Quote:
Originally Posted by LesMts
Deconstructionism and relativism has always bugged me. It's all well and good as an intellectual plaything, fodder for debate, but it's completely useless and, in my opinion (assuming I understand it correctly) quite, quite flawed.
It holds (I think) that the objective world is unknowable and all descriptions of it are (indeed, can only be) subjective and symbolic. Yet technology works so well. As Dawkins said, "Show me a relativist at 30,000 feet and I'll show you a hypocrite".
Also, Sokal, "Those who believe the laws of physics are merely social conventions are welcome to attempt transgressing those conventions from the window of my apartment. I live on the twenty-first floor."
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I understand where you are coming from, but you shouldn't conflate deconstruction with relativism. Deconstruction is not useless because it is only the first stage that is the admission of the unknowability of everything. The second stage is using deconstruction as a tool for stepping back from the very basic tools we use to understand the world in order to see them more clearly and come to a greater awareness. In this sense it is not nihilistic but in fact a positive tool for learning.
Perhaps you think it is hypocritical to admit you know nothing and then still live your life as though you do. However I would say that this is because it is an uncomfortable knowledge for those who feel they hold a certainty with science in much the same way it is uncomfortable for those who are religious to see the factual evidence of science.