Explaining Postmodernism by Stephen Hicks: Chapter 1: What Postmodernism Is

This audiobook edition of Explaining Postmodernism is read by the author.

To download MP3s of the audiobook or for more information, visit Dr. Stephen Hicks's Explaining Postmodernism page:

Other links:

[Brutaltronics]

Anybody here because of professor Jordan Peterson?

[susacp]

Post modernism allows privileged intellectuals to “resist” the oppression of capitalist society, without any of that messy business of putting your body on the line to actually effect change.

[johnbrown]

Dr. Hicks has produced a marvelously detailed examination of Postmodern philosophy. Thank you Dr. Hicks for publishing this work.

[Waibublz]

My god. It just absolutely clicked for me after listening to this. We're currently in a philosophical war of modernism versus post-modernism in the west. That's actually the root cause of all the political turmoil and polarization in the western world. What we're seeing right now, on the left particularly, is the rise of the post-modern world view and it's attempt to eradicate modernism.
This is why I've never been able to understand the world view of most of these people. I've been twisting myself in and out using reason and logic to try and understand where they're coming from only to conclude "I don't FUCKING get it" every time. But they don't actually believe in logic and reason, and so their world view isn't rooted in reason and logic and cannot be understood by people using these concepts. They think only of logic and reason as some sort of linguistic tool-to-power intended to be used to oppress other groups and further the power of ones own. These people can't be persuaded with logical and reasonable arguments because all they think you're doing is trying to exact power over them. It makes so much fucking sense now. Thank you for this!
We need to win this philosophical war or we're fucking doomed, that much is clear.

[insme]

I can see where the SJWs get the idea of white oppression and such other frivolous ideas from.

[Ostsol]

How can post-modernists deny the possibility of an objective interpretation of literature whilst simultaneously asserting what something is "really about?" I'll listen to the rest of this series, but right now this issue is really bugging me.

[fraternitas]

You get to learn how postmodernism is trash in six minutes, a wonderful explanation!

[sweetpadre]

I heard enough. Time to purchase the book.

[RAndrewKReed]

If it's only a question of will...let's impose white, male, western ways and be done with all the foolishness.

[nvman]

Every one Criticizing this should now go listen to Rick Rodricks lectures because if you think it’s really easy to tell what is true nowadays there are some good examples to report that

[truebomba]

My God, this book is an example of misconceptions, misinformation, and misquotation for politically charged reasons.

[jl]

Well, I suspect it takes formal training in philosophy to recognize complete fucking bullshit from piling it higher and deeper bullshit. The claim one doesn't not have be right, just interesting, is a false choice. One can clearly be wrong and uninteresting. 

[winstonsmith]

Let's just throw out reason and let's use irony nothing is true...a-hmm!

[syourke]

Well if this is post-modernism, count me a modernist. How did such foolishness ever prevail in U S academia?

[djanitatiana]

Here today, I learned a new oxymoron: "Postmodern intellectual".

[James-lljb]

This is the guy whose errors led Jordan Peterson into a pit.

[harshilsangal]

Postmodernism is pretty fun to play around with, but things get ridiculous at 32:06

[davidwood]

Is Jordan Peterson a Postmodernist and does not know it?

[ThuyPham-ojzy]

Well they got into my phone change all my stuff

[johnbrusseau]

How Post Modernism is Essentially Reactionary

Reactionary constructs are generated by the subjectivity inherent in unresolved fear.
Post Modernism essentially takes the position that all reality is of a relative nature. There is no absolute reality. This idea is a reaction to the experience of the damaging psuedo absolute rreality that is brutally imposed upon people, for all of the subjective reason one subjectively does things. The brutalizer believes he ios being absolutely objective, while actually being quite subjective, and thus does not see that the brutal things he is doing is not actually a result of some absolute reality, but the expression of his own personal subjectiv eissues. In reaction to thi terrible experience one feels a need to defend oneself agains all assertions of absolute truth.

The fact that there cannot exist relative truth apart from a framework of absolute truth, does not occur to the perosn with the reactionary Post Modern delusion. It feels comforting to him to say there is no such thing as objectivity (in either degree or in whole), and so he has no difficulty holding onto the self-contradictory notion that there is no such thing as objective (or absolute) truth. {Obviously, the statement that there is no such ting as absolute truth is an assertion of an absolute truth.}

While it is obvious to anyone with some measure of objectivity that our human thinking involves a great deal of subjective truth, this does not imoply that there is no such thing as objective truth. Rather it implies there is, and it does in the following way.

Our consciousness is like a wax seal. The absolute truth of actual things outside of our consciousness, which leave an impression in our wax seal consciousness, does in fact exist, and the admittedly relative impressions, the subjective impressions left in our human consciousness imply there is. Now there are imperfections (due to the presence of emotional baggage and unconscious associations) that render our impression of reality even less accurate, but this does not ague against trying to get an impression of absolute reality, or trying to get some degree of objectivity, it agues for doing so.

A Post modern person is emotionally reacting to past unresolved wounding done at the hands of people pretending to be objective, while simultaneously subjectivley moving to brutally victimize them. Post Moderism does tend to contain a seed of objective truth, even though it is reactionary, because there are times when we are so entrenched within false certainty that the only way to gain some measure of objectivity about our false certainty is to be faced with the extreme fixation on the existence of subjective reality that post moderism is so eloquent in expressing.

A false sence of certinty is such an enormous tendency in our species (every last one of us is plagued by far more false certainty then we would believe is possible). And as long as we resist the questioning of our certainties the Post Modern reactionary delusion will persist. In fact, the more we resist facing our false certainties, the more Post Modernism will thrive. Currntly Post Modernism is all the rage, especially in academic circles. Hmmm!

No person is more certain that a post modernist. This is a enlightening irony.

A. In Steven Hicks rebuttal of Post Modernism he sites psuedo certainties that are flawed syllogisms, such as the following. The US is (and other nations like them are) Capitalistic. The Soviet union is (and other nations like them are) socialistic.

B. Capitalistic nations a more economically successful than Socialistic nations.

C. Therefore capitolisim is more a success approach than socialism.
The fallacy in this damaged syllogism is, of course that no nation is wholly capitalistic or socialistic. Thus one cannot say that the capitolism experienced in some nations did not thrive because of the presence of some forms of socialism. Government is itself a form of socialism, and certainly capitolistic societies have benefitted by the presence of governing bodies. And as the left frequently likes to point out, those collectively funded projects that fill out a community’s infrastructures are all socialistic endeavors. Thus the conclusion that capitalism is based upon a false premise and any certainty ecxpressed by those embracing such a conclusion will be fruaght with that kind of uncertainty that is engendered by relied upon fals-premises.

I see in this video presentation both the flaws in post moderism (very eloquently defined by Steven) and the false and somewhat brutally condescending false certainty that has promoted the existence of (if not also given birth to) Post Moderism in the first place.