Ligue 1 : le Fello va enfin évoluer à Saïfoulaye

, but would offer some qualifications. Re. your point 1. Not to be orevly pedantic, but « post » of course means after, not against. Yes, much of the mishmash called postmodernism is also anti-modernism, but not all. As you note, the term arose in architecture where nothing about the « modernism » that it was « post- » can really be considered a critical aspect of enlightenment attitudes.Re. your point 2. There are a number (I’d like to think this number is increasing, but that is probably only wishful thinking) of postmodernists who are friendly to science because they see a difference between statements about things and statements about human concepts. To offer a somewhat random quote from Michael Berube (who is one of these people):[I] consider things like gravity and slavery to be qualitatively different kinds of objects: the first a natural phenomenon whose laws can be discovered by humans with great diligence…, the other a cultural object created by humans, contested by humans, and gradually–and fitfully, and still not universally–abolished by humans…. I believe that gravity and slavery are different kinds of things, and that objective, observer-independent knowledge about gravity is possible but should not be taken as a model for knowledge about human affairs. I believe there are mind-independent entities, and that you can check this for yourself by kicking a stone; but I do not understand how people…can insist on the existence of mind-independent concepts.By seeing not a « two cultures rivalry » but rather two distinct types of things under intellectual investigation–things that exist independent of people and things that have meaning only because people exist to invent them–one can avoid the « fundamental hatred of science ».You continue this point by saying:When you claim to be the arbiters of truth, it is very inconvenient to have a center of truth that can keep disproving your scientifically ignorant pronouncements. This can be erased if truth becomes « truth » and nothing is provable or disprovable.Make no mistake, this is a fundamental rejection of the Enlightenment and a return to the tradition of scholarly « what I say is true because my incantations are better. »Many postmodernist recognize that because they are very uncomfortable with–or even opposed to–the idea that one can ever say something is true, they are similarly precluded from saying that one can’t say that it’s true that things aren’t provable and disprovable! To quote Berube again (about a comment made by a postmodernist that fits your description):It is strange to hear social constructionists say…that they have demonstrated once and for all the social character of knowledge. One would think…that the recognition of the social character of knowledge would prevent one from believing that any proposition about the social character of knowledge could achieve such a permanent status.One of the key concepts of postmodernism is indeed the rejection of absolute truth. However, when one limits this to only the non-science world (as discussed by Berube above), this takes on a very different character. After all, in what way could it ever be objectively proven or disproven that abortion is morally wrong? We may have very good or very bad reasons for the side of this issue we come down on, but I don’t see that they are amenable to proof. This is the way most day-to-day postmodernism is « post- » modernist.Re. your point 3. I think I’ve read all the essays on your other site, but I’ll take a look in case I missed that one.Re. your point 4. My impression has long been that they don’t hate SF because they’re postmodernists, but rather because they can’t yet pretend (give it a couple centuries) that it wasn’t written for money. Still a stupid attitude, but hey, I read SF so of course I’d think so.I guess my general point is that one should be careful not to throw out everything that goes under the label of postmodernism just because some of those things are nutty or anti-Enlightenment. The best postmodernism often gets no publicity, and believes not that it has THE TRUTH but rather that it has better questions. And even if the questions aren’t better, they’re still worth addressing.And in case I haven’t been clear enough on this, I’m not the best apologist for postmodernism, because I, too, think most of it is bulls**t. So I’ll finish by reiterating my strong recommendation that anyone interested in what’s going on inside the head of a postmodernist read Michael Berube (if nothing else, you may reach the conclusion that you and he are in a position of incommensurability on this issue and that you therefore have no choice but to kill him*).*A little joke for those who have read What’s Liberal About the Liberal Arts?.