Last week, we took a look at the basic origin of postmodern philosophy, exploring how Kant’s distinction between the phenomenal and the noumenal set the stage for a crisis in modernist (i.e. more or less Enlightenment-era and, sometimes, post-Enlightenment) philosophy. I suggested at the end of that piece that the main reaction to this crisis—what we generally call postmodernism—took two distinct paths, one of which is the better-known (and frequently attacked), the other of which gets much less attention (but I think should get much more). So let’s dive right in1 (though if you haven’t read Part 1 and you aren’t that familiar with Kant’s work, you may want to read that first).

Western philosophers in the 19th century, who took Kant’s distinction seriously, were indeed in an intellectual crisis, for if the phenomena of our thinking lives—sensory impressions, concepts, the reasoning that binds them, etc.—have no guaranteed access to the noumena of reality, of things as they are in themselves, then it would be easy to give into despair: perhaps our thinking makes no contact with reality. If Kant is right, we can’t actually ever check or verify whether it does, since any new evidence we could evaluate would be, of course, evidence that we gathered with our senses and used our reason to organize into concepts—all evidence of the noumenal must become phenomenal for us to consider it at all.

From one perspective, then, post-Kantian philosophy found itself “locked in” to the mind. They wanted to say true things about reality, but had lost confidence that they could do so. What does an aspiring philosopher do in such dire straits?

Continue reading on my substack at: https://phenomenologyeastandwest.substack.com/p/postmodernism-vs-postmodernism-part-c1c