The One Time Alan Sokal Completely Destroyed Postmodernism 

If you are interested in a less "ranty" and more nuanced explanation of the developmental process of postmodernism and how it finally led to the unholy mixture between postmodernism and neo-marxism we see today, check out this clip from Stephen Hicks, a professor of philosophy at rockford university: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-1cuxEmy_Ipo.html

Did you hear the one about the post modern mafia boss? He's gonna make you an offer you can't understand.

"E=mc2 is sexist" ...and I spat my drink laughing

Postmodernists could build us missile defence by merely disagreeing with the conceptual framework of nuclear physics.

Postmodernists missed the elephant.

Postmodern thinking turned me into an empiricist.

My dad became a postmodernist at 70 after his memory and good mind died.

Postmodernism in a nutshell is recreational outrage.

I always think of Post-modernist thinkers and acolytes as victims of their own ridiculous practical joke. They’re all laughing manically at the world and each other but it’s been going on so long no one can remember what the joke was about. And now they’re scared because if one of them stops laughing and says ‘hold on a minute what they fuck are we laughing about??’ They might loose face. So they just hysterically laugh into eternity because to stop would suddenly give it meaning.

This gets at the heart of epistemology. Really, what is knowledge outside of our own phenomenal experience? With that said, science is the best epistemological approach to knowing the noumenal world (in Kantian terminology); and post modernism is a sham.

I took an English and Media Studies degree in the mid-90's. One day, a lecturer told me that the text we were studying meant anything I wanted it to mean and that this applied to all language. This is when I realised that the course was garbage and so after my first year I left and studied English elsewhere. However, before I left, I bet a fellow student I could incorporate any random quotes into our next paper. I took a piece of discarded photocopying we found in the bin and I used it in the next paper - even before we'd seen the question: it received a first. Postmodernism is a case of those who have nothing worth saying, saying it with words that convince idiots that they are saying something profound.

The person in the cover shot isn't Sokal. It's Bruno Latour.

"Completely Destroyed!!" Don't you ever get tired of writing these titles?

Oh gawd! He defeated the mighty strawman! :O

Clips such as this are wonderful encapsulations of what postmodernism is commonly taken to be: loose context and rapid-fire buzzwords in an ocean of self-righteous indignation.

One problem with the Sokal Hoax, as proof of anything, is that it is a one case study and it is not possible to conduct a statistically significant study based on his "experiment". It was a prank that exposed some bad practices of one journal, but does it bring a universal truth? I am not sure we can say that categorically.

I think that the main importance of postmodernism is its challenge to the metanarratives, I do agree with the postmodernist in this point.

The speed of sound is being oppressed by the speed of light! #allspeedsmatter

Fun Fact: Dr. Sokal's paper was published on April 1, 1996.

This video, as well as many of the comments below, is pretty silly. Postmodernism is just what the name suggests: a worldview/critique that follows high modernism and tries to reveal its erroneous assumptions and mistakes. That doesn't mean it's all correct (but neither are "modernist" narratives). Everybody can now get their panties out of a wad and try to move forward with integrity, recognizing that human knowledge is an incomplete, ongoing, and wonderful project.

Sadly, Post-modernism has only tightened its stranglehold on academia since Sokal's expose. One is reminded of Mickey Mouse as the Sorcerer's Apprentice in Fantasia.

Humor (esp. mockery) has a sanitizing effect on self-importance. Academia has made itself uniquely susceptible to this cleansing agent.

I read Sokal & Bricmont's post-hoax book Impostures Intellectuelles, which features the hoax article as a chapter - utterly hilarious!

Destroyed? Postmodernism has never been stronger, decades later.

If we say that Sokal "destroyed" post modernism, ie, that a single hoax can demolish an entire academic approach, then we are committed to Piltdown man "destroying" science, which is nonsense. Post modernism has problems, and some practitioners of post modernism are intellectual frauds, as Sokal demonstrated. But that does not mean post modernism is entirely without intellectual merit. Post modernists have made some genuinely insightful observations - and they do so consistently in areas where those following more classical epistemologies consistently fail to do so.

"The elephant is still there". Nobody's arguing about that. However, a lot of people fail to recognize that more than physical realities exit. And, a lot of those non-physical realities include subjective opinions. A subjective opinion might be only an opinion. But, it's a fact that people have them. Deal with it.

Part of the issue here is a misunderstanding of the intention of most reputable postmodernists. The intention is not to doubt that there isn't some event really happening, but that the certainty of any one perspective is incomplete. Relativism has been around for millennia, but relativity and relational thinking has only more recently been accessible to the masses. "Post" modernity doesn't necessarily mean after the END of modernity, but having passed through modernity and learned something about modernity and its limitations.

All of this is based on the deeply mistaken conception many people have that postmodernism denies that there is a reality out there. It absolutely does not. What it does deny is that we can ever have a pure, transparent apprehension of that reality, not mediated by the emphases and limits of social constructs (including language). If you think about it that way, the claims of postmodernism have obvious merits for questioning and undoing some of the assumptions on which our world is based. In other words, postmodernists certainly wouldn't deny that "e=mc-squared" works, within its given assumptions, but they would inquire how that line of thinking comes to be and if it is the only way to approach the truth of the universe--something with which quantum physicists themselves would fully concur. The problem comes with a false relativism--people saying, if there is no one, pure truth, than all versions of truth must be equal--which is absolutely NOT the point of postmodernism.

In good debate practice I was taught that you take on the opponent's perspective and truly understand it and then argue FOR it. I'm not sure anyone I have ever heard in any setting has done this with Postmodernism because they don't demonstrate much understanding of it.

I was introduced to Postmodernism in 1976 when I was 21. It was such obvious horseshit. I can't believe it lasted this long.

Two problems: first, bad editors don't make a good theory bad. Second, if you have not made the linguistic turn, you will hardly be able to catch up with either side of this debate.

All Sokal did was show that scientific concepts were being misused in post-modern philosophy. He didn't "destroy" post-modernism, whatever that's supposed to mean.

This didn't age well. We now know that Social Text was not (and never was) a peer reviewed journal. It was an obscure zine. The editors read Sokal's paper and asked Sokal to revise certain sections, which he refused to do. So the paper was put aside for two years before it was even published as part of an issue devoted to science and society. The fact that the paper was published does not mean it undermined all postmodernism, as Sokal seems to have believed. It is one paper in one zine. Similar hoaxes have been done to other journals in other academic fields. The Sokal affair only tells us about the quality of one zine.

My objection to this treatise is contingent, yet prevailing throughout, upon a regressive/agressive bi-constructual duplicity implied by the speaker's conspicuously unstated disavowal of a preeminent, self-referential sub-eminence. Otherwise I concur with him.

I had to endure postmodern theory as a Lit and Film major in the late 80s. Derrida was all the rage. The nonsense actually led me to abandon my master degree and escape academia. Best decision I could’ve made at the time, as it led me into a long successful career in advertising and publishing.

Small number voted this down. Such people are socially constructed.

But if we can only see reality through our senses then how do we ever know the elephant is really there...

Can you say no truth exists, isn't that a statement of truth??

WTF? This guy doesn't even understand postmodernism...

Sokal, the forefather of The Greviance Study papers.

Why are all these titles so hyperbolic? It makes me feel 14 years old. "Destroyed postmodernism forever?" - Oh, so we can just consider this issue solved, then? No honest thinker feels the need to banish an entire school of thought. It wouldn't exist if it didn't have some elements of truth. These titles are way too self-congradulatory, oversimplified, and drawing an unnecessary line in the sand so you can get an easy ego-boost by "othering" an entire wing of philosophy.

Sokal played the Postmodernists....😂

Great channel

Postmodernism is still here. I guess he didn't destroy it.

This is a pretty weak treatment. He invokes postmodern authors without actually quoting them. Instead he segues into un-cited and absurd remarks from people he has described as fans of those authors. This is really sloppy. I don't defend post modernism but I do defend ethical and charitable academic standards. If you are going to critique a particular concept you should actually take the time to describe it. Foucault, for instance, doesn't dismiss science in the way that he describes at all. Please be more thorough than this.

Postmodernism brought us the alt-right.

I would be more inclined to take people 'destroying' postmodernism seriously if a) they showed any understanding of the philosophers they are criticising and b) if they understood that the idea that what is often called the 'postmodern conception of truth' is not that all beliefs are equally true, but that the standard for what counts as truth dependent on something else. I too can 'destroy' a position by strawmanning the hell out of it by relating it to famous philosophers whom I have never read. Look here it goes: "Everyone who beliefs in cultural progress is stupid, you know people that follow Hegel, because once the admins of the leading white supremacy forum did not realise that a troll was sharing fake information." I did it, I wrecked the vaguely, nondescript position of 'believers in cultural progress' by not mentioning any of the arguments they use, misrepresenting their position, taking a very particular and extremist group of people that I choose to make representative of this position, linking it to a famous philosopher who's work I have not read but I belief to be somewhat related to the topic because someone else once told me so and mentioning how in this group of people there was an outlet that was unable to check the validity of an article. By following these steps anyone can 'destroy' anything! Just add water!

While postmodern thought makes assertions on a position of unjustifiability, this monologue kind of misses the point. The claim is not that there is no "real"; the claim is that what is the "real" cannot be known through anything other than the filter of the observer, and is therefore only a representation constructed relatively by the observer. The models that we construct to describe what we observe, to each other, are representations. So, we all exist relatively in this medium. And, that which we refer to as "real" is itself a representation of whatever is, so the "real" is therefore relative.

"Destroyed"? Alan Sokal doesn't think he "destroyed" postmodernism. This kind of shameless hyberbole is a bit unbecoming in a video that purports to be about serious philosophy, is it not? Here are Sokal's own words on the subject: From the mere fact of publication of my parody I think that not much can be deduced. It doesn't prove that the whole field of cultural studies, or cultural studies of science -- much less sociology of science -- is nonsense. Nor does it prove that the intellectual standards in these fields are generally lax. (This might be the case, but it would have to be established on other grounds.) It proves only that the editors of one rather marginal journal were derelict in their intellectual duty, by publishing an article on quantum physics that they admit they could not understand, without bothering to get an opinion from anyone knowledgeable in quantum physics, solely because it came from a ``conveniently credentialed ally'' (as Social Text co-editor Bruce Robbins later candidly admitted[12]), flattered the editors' ideological preconceptions, and attacked their ``enemies''.

Why is the thumbnail of Bruno Latour?

Man, what a hysteric and unrelaxed way of speaking. Hurts to listen to. Need a stiff drink to calm my senses after watching this. By God, take it easy, man. Everything is gonna be ok. Apart from this neurotic's style: as much as I agree with bashing the non-constructive ways of postmodernism, there is just simply no way to say there is something like an objective 'true' reality, at least in the empirical sense in which tihis man means it; it is typical of a special sort of scientism, which is devoid of any imagination and which is totally enclosed within the human world as if that is the locus of truth, and totally enclosed within its time in history, to make that claim. But this is not even the point. this scientism thinks there is a dictionary of 'real things' out there, a list of names and words, floating apart from creation, in which the 'real' things are listed. Atoms are there. Tables are there. But reality is way too subtle and elusive to be broken down into 'the ultimately real things.' It just does not work that way. I find the arguments this squeeqy-voiced man uses to be not convincing at all, and by far not self-critical enough. To admit that 'yes, reality is mediated by our senses (Immanuel Kant), and yes, there is such a thing as perspective (the elephant metaphor is borrowed from Buddhism, but squeeker doens't care to mention)' and after that stating that there still is an objective reality, which is ultimate, is like saying: 'sure, there are very convincing philosophical arguments out there for X, but we are still going to go with Y.. Just.....because.' Immanuel Kant wrote a whole goddam book to show that the 'ultimately real thing' (Ding an sich) does not exist, or rather that we cannot acces it, and this man says: 'not true. I've seen it meself! I've seen it through me microscope, which is state of the art modern, so I should know. I mean goddammit, we live in the 21 century! Don't you think we should have stumbled upon the objective reality by now? I've seen it! Through me microsope! It is very modern, it's the newest, I got it for my birthday.' We will never be able to have knowledge that is unconditioned, unmediated, not culturally and historically determined, not totally intertwined with society's way of looking at things. It will never ever happen, simply because knowledge is never formed in a vacuum apart from the world- as much as hysteria-man wants to think. Science is a product of of its time, and it wil always be that way. This is not the same thing as agreeing with postmoderism, which just wants to break any narrative about the cosmos into a million pieces and leaves us no ground to stand on. It is simply saying: our knowledge about the world is never precise, always conditioned, always from a human perspective, and it is very limited. It would become us to see this and be humbled just a tiny bit.

HAHAHA.....He Trolled the SHIT out of them! what a Beast!

This is all true. I taught myself postmodern philosophy through the "Introducing" books by Icon. They destroyed me. No joke. They stripped me of all meaning and purpose. Caused me to destroy the old foundations but gave me nothing to replace them with. All that was left was despair and nihilism.

Sokal proved that, despite conventional wisdom, dazzling with brilliance and baffling bullshit are not mutually exclusive.

Sokal is one with Pepe.

Well he doesn’t understand postmodernism. Well... his deluded version of postmodernism is based on a complete straw man.

Sokal exposes what "peer review" means in postmodernism. It means nothing.

I despise post modernization mostly people who use it in film criticism

Constant attacks on reality, objectivity and reason are now everywhere in our culture. This world needs Ayn Rand!

Left, right, centrist, libertarian, etc. can move forward into action by agreement that identity politics is wrong and that Postmodernist-marxism is an evil idea. Everyone agrees. We work from there. Political agreement is always a compromise of ideals in practice but allows everyone to move forward and take action to deal with the most basic problems together.

This is a simplistic strawman criticism. Yes there are many inane ideas and positions in postmodernism, but all postmodern ideas are the same. Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche is the father of post-modernism. Modernism uses religious categories to define reality. Science just substitutes man for god, but all categories are essentially the same. Nietzsche blew this up in his Twilight of the Idols in 1889.

It doesn’t take a tenured professor to tell you that this man does not understand what post modernism is

He hasn't completely destroyed post modernism, he just taken the most outrageous and radical examples of post modernism trying to work its way into science. I agree with him that the examples he provides are insane and stupid, but post modernism is an incredibly broad movement that encompasses art and philosophy. Science is objective, values are not, postmodernism acknowledges that your morals, ethics, and sense of right and wrong are essentially built by your value structure. For example, it's not objectively right or wrong to eat animals. One perspective is empathetic, which is that you choose not to eat animals because you feel bad for them and don't want to hurt them. Another perspective is that we should eat animals because we are evolved to be omnivores so it is ok for us to eat them. Neither perspective is the "right answer", they are both bringing valid points to the table. Which perspective you prefer is just dependent on where your values lay.

The Sokal hoax was stupid tho. He submitted to a paper to see if they'd peer review it, it shouldn't be a shock that they didn't: It wasn't a peer reviewed journal, or even a physics journal, any science he submitted should have been uncontroversial. He wanted to see if they'd include him just because he was a scientist from a hard science. That's exactly why they printed his article, it was printed in an issue specifically focusing on arguments for or against the position that science is or isn't a social construct. Whether you agree with postmodernism or not, this wasn't any kind of real intellectual exercise, it was just a 'gotcha' that really does nothing to advance either side of the argument.

The video started very badly: "There are those who believe in absolute truth and those who believe in absolute relativism". I almost stopped the video right there. I nevertheless watch it to the end. Not a great video. He talks in a far too emotional way, it's difficult to filter the emotion to get the substance of what he says. In the end, it feels like he has found his own personal boogeyman "Post-modernism". Feminists have "Patriarchy", this guy has "Post-modernism".

Is This guy a jew

I am not really post-modernist but all these guys that criticize it to it's core really go out of their way in their cherry-picking for most radical thoughts in it. guys... don't take their word for it - read Derrida and Foucault - and then make your decisions, really, there is a lot you can learn from them. Make your own conclusions

*ABSOLUTE TRUTH:* *GOD SAID YOU ARE A GUILTY SINNER! ALREADY CONDEMNED AND ON YOUR WAY TO HELL!* *_{Rom _**_1:18_**_}_* For the *wrath of God is revealed* from heaven *against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men,* who hold the truth in unrighteousness; *_{Rom _**_1:19_**_}_* Because that which *may be known of God is manifest in them; for God hath shewed it unto them.* *_{Rom _**_1:20_**_}_* For the invisible things of him from the *creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood* by the things that are made, even his eternal power and Godhead; *so that they are without excuse:* *_{Rom _**_1:21_**_}_* Because that, *when they knew God, they glorified him not as God,* neither were thankful; but became vain in their imaginations, and their foolish heart was darkened. *_{Rom _**_1:22_**_}_* *Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools,* *_{Rom _**_1:29_**_}_* *Being filled with all unrighteousness, fornication, wickedness, covetousness, maliciousness; full of envy, murder, debate, deceit, malignity; whisperers,* *_{Rom _**_1:30_**_}_* *Backbiters, haters of God, despiteful, proud, boasters, inventors of evil things, disobedient to parents,* *_{Rom _**_1:31_**_}_* *Without understanding, covenantbreakers, without natural affection, implacable, unmerciful:* *_{Rom _**_1:32_**_}_* Who knowing the judgment of God, that *they which commit such things are worthy of death, not only do the same, but have pleasure in them that do them.* *_{Rom 2:1}_* Therefore *thou art inexcusable, O man,* whosoever thou art that judgest: for wherein thou judgest another, thou condemnest thyself; for thou that judgest doest the same things. *_{Rom 2:2}_* But we are sure that the *judgment of God is according to truth* against them which commit such things. *_{Rom 2:3}_* And thinkest thou this, O man, that judgest them which do such things, and doest the same, *that thou shalt escape the judgment of God?* *_{Rom 2:4}_* Or despisest thou the riches of his goodness and forbearance and longsuffering; not knowing that the *goodness of God leadeth thee to repentance?* *_{Rom 2:5}_* But after *thy hardness and impenitent heart treasurest up unto thyself wrath* against the day of wrath and revelation of the righteous judgment of God; *_{Rom 2:6}_* Who will *render to every man according to his deeds:* *_{Rom 2:7}_* To them who by patient continuance in well doing seek for glory and honour and immortality, eternal life: *_{Rom 2:8}_* *But unto them that are contentious, and do not obey the truth, but obey unrighteousness, indignation and wrath,* *_{Rom 2:9}_* *Tribulation and anguish, upon every soul of man that doeth evil,* of the Jew first, and also of the Gentile; *_{Rom _**_2:10_**_}_* But glory, honour, and peace, to every man that worketh good, to the Jew first, and also to the Gentile: *_{Rom _**_2:11_**_}_* For there is no respect of persons with God. *_{Rom _**_3:10_**_}_* As it is written, *There is none righteous, no, not one:* *_{Rom _**_3:11_**_}_* There is none that understandeth, there is none that seeketh after God. *_{Rom _**_3:12_**_}_* They are all gone out of the way, they are together become unprofitable; *there is none that doeth good, no, not one.* *_{Rom _**_3:13_**_}_* Their throat is an open sepulchre; with their tongues they have used deceit; the poison of asps is under their lips: *_{Rom _**_3:14_**_}_* *Whose mouth is full of cursing and bitterness:* *_{Rom _**_3:15_**_}_* Their feet are swift to shed blood: *_{Rom _**_3:16_**_}_* Destruction and misery are in their ways: *_{Rom _**_3:17_**_}_* And the way of peace have they not known: *_{Rom _**_3:18_**_}_* There is no fear of God before their eyes. *_{Rom _**_3:19_**_}_* Now we know that what things soever the law saith, it saith to them who are under the law: that *every mouth may be stopped, and all the world may become guilty before God.* *_{Rom _**_3:20_**_}_* Therefore *by the deeds of the law there shall no flesh be justified* in his sight: for *by the law is the knowledge of sin.* *YOU NEED TO REPENT TOWARD GOD, THAT MEANS YOU CHANGE YOUR MIND AND AGREE WITH GOD ABOUT HIS EVIL TIDINGS AGAINST YOU (ROM **1:18**-**3:20**) AND THE GOSPEL ABOUT CHRIST (ROM **3:21**-25). IF YOU AGREE WITH GOD, THERE IS HOPE FOR YOU. GOD’S WILL IS THAT YOU GET SAVED FROM HIS RIGHTEOUS JUDGEMENT AND WRATH, WHICH IS HELL & THE LAKE OF FIRE* *_{1.Tim 2:3}_* For this is good and acceptable in the sight of God our Saviour; *_{1.Tim 2:4}_* *Who will have all men to be saved,* and to come unto the knowledge of the truth. *_{1.Tim 2:5}_* For there is *one God, and one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus* *HOW TO BE SAVED (JUSTIFICATION BEFORE GOD)* *_{Rom _**_3:21_**_}_* *But now the righteousness of God without the law is manifested,* being witnessed by the law and the prophets; *_{Rom _**_3:22_**_}_* Even the *righteousness of God which is by faith of Jesus Christ unto all and upon all them that believe:* for there is no difference: *_{Rom _**_3:23_**_}_* *For all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God;* *_{Rom _**_3:24_**_}_* *Being justified freely by his grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus:* *_{Rom _**_3:25_**_}_* *Whom God hath set forth to be a propitiation through faith in his blood,* to declare his righteousness for the remission of sins that are past, through the forbearance of God; *_{Rom _**_3:26_**_}_* *To declare, I say, at this time his righteousness: that he might be just, and the justifier of him which believeth in Jesus.* *_{Rom _**_3:27_**_}_* Where is boasting then? It is excluded. By what law? of works? Nay: but by the law of faith. *_{Rom _**_3:28_**_}_* *Therefore we conclude that a man is justified by faith without the deeds of the law.* *SO WHAT MUST YOU DO TO BE SAVED (JUSTIFIED BEFORE GOD)* *_{Acts _**_16:30_**_}_* And brought them out, and said, Sirs, *what must I do to be saved?* *_{Acts _**_16:31_**_}_* And they said, *Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved,* and thy house. *HOW TO BELIEVE: (ABRAHAM FOR OUR EXAMPLE)* *_{Rom 4:3}_* For what saith the scripture? *Abraham believed God, and it was counted unto him for righteousness.* *_{Rom 4:4}_* Now to him that worketh is the reward not reckoned of grace, but of debt. *_{Rom 4:5}_* But to him that *worketh not, but believeth on him that justifieth the ungodly, his faith is counted for righteousness.* *_{Rom _**_4:20_**_}_* He *staggered not at the promise of God through unbelief; but was strong in faith,* giving glory to God; *_{Rom _**_4:21_**_}_* And *being fully persuaded that, what he had promised, he was able also to perform.* *_{Rom _**_4:22_**_}_* And *therefore it was imputed to him for righteousness.* *_{Rom _**_4:23_**_}_* Now it was not written for his sake alone, that it was imputed to him; *_{Rom _**_4:24_**_}_* But *for us also, to whom it shall be imputed, if we believe on him that raised up Jesus our Lord from the dead;* *_{Rom _**_4:25_**_}_* Who was *delivered for our offences,* and was *raised again for our justification.* *YOU NEED TO BELIEVE/TRUST IN JESUS AS YOUR PERSONAL SAVIOR AFTER YOU BELIEVED THE RIGHT GOSPEL ABOUT CHRIST (ROM **3:21**-26). JESUS PAID THE PENALTY FOR YOUR SINS SO YOU MIGHT BE FORGIVEN. THAT MEANS HE TOOK THE PUNISHMENT FOR YOUR SINS ON HIMSELF AND PAID FOR ALL YOUR SINS ON THE CROSS BY SHEDDING HIS BLOOD. HE WAS MADE SIN FOR YOU, WHO KNEW NO SIN, SO YOU MIGHT BE MADE THE RIGHTEOUSNESS OF GOD IN HIM. YOU ALSO HAVE TO BE FULLY PERSUADED IN YOUR OWN MIND THAT GOD WILL KEEP HIS PROMISE BY FREELY JUSTIFYING YOU BECAUSE YOU BELIEVE/TRUST IN JESUS AND THE RIGHT GOSPEL ABOUT CHRIST. YOU FALL FROM GRACE AND GO TO HELL WHEN YOU CAST OFF YOUR FAITH OR ADD WORKS FOR YOUR JUSTIFICATION (SEE 1.COR 15:2, GAL 5:4, 1.TIM **5:12**). IF YOU CALL YOURSELF A CHRISTIAN AND DISAGREE WITH THIS MESSAGE THEN YOU BETTER PROVE YOURSELF WHETHER YOU ARE IN THE NARROW SAVING FAITH. IF IT DOESN’T MATCH WITH ROMANS CHAPTER 3 & 4, THEN YOU ARE ONE OF THE MANY IN MATTHEW **7:22**, A FALSE CONVERT, LOST AND ON YOUR WAY TO HELL!* *BUT IF YOU REJECT GOD'S GRACE OFFERED FREELY TOWARD YOU, READ YOUR FUTURE ACCORDING TO GOD'S WORDS:* *_{Rev _**_14:11_**_}_* And the smoke of *their torment ascendeth up for ever and ever: and they have no rest day nor night,* who worship the beast and his image, and whosoever receiveth the mark of his name. *_{Rev _**_20:10_**_}_* And the devil that deceived them was cast into the lake of fire and brimstone, where the beast and the false prophet are, and *shall be tormented day and night for ever and ever.* *_{Rev _**_20:11_**_}_* And I saw a great white throne, and him that sat on it, from whose face the earth and the heaven fled away; and there was found no place for them. *_{Rev _**_20:12_**_}_* And I saw *the dead, small and great, stand before God;* and the books were opened: and another book was opened, which is the book of life: and *the dead were judged* out of those things which were written in the books, according to their works. *_{Rev _**_20:13_**_}_* And the sea gave up the dead which were in it; and death and hell delivered up the dead which were in them: and they were *judged every man according to their works.* *_{Rev _**_20:14_**_}_* And death and hell were cast into the lake of fire. This is the second death. *_{Rev _**_20:15_**_}_* And *whosoever was not found written in the book of life was cast into the lake of fire.* *_{Rev 21:8}_* But the *fearful, and unbelieving, and the abominable, and murderers, and whoremongers, and sorcerers, and idolaters, and all liars, shall have their part in the lake which burneth with fire and brimstone: which is the second death.* *YOU SEE THERE IS A TEMPORARY PLACE CALLED ''HELL'' AND THE ETERNAL PLACE CALLED ''THE LAKE OF FIRE'' WHERE ALL SINNERS WILL BE TORMENTED FOR EVER AND EVER. THE REASON WHY YOUR PUNISHMENT WILL LAST FOR EVER IS BECAUSE YOU ARE NOT ABLE TO PAY OFF YOUR SINS SO YOU HAVE TO PAY THEM FOR EVER. IT’S REALLY THAT SIMPLE, IT’S A JUSTICE ISSUE WITH GOD. GOD IS HOLY AND JUSTLY PUNISHES SINNERS FOR EVER AND EVER IN THE LAKE OF FIRE. YOU BETTER BELIEVE IT.*

His argument against postmodernism is not only built over a strawman, but it's also very easy to see the moment when his argument stops being about science and becomes political. Why not try to engage against the arguments of people like Foucault or Derrida instead of just trying to ridicule them?

Yeah dude going after a tiny baby journal that exists to capture minority perspectives and talks about stuff like sex work with a paper that spent months going back and forth with Sokal really disproves post modernism. LMAO Have you actually read Andrew Ross's response to Sokal? It's called "Mystery Science Theatre" and while I can't link it here it is definitely worth a read. I know you won't read it but it is entertaining for anyone who reads this comment. Sokal was literally labeled a "uncooperative author" by the editors because he would not consider any edits and much of his references seemed very dated by the time that it was published, and the piece was literally only published in a good faith attempt to try addressing the science wars. It's obvious the editors of Social Text were very skeptical of Sokal and were really only punished for giving him a good-faith chance. Doesn't really seem like defeating post modernism to me, especially considering that we're still talking about it! However, let's talk about a journal that really screwed up - The Lancet, one of the most prestigious medical journals in western science, infamously published the Andrew Wakefield MMR vaccine causes autism paper, which wasn't even redacted until the mid 2000s! Yep, while Social Text immediately pulled Sokal's paper upon realizing it was a hoax, the vaccines-cause-autism paper took over 5 years to be formally pulled. Lmao. Not only this, but the mere publication of this work fueled an anti-vaccination movement that is currently threatening us with continued pandemic. Maybe we should be asking about why the Lancet gets to make such a monumental screw up but not a barely relevant minor publication that practically only exists as a historical archive. Fun fact though - Sokal is so poorly researched in post modernism that he seems completely unaware that Felix Guattari, one of the authors he criticizes in the book, actually has a very sound criticism of post modernism. While this essay is quite obscure ("Post Modern Deadlock and Post Media Transition") but this critique, which basically states that post modern critique is based on language and ignores how language is produced, is still found in his other works that were translated/more readily available at the time. Considering Sokal was working with a native French speaker surely they could have done a little research into the guy. Surely.

Loved the elephant analogy at the end!

How many people read his article, and believed it was brilliant?

It's ALL "social blather"; 'truth' is relative at best, subjective at worst. -Thanx for nothing.............

the world doesn't come through the sense doors objectively? It's only when we react to that experience and make up concepts that subjectivity begins. Sounds good to me.

You oversell it with exaggerated rhetoric and vocals. It was not all nonsense, silly. He used actual quotations and made sense in parts to frame the nonsense. You failed to quote his best lines too, near the end. Lazy reading on your part. So why are you doing a video, if you haven't done your homework?

If his audience loses sight of the fact there was an elephant in the parable, I would say, they are not any brighter than the post-modernists.

I don't like inequality. Inequality is in conflict with empathy. So what do I do to stay internally consistent? I'll take a theory that helps me blame something or someone. What are my other options? :)

He sounds like right wing republican. Trup maybe.

Well, this is all fine and dandy, and Sokal did a great job. But Postmodernism is hardly "destroyed" - along with Cultural Marxism, it's the ruling ideology on campuses, in schools, in the media, in Hollywood, and in politics.

Woah woah woah hold up this is only taking a whack at Foucault's epistemology. Post modernism dealt with a lot more than just epistemology, Jean Baudrillard for example mostly just criticized consumerism.

Is the claim :" All truth is relative " relative or absolute? If relative then why should I favor it over the claim that it's absolute? If absolute, then the claim is contradictory :)

The bottom line description of the mistake this video is exposing is the confluence of metaphysics with epistemology. That is, what aspect of reality is primary - existence or consciousness? Does reality come first with consciousness being a perceived of what is, or is consciousness a creator - Aristotle or Plato - existence or mysticism. Belief in a God is a dead giveaway for belief in the primacy of consciousness. I was not taught this basic controversy at the root of almost every debate, and they don,t teach it today. BASIC PHILOSOPHY MATTERS.

False dichotomy at the beginning. All knowledge is subjective, as the postmodernists say. But some knowledge (usually via science and reason) better represents reality and is therefore more useful.

Wow, I would probably have assumed he was taking the piss, as absolutely none of what he wrote made any actual sense to me. I assume generally I'll at least get a gist, but from that, I got no meaning except being funny, mocking, and as I said above. Wow. Nice job. Like the rantings of a psychotic schizophrenic or something. SEEMS to make sense, somehow, but it just doesn't.

So...is post-modernism related to the concept, "What do we really know, anyway, we are "likely" just a computer program running on some vast alien's system?"

Dude, calm down - Social Constructionism and Postmodernism really boil down to questions of how scientific evidence is produced and used. Not so controversial. I would have thought that it is worthy of serious consideration. Remember, what we believe today is probably not what we will believe in 20-50 years.

Technically this doesn't disprove fuck all. Granted it's a good example of the lack of criteria for judging that which is supposed to be crucially perspectival. Reminds me of modern art (one could fake modern art and get away with it - but there's still good modern art). To disprove postmodernism in science one could do better (maybe examples of objective physical reality would be one way?).

I hated having to study the post-modern theorists when I was at Uni. Not because I couldn't understand it, but because I know muddied waters when I see them. Much of it is pretentious BS. The way they bugger up language (sorry, 'discourses') verges on criminal. What it winds up doing is promoting of herd thinking; many of my fellow students would simply memorize the jargon, much as this Alan Sokal did, along with enough mentions of colonialism, imperialism and oppressive-----------. Thankfully most of my profs kept it to a minimum.

You know, or it was a protest against postmodernists using scientific jargon that they didn't understand. Sokal himself didn't even have a problem with postmodernism in general, but rather the imprecise way they applied scientific terms to cultural criticism. Mostly, he had a problem with Lyotard in this capacity. Or, sorry, I meant postmodernism is SJWs.

Science is unaffected by culture? Ha! Science progresses one funeral at a time. Today we have the cult of St. Einstein. None may dare question his hallowed name. Nor his theory of "Bent Nothingness". It is easy to poke fun at the absurdities of the lumpen.

The speed of sound and I are good friends. He/She/Xe/Xer often talks about how they are left feeling inferior due to all the E=mc2 excitement. I propose a 'Speed of Sound' day. Chuck Yeager's likeness could be the symbol for that day....but only a likeness for I don't want it to devolve into a cis-gender, white male celebration.

Everyone needs to explain what they mean by postmodernism and what particular shit they mean because anyone who knows SHIT knows that science is to some extent relative although objective and isn’t absolute and isn’t necessarily even touching the “true world” exactly. Is Kant postmodern? Is Sellars?

So...you're saying postmodernists won't acknowledge the elephant in the room? (Or the room, or the fact that you challenged their point of view with this silly question)

Yo, homie... Take a Xanax. This shit ain't like that. Life is far too important to take seriously. We've had sedatives for years. Get to know your Rx.😀

The thing is, relativism makes sense to a certain point. Let's just take moral relativism. From Wiki: 1. "Descriptive moral relativism holds only that some people do in fact disagree about what is moral;" 2. "meta-ethical moral relativism holds that in such disagreements, nobody is objectively right or wrong;" 3. "and normative moral relativism holds that because nobody is right or wrong, we ought to tolerate the behavior of others even when we disagree about the morality of it." These points are logical steps built upon each other. Regarding 1.: Some societies declare drug usage as legal, some as illegal. Some cultures see slavery as fine, some don't. Some consider conquering, killing, warmongering and raping as fine, some don't. It all also depends on the time frame. So indeed different cultures have different views on morality. About 2.: Sure - what *is* objective even? Who could ever tell what is really right or wrong? Muslims don't seem to care highly about human rights and are quite intolerant - yet they seem to prevail quite fine, even though warmongering, chaotic and barbaric. Genghis Khan didn't think highly of pacifism either, yet the genetic spread of his people across Eurasia must be tremendous. Regarding 3.: Here I get real difficulties to argue for it. This one makes no sense. Now, let's get to some counterarguments. Sure, different cultures have different views on morality, but assuming morality works in binary - meaning things are either moral or amoral (with various degrees of magnitude, which we omit for now). So there is something objective to it. Morals may have been always there, they may just not have been followed by societies. Taxation is theft - forces of authority will come and punish or kill you if you don't bleed your "fair share" to the takers - the exploiters and parasites. Yet it is totally normal practice today, just as slavery was a few centuries ago. But even back then there was awareness that slavery was amoral. So cultures don't just have their own "versions" or views of morality - they just have varying application of morality. Another point is that if theft would be moral, first of all, it wouldn't be called theft, and the second one would be that defending against theft wouldn't be a thing. People would just freely take things and nobody would have to care - property wouldn't exist either then. However, it is people who acquire resources through work, and people work differently hard (some even don't work at all) - so people want to keep what they worked for, and not just randomly hand it out (or have it taken away). If resources would be sparse (which they were for basically as long as humanity existed minus 1-2 centuries at best), following that strategy could be suicide. Not only that, working would become disincentivized, and at the end everybody would simply starve. Despite all advancements, that's also what occurred in communist regimes basically every time. That's not a workable strategy to prevail. Therefore property *must* be a concept that exist, and therefore theft *must* be a concept that exists. Not only that, even animals recognize property - especially if it's about food and prey - that's even the case cross-species. Now, regarding 2. one could say that violence is a better system to perpetuate genes than pacifism. But that does not constitute morals - that's just biology and evolution in their works. Morals is not about the *goals*, it's about the *methods*. "The end does justify the means" even implies that there has to be made justification for means which must be inherently amoral. So there was awareness of amorality taking action for a "higher good." Morality can never claim that theft is moral, nor can it claim murder as moral (given that survival is a basic instinct and a necessity for existence), however there is self-defence and possibly prevention against actions taken against you or other people. Either way, the definitions of "right" and "wrong" are ambiguous. Now to 3.: Let's say fine - nobody is objectively right or wrong. Yet everybody has it's own stance, and cultures have shared stances. Everybody has it's own view on "right" and "wrong." That does not imply that cultures should tolerate other cultures or their lack or "overabundance" of morality - quite the contrary. It implies that there is no objective ground to stand upon, so everybody must rely on some "arbitrary" relative set of views. That objective ground could have served as a way to slowly approach towards to, so that all those pesky arbitrary relative sets of views can converge towards it - as a middle ground where actual communication can occur. But then comes the hit! "...we *ought* to tolerate the behavior of others even when we disagree about the morality of it." - Wait what? It's like saying because we don't know what 2+2 is (yet), we have to accept and tolerate every possible answer, no matter how unreasonable?! We could at least say based on what we know it's somewhere between 1 and 10, so the answers -5, 0, 2740 could be dismissed right away. No - we *ought* to tolerate every answer. Where does this madness come from so suddenly? 1. and 2. made sense and can be argued for and against, but by god - I can argue better for fascism than for the third step of moral/cultural relativism. But I simply can't, it's so devoid of logic and common sense. At this point I do not even want to attempt to get into the reasoning - as it seems it is driven by some subconscious drive of globalist people, who are Marxist Socialists, postmodernists, moral/cultural relativists and multiculturalists. I have my theories about that. But let's keep this post short...

Check out the story about article named "Rooter: A Methodology for the Typical Unification of Access Points and Redundancy" that was generated by SCIgen and accepted to a 2005 WMSCI. The nonsense-generator program was used to quite an extent since then to generally goof around on multiple occasions, e.g. publishing an utter bullshit is not a unique trait of that one post-modernist magazine, even though it can have a significantly higher amount of bullshit than an average journal due to its field of studies. Therefore, the name of the video is to be considered a click-bait, and accordingly marked with a dislike.

"Confirmation bias" IS real. So is "social conditioning" and "relativism." Yep. 1) That stuff should be applied as filter back to feminism et al first. I.e used to 'deconstruct' femi first, since that "discipline" is most prone to subjective pre-judice and most prone to being staffed by politically motivated idiots, and liars who hide inside popular hysterias demonstrably. 2) Society /academia etc and whatever can't just stop because the universe is a "quantum field of uncertainty and super position." We all still 'look both ways' when we cross the confirmation-bias-drawn road of uncertain bus collision potentials. Whenever femi is challenged on its one-sided HATE SPEECH it retreats to its pretense of 'deep epistemology' even tho it is smoke screen that femi doesn't understand. 3) A deep understanding of epistemology is a dead white male scientific creation. I.e the feminists are not enlightening anyone tho that is what they are pretending.

Brilliant, also someone did the same as Sokal with an article called the conceptual penis in gender studies.

Where has Derrida said anything about there not being an absolute truth as far a physics go? Also, I did not know there was such a thing as a postmodernists, outside of arts and architecture and such. We live in a postmodern world or condition, and even that is sometimes hard to define because postmodernism is not clearly defined. E.g. the end of the grand narrative. We used to describe the world as how Europeans discovered it. Now we recognize it as one of many narratives. Or the end of the critic. Or that money has become the yardstick for everything. Everything is of equal/zero values. "Let the market decide." I don't know if the latter is postmodernism or eclecticism/junk postmodernism. In one way, postmodernism is just hyper capitalism. If postmodernism/t is used only as a strawman, like SJW, communist, "cultural Marxist" (an expression that makes no sense to anyone that knows the least bit about Marxism), then it is a big fail. I believe a word should have an absolute meaning or the word is meaningless. I think language should be treated as science or engineering. Often z and r are the same in an electric circuit, but not always. The difference does not even matter in many circuits (e.g. below RF or whatever). If preciseness was required, then we might not have fluffy concepts like "God." People would have to say what they mean.

I have not read Foucault, Derrida, Lucan, etc. but I question whether they should be lumped together under the label of postmodernism and then debunked en mass. And Socal's hoax did succeed in exposing the editors of a particular journal but does it actually debunk everything written by all these thinkers? I don't think so. I will reserve judgement until I have actually read them for myself.