Explaining Postmodernism
by Stephen R. C. Hicks · first published 2004
8mentions
5recommended by
8HN commenters
2017–2020first – last mentioned
63% recommend13% neutral25% critical
Why HN recommends it
A concise, clear history tracing postmodern thought from Rousseau through Foucault, showing how skepticism and socialism shaped it. It serves as an accessible overview of the movement for readers new to the subject.
Common criticism: Critics call it a self-published, poorly argued book with a polemical, one-sided view of postmodernism.
Summarised by Claude from recommending comments
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…(marxists) confronted with the horrors of communism chose to reformulate their philosophy to concentrate on identity politics instead of class war. The following book provides a good history of this: Explaining Postmodernism: Skepticism and Socialism from Rousseau to Foucault (Expanded Edition) by Stephen R. C. Hicks
* Full time remote jobs * Conspicuous Signalling Theory * The Gulag Archipelago by Aleksandr I. Solzhenitsyn * Explaining Postmodernism: Skepticism and Socialism from Rousseau to Foucault by Stephen R. C. Hicks * The Ethics of Liberty by Murray N. Rothbard e Hans-Hermann Hoppe * The Red Pill * How a Cultural War works and who is waging…
on “Ask HN: What things do you wish you discovered earlier?” ↗For a concise, clear summary, one cannot recommend Hicks enough: https://www.amazon.com/Explaining-Postmodernism-Skepticism-S...
on “Postmodernism and Its Impact (2017)” ↗…the same thing with people who are flirting with the extreme left. I hope many of them follow his advice and are smart enough to read and understand The Gulag Archipelago by Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, and Explaining Postmodernism by Stephen Hicks. We have serious problems in Western society, but the extreme "solutions" suggested by both of these parties will result in a complete and utter disaster for everyone. Even worse, we…
on “The curious star appeal of Jordan Peterson” ↗…Bricmont and Sokal (Fashionable Nonsense in the US) [2] for an expansion on the Sokal Hoax, and many examples on pretentious and preposterous abuse of scientific terminology by postmodern philosophers * Explaining Postmodernism: Skepticism and Socialism From Rousseau to Foucault by Hicks [3] on the history of postmodernism, arising from counter-enlightenment philosophy all the way from Rousseau via the insufferable German idealists,…
on “How to become a great impostor” ↗David Hume is an empiricist. Noam Chomsky is more of rationalist. LessWrong-rationalism is just crackpottery. This brings to mind a review of Stephen Hicks “Explaining Postmodernism”. In the book he contrasts postmodernism with objectivism: postmodernists are irrational while objectivists are rational. And once you look long enough at the comparison tables you realize that there…
…God is a prerequisite for all proof. Most of his knowledge about postmodernism isn't from actually reading the texts he so dislikes; he just gets it[1] from a self-published/vanity-press book (Hicks' Explaining Postmodernism) that ... just isn't very good. From a review of the book, which could very well be applied to Peterson's videos: > Second, although it accuses (rightly I think) postmodernism of being too polemical,…
on “The Vacuity of Postmodernist Methodology (2005) [pdf]” ↗Re: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15168264. FYI, the publisher of Explaining Postmodernism for its first many printings was Scholargy Press, which did standard peer review and to which I had no personal or professional relationship other than the standard publisher-author one. Please also note…
on “On the Publisher of Hicks's *Explaining Postmodernism*” ↗