Rationalists (Bay area type) tend to think of what they call Postmodernism[*] as the antithesis to themselves, but the reality is more complex. “Postmodernism” isn’t a short and cohesive set of claims that are the opposite of the set of claims that rationalists make, it’s a different set of concerns, goals and approachs.
Except that it does make claims that are the opposite of the claims rationalists make. It claims that there is no objective reality, no ultimate set of principles we can use to understand the universe, and no correct method of getting nearer to truth. And the ‘goal’ of postmodernism is to break apart and criticize everything that claims to be able to do those things. You would be hard pressed to find a better example of something diametrically opposed to rationalism. (I’m going to guess that with high likelihood I’ll get accused of not understanding postmodernism by saying that).
And what’s worse is that bay area rationalism has not been able to unequivocally define “rationality” or “truth”. (EY wrote an article on the Simple idea of Truth, in which he considers the correspondence theory, Tarki’s theory, and a few others without resolving on a single correct theory).
Well yeah, being able to unequivocally define anything is difficult, no argument there. But rationalists use an intuitive and pragmatic definition of truth that allows us to actually do things. Then what happens is they get accused by postmodernists of claiming to have the One and Only True and Correct Definition of Truth and Correctness, and of claiming that we have access to the Objective Reality. The point is that as soon as you allow for any leeway in this at all (leeway in allowing for some in-between area of there being a true objective reality with 100% access to and 0% access to), you basically obtain rationalism. Not because the principles it derives from are that there is an objective reality that is possible to Truly Know, or that there are facts that we know to be 100% true, but only that there are sets of claims we have some degree of confidence in, and other sets of claims we might want to calculate a degree of confidence in based on the first set of claims.
Bay area rationalism is the attitude that that sceptical (no truth) and relativistic (multiple truth) claims are utterly false, but it’s an attitude, not a proof.
It happens to be an attitude that works really well in practice, but the other two attitudes can’t actually be used in practice if you were to adhere to them fully. They would only be useful for denying anything that someone else believes. I mean, what would it mean to actually hold two beliefs to be completely true but also that they contradict? In probability theory you can have degrees of confidence that are non-zero that add up to one, but it’s unclear if this is the same thing as relativism in the sense of “multiple truths”. I would guess that it isn’t, and multiple truths really means holding two incompatible beliefs to both be true.
If rationalist is to win over “postmodernism”, then it must win rationally, by being able to demonstrate it’s superioritiy.
Except that you can’t demonstrate superiority of anything within the framework of postmodernism. Within rationalism it’s very easy and straightforward.
I imagine the reason that some rationalists might find postmodernism to be useful is in the spirit of overcoming biases. This in and of itself I have no problem with—but I would ask what you consider postmodern ideas to offer in the quest to remove biases that rationalism doesn’t offer, or wouldn’t have access to even in principle?
Except that it does make claims that are the opposite of the claims rationalists make. It claims that there is no objective reality, no ultimate set of principles we can use to understand the universe, and no correct method of getting nearer to truth.
The actual ground-level stance is more like: “If you think that you know some sort of objective reality, etc., it is overwhelmingly likely that you’re in fact wrong in some way, and being deluded by cached thoughts.” This is an eminently rational attitude to take - ‘it’s not what you don’t know that really gets you into trouble, it’s what you know for sure that just ain’t so.’ The rest of your comment has similar problems, so I’m not going to discuss it in depth. Suffice it to say, postmodern thought is far more subtle than you give it credit for.
If someone claims to hold a belief with absolute 100% certainty, that doesn’t require a gigantic modern philosophical edifice in order to refute. It seems like that’s setting a very low bar for what postmodernism actually hopes to accomplish.
If someone claims to hold a belief with absolute 100% certainty, that doesn’t require a gigantic modern philosophical edifice in order to refute.
The reason why postmodernism often looks like that superficially is that it specializes in critiquing “gigantic modern philosophical edifice[s]” (emphasis on ‘modern’!). It takes a gigantic philosophy to beat a gigantic philosophy, at least in some people’s view.
Except that it does make claims that are the opposite of the claims rationalists make. It claims that there is no objective reality, no ultimate set of principles we can use to understand the universe, and no correct method of getting nearer to truth.
Citation needed.
Well yeah, being able to unequivocally define anything is difficult, no argument there
On the other hand, refraining from condemning others when you have skeletons in your own closet is easy.
But rationalists use an intuitive and pragmatic definition of truth that allows us to actually do things. T
Engineers use an intuitive and pragmatic definition of truth that allows them to actually do things. Rationalists are more
in the philosophy business.
It happens to be an attitude that works really well in practice,
For some values of “work”. It’s possible to argue in detail that predictive power actually doesn’t entail correspondence to ultimate reality, for instance.
I mean, what would it mean to actually hold two beliefs to be completely true but also that they contradict?
For instance, when you tell outsiders that you have wonderful answers to problems X, Y and Z, but you concede to people inside the tent that you actually don’t.
Except that you can’t demonstrate superiority of anything within the framework of postmodernism
That’s not what I said.
but I would ask what you consider postmodern ideas to offer in the quest to remove biases that rationalism doesn’t offer, or wouldn’t have access to even in principle?
There’s no such thing as postmodernism and I’m not particularly in favour of it. My position is more about doing rationality right than not doing it all. If you critically apply rationality to itself, you end up with something a lot less elf confident and exclusionary than Bay Area rationalism.
Citing it is going to be difficult, even the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy says “That postmodernism is indefinable is a truism.” I’m forced to site philosophers who are opposed to it because they seem to be the only ones willing to actually define it in a concise way. I’ll just reference this essay by Dennett to start with.
On the other hand, refraining from condemning others when you have skeletons in your own closet is easy.
I’m not sure I understand what you’re referring to here.
For instance, when you tell outsiders that you have wonderful answers to problems X, Y and Z, but you concede to people inside the tent that you actually don’t.
That’s called lying.
There’s no such thing as postmodernism
You know exactly what I mean when I use that term, otherwise there would be no discussion. It seems that you can’t even name it without someone saying that’s not what it’s called, it actually doesn’t have a definition, every philosopher who is labeled a postmodernist called it something else, etc.
If I can’t define it, there’s no point in discussing it. But it doesn’t change the fact that the way the mainstream left has absorbed the philosophy has been in the “there is no objective truth” / “all cultures/beliefs/creeds are equal” sense. This is mostly the sense in which I refer to it in my original post.
My position is more about doing rationality right than not doing it all. If you critically apply rationality to itself, you end up with something a lot less elf confident and exclusionary than Bay Area rationalism.
I’d like to hear more about this. By “Bay Area rationalism”, I assume you are talking about a specific list of beliefs like the likelihood of intelligence explosion? Or are you talking about the Bayesian methodology in general?
To which the glib answer is “that’s because it isn’t true”.
″ I’m forced to site philosophers who are opposed to it because they seem to be the only ones willing to actually define it in a concise way. I’ll just reference this essay by Dennett to start with.
Dennett gives a concise definition because he has the same simplistic take on the subject as you. What he is not doing is showing that there is an actually group of people who describe themselves as postmodernists, and have those views. The use of the terms “postmodernist” is a bad sign: it’s a tern that works like “infidel” and so on, a label for an outgroup, and an ingroup’s views on an outgroup are rarely bedrock reality.
On the other hand, refraining from condemning others when you have skeletons in your own closet is easy.
I’m not sure I understand what you’re referring to here.
When we, the ingroup, can’t define something it’s Ok, when they, the outgroup, can’t define something, it shows how bad they are.
For instance, when you tell outsiders that you have wonderful answers to problems X, Y and Z, but you concede to people inside the tent that you actually don’t.
That’s called lying.
People are quite psychologically capable of having compartmentalised beliefs, that sort of thing is pretty ubiquitous, which is why I was able to find an example from the rationalist community itself. Relativism without contextualisation probably doesn’t make much sense, but who is proposing it?
There’s no such thing as postmodernism
You know exactly what I mean when I use that term, otherwise there would be no discussion.
As you surely know that I mean there is no group of people who both call themselves postmodernists and hold
the views you are attributing to postmodernists.
It seems that you can’t even name it without someone saying that’s not what it’s called, it actually doesn’t have a definition, every philosopher who is labeled a postmodernist called it something else, etc.
It’s kind of diffuse. But you can talk about scepticism, relativism, etc, if those are the issues.
If I can’t define it, there’s no point in discussing it. But it doesn’t change the fact that the way the mainstream left has absorbed the philosophy has been in the “there is no objective truth” / “all cultures/beliefs/creeds are equal” sense.
There’s some terrible epistemology on the left, and on the right, and even in rationalism.
My position is more about doing rationality right than not doing it all. If you critically apply rationality to itself, you end up with something a lot less elf confident and exclusionary than Bay Area rationalism.
I’d like to hear more about this. By “Bay Area rationalism”, I assume you are talking about a specific list of beliefs like the likelihood of intelligence explosion? Or are you talking about the Bayesian methodology in general?
I mean Yudkowsky’s approach. Which flies under the flag of Bayesianism, but doesn’t make much use of formal Bayesianism.
Except that it does make claims that are the opposite of the claims rationalists make. It claims that there is no objective reality, no ultimate set of principles we can use to understand the universe, and no correct method of getting nearer to truth. And the ‘goal’ of postmodernism is to break apart and criticize everything that claims to be able to do those things. You would be hard pressed to find a better example of something diametrically opposed to rationalism. (I’m going to guess that with high likelihood I’ll get accused of not understanding postmodernism by saying that).
Well yeah, being able to unequivocally define anything is difficult, no argument there. But rationalists use an intuitive and pragmatic definition of truth that allows us to actually do things. Then what happens is they get accused by postmodernists of claiming to have the One and Only True and Correct Definition of Truth and Correctness, and of claiming that we have access to the Objective Reality. The point is that as soon as you allow for any leeway in this at all (leeway in allowing for some in-between area of there being a true objective reality with 100% access to and 0% access to), you basically obtain rationalism. Not because the principles it derives from are that there is an objective reality that is possible to Truly Know, or that there are facts that we know to be 100% true, but only that there are sets of claims we have some degree of confidence in, and other sets of claims we might want to calculate a degree of confidence in based on the first set of claims.
It happens to be an attitude that works really well in practice, but the other two attitudes can’t actually be used in practice if you were to adhere to them fully. They would only be useful for denying anything that someone else believes. I mean, what would it mean to actually hold two beliefs to be completely true but also that they contradict? In probability theory you can have degrees of confidence that are non-zero that add up to one, but it’s unclear if this is the same thing as relativism in the sense of “multiple truths”. I would guess that it isn’t, and multiple truths really means holding two incompatible beliefs to both be true.
Except that you can’t demonstrate superiority of anything within the framework of postmodernism. Within rationalism it’s very easy and straightforward.
I imagine the reason that some rationalists might find postmodernism to be useful is in the spirit of overcoming biases. This in and of itself I have no problem with—but I would ask what you consider postmodern ideas to offer in the quest to remove biases that rationalism doesn’t offer, or wouldn’t have access to even in principle?
The actual ground-level stance is more like: “If you think that you know some sort of objective reality, etc., it is overwhelmingly likely that you’re in fact wrong in some way, and being deluded by cached thoughts.” This is an eminently rational attitude to take - ‘it’s not what you don’t know that really gets you into trouble, it’s what you know for sure that just ain’t so.’ The rest of your comment has similar problems, so I’m not going to discuss it in depth. Suffice it to say, postmodern thought is far more subtle than you give it credit for.
If someone claims to hold a belief with absolute 100% certainty, that doesn’t require a gigantic modern philosophical edifice in order to refute. It seems like that’s setting a very low bar for what postmodernism actually hopes to accomplish.
The reason why postmodernism often looks like that superficially is that it specializes in critiquing “gigantic modern philosophical edifice[s]” (emphasis on ‘modern’!). It takes a gigantic philosophy to beat a gigantic philosophy, at least in some people’s view.
Citation needed.
On the other hand, refraining from condemning others when you have skeletons in your own closet is easy.
Engineers use an intuitive and pragmatic definition of truth that allows them to actually do things. Rationalists are more in the philosophy business.
For some values of “work”. It’s possible to argue in detail that predictive power actually doesn’t entail correspondence to ultimate reality, for instance.
For instance, when you tell outsiders that you have wonderful answers to problems X, Y and Z, but you concede to people inside the tent that you actually don’t.
That’s not what I said.
There’s no such thing as postmodernism and I’m not particularly in favour of it. My position is more about doing rationality right than not doing it all. If you critically apply rationality to itself, you end up with something a lot less elf confident and exclusionary than Bay Area rationalism.
Citing it is going to be difficult, even the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy says “That postmodernism is indefinable is a truism.” I’m forced to site philosophers who are opposed to it because they seem to be the only ones willing to actually define it in a concise way. I’ll just reference this essay by Dennett to start with.
I’m not sure I understand what you’re referring to here.
That’s called lying.
You know exactly what I mean when I use that term, otherwise there would be no discussion. It seems that you can’t even name it without someone saying that’s not what it’s called, it actually doesn’t have a definition, every philosopher who is labeled a postmodernist called it something else, etc.
If I can’t define it, there’s no point in discussing it. But it doesn’t change the fact that the way the mainstream left has absorbed the philosophy has been in the “there is no objective truth” / “all cultures/beliefs/creeds are equal” sense. This is mostly the sense in which I refer to it in my original post.
I’d like to hear more about this. By “Bay Area rationalism”, I assume you are talking about a specific list of beliefs like the likelihood of intelligence explosion? Or are you talking about the Bayesian methodology in general?
To which the glib answer is “that’s because it isn’t true”.
Dennett gives a concise definition because he has the same simplistic take on the subject as you. What he is not doing is showing that there is an actually group of people who describe themselves as postmodernists, and have those views. The use of the terms “postmodernist” is a bad sign: it’s a tern that works like “infidel” and so on, a label for an outgroup, and an ingroup’s views on an outgroup are rarely bedrock reality.
When we, the ingroup, can’t define something it’s Ok, when they, the outgroup, can’t define something, it shows how bad they are.
People are quite psychologically capable of having compartmentalised beliefs, that sort of thing is pretty ubiquitous, which is why I was able to find an example from the rationalist community itself. Relativism without contextualisation probably doesn’t make much sense, but who is proposing it?
As you surely know that I mean there is no group of people who both call themselves postmodernists and hold the views you are attributing to postmodernists.
It’s kind of diffuse. But you can talk about scepticism, relativism, etc, if those are the issues.
There’s some terrible epistemology on the left, and on the right, and even in rationalism.
I mean Yudkowsky’s approach. Which flies under the flag of Bayesianism, but doesn’t make much use of formal Bayesianism.