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Is postmodernism a pseudo-philosophy?

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Some claim postmodernist philosophical writing (e.g. Derrida, Foucault, Lyotard, and Lacan) to be pseudo-philosophy. Are they right?

Postmodernism is a pseudo-philosophy

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Arguments for

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  •   Pro Postmodernism was exposed by the Sokal hoax.[1]. See also Wikipedia: Sokal hoax.
    •   Objection This is far from conclusive, being a mere single incident, as suggestive it may be.
  •   Pro Postmodernism was exposed by Sokal and Bricmont book Fashionable Nonsense (published as Intellectual Impostures in the U.K.).
    •   Objection Since the content of the book is not available online, the online reader has no way of putting this argument under stress by reviewing the book.
  •   Pro It is so by the duck test: if something looks like incomprehensible likely-meaningless text after first, second and third reading, there is a good chance it is meaningless text. The quotations from postmodernists given by Dawkins are suggestive.[2]
    •   Objection The problematic passages are not entirely void of semantics, and therefore, they are probably not entirely meanigless.
  •   Pro According to Britannica, postmodernism states the following: "Reality, knowledge, and value are constructed by discourses; hence they can vary with them. This means that the discourse of modern science, when considered apart from the evidential standards internal to it, has no greater purchase on the truth than do alternative perspectives, including (for example) astrology and witchcraft." More does not need to be said.
    •   Objection Britannica is an Anglophone encyclopedia and it is not certain it gets postmodernism right.

Arguments against

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  •   Con Postmodernism is not a single monolith and therefore, it is unlikely to be possible to show it to be pseudo-philosophy without analyzing its different strands one at a time.
    •   Comment One could respond to this by adding "largely" into the motion.
  •   Con One could argue that for something to be pseudo, it needs to have at least an appearance of the thing, here philosophy. It is questionable that these author create at least an appearance of philosophy.
    •   Objection In so far as enough lay people and even professionals seem convinced they are dealing with philosophy, the requirement given by the prefix pseudo- seems to be met.

References

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  1. ↑ The Sokal affair by Ben Goldacre, 5 Jun 2003, theguardian.com
  2. ↑ Postmodernism disrobed by Richard Dawkins, physics.nyu.edu

Further reading

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