"The Curiously Postmodern Modern Apologists"

It is this post-modernism and relativism that undermines science, and it isn't limited to reactionary christians. I've seen this same line of thought used by religious people who think of themselves as supporters of the scientific enterprise. I just don't see why more people don't value the need to be consistent: either science is the best tool we know of for evaluating empirical claims, or it isn't. If it is, then we should apply it to every empirical claim, and ignore authorities based on empirical claims carefully tailored to be untestable, unprovable, and unfalsifiable. If it isn't, then someone has to explain away the success science has had thus far, and demonstrate a better method without falling into superstition. I would very much like to see someone do that, but I am not holding my breath.

There is not a single way. Not one.

in its blatant disdain for objective knowledge? Are you suggesting that the privileging of and emphasis on social construction of reality doesn't fall within post-structuralism which is one manifestation of postmodernism?

But I still don't have an answer to my question.

FWIW, there is a kind of constant refrain about postmodernism that pretends that renowned postmodern philosophers (presumably Lyotard) express a "disdain for objective knowledge," but I have yet to see a single instance of Lyotard actually staking out that position. He does, however, question metanarratives (grands récits) and Truth (capital T) and instead tends to privilege local knowledge and truth-production. That position, to be sure, destabilizes notions of authority and many Enlightenment propositions, but it does not mean "postmodernism" expresses disdain for objective knowledge.

As an example, one could say that feminist scientific inquiry is rooted in a kind of postmodernism: it says that the scientific subject has been construed as an Enlightenment abstraction--the white male a transcendent subject. But this is problematic in, for example, medicine, where women often express symptoms for heart disease differently than men and respond to treatment differently than men. That does not mean that feminist medical inquiry "disdains" objective knowledge, but that it believes in searching beyond abstraction.

I was unaware that poststructuralism was a manifestation of postmodernism; I thought it was a response to what its practitioners viewed as the limits of structuralism.

but it enables people to avoid pronouncements of science. It gives them a philosophical "exemption" for their pet beliefs, so they don't have to analyze them too much and risk finding out they aren't true.

By saying that "non-science" is equal to "science" in explaining and understanding the universe, "science" is reduced to the same level as any superstition.

I believe that science is superior to superstition as a method of explaining/understanding the universe. To lower science to the level of any old superstition clearly undermines science.

I believe that is the point H&E was making. I also believe he will correct me if I am wrong.

How can you disagree with me but I agree with you? Now I'm confused. One of the reasons why I hate pomo.

You seemed to want to soften that point, but I wanted to make a sharp distinction.

I guess I meant more along the lines of "it's just bunk and doesn't REALLY harm science" but the reality is that yes it does indeed from a practical standpoint and allows harmful superstitions to proceed merrily along with less harmful religious and philosophical beliefs.

Your militant atheist credentials. Such a conciliatory tone could only come from an apologist, not a militant. One more outburst like that and your rubber chicken will be revoked.

(We need a picture of a rubber chicken holding an AK-47 and wearing a Che Guevara t-shirt. No body would fuck with militant atheists if our rubber chickens had AK-47s and Che Guevera t-shirts!)

:)

You see, this is why I think we are talking about different things. I don't think of "pet beliefs" as occurring in "postmodern" thought. If anything, there are pet un-beliefs.

And, again, I don't know how "postmodernism" enables people to avoid scientific pronouncements. Instead of what you purport "postmodernism" or "postmodern thought" does--to create a paradigm under which analytical work can be held in abeyance--what is called postmodernism insists on an active engagement with the production of knowledge.

Sorry, I know I am going somewhat far afield in this discussion, which has ended up having little to do with religion, but I saw the thread title yesterday and I read it out of a sense of anxiety about what nefarious consequences would be attached to a a mode of philosophical inquiry this time.

http://www.pbs.org/faithandreason/gengloss/postm-body.html
Postmodernism is largely a reaction to the assumed certainty of scientific, or objective, efforts to explain reality. In essence, it stems from a recognition that reality is not simply mirrored in human understanding of it, but rather, is constructed as the mind tries to understand its own particular and personal reality. For this reason, postmodernism is highly skeptical of explanations which claim to be valid for all groups, cultures, traditions, or races, and instead focuses on the relative truths of each person.

Key here: the relative truths of each person.

This is how individuals are able to hold up pomo as a shield of sorts when science or rational inquiry rains on their parade.

By treating definitions like that as representative of what is called posstmodernism but not looking to Lyotard, whose writings on "postmodernism" provide much of the basis for "postmodern philospohy" or to Frederick Jameson, whose critiques of "postmodernism" are related to dialectical/narratological concerns. Neither of these thinkers, one its greatest champion and the other its most significant critic, has ever come close to suggesting that "postmodernism" (a philosophical school of which I am no particular fan, I should say) is about "the relative truths of each person." To suggest that "postmodernism" does this, to me, is to willfully misrepresent its analytical mission.

Specifically, the article cites a Christian as saying: Are facts from the bible so different from the facts you read from magazines, books and websites....nope.

The article claims that this position is post-modernism. Do you accept that claim?

I can see that as undermining science, assuming that the facts he's talking about from magazines, books, and websites are generally accepted scientific facts. I think generally accepted scientific facts are different from "facts from the Bible". I don't know enough about post-modernism to know whether or not that claim is true.

proposition. That sounds like relativism, which is the way people who half-heartedly engage in the "postmodern" philosophy (i.e., engage enough to dismiss it as "nihilistic," etc.) often misconstrue "postmodern" ideas.

Because there are an awful lot of people out there in the world promoting some kind of "-ism" which fits the definition trotsky provided for postmodernism pretty well.

Pseudopostmodernism? Neopostmodernism? Postpostmodernism?

Perhaps postmodernism comes in more than one flavor, just as there are many flavors of Christianity.

now finds refuge in the same philosophical ideas that it once denounced. (And still does, in certain circles.)