[FRIAM] talk about rabbit holes ...

[Steven A Smith]

Glen -

Not just any ole rabbit hole but a very convoluted/complex (albeit
interesting) one.

I dove into your last link (only) because I've been wanting to
understand more better what YOUR view of postmoderism is...   on the
whole I like what I read.   I don't have the focus nor bandwidth right
now to begin to ask more questions or assert speculations for you to
shoot down or bat around.

One thing I'm left wondering is what the species of post postmodernism
are or are going to be. 

Especially right now when we are all going through a huge
experiment/experience... in some ways it is as if there is a fast-moving
battle (fire-fight) between free market capitalism and social democracy
in this pandemic.   Both styles of socioeconomic structuring are being
put to the test (as are totalitarian vs democratic governances) in a
trial by fire/virus.  

Certainly the author's 4 definitions of postmodernism apply to this
current goat rope:

 1. Non uniformity of progress is being demonstrated in our face at many
    scales... in the spirit of 3 steps forward and 2 steps back, a LOT
    of obvious things are in the 2 steps back phase.  Others we maybe
    can't see clearly for the smoke of our economy and TP supplies
    burning up might actually be 3 forward, or at least foreshadow the
    possibility.
 2. Scepticism of the traditional metanarrative is definitely being
    trumped (Trumped?) by the urgent reality of the sky falling in so
    many ways... expedience and practicality are knocking holes in some
    of the old-school metanarratives. 
 3. I'm not sure if hidden power structures are being revealed by
    deconstructionism, but the fat is melting off and leaving the bare
    bones behind to be seen?
 4. Obscurantism:   This is more of a criticism of postmodernism I think
    than a definition of it.  I do find most self-identified po-mo's to
    engage in this.

I suppose a meta-question I'm pondering is what kind of post
postmodernism does postmodernism bootstrap (or procreate if you want a
tongue twister)?


I don't have anything much to say about separating the man Ramsey from
the behaviour Jerkiness.   This occurs a lot in my experience (mostly
when reviewing historical or famous figures public/private lives)....
I"m sympathetic with your preference for not accidentally reinforcing
jerkiness by giving the vessel of it attention.

Mumble,

 - Steve


> So, I find this:
>
> Theorem Proving, Multigraphs and Euler Cycles in R. Part I
> https://criticathink.wordpress.com/2020/03/21/theorem-proving-multigraphs-and-euler-cycles-in-r-i/
>
> Which is pretty cool. And I think, wow a philosopher who uses R! Maybe I should follow this dude on feedly or somesuch. So, then I find this:
>
> The Newman Objection to Ramsey Sentence Structuralism
> https://m-phi.blogspot.com/2013/04/the-newman-objection-to-ramsey-sentence.html
>
> which I read *because* of this I received earlier this morning:
>
> The remarkable life of philosopher Frank Ramsey
> https://blog.oup.com/2020/02/the-remarkable-life-of-philosopher-frank-ramsey/
>
>
> In the link to the academia.edu page, linked from 2 articles in that post, his blurb says: 'Logician. Stalked by a psychopath. Chased out of Oxford by a feminist vigilante mob. Now a researcher at The University of Warsaw (a project "Model theoretic methods in the foundations of science")'. So now I have to find out if he's just an outright jerk, which means no matter how interesting his tech or philosophy output might be, I'm not gonna follow his work. At which point I find all sorts of links showing he gives talks at Men's Rights conferences and such. Blech. He does seem like a bit of a jerk.
>
> It's a shame because I really like (and agree with) his conception of postmodernism:
>
> The Metanarrative of Social Justice. Or, Why SJW isn’t Postmodernist Either
> https://criticathink.wordpress.com/2018/04/29/the-metanarrative-of-social-justice-or-why-sjw-isnt-postmodernist-either/
>
> I worry even about posting these links, here. Am I facilitating the more antisocial aspects of his work? I doubt I am with the FriAM members, particularly. But given that the list is archived and googlable, is it irresponsible to link to his work? Gah. Why is everything so difficult?
>
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