Utopia Talk / Politics / Michel Foucalt

Nimatzo iChihuaha	Thu Dec 01 04:20:49 A man who died from AIDS he contracted frequenting gay S/M clubs (he was a free loving kinda guy). He contracted this disease in the early days when our knowledge of the disease was limited. Given the medical facts we are now aware of, would he have taken precautions or remained skeptical of the truth that science can produce? It is a silly question because he denied HIV even existed and spread the disease to unsuspecting people resulting in their death. Why am I posting this? Because this guy and other post modernist "thinkers" have laid, in no small part, the foundation of what today is call third-wave feminism and SJW.
williamthebastard Member	Thu Dec 01 04:24:23 Jergul, this is what I should have said: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Verificationism
williamthebastard Member	Thu Dec 01 04:31:50 As for the OP on par with mocking hawking for his MS, as well as being blatantly homophobic and stupid: "Foucault appears to have suspected that he contracted AIDS in California, probably in 1982, but no positive diagnosis of AIDS was ever made. Alan Sheridan says that Foucault told him (in 1984 I think) that the doctors did not know what was wrong with him. Aids was considered but dismissed. Paul Veyne and Pierre Nora says that Foucault knew he had AIDS before died in June 1984. " http://foucault.info/pst/az-cf-72215-892914403 http://foucault.info/pst/az-cf-72215-892914403
williamthebastard Member	Thu Dec 01 05:01:46 Also, about feminism “Foucault makes few references to women or to the issue of gender in his writings” http://www.iep.utm.edu/foucfem/ So, it would seem youre factually wrong on 2 points so far in the OP. Give up using examples that would mean that world famous thinkers were actually unusually stupid, this ridiculous world where you’re 3 times as smart as world famous thinkers whose arguments you are so above that you can dismiss them without even ever having studied them (and thus getting them utterly wrong while being utterly convinced you understand perfectly without ever having studied what it takes other normal humans years of study to get) You’re just being the clever-dick loudmouth student who knew it all at the back of the class who got an F and wasnt allowed to continue the program.
Nimatzo iChihuaha	Thu Dec 01 05:45:49 He is also quoted saying that he does not believe in AIDS. And while he may have had criticism of the feminism of his day (second wave) the current generation derives in large parts from ideas put forward in post-modernism. Interesting, in light of the friction between second wave and third wave on many issues. "You’re just being the clever-dick loudmouth" We just spent 2 threads where you criticized science, TOE and people that I respect, it never occurred to me that you were attacking me personally, which in retrospect might seem naive. Regardless of your motives, you should not take my views on post modernism or any other idea that you may have as a personal attack on you.
williamthebastard Member	Thu Dec 01 05:47:43 "He is also quoted saying that he does not believe in AIDS. " Link? The only link I found was some far right garbage nonsense. So far, factually wrong on both main points of the OP: a) The highly tenuous linking to feminism which was not a topic that he ever spent any time on, and the (incorrect) humorous irony that his beliefs were so wrong they led to him not believing in what killed him. What are you going to do about all the factual errors I keep showing you making, Mr. Facts? The real irony is, it would seem that he believed he had aids even when science didn’t. The only other thing you wanted to sarcastically point out was his “free loving kinda guy”-homosexuality, as if that should be mentioned when discussing how to assess his credibility. Great thinking there, man. “Given the medical facts we are now aware of, would he have taken precautions or remained skeptical of the truth that science can produce? It is a silly question because he denied HIV even existed” No, its not a silly question because of your apparently untrue and incorrect premise that he believed that, but because you have such a terrible misunderstanding of how he thought, and that you think world famous thinkers actually probably can have a rather low IQ, and that you think so terribly erroneously that he would for a second consider questioning science in exactly what science is good at. For a tolerant liberal guy who’s always the owner of the facts, the OP is a bit of an intellectual, fact-checking and ethical disaster.
Nimatzo iChihuaha	Thu Dec 01 06:01:31 "Give up using examples that would mean that world famous thinkers" Fame is all you need to be immune from criticism and falsehoods? And as if I am the first person to criticize the likes of Foucault and post modernism? This is an unusually lazy argument. "you’re 3 times as smart" "convinced you understand perfectly" "you can dismiss them without even ever having studied" I am a stupid, pompous ass who has no idea what he is talking about!! I will never get it! These people are world famous thinkers!!! Do these things count as arguments and evidence in your circles? It is an honest question, do the convince anyone?
williamthebastard Member	Thu Dec 01 06:02:13 But you avoid mentioning your factual mistakes.
williamthebastard Member	Thu Dec 01 06:03:09 Wheres that link?
Nimatzo iChihuaha	Thu Dec 01 06:07:09 Carvalho: For The Love of Boys Miller, 349. Even after collapsing “like a kind of rag doll” on a walk to Miller’s car on a warm spring afternoon in 1983, Foucault tells his friend he doesn’t believe in AIDS.  “Je n’y crois pas,” he says.9 And, yet, within a year, he would succumb to complications brought on by the retrovirus, HIV. With others, Foucault found the idea of a disease that would attack you because you were gay hysterical.    More generally, Foucault thought, death was nothing to fear.    “How could I be afraid of AIDS when I could die in a car,” he asks his undergraduate interviewer.10 For Miller he described an experience of being hit by a car, lying in the street in a kind of drugged euphoria, feeling that he was leaving his body, thinking he was going to die; it was ecstatic, he says.11 And, then, returning to the subject of AIDS, he leaned toward Miller and said, “Besides, to die for the love of boys: What could be more beautiful?”12
williamthebastard Member	Thu Dec 01 06:11:09 Thanks. This contrasts with other accounts, and it shows nothing ironically stupid about his ideology in a time when his doctors were telling him it wasnt aids when he apparently began to believe it was. So, still bogus evidence in the completely incorrect argument that Foucault didn't believe in the effects of medicine.
williamthebastard Member	Thu Dec 01 06:11:50 Read my lips: Foucault never voiced anything like a doubt in the tangible effects of medicine or science.
williamthebastard Member	Thu Dec 01 06:12:33 In fact, in his criticism of science in general, he was even more critical of the social sciences than the natural sciences. Youre just so wrong and ignorant on this topic.
williamthebastard Member	Thu Dec 01 06:13:41
Nimatzo iChihuaha	Thu Dec 01 06:14:22 "williamthebastard Member Thu Dec 01 06:03:09 Wheres that link?" lol I asked for examples and evidence so many times! Nothing, you couldn't control your hysteria over the claim that your hero was an AIDS denier. Anyway I need to go, people are paying me to shit that is, well not this.
williamthebastard Member	Thu Dec 01 06:15:25 ^Weak retreat heh.
williamthebastard Member	Thu Dec 01 06:15:55 Read my lips: Foucault never voiced anything like a doubt in the tangible effects of medicine or science. Your argument is ignorant nonsense.
williamthebastard Member	Thu Dec 01 06:19:03 They didnt even have a name for aids until after september after his death in june, btw, so give up that utterly incorrect garbage that this is evidence of how he didnt believe in the tangible effects of science. Full of untruths, Mr Facts.
Nimatzo iChihuaha	Thu Dec 01 06:20:43 Now, don't get hysterical, I wont ignore you or anything, but I like you am at the end my patience, just a little bit. Better to let things cool off.
williamthebastard Member	Thu Dec 01 06:22:03 Probably, in other words, shortly before his death, he correctly suspected he did have this new disease that was so new there was no name for it yet and his doctors did not believe it. This is evidence of hating science, eh? This is so intellectually weak, nimatzo, come on you can do better.
williamthebastard Member	Thu Dec 01 06:22:54 And, of course, yoour other point trying to link him to feminism is crap as well, as proven.
williamthebastard Member	Thu Dec 01 06:26:24 Its very simple: You are factually wrong in trying to argue that Foucault ever voiced anything like a doubt in the tangible effects of medicine or science. You are factually very tenuously stretching links to feminism. And you take a dig at mentioning BS clubs and homosexuality when discussing how to assess his credibility. The end, Mr Facts.
Nimatzo iChihuaha	Thu Dec 01 06:32:22 http://www.iep.utm.edu/foucfem/ Anyway, really, see you later!
williamthebastard Member	Thu Dec 01 06:33:49 Yes, do read that next time. Read how some of this theories have been interesting to later feminists, a group he never really bothered about, but how they also dont like the fact that his theories mean they can be just as guilty of sexism. You get an F.
williamthebastard Member	Thu Dec 01 06:35:15 Your intent was to try to link him to a group that you feel is universally mocked, through very tenuous links. Weak argument. Your argument that he ever voiced anything like a doubt in the tangible effects of medicine or science is completely untrue and factually wrong. Have a nice day!
jergul large member	Thu Dec 01 06:39:09 wtb Ultimately, all good scientific research is based on: "To the best of our current knowledge, the following is..." Everything we know is wrong and will be replaced by better knowledge in the days, months, years, decades, centuries, and/or millenium to come* *Barring the rather high likelihood of civilization ending mass extinction events.
williamthebastard Member	Thu Dec 01 06:48:03 *although the chronological practice of adding more and more lego pieces and thus creating increasing complexity might not == better. Some might call it a form of entropy.
werewolf dictator Member	Thu Dec 01 06:50:13 this foucault guy is pretty creepy
williamthebastard Member	Thu Dec 01 06:53:37 Amusingly, he came from a family of surgeons.
jergul large member	Thu Dec 01 06:56:59 That practice is fundamental to paradigm shifts. Load down existing systems until they break and are replaced by better ones. I understand the sentiment. It would be nice to think we could know everything one day if only we dedicated ourselves to study. But no matter how much you read, the fraction of total knowledge you possess decreases every day. I blame China. And India. And other places.
Nimatzo iChihuaha	Thu Dec 01 07:33:23 "Yes, do read that next time. Read how some of this theories have been interesting to later feminists, a group he never really bothered about, but how they also dont like the fact that his theories mean they can be just as guilty of sexism. You get an F." Thu Dec 01 05:45:49 "And while he may have had criticism of the feminism of his day (second wave) the current generation derives in large parts from ideas put forward in post-modernism. Interesting, in light of the friction between second wave and third wave on many issues." Teacher, you are FIRED!
williamthebastard Member	Thu Dec 01 07:36:41 Youre actually still trying to link him to a group you feel is despised that he didnt care about and how heartily disagree with him to discredit him. You think this is an argument worth pursuing together with a persposterously false argument about his position on science. Want me to go fetch a bunch of quotes showing feminists ´having problems with him because of that I explained and other stuff? Rally, youre a low brow kinda guy, Mr Facts. Liking "I fucking love science" on FB doesnt actually mean anything.
Nimatzo iChihuaha	Thu Dec 01 07:38:01 "like a doubt in the tangible effects" Do you think the effects of evolution are intangible?
williamthebastard Member	Thu Dec 01 07:38:39 I think youre not worth reading anymore until you step up the game several levels.
williamthebastard Member	Thu Dec 01 07:41:35 * and who heartily disagree with him on some issues
Nimatzo iChihuaha	Thu Dec 01 07:44:45 "Youre actually still trying to link him" LOL, not me, this is the work of WORLD FAMOUS THINKERS!!! Are you smarter than them? ;) I would appreciate if you retract the statement, that I am no better than Hot Rod and did not read my own link. Also please admit that you did not read my post.
williamthebastard Member	Thu Dec 01 07:47:47 "Load down existing systems until they break and are replaced by better ones. " Hmm, still that "better" there that Im uncertain about
williamthebastard Member	Thu Dec 01 07:49:06 Sometimes better, sometimes worse, there may not be a progressive method to the madness.
Nimatzo iChihuaha	Thu Dec 01 07:52:25 "I think youre not worth reading anymore" I think we can establish that you have not been reading half the things I have been writing and that you have an uncontrollable contempt for me over philosophical differences. And that can only be described as sad.
jergul large member	Thu Dec 01 08:01:29 wtb Better loosely defined as "with more explanatory power" as we slowly trend towards the unified theory of everything.
Hot Rod Revved Up	Thu Dec 01 08:15:14 Is he the one who said now that he had it he was going to give it to as many others as he possibly could?
jergul large member	Thu Dec 01 08:17:27 Nah. That was some military guy who said that.
Hot Rod Revved Up	Thu Dec 01 08:19:31 jergul, has anyone ever told you that you are one sick little puppy?
Nimatzo iChihuaha	Thu Dec 01 09:04:30 No Hot Rod, I don't think the man had malicious intent, he was simply misinformed.
Hot Rod Revved Up	Thu Dec 01 12:25:38 Then it was another guy. I heard about the one I described when Y was living in San Francisco.
Hot Rod Revved Up	Thu Dec 01 13:48:46 *-I
pillz Member	Thu Dec 01 14:57:13 "As for the OP on par with mocking hawking for his MS, as well as being blatantly homophobic and stupid:" I knew this was going to be wtb's response, more or less, the moment I read the OP. The wtbs of the world need to be drowned en masse in semen.
Cherub Cow Member	Thu Dec 01 19:54:27 "Better loosely defined as "with more explanatory power" as we slowly trend towards the unified theory of everything." A "unified theory of everything" would be a pretty terrifying authoritarianism, one predicated on some kind of Borg groupthink or mass cultural illusion.
Forwyn Member	Thu Dec 01 20:36:31 "As for the OP on par with mocking hawking for his MS" Hawking "caught" MS by being furiously fucked in the ass by multiple men?
Cherub Cow Member	Thu Dec 01 20:38:48 England can be so dangerous :(
earthpig GTFO HOer	Fri Dec 02 01:23:25 It's been so long since Marxism 101 at Cal! Was Foucault the deconstructionist literature idiot or the everything including atoms is a social construct guy?
Nimatzo iChihuaha	Fri Dec 02 01:23:49 Just to clarify, I could not care less about who he fucked. I was providing context for the reckless type of life style and denial of science that killed him. And men live more recklessly, gay men have much more sex with many more partners than any other group and that puts them in higher risk category for sexually transmitted disease. There is nothing wrong with fucking with as many people as possible, if that is your thing. Foucalt put a lot of emphasis on love and sex hence "free loving kinda guy". You expect to be able to have a conversation with another adult without having to weave your arguments in disclaimers, you expect some level of good faith or at the very least you do not expect "bad faith". Unfortunately that is all that I can expect from you WTB. At the same time I think, over the years you have learned enough about me, to know (yes you should know) that half the things you accuse me of, are simply not true. I wont speculate as to why you keep doing it or ever acknowledge that you have misunderstood anything. You should however know that it creates a gap an abyss between us that is impossible to bridge.
jergul large member	Fri Dec 02 01:37:30 CC Well, quite. Though humans are admirably able to accept theory, and adopt completely different practices. A deadly sin, or a saving grace. Depending on context.
Cherub Cow Member	Fri Dec 02 02:53:41 Context ftw! :p Acceptance of theory itself can be dangerous, but there can be degrees and context for that too, so yeahs... ... [ep]: "Was Foucault the deconstructionist literature idiot or the everything including atoms is a social construct guy?" I know him mainly for « Surveiller et punir » ("Surveil/Discipline and Punish"), which tends to be a highly useful work on Panoptic cultures -- cultures which discipline people into believing in simulations and illusions as reality in order to control the arrangement of their physical bodies. That doesn't seem too apparent from these threads, though! I haven't read the first thread, but Foucault's philosophies seem less relevant here than do dismissals of his works via ad hominem or irrelevant details. Some of the responses also haven't been useful considering that some mainstream feminists *reject* postmodernism due to perceived sexism in postmodern*ists* (more ad hominem) as well as rejecting it because individualism themes of postmodernism are contrary to the group identity that some feminists want to impose on women. Which also leads to the fact that it would be similarly uninformed to reject postmodernism in general, given that it is not a collection of philosophers (easily struck down by biographical details) so much as an accidental umbrella over pretty reasonable themes like subjectivity, incompleteness, false unity, and critical self-reflection. So with those themes cast aside this thread reads more like an excuse for nameless frustration ;)
williamthebastard Member	Fri Dec 02 03:51:31 "Some of the responses also haven't been useful considering that some mainstream feminists..." Well, its a pointless troll thread, sometimes when you hear a crap song you change channel immediagely, sometimes you hum along for a few bars before going "wtf am I listening to" and changing channels. I know very little about feminism which is an irrelevant topic anyway when assessing the plausibility of Foucault's thinking.
williamthebastard Member	Fri Dec 02 03:55:06 Its actually a bit of a shame that F never really got into race or gender, would have been interesting reading today.
williamthebastard Member	Fri Dec 02 04:01:31 And, yeah, probably fair to characterize postmodernism as the various counterreactions to modernism rather than a uniform school of thought.
williamthebastard Member	Fri Dec 02 04:10:48 Unsurprising that harvard medical school includes a large amount of foucault literaure in its "Medical Education for the Future" program.
Renzo Marquez Member	Fri Dec 02 04:47:38 Unsurprising that wtb thinks AIDS is a social construct.
Nimatzo iChihuaha	Fri Dec 02 07:22:27 "Foucault’s idea that the body and sexuality are cultural constructs rather than natural phenomena has made a significant contribution to the feminist critique of essentialism." This is at the core of third wave feminism and the SJW movement. "So with those themes cast aside this thread reads more like an excuse for nameless frustration ;)" I know nothing about post-modernism, but world famous thinkers do and I can defer to their knowledge, the consensus is rather clear and I have yet to find a good reason to waste my own time studying nonsense so that I may engage in obscure sophistry. With that said, I am sure not everything post modernism has produced is garbage, just like not everything in the bible can be dismissed a useless.
Nimatzo iChihuaha	Fri Dec 02 07:37:59 "I know very little about feminism which is an irrelevant topic anyway when assessing the plausibility of Foucault's thinking." We agree on that. The connection to feminism has no relevance, outside of connecting the stupidity that killed him with the stupidity going on today informing policy decisions.
williamthebastard Member	Fri Dec 02 07:43:36 Without reading your immature and ludicrously incorrect junk: every single field that studies any aspect of human behavior uses foucaults theories at some point, as do top medical schools etc.
williamthebastard Member	Fri Dec 02 07:46:19 Neither are feminists a universal band of idiots, hanif bali.
williamthebastard Member	Fri Dec 02 07:54:09 Apparently also the US military draws on his theories too. I guess foucault is to blame for war https://books.google.se/books?id=f1OFCwAAQBAJ&pg=PT145&lpg=PT145&dq=military+academy+foucault&source=bl&ots=lPoHJacpaP&sig=q1RPmrE22NKMs7gXjwDT2TyPtdI&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjgt9jW09XQAhWkHJoKHV_tB5gQ6AEIJDAC#v=onepage&q=military%20academy%20foucault&f=false
Nimatzo iChihuaha	Fri Dec 02 08:01:12 "Neither are feminists a universal band of idiots" For the third time buddy, I was the first one in this thread to make a distinction between the different bands of feminist.
Nimatzo iChihuaha	Fri Dec 02 08:07:47 I am actually interested in that, the influences he supposedly has had on useful things, like medicine.
Asgard Member	Fri Dec 02 10:03:20 Michel Foucault... Derrida, Lacan... Fucking French "philosophers" whose only "contribution" to the world are nonsensical walls of texts, contradictory arguments, simple and stupid over-complicated old ideas represented as novelties... fucking fuck.
Asgard Member	Fri Dec 02 10:04:31 "Noam Chomsky Calls Jacques Lacan a 'Charlatan' " http://www...lls-jacques-lacan-a-charlatan/
Nimatzo iChihuaha	Fri Dec 02 13:46:48 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OzrHwDOlTt8 This is probably my favorite of Chomsky explaining this.
Cherub Cow Member	Fri Dec 02 21:23:54 [Nimatzo]: "'Foucault’s idea that the body and sexuality are cultural constructs rather than natural phenomena has made a significant contribution to the feminist critique of essentialism.' This is at the core of third wave feminism and the SJW movement." From that [complete] same statement: "...feminist critique of essentialism. While feminists have found Foucault’s analysis of the relations between power and the body illuminating, they have also drawn attention to its [*limitations*]. From the perspective of a feminist politics that aims to promote women’s autonomy, the tendency of a Foucauldian account of power to reduce social agents to docile bodies seems [*problematic*]" ( http://www.iep.utm.edu/foucfem/ ). "Limitations" and "problematic" being emphasized because this essay was not meant to say that Foucault was responsible for third wave feminism; it is only that he was sampled by it and the rest of his work cast aside for a political agenda. There tends to be a big difference between someone *sampling* part of another's philosophy and that philosopher actually *saying* the certain things that the sampler wishes that they said. Ayn Rand heavily sampled Nietzsche, for instance, but that does not mean that Nietzsche should be blamed for all of Ayn Rand. On Foucault, I can't speak to his other works, but in "Discipline & Punish" he did not try to say that the body does not exist; his meaning there was that how we *interpret* the real body is the result of the psychic enforcement of cultural constructs (laws, training, etc.), and those cultural constructs may further propagate via a confirmation bias. That is, if you say that anyone who loves fish sticks/dicks is a gay fish (the construct), and you get someone to admit loving fish dicks, then that someone may slowly believe that he's a gay fish that should make love to other gay fish. Foucault was explaining that watchfulness and punishment (psychic/cultural and real) can be used to get people to incorporate moral values into themselves; they behave according to those values even when not watched. It should be pretty intuitive. But how did fractions of feminism distort this? Their imperative *omitted* the wider gaze of a state apparatus and omitted the enforcement of control via individual gazes that had internalized the state control (they omitted that *everyone* can enforce discipline via a gaze; we see this all the time with internet lynch mobs). Instead it was specifically a *male* gaze which controlled women — part of a specifically patriarchal framing of state control. See the difference? Foucault was not talking about a male-specific gaze, but he was sampled by feminists who — in their specific political orientation — re-purposed his wider theme into one that they could use. Does that mean that there is no "male gaze"? Not really, but it is not the only gaze. Should the philosopher be blamed for people manipulating his work for their subjective ends? Probably it doesn't make sense to do so, especially when it's so selective. And why bother with Foucault anyways? Simone de Beauvoir would be more useful on this subject and spoke far more directly about society coding female behavior ("one is not born a woman, but becomes one."). ... [Nimatzo]: "I know nothing about post-modernism, but world famous thinkers do and I can defer to their knowledge, the consensus is rather clear and I have yet to find a good reason to waste my own time studying nonsense so that I may engage in obscure sophistry. [/] With that said, I am sure not everything post modernism has produced is garbage, just like not everything in the bible can be dismissed a useless." Not sure if you're being sarcastic with the "but world famous thinkers do and I can defer to their knowledge," since there was sarcasm about that earlier in this thread series... but if serious, definitely that kind of deferral would be a fallacy/argument from authority. That's the case especially because philosophy subjects (like that of Foucault) should be visited as *primary* sources, not read *about* via people who have sampled them out of context for their activism. So do not take for granted the "authority" of someone writing on the subject of Foucault — not even mine — or at least be aware of the context of their sampling and do not just agree because you haven't read into it yourself. And a good example of this that I sort of mentioned earlier on the subject of [collectivist] feminism often being at odds with postmodernism... In Kate Soper's "Feminism, Humanism, and Postmodernism", she goes on a mission to critique postmodernism, so if you were to read some of her arguments without knowing any better, you might agree when she says that silencing women is a part of postmodernism, and that a reversal to individualism (i.e., women acting as individuals rather than as "women" en masse) "leaves feminism exposed to the temptations of what are arguably deeply nostalgic and conservative currents of postmodernist thinking" ( http://www.radicalphilosophy.com/wp-content/files_mf/rp55_article2_feminismhumanismpostmodernism_soper.pdf ). She qualifies with "currents," but if you took her word for it, postmodernism is pretty sexist, nostalgic, and maybe even a symptom of the UK Conservative Party. But her reasoning is mainly that Jacque Derrida and Jean Baudrillard said some pretty sexist things (they did). Still, if you instead read the source that she offered at the very beginning of her essay where she avoided the responsibility of defining her terms because she expects her audience already knows them (in the way that *she* knows them), she mentions Jean-François Lyotard, who very succinctly gives an overview of postmodernism in « Le Postmoderne expliqué aux enfants » ("The Postmodern Explained to Children"). If Lyotard did not come up in any of these threads or you have not read this essay, then you may have a skewed vision of postmodernism, because just as collectivist feminists prop up a straw man of postmodernism (part of a trope of eternally establishing who the patriarchy is 'today' for battlefield clarity), so do uncritical scientists prop up a straw man of postmodernism (part of a trope of wanting to believe in the purity of method and the ideal of a unified utopia of scientific achievement). In reality, though, postmodernism is highly *compatible* with science — but the self-critical kind of science, which recognizes error reports, sample purity limitations, and the biases of publishing standards. This message kind of gets lost when uninitiated people think that postmodernism is reality-denying, when it's actually a combat *against* reality denial. .. Chomsky's responses there (video OzrHwDOlTt8) were pretty limited against a particular subset of some phantom population. It does not help that he didn't get specific, because that same video could be labeled "Chomsky on Science and [the Circumlocution Office]." He seems to be thinking of a catalog of errors (wordiness, cryptic language, etc.) and putting it under postmodernism. Yet nowadays it seems exceedingly rare that feminism and SJWs actually align with postmodernism, so maybe the video is dated. Also worth noting that the same kind of self-criticism that applies to wordiness in humanities also applies to the sciences, so applying it to his disfavored subset is disingenuous. He might have glossed over that because he thinks one is more noble, when, again, each can and has informed the other in productive ways and each has similar failings. This might be a better read about language, science, and how it's presented in the upper levels of academia: "Why Academics Stink at Writing" http://www.chronicle.com/article/Why-Academics-Writing-Stinks/148989/ The article goes into how alienating readers with jargon is a big problem in scientific *and* humanities writing; people try to protect themselves by hiding their actual data or disguising the simple messages that they have. To focus on science in particular (since humanities seems to be taken for granted in this discussion), that can be as simple as trying to figure out what a particular science manuscript's bar charts *mean* as far as proof of hypothesis; it is sadly common how many manuscripts mislabel the charts or omit to where all of their bad data disappeared (like omitting important information on mice samples or over-extrapolating low n-values). Science manuscripts also often fail to present and explain terms which only exist within the originating laboratory, so reading them takes a lot of work! TLDR: Postmodernism can actually be pretty neato if you look into it via primary sources. It's pretty much at odds with SJWs and pseudo-feminism, and it can be pretty useful when reading scientific papers. Kind of a shame to see peeps like Chomsky create a false divide between self-critical humanities and the sciences... postmodernism can make much more critical scientists.
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