Modernism vs. Post Modernism

[doodle]

I think that many of the moral and ethical debates that we have had here come down to a fundamental different view of the world based on these two philosophies:

Modernism vs. Postmodernism

The term "Postmodern" begins to make sense if you understand what "Modernism" refers to. In this case, "Modernism" usually refers to Neo-Classical, Enlightenment assumptions concerning the role reason, or rationality, or scientific reasoning, play in guiding our understanding of the human condition and, in extreme cases of Postmodern theory, nature itself.  Postmodernism basically challenges those basic assumptions.


Modernism (or Enlightenment Humanism)  = M

Postmodernism = P


M - Existence of stable, coherent “self”?, independent of culture and society.

P - The “self”? is a myth and largely a composite of one’s social experiences and cultural contexts. The "self" is an Ideology.


M- Reason and science provide accurate, objective, reliable foundation of “knowledge”?

P - Reason and science are Ideologies in the Marxist sense; myths created by man.


M - Reason transcends and exists independently of our existential, historical, cultural contexts; it is universal and “true”?.

P - There is no universal, objective means of judging any given concept as “true”?; ALL judgments of truth exist within a cultural context (cultural relativism).


M - Reason and human independence/freedom are inherently linked; just laws conform to the dictates of Reason. We hold these truths to be self evident…

P - The application of pure Reason (predicated Cartesian Radical Skepticism) disproves the universal nature of a priori  human freedom. Independence/Freedom are Western Ideologies used to colonize foreign cultures (ie Belgian Congo, Viet Nam, Iraq, Afghanistan)


M - Because it is universal, Reason can help us overcome all conflicts.

P - Reason is no more universal than is any other culture’s definition of “truth”?.


M - Science is the paradigm of all true knowledge.

P - Science is Ideology.


M - Language is transparent; a one to one relationship between signifier (word) and signified (thing or concept).

P - Language is fluid and arbitrary and/or rooted in Power/Knowledge relations. Meaning is fluid and arbitrary. Meaning is “messy”?.


M - Reason will lead to universal truths all cultures will embrace.

P - “…no eternal truths, no universal human experience, no universal human rights, overriding narrative of human progress”? (Faigley, .


M - In sum: Truth exists independent of human consciousness and can be known thru the application of Reason. All Enlightenment conclusions lead from this assumption.

P - In sum: Truth may exist independent of human consciousness but there is no objective means of nailing it down. All Postmodern conclusions lead from this assumption.

M - Connotations: The application of Reason leads to a progressive movement toward civilization, democracy, freedom, scientific advancement. The Enlightenment is prescriptive: a means of building a better society.

P - Connotations:  There is no objective means upon which to predicate morality and right/just governance. Postmodern theory is descriptive of the human condition; it describes an  impasse in philosophy and social relations.


M - Modernist Feminism:  Women are oppressed by patriarchy and can use Reason to achieve both independence and regain their “authentic selves”?.

P - Postmodern Feminism: The categories male/female, masculine/feminine are themselves culturally constructed and/or Ideology. Gender roles are culturally relative in all cultures and contexts.

[WildAboutHarry]

M - Hank Rearden, Dagney Taggart, John Galt
P - Wesley Mouch, Floyd Ferris, James Taggart

[doodle]

If one of the purposes of a philosophy is to lead a happy life, then objectivism failed Ayn Rand. She was a bitter, miserable person.

[doodle]

Ultimately I think that it is best to probably shape society around the philosophy of modernism.....although I tend to think that postmodernism is closer to the truth. Ironically, the truth isn't necessarily a good thing for humans. We tend to function better by softening reality with myth.

[Mountaineer]

doodle,

I pretty much agree with your assessment of modernism and postmodernism.  For completeness, there is an earlier pre-modernism you may wish to incorporate into your analysis.  It also deals with a belief in truth, just like modernism, but has a very heavy religious (vs. science) tilt.

... Mountaineer

[Pointedstick]

Ultimately I think that it is best to probably shape society around the philosophy of modernism.....although I tend to think that postmodernism is closer to the truth. Ironically, the truth isn't necessarily a good thing for humans. We tend to function better by softening reality with myth.

I agree with you and mountaineer. While there are nits to pick with post-modernism (e.g. I think that truth does exist for some things) I also think that it's mostly right. The problem is that it is a belief system that is at best functionally useless and at worst cripplingly damaging. It is a memetic dead end. Internalizing post-modernism doesn't lead you anywhere good in your life. It doesn't help you create anything, learn anything, do anything, or grow as a person. I have never met a person in my entire life who really internalized post-modernism--and, having spent the first 22 years in an academic setting, I have met a lot of them--whose thinking was not hopelessly muddled and who was not borderline unable to function in the world.

[doodle]

Ultimately I think that it is best to probably shape society around the philosophy of modernism.....although I tend to think that postmodernism is closer to the truth. Ironically, the truth isn't necessarily a good thing for humans. We tend to function better by softening reality with myth.

I agree with you and mountaineer. While there are nits to pick with post-modernism (e.g. I think that truth does exist for some things) I also think that it's mostly right. The problem is that it is a belief system that is at best functionally useless and wt worst cripplingly damaging. It is a memetic dead end. Internalizing post-modernism doesn't lead you anywhere good in your life. It doesn't help you create anything, learn anything, do anything, or grow as a person. I have never met a person in my entire life who really internalized post-modernism--and, having spent the first 22 years in an academic setting, I have met a lot of them--whose thinking was not hopelessly muddled and who was practically unable to function in the world.

Maybe your experience, but does not have to be the case.....it just requires a great deal of responsibility. Post-modernism is inherently more liberating than modernism. Meaning is entirely a personal construct....most people cant handle that. The freedom of post-modernism is too much for most people to handle.

[WildAboutHarry]

[quote=doodle]If one of the purposes of a philosophy is to lead a happy life, then objectivism failed Ayn Rand. She was a bitter, miserable person.[/quote]

A philosophy helps us understand the universe and ourselves.  If I understand postmodernism correctly (and I probably do not), there is no point to anything, since a happy life is just an illusion.

Philosophy is a human construct.  Therefore, a philosophy that "helps" us is preferable to one that does not, as you allude to.

A philosophy that "everything sucks" is not helpful.

[doodle]

Post modernism doesn't say everything sucks....it just says that meaning is up to you to create. Most people want to believe that there is objective meaning and purpose in life. Post modernism would argue that meaning and purpose are subjective and up to you to define. This is more freedom and responsibility than most people can handle.

[Pointedstick]

Postmodernism doesn't say that everything sucks, but it comes perilously close to saying that nothing's real. Postmodernism is all about how basically everything is a "social construction." While this may be true, again, it doesn't help us actually do anything. So what if everything is a social construction!? How does that observation help us at all? It doesn't. In my experience, postmodernism is mostly a cowardly shield for over-socialized intellectuals to hide behind when confronted with assertions of absolute truth that they cannot refute or have no pre-prepared response for. Very few internalize postmodernism and become intellectually liberated. Ironically, for most, it becomes simply a different mental shackle binding their thought process.

[WildAboutHarry]

[quote=Pointedstick]In my experience, postmodernism is mostly a cowardly shield for over-socialized intellectuals to hide behind when confronted with assertions of absolute truth that they cannot refute or have no pre-prepared response for. [/quote]

Quite so.

[quote=doodle]Most people want to believe that there is objective meaning and purpose in life. [/quote]

But there is objective meaning and purpose in life, although I do admit that meaning and purpose may stem, on occasion, from individual circumstances.  (e.g. a chicken is an egg's way of making another egg).

[doodle]

In my experience, postmodernism is mostly a cowardly shield for over-socialized intellectuals to hide behind when confronted with assertions of absolute truth that they cannot refute or have no pre-prepared response for.

Quite so.

Most people want to believe that there is objective meaning and purpose in life.

But there is objective meaning and purpose in life, although I do admit that meaning and purpose may stem, on occasion, from individual circumstances.  (e.g. a chicken is an egg's way of making another egg).

What is the objective meaning and purpose of a life? As far as I can tell, that is up for you to figure out for yourself. Humans have created structures and concepts through religion for example that can provide "a" meaning and purpose....but they are only man made constructs that are based on some philosophical idea about our place in the universe.

Pointed stick, I'm surprised that you find post modernism so objectionable since it is a philosophy that liberates man completely. There is no more freeing philosophy than post modernism.

[doodle]

Well....I might be getting post modernism mixed up with absurdism.....I have to admit this stuff is still a bit new to me. Post modernism I believe supports the idea that we are generally deterministic creatures....so in that regard it wouldn't be liberating.....I think I need to do some more reading.

[Pointedstick]

Well....I might be getting post modernism mixed up with absurdism.....I have to admit this stuff is still a bit new to me. Post modernism I believe supports the idea that we are generally deterministic creatures....so in that regard it wouldn't be liberating.....I think I need to do some more reading.

IMHO absurdism is a psychological defense mechanism against the depression that postmodernism can cause in highly intelligent people. When you come to believe that there is no objective truth or meaning, often only laughter and mockery can lift the spirits.

Doodle, I don't find postmodernism liberating at all. This probably because I don't really feel very many constraints on my life. Therefore, a philosophy whose point is the proof that other philosophies are constraining on the basis of humans mistaking the subjective for the objective does not feel liberationist.

One of the strangest tendencies of liberalism that I am only now coming to realize--having been steeped in it for so long--is the conflation of destruction with liberation, wrapped up in the mantle of rebellion. To an average liberal, the world is full of obstructions. Physical, mental, emotional, you name it. Therefore, anything that purports to rebel against or even destroy obstruction is psychologically liberating to liberals. Postmodernism, with its emphasis on minimizing all other philosophies as "just social constructions" and leaving its believers with blank slates so they they may finally believe what they wish, is the intellectual equivalent of the real-life revolutions fought by leftists seeking to abolish social orders they deemed to be too restrictive. It is a rebellious philosophy. But it only holds appeal for those who feel intellectually constrained by existing philosophy, like they cannot believe certain things because it would be wrong, or bad, or contrary to society's expectations, or because God would be angry, or whatever.


The Unabomber's manifesto has something on the subject that I find simply fascinating:

http://cyber.eserver.org/unabom.txt

  26. Oversocialization can lead to low self-esteem, a sense of
  powerlessness, defeatism, guilt, etc. One of the most important means
  by which our society socializes children is by making them feel
  ashamed of behavior or speech that is contrary to society's
  expectations. If this is overdone, or if a particular child is
  especially susceptible to such feelings, he ends by feeling ashamed of
  HIMSELF. Moreover the thought and the behavior of the oversocialized
  person are more restricted by society's expectations than are those of
  the lightly socialized person. The majority of people engage in a
  significant amount of naughty behavior. They lie, they commit petty
  thefts, they break traffic laws, they goof off at work, they hate
  someone, they say spiteful things or they use some underhanded trick
  to get ahead of the other guy. The oversocialized person cannot do
  these things, or if he does do them he generates in himself a sense of
  shame and self-hatred. The oversocialized person cannot even
  experience, without guilt, thoughts or feelings that are contrary to
  the accepted morality; he cannot think "unclean" thoughts. And
  socialization is not just a matter of morality; we are socialized to
  confirm to many norms of behavior that do not fall under the heading
  of morality. Thus the oversocialized person is kept on a psychological
  leash and spends his life running on rails that society has laid down
  for him. In many oversocialized people this results in a sense of
  constraint and powerlessness that can be a severe hardship. We suggest
  that oversocialization is among the more serious cruelties that human
  beings inflict on one another.
 
  27. We argue that a very important and influential segment of the
  modern left is oversocialized and that their oversocialization is of
  great importance in determining the direction of modern leftism.
  Leftists of the oversocialized type tend to be intellectuals or
  members of the upper-middle class. Notice that university
  intellectuals (3) constitute the most highly socialized segment of our
  society and also the most left-wing segment.
 
  28. The leftist of the oversocialized type tries to get off his
  psychological leash and assert his autonomy by rebelling. But usually
  he is not strong enough to rebel against the most basic values of
  society. Generally speaking, the goals of today's leftists are NOT in
  conflict with the accepted morality. On the contrary, the left takes
  an accepted moral principle, adopts it as its own, and then accuses
  mainstream society of violating that principle. Examples: racial
  equality, equality of the sexes, helping poor people, peace as opposed
  to war, nonviolence generally, freedom of expression, kindness to
  animals. More fundamentally, the duty of the individual to serve
  society and the duty of society to take care of the individual. All
  these have been deeply rooted values of our society (or at least of
  its middle and upper classes (4) for a long time. These values are
  explicitly or implicitly expressed or presupposed in most of the
  material presented to us by the mainstream communications media and
  the educational system. Leftists, especially those of the
  oversocialized type, usually do not rebel against these principles but
  justify their hostility to society by claiming (with some degree of
  truth) that society is not living up to these principles.

[...]

  30. We certainly do not claim that leftists, even of the
  oversocialized type, NEVER rebel against the fundamental values of our
  society. Clearly they sometimes do. Some oversocialized leftists have
  gone so far as to rebel against one of modern society's most important
  principles by engaging in physical violence. By their own account,
  violence is for them a form of "liberation." In other words, by
  committing violence they break through the psychological restraints
  that have been trained into them. Because they are oversocialized
  these restraints have been more confining for them than for others;
  hence their need to break free of them. But they usually justify their
  rebellion in terms of mainstream values. If they engage in violence
  they claim to be fighting against racism or the like.