Post modern theories often use Relativism which then moves on to social constructivism. Unlike in modernism, morality or standards of right or wrong are cultrually based, not biologically or scientifically determined and therefore become a matter of individual choice opposed to accepting the hegemony or dominant forms ideals or beliefs. Whilst modernism believed that the truth shall set you free, post modernism believes there is no such thing as truth.
I wrote a massive paper on it
save yourself an evening and just talk to me instead.
if your interested in postmodernistic art, today, then look at what someone like Damien Hirst is doing. he believes in the theory that art is art if you believe it is.
Allan said:
“Whilst modernism believed that the truth shall set you free, post modernism believes there is no such thing as truth.
I wrote a massive paper on it”
Well, you’re writing in a style which is insensitive to the kinds of criticisms “post-modernism” makes, so I don’t feel inspired to read your paper.
At least in a philosophical sense, your above statement is blindingly unrepresentative of both postmodern and modern thinkers.
Most postmodern thinkers would say that morality is culturally based (at at least one level this is a truism – it depends what you mean, modernists may not necessarily deny it either). But most (for example Derrida, Badiou, Levinas, and Caputo) would not say that they are then based on the “individual choice” – that is more modern. The whole concept of the “Other”, Caputo’s concept of heteronomy, Levinas’s example of why it is wrong to murder, are about the ways in which we are already bound up in situations prior to making choices.
I suggest you try actually reading these authors.
Challenge: At a philosophical level, name one representative author of postmodernism who makes the claim that morality becomes a “matter of individual choice”. It sounds almost prototypically modern to me.
Regarding your statement on truth and freedom, it would be more fair to say that postmoderns might hope for truth to set us free but realize that all truths are contextualized and expressed by people with their own agendas which are never pure. Any truth we have is a pharmakon, both a poison and a remedy – but that does not mean it is not worth living and dying for. And it does not stand outside of human affairs, meaning one thing for all people over all time. That is the break postmodernism makes.
So in that limited sense postmodernism is a kind of “relativism” (but not with a capital R). It is misleading though to make the statement you make because it sounds like this means that “anything goes” (the deep conservative fear that the floodgate of moral evil will overcome them). Instead, postmodern authors are saying that not everything is possible, helpful, relevant or just in a given situation. To say that things are relative rather absolute is to say “it depends” – on the situation, the people etc. etc. And that is something I am profoundly grateful for.
Absolute truth is sodomy to real people.
In authors such as Derrida, Levinas and Caputo for example, words like truth, justice, faith, hope and love are all limit, quasi-transcendental concepts – we never (quite) get justice, or truth or any of these things. But that does not make them less real (although it does raise questions about epistemic and ontological claims of existence).
Art. Art’s interesting because postmodernism opened up the ground in insisting that truth was cultural and sociological. This allowed a discussion of truth in art, something which was not previously possible (as art was seen as metaphorical, subjective, uncertain, emotional and related to feelings – devoid of rational truth content). Work like Mark Johnson’s “Moral Imagination – The Implications of Cognitive Science for Ethics” points out that morality is through and through metaphorical. This raises the interesting question (particularly to a Christian audience) of where truth might reside. I would reccommend the work of Lambert Zuidevaart as offering potentially fruitful paths from a Christian point of view.
D.
I confess that I am more than a little behind on my reading and have read fairly little of Milbank, Zizek, Lacan and Badiou.
But postmodernism is certainly not the monolith you portray it as, and at least philosophically, the above authors would be strongly opposed to your presentation of them, as would I.
I guess nobody reads the authors themselves because it’s not simple.
haha you dildo!
you’ve missed the whole point of postmodernism. nothing is true. your wrong. i’m right. I’m right, your wrong, it makes no difference really. wow. I was just writing a little for fun. Did you crap your panties and decide to take it out on the internet! c’mon. All I read from you is mental masturbation.
how’d it go?
Unfortunately I have cadets on Thursdays — have to ask Aaron.
Well. A good start.
Post modern theories often use Relativism which then moves on to social constructivism. Unlike in modernism, morality or standards of right or wrong are cultrually based, not biologically or scientifically determined and therefore become a matter of individual choice opposed to accepting the hegemony or dominant forms ideals or beliefs. Whilst modernism believed that the truth shall set you free, post modernism believes there is no such thing as truth.
I wrote a massive paper on it
save yourself an evening and just talk to me instead.
if your interested in postmodernistic art, today, then look at what someone like Damien Hirst is doing. he believes in the theory that art is art if you believe it is.
Allan said:
“Whilst modernism believed that the truth shall set you free, post modernism believes there is no such thing as truth.
I wrote a massive paper on it”
Well, you’re writing in a style which is insensitive to the kinds of criticisms “post-modernism” makes, so I don’t feel inspired to read your paper.
At least in a philosophical sense, your above statement is blindingly unrepresentative of both postmodern and modern thinkers.
Most postmodern thinkers would say that morality is culturally based (at at least one level this is a truism – it depends what you mean, modernists may not necessarily deny it either). But most (for example Derrida, Badiou, Levinas, and Caputo) would not say that they are then based on the “individual choice” – that is more modern. The whole concept of the “Other”, Caputo’s concept of heteronomy, Levinas’s example of why it is wrong to murder, are about the ways in which we are already bound up in situations prior to making choices.
I suggest you try actually reading these authors.
Challenge: At a philosophical level, name one representative author of postmodernism who makes the claim that morality becomes a “matter of individual choice”. It sounds almost prototypically modern to me.
Regarding your statement on truth and freedom, it would be more fair to say that postmoderns might hope for truth to set us free but realize that all truths are contextualized and expressed by people with their own agendas which are never pure. Any truth we have is a pharmakon, both a poison and a remedy – but that does not mean it is not worth living and dying for. And it does not stand outside of human affairs, meaning one thing for all people over all time. That is the break postmodernism makes.
So in that limited sense postmodernism is a kind of “relativism” (but not with a capital R). It is misleading though to make the statement you make because it sounds like this means that “anything goes” (the deep conservative fear that the floodgate of moral evil will overcome them). Instead, postmodern authors are saying that not everything is possible, helpful, relevant or just in a given situation. To say that things are relative rather absolute is to say “it depends” – on the situation, the people etc. etc. And that is something I am profoundly grateful for.
Absolute truth is sodomy to real people.
In authors such as Derrida, Levinas and Caputo for example, words like truth, justice, faith, hope and love are all limit, quasi-transcendental concepts – we never (quite) get justice, or truth or any of these things. But that does not make them less real (although it does raise questions about epistemic and ontological claims of existence).
Art. Art’s interesting because postmodernism opened up the ground in insisting that truth was cultural and sociological. This allowed a discussion of truth in art, something which was not previously possible (as art was seen as metaphorical, subjective, uncertain, emotional and related to feelings – devoid of rational truth content). Work like Mark Johnson’s “Moral Imagination – The Implications of Cognitive Science for Ethics” points out that morality is through and through metaphorical. This raises the interesting question (particularly to a Christian audience) of where truth might reside. I would reccommend the work of Lambert Zuidevaart as offering potentially fruitful paths from a Christian point of view.
D.
I confess that I am more than a little behind on my reading and have read fairly little of Milbank, Zizek, Lacan and Badiou.
But postmodernism is certainly not the monolith you portray it as, and at least philosophically, the above authors would be strongly opposed to your presentation of them, as would I.
I guess nobody reads the authors themselves because it’s not simple.
haha you dildo!
you’ve missed the whole point of postmodernism. nothing is true. your wrong. i’m right. I’m right, your wrong, it makes no difference really. wow. I was just writing a little for fun. Did you crap your panties and decide to take it out on the internet! c’mon. All I read from you is mental masturbation.
good one.