by prunesquallori » Thu Sep 01, 2005 9:58 am
The main commonality between various "cancerous" ideolgies goes back further than post modernism. The Positivists were a group that (Ayn Rand-style) denied the value of any knowledge except for scientific knowledge. They built churches to science and prayed to Newton, and had incredibly grandiose plans for remaking the world in accordance with their theories. <br><br>Post-modern thought is predicated upon modernity, which is exemplified in Positivism.<br><br>Anyway, the positivists had a HUGE influence... their ideas trickled down to Sayyid Qutb, and Leo Strauss, to name a couple notable writers.<br><br>The positivist fallacy is to deny the reality that exists outside of one's theories. This is abnormal and irrational on it's face; aside from all metaphysical or cultural considerations, information-theoretic limits on the amount of information we can usefully use should put a damper on the Positivist dream of a world run by Reason. Nevermind that theory can never account for the totality of experience, the positivist longs to remove human discretion from every aspect of life.<br><br>When you go to the doctor, does he do anything more than check off a mental checklist of symptoms? (you're lucky if you've got one who uses his brain!) The doctor's dignity and autonomy have been tacitly replaced by a protocol. Same with credit reports, beauracracy of all kinds, the legal system, etc... We see a trend towards increasing systemization and decreased role for human thought.<br><br>Marx noted that the efficiency of production was increasing. Extrapolating, he suggested that, in the future, there would be no competition and all resources would be held in common (well, close enough!) The Stalinists simply said, "We'll bring that future about TODAY!" and began the systemization of a gigantic empire, killing thousands in the process, all because they believed so strongly in thier theories, that any loss of life was considered acceptable. I am not the first to note the similarity to our own American society: the policies of the leaders bear almost no resemblance to actual free-market theory, but use the language and tropes. The PNAC plan for Iraq is a bloody good example; we'll just drop a modern free-market economy onto this country (with no regard for the infrastructure that must be present to support such an economy) and if anything gets in the way, we'll KILL it. A perfect and perfectly rational plan.<br><br>Post-modernism, while promoting relativity (which can, at least phenomenologically, be seen as a "degeneration" of culture), does have the benefit of pointing out the arbitrary nature and flimsy structure of the modern worldview. You can see this in intellectual young hipsters getting excited about Traditionalists and metaphysics again.<br><br>I've hoping to make a comic about the positivists and their impact on society sometime in the next few months. <p></p><i></i>
