NP-po-pooing PoMo, futility for trhe feeble minded

[John Bailey]

There's a new strain of youthful conservatism in the air that heralds
itself under the banners of Reason and Science and Enlightenment
without really getting into what those (and related) terms mean. It
treats rationality and empiricism as synonymous, for instance, with no
knowledge that for almost the entirety of western thinking (at least
until Kant) they've been considered in opposition to one another. And
that the Enlightenment wasn't "the time when people starting thinking
properly" but was often very theistic, often Christian, resulted in
some longstanding suppositions that held back science and philosophy
for centuries, or led to much needless suffering, and that even the
most prominent figures in Enlightenment thinking could be at
loggerheads on its basic definition.
A lot of it probably is a backlash to the 90s/00s academic focus on
post-structuralist thinking that is way too complex for your typical
undergrad to grasp. But the result is people in their 20s and 30s
calling for a return to an academic tradition that either never
existed or would greatly disappoint them if they were ever subjected
to it. Nostalgia for the time when facts were facts and there were
none of these darned grey areas that don't add up to a solid truth...
nah, sorry.
Hell yes to more Voltaire, though.
On Sun, Oct 21, 2018 at 2:44 PM jody2.718 <jody2.718 at protonmail.com> wrote:
>
> T. Ekchardt offered:
>
> https://areomagazine.com/2017/03/27/how-french-intellectuals-ruined-the-west-postmodernism-and-its-impact-explained/
>
> As an example of a "recommendable article which criticises Postmodernism not from the right but in the name of the enlightenment."
>
> An interesting read, but, I think, one sided. I'm not knowledgeable enough to defend PoMo. However, the article does seem to be a little simplistic with regards to what it refers to as "The Enlightenment."  The author takes for granted the beneficial effects of science and technology, while failing to deal with the seriously deleterious ones, as if the downside of science and technology could somehow be avoided by embracing the ideals of reason and an objective consideration of reality. She seems a little idealistic, if not enchanted.
>
> For example:
>
> "Despite this, science as a methodology is not going anywhere. It cannot be “adapted” to include epistemic relativism and “alternative ways of knowing.” It can, however, lose public confidence and thereby, state funding, and this is a threat not to be underestimated. Also, at a time in which world rulers doubt climate change, parents believe false claims that vaccines cause autism and people turn to homeopaths and naturopaths for solutions to serious medical conditions, it is dangerous to the degree of an existential threat to further damage people’s confidence in the empirical sciences."
>
> Hello? She needs to complete the circuit- Climate change has not only been detected and proven by science, its acceleration has been caused by the heedless effects of science and technology. Vaccines may not be a cause of autism, but the scientific development of convenient organic chemicals and their heedless injection into the environment by a zillion unregulated drain pipes can't be a good thing for the developing brain- let alone their carcinogenic effects, and not to mention, the over use of broad spectrum antibiotics which has us all running like Alice in the garden of The Red Queen- just to keep one step ahead of the next super bug.
>
> I don't know about Lyotard, Foucault and Derrida, but I could use some more of the likes of Voltaire, despite his shortcomings, and Jonathan Swift, as well.
>
> jody
>
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