Pynchon and postmodernism (was

jbor jbor at bigpond.com
Mon Oct 18 17:34:10 CDT 2004


on 18/10/04 11:10 AM, o j m wrote:

> I was 
> pointing out an epistemologically inconsistent claim that many
> poststructuralists make: that their denial of epistemically reliable
> knowledge is itself put forth as epistemically reliable.  So one of two
> things must be true: 1) the insistence on epistemological unreliability
> could very well itself be wrong, or 2) the poststructuralist rejection of
> epistemic reliability itself somehow transcends the logocentric construct,
> somehow avoids its very own critique.  The former seems more amenable to
> poststructuralist criticism, but if it is indeed right the force of the
> argument is lost.

Not really. Poststructuralists don't, for the most part, privilege the
notion of "epistemological reliability" as the be all and end all of
philosophical inquiry. Thus the shoulder-shrug.

It's positing this sort of thing as a counter-argument to poststructuralism
which is illogical. If one does believe in "epistemological reliability" --
and thus that one or another epistemological system is more reliable than
any other -- it's hypocritical to dismiss poststructuralism for the fact
that it criticises that paradigm.

best




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