This is one video on youtube that I would watch even if Ryan rolled his eyes at me. I don't think it would get me that token gang of friends gathering around me in the library to laugh at something mildly funny, but I still recommend watching it. If the name Derrida means anything to you, feel free to head on down to the end of this post, ignore my poor introduction to him, and click the link.
See, here's the deal. Jacques Derrida (the man in the clip) is probably the most important postmodern philosopher. His work concerns meaning - he tries to ask the question if any part of our lives really means anything, especially books and conversations. He is also the name most people associate with deconstruction, a technique for interpreting text which he believes is capable of stripping the text of all meaning. For Derrida, life has no meaning, but is a dance, a play, an undoing of the past and a knitting together of the present.
As a Christian, it's hard to accept Derrida as a good philosopher. It's impossible for me to tell you exactly why, but here's my best attempt: YHWH is the meaning and the source of life, and history is His Story. So working to undo the meaning we have in our life seems foolish in the true sense of the word (Psalm 14:1). And working towards a place where no words have meaning does not seem smart for a man who attempts to make his living selling books and giving speeches. Derrida seems unenviable, he is convinced that the world has no meaning other than the meaning assigned to it by humans. The only problem with this is that now his words themselves can be doubted.
Maybe it's more easily expressed with an example: if one person says: "everyone can create his or her own truth", he is not able to argue his position against a person who says: "There is such a thing as absolute truth." For the first person to argue would be for him to say that there is something that is true for both people; namely, his opinion. Derrida finds himself in a similar predicament.
The fact that he is in this predicament may make this video mean less, because Derrida is simply playing his game, building and then destroying even his own arguments to keep the dance going even at the cost of his own credibility. But you have to appreciate the humanity with which he expresses himself. It makes postmodern philosophy seem so attractive.
Sorry for keeping you all waiting. The video is available here.
Love, Ben
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4 comments:
But, still I don't get it. Wittgenstein was concerned with this too, the whole language deal, and one of his 'conclusions' was that good philosophy gives the big philosophical questions a rest. Why should we bother listening to post-modern philosophers if none of the 'truth' that they come to is credible. And by credible, I mean that we could make up our own 'truth' to combat theirs, and they could both potentially be 'true'. I speak outside of the Truth that we have been revealed. If this is true (no inverted commas) then why do postmodern philosophers bother speaking at all, if they know that they are simple imposing their own 'truth' and their own meaning on the world. They know that the ponderings and the truth imposed on the world by an idiot are no more credible than theirs. Are they throwing away the coherence theopry of truth to be an individual?
It could be that I am just ill-informed, and all these questions are those of a beginner, but two things still remain for me. Will the world ever get out of post-modernist thinking; is it the black hole of philosophy? And with post-modernism, have we killed the role of the philosopher in society?
... have we?
Ben, I don't think we should bother listening to them as they lie, but as they fumble through the process of dealing with the world, we have to come alongside them, seeing their mistakes and accuracies. Christian philosophy should be done like an apologetic to a strung-out world. Therefore, listening is always worthwhile.
My suspicions for answers to your questions: Yes, postmodern thinking will pass. In it is a tremendous opportunity for Christians to share the True story about the world, while at the same time showing why Emmanuel at the centre of this story is the best idea.
And no, we have not killed the philosopher. If the world could truly have no meaning, then we would have killed not just the philosopher, we would have killed God. But don't believe the lies! The world is still God's, and as long as he is around, there will be his work and his word for us to to meditate on and build on.
For the record, I didn't roll my eyes. I actually went home and watched the video. Everybody loves a good philosophy clip!
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