds like an answer in the negative. — Kenosha Kid

I mean there's many aspects to it. There's even something called postmodern architecture, based on deconstruction. But the idea would be, if you ask a historian, would they recognize something like the "postmodern era"? Not most that I'm aware of.

Also, aside from quoting Lyotard's disdain for "metanarratives" or just saying something like "it's all relativism", it's far from clear what postmodernism is supposed to include, as evidenced by your own excellent OP in terms of having to say a lot to even have a discussion about it.

I'm unsure about your view here, but, what I really dislike about po-mo, outside of much of the willful obscurantism found in many of its adherents, is that they think the enlightenment was a failure. Compared to how Europe was before the enlightenment, I think such a view is pretty wild. I don't think the enlightenment project will be finished, but to say it failed misses the mark.

Not that all of pomo is bad at all, Pynchon is an amazing writer, Rorty was quite clear and some of the Parisians, mostly Foucault, had interesting things to say.

It's just quite baffling that they never really gave a good response to Sokal and Bricmont's books or arguments.

I'll end my random thoughts here...

If all it takes to describe something as an epoch of history is someone merely saying something has happened, then things would be really confusing and completely arbitrary. I mean, why then only limit ourselves to what we read in the news? We should start claiming that the descriptions we make about our neighbors daily routine is of historical importance.

There's a lot in your post, much of it quite interesting but I'd be skeptical. Rorty, for example, claimed that what was useful in postmodernism was already well established towards the end of the 19th century. Thomas Pynchon never described himself as a postmodernist, and he actually seemed to take jabs at the whole idea in his last book Bleeding Edge.

Lyotard eventually claimed that his Postmodern Condition was "a parody". I think it is much more useful to look at the development of the PR industry in the early 20th century to gain some insight into how powerful people thought about how to indoctrinate people, which forms a direct link between between irrational behavior all the way up to Q stuff.

Outside of books written by Stewart Ewen, Chomsky, Bernays and others, Adam Curtis has a few interesting documentaries on the subject, most notably The Century of the Self.

Having said that, I do think that it's fair to say that postmodernism was a movement in literature and philosophy I suppose, depending on how you view Derrida and company. But I don't think it was a historical epoch. So I can't answer the question you pose.

Interesting post though.

Stubborn Fact and Creative Advance by Thomas E. Hosinski

By far the best book I've read on Whitehead, finally I can begin to make some progress here.

Starmaking by Nelson Goodman
The World as Will and Representation by Schopenhauer
Why Materialism is Baloney by Bernardo Kastrup
Treatise Concerning Eternal and Immutable Morality by Ralph Cudworth
Inborn Knowledge: The Mystery Within - Colin McGinn

There's likely more of this type of thing within the rationalist tradition, it's also an area of personal interest for me, but these days such views aren't as common.

Well, if you're not in favor for freedom of speech which you hate, they you're not in favor of freedom of speech. Saying one likes free speech when you only hear things you like, does not make you a supporter of freedom of speech.

Though misattributed to Voltaire, to him it was obvious: "I wholly disapprove of what you say and will defend to the death your right to say it.”

Thanks very much for the detailed analysis. It's horrifying.

It's also quite distressing not knowing too well when a point of "no matter what we do, we are 100% fu*ked" will come. But it's likely sooner rather than later.

We've kind of reached the peak at which a typical species goes extinct, right? Something like 100,000 years or so. But taking most of life with you consciously, is a new phenomena...

I think that for philosophy specifically, you eventually find one school of thought or pattern of ideas that you sympathize with and then you mostly stick to that. Much of the brand new stuff is quite arid compared to many classics, even classics of the 20th century did much more interesting work than a lot of recent stuff.

Having said that, I suppose that once in a while going to sites like academia.edu and reading a few essays keeps you informed on the new stuff.

With science it's different, I try to find articles on astronomy weekly, to see what new discovery has been made. I also check my favorite public physicists a few times a month. With the other sciences it's more rare for me to look new stuff up, unless it makes the headlines. So your interests dictate what you follow and deem worthy of your time.

I always look for interesting YouTube lectures, these can be excellent if you find good sites. And finally I read daily the headlines in the Financial Times, Al Jazeera, Russia Today and sometimes Democracy Now! and sometimes several articles depending on the topic.

If you're looking for something not too long, but quite compact and lucid, you can't go wrong with any of Bryan Magee's books. For a first timer, I'd suggest his The Story of Philosophy: A Concise Introduction to the World's Greatest Thinkers and Their Ideas.

After that his Confessions of a Philosopher is a much more in depth study of many key philosophers.

Then you can go to Russell or Copleston, etc.

@James Riley @T Clark

To steelman an argument is to present the argument in the best possible formulation. In a sense it's presenting your opponents argument in an even stronger manner than he or she would state it.

The idea being that once you give the best possible version of such an argument, you can proceed to show why it is defective, even when presented in this manner.

But psych itself, personality theory and the like, is just no science at all because its subject matter does not lend itself to scientific enquiry. — tim wood

:up:

Exactly.

Which is why we have novels and can gain some insight into the human experience.

I don't think we know enough about "higher animals" to be conclusive on this. Obviously not based on race, but there are cases in which families of mammals leave one of there own out by themselves. It's not clear if it's something to do with the excluded one being too weak or something like that, but yes, people take this to just a whole other dimension.

Some people, likely many, like to feel they are better than someone else for X factor. Usually x factor is quite arbitrary, but complex systems get created out of these tendencies.

Well people believing in pedophiles coming from space or that Trump is going to get reinstated some time this year is so far off from anything based in reality that I wonder how a human being could come around to believe this.

It's not as if we're in the desert 2000 years ago when everything could be discussed in terms of miracles.

not different "races" — 180 Proof

Some of these Republicans make me question everything. :meh:

Sure.

We also often rationalize things away as if we were going to do whatever we ended up doing anyway. So it's not as if by having a self, we have absolute control of ourselves all the time. Often times we don't.

What I wanted to point out in the cases of DID goes in a different direction. One thing is to behave or even feel differently around types of people. Another thing altogether is being a completely different person and often not having a clue you were more than one person. So a self need not be unitary at all.

Which makes the whole topic very hard to grasp.

It's been pointed out before, but when Hume says:

"For my part, when I enter most intimately into what I call myself, I always stumble on some particular perception or other, of heat or cold, light or shade, love or hatred, pain or pleasure. I never can catch myself at any time without a perception, and never can observe any thing but the perception."
(Bold added)

He refers to himself four times, to then say that he only sees a perception. That's not very persuasive if the attempt is not show that the self is an illusion, which is not entirely clear.

As to what a self is, is an incredibly hard question and likely a mystery. Coincidentally I was looking at some very interesting interviews with people who have been diagnosed with dissociative personality disorder. Some of these people had up to 11 selves! If that's not baffling, I don't know what is.

And I'm no less clear on what a self is.

Here's a link for anyone interested:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ek7JK6pattE

EDIT: At around minute 17:45 you can see a person witching to another one.

This is a philosophy forum, where one would hope people would want to use reason to attempt to establish tentative conclusions about the many aspects of reality.

If there is one alleged entity with supreme power over human affairs, it would be of interest to examine this idea. Being that so many people believe in it and also being that it causes much suffering despite doing good, it is only fair for people here to point out why such reasons given for this entity are not persuasive.

This ideas has governed much of the "West" for thousands of years, with sub-optimal results...

"Baba O'Reilly" - The Who

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x2KRpRMSu4g

:up:

It's just not my personal area of interest, though I do for example think that Hume's talk about ethics is interesting. Aristotle, from what I can remember, aims for a standard that is very high to be used consistently.

As for the rest, I can't say. But they must have insightful things to say.

I'm not much interested in ethics philosophically, with a few exceptions when it comes to our intuitions of right and wrong.

I suppose my exception would be Bertrand Russell. He has a bunch of stuff on ethics pertaining to all kinds of problems. One book would be The Conquest of Happiness.

In terms of essays, I think his In Praise of Idleness is quite interesting and on point. In short, almost any book or essay by him on this topic is worth skimming at least.