Discussion of Scientific Postmodernism

      I've learned from experience to
be careful about telling others of my
interest in postmodernism because so
few people understand what the word
"postmodernism" even means. Some people
mistakenly identify "postmodernism" with
a transitory "postmodern" movement such
as "postmodern art." Others, including
some who haven't previously encountered
the word "postmodern," mistakenly iden-
tify "postmodernism" with a transitory
"postmodern" successor to a transitory
"modern" movement such as "modern art."
Others reason that since "modern" often
means "contemporary," "postmodern" means
"after contemporary, but when exactly is
that? Yet others are simply baffled by
my use of an unfamiliar term.
      Some Christians and allied cul-
tural conservatives are hostile toward
postmodernism because they know that
Newton, Galileo, and Kepler brought
about a modern scientific understanding
of the world because of their Christian
faith and fear that anything postmodern
must be antithetical to that Christian
faith which they share. Some have gone
so far as conflate postmodernism with
existentialism and in turn conflate
existentialism with nihilism, which
means that the conflate postmodernism
with nihilism.
      Postmodernism means understanding
that all of history has three successive
periods--premodern, modern, and post-
modern--each of which is distinguished
by its unique zeitgeist (spirit of the
age), and understanding that humankind
is now in the third, postmodern, period.
The premodern thesis, modern antithesis,
and postmodern synthesis are the unique
sources of these unique zeitgeists. Both
the zeitgeist concept and the dialectic
(thesis-antithesis-synthesis) concept
come from Georg W. F. Hegel. I call this
understanding "Zeitgeist Postmodernism,"
it is the foundation on which Scientific
Postmodernism is built.
      Upon first encountering it, the
term "Scientific Postmodernism" might be
confusing since it was prior to the
postmodern period (during the modern
era) when the scientific method was
discovered and first put to use. I take
the term "Scientific" from the phrase
"queen of the sciences," where
"sciences" mean "fields of knowledge."
According to the original monotheism
hypothesis, religion was the queen of
the sciences and there was an ideational
emphasis as opposed to sensate emphasis
at the dawn of the premodern age. The
Copernican Revolution, dateable to
Copernicus's publication of On the
Revolutions of the Heavenly Spheres
in 1543, made mathematics queen of the
sciences and brought about a senate
emphasis at the dawn of the modern age.
A foundational crisis in mathematics of
similar magnitude, dateable to Kurt
Godel's publication of his incomplete-
ness theorems in 1931 and 1932, deposed
queen mathematics and restored religion
and similarly overthrew the senate
emphasis and restored an ideational
emphasis at the dawn of the postmodern
age. The concept of alternating idea-
tional and senate periods comes from
Pitirim Sorokin. I call this enhanced
understanding of Zeitgeist Postmodernism
"Scientific Postmodernism."

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