sj_zero on Nostr: I think that modernists are epistemologically stupid. That doesn't mean they're ...
I think that modernists are epistemologically stupid.
That doesn't mean they're unintelligent or not good people, but modernity (including postmodernity which is treated as a modernist totalizing ideology by most, although it can be used as a non-modernist tool) is a simplifying and narrowing lens that requires massive blind spots to actually use.
That makes it incredibly useful and powerful in narrow ways, but it also means that stuff that's outside your framework basically doesn't exist. That's why the story of the modern age turned into the great battle between grand ideologies.
Modernist design tended to remove extraneous elements. Modernist writing strove to cut words and try to streamline sentences. Modernist furniture is sleek and lacks adornment. Modernist architecture's height was brutalist cement towers.
Modernist ideologies do the same. They try to remove all extraneous elements and focus on one concept. Classical liberalism contends that freedom is the totalizing element. Socialism contends that equality is the totalizing element. National socialism contends that racial brotherhood is the totalizing element. Fascism contends that the state is the totalizing element. They're all stupid ideologies, but that makes them powerful too.
I saw a video where the host asked why people can't agree with basic facts. At first glance it looks like there's a sinister reason, but I think it all fits into this framework. Of course people only see one set of facts or another, because where facts are contradictory, modernist epistemology naturally suggests that you "pick a side" and only acknowledge facts that fit with their worldview, because anything else is an extraneous element.
Once you've seen it, you can't unsee it, and rhetorical and logical footwork that would have previously looked very impressive just looks like the special olympics in boxing. "Oh yeah? Well you're ignoring THIS fact!" "Oh yeah? Well you're ignoring THIS fact!" and in the end you have people pointing out the obvious, that their universalized and highly rational ideology relies on ignoring most of reality to make it work that way.
Proper discussion ought to actually admit the things the other side is right about, as well as trying to see any other truths that perhaps both sides are missing. The problem is that this results in nuance, and you can't destroy your opponent with nuance -- you can only develop accurate understandings of the world that might help you actually succeed in the long-term. In seeing the other side's points, you might not come to their way of thinking. However, you might come to a new understanding of the overall picture that changes your overall view. The other fact is that you may not weigh truths in superposition the same as other people, so perhaps one thing is more important to them, and another thing is important to you. At least you can accept the things that are true and recognise that you agree on the facts but disagree on the weighting, and no amount of screaming facts you both agree with at each other is going to change that.
As much as so-called "centrism" thinks it's above it all, it's just another modernist ideology, selecting pieces of different modernist ideologies a la carte, but not actually holding all the truths in superposition but choosing which grand narratives to follow in a vacuum. Truly independent thought would not be constrained by whatever you're putting at different poles to get a "center". If one group wants to kill Bob and the other group wants to kill Jim, the enlightened centrist position might be to only half kill Bob and Jim, when maybe you don't need to kill anyone at all and the question is wrong?
Something like Beyesian reasoning is also ultimately used in a modernist way. While it is true that within a narrowly defined system there is a single truth one can work towards, once the scope broadens, truth becomes more multi-layered, and trying to collapse into one truth using Beyesian reasoning actually leads to false confidence in a simple result. That doesn't necessarily mean that it's modernist per se -- some things are just objectively true and it isn't a unique thing to find that truth -- but how it's used can oversimplify complex reality.
The fact that there are multiple truths at first glance looks like the relativism of postmodernity, but in practice it's more like driving your car through an obstacle course -- you're trying to navigate in between the different contradictory things dynamically rather than collapsing them into one truth -- because there isn't one truth, there's multiple and you need to navigate them or you're going to hit a pylon.
I think the accusation of "whataboutism" is a fantastic modernist deflection. Instead of having to start engaging with truth that there's more than one true thing you have to navigate, you just go "you're just trying to justify bad behavior by pointing out other bad behavior!" -- well maybe, but if the alternative data points change the view of the one data point they want you to pay attention to, then that matters regardless of what you're trying to do.
To close out this discussion, it isn't to say that modernism is useless or that it should be totally ignored. It is self-evidently useful in the fact that modernists took over the globe. The problem is that it isn't the only useful tool, and it isn't a sustainable totalizing ideology for everything. The more accurate our models of the world, the more likely we are to create plans that are going to work in the long-term. Modernism itself was always fairly unstable, and really didn't last that long in the grand scheme of things, the modernist era's end beginning around the beginning of World War 1 which has a direct causal line to the French Revolution which some historians generally consider the beginning of the modernist age.
That doesn't mean they're unintelligent or not good people, but modernity (including postmodernity which is treated as a modernist totalizing ideology by most, although it can be used as a non-modernist tool) is a simplifying and narrowing lens that requires massive blind spots to actually use.
That makes it incredibly useful and powerful in narrow ways, but it also means that stuff that's outside your framework basically doesn't exist. That's why the story of the modern age turned into the great battle between grand ideologies.
Modernist design tended to remove extraneous elements. Modernist writing strove to cut words and try to streamline sentences. Modernist furniture is sleek and lacks adornment. Modernist architecture's height was brutalist cement towers.
Modernist ideologies do the same. They try to remove all extraneous elements and focus on one concept. Classical liberalism contends that freedom is the totalizing element. Socialism contends that equality is the totalizing element. National socialism contends that racial brotherhood is the totalizing element. Fascism contends that the state is the totalizing element. They're all stupid ideologies, but that makes them powerful too.
I saw a video where the host asked why people can't agree with basic facts. At first glance it looks like there's a sinister reason, but I think it all fits into this framework. Of course people only see one set of facts or another, because where facts are contradictory, modernist epistemology naturally suggests that you "pick a side" and only acknowledge facts that fit with their worldview, because anything else is an extraneous element.
Once you've seen it, you can't unsee it, and rhetorical and logical footwork that would have previously looked very impressive just looks like the special olympics in boxing. "Oh yeah? Well you're ignoring THIS fact!" "Oh yeah? Well you're ignoring THIS fact!" and in the end you have people pointing out the obvious, that their universalized and highly rational ideology relies on ignoring most of reality to make it work that way.
Proper discussion ought to actually admit the things the other side is right about, as well as trying to see any other truths that perhaps both sides are missing. The problem is that this results in nuance, and you can't destroy your opponent with nuance -- you can only develop accurate understandings of the world that might help you actually succeed in the long-term. In seeing the other side's points, you might not come to their way of thinking. However, you might come to a new understanding of the overall picture that changes your overall view. The other fact is that you may not weigh truths in superposition the same as other people, so perhaps one thing is more important to them, and another thing is important to you. At least you can accept the things that are true and recognise that you agree on the facts but disagree on the weighting, and no amount of screaming facts you both agree with at each other is going to change that.
As much as so-called "centrism" thinks it's above it all, it's just another modernist ideology, selecting pieces of different modernist ideologies a la carte, but not actually holding all the truths in superposition but choosing which grand narratives to follow in a vacuum. Truly independent thought would not be constrained by whatever you're putting at different poles to get a "center". If one group wants to kill Bob and the other group wants to kill Jim, the enlightened centrist position might be to only half kill Bob and Jim, when maybe you don't need to kill anyone at all and the question is wrong?
Something like Beyesian reasoning is also ultimately used in a modernist way. While it is true that within a narrowly defined system there is a single truth one can work towards, once the scope broadens, truth becomes more multi-layered, and trying to collapse into one truth using Beyesian reasoning actually leads to false confidence in a simple result. That doesn't necessarily mean that it's modernist per se -- some things are just objectively true and it isn't a unique thing to find that truth -- but how it's used can oversimplify complex reality.
The fact that there are multiple truths at first glance looks like the relativism of postmodernity, but in practice it's more like driving your car through an obstacle course -- you're trying to navigate in between the different contradictory things dynamically rather than collapsing them into one truth -- because there isn't one truth, there's multiple and you need to navigate them or you're going to hit a pylon.
I think the accusation of "whataboutism" is a fantastic modernist deflection. Instead of having to start engaging with truth that there's more than one true thing you have to navigate, you just go "you're just trying to justify bad behavior by pointing out other bad behavior!" -- well maybe, but if the alternative data points change the view of the one data point they want you to pay attention to, then that matters regardless of what you're trying to do.
To close out this discussion, it isn't to say that modernism is useless or that it should be totally ignored. It is self-evidently useful in the fact that modernists took over the globe. The problem is that it isn't the only useful tool, and it isn't a sustainable totalizing ideology for everything. The more accurate our models of the world, the more likely we are to create plans that are going to work in the long-term. Modernism itself was always fairly unstable, and really didn't last that long in the grand scheme of things, the modernist era's end beginning around the beginning of World War 1 which has a direct causal line to the French Revolution which some historians generally consider the beginning of the modernist age.