Brad De Long writes: 
 
>>the continued taint of Enlightenment thought, primarily an 
>>epistemological foundation that guarantees certainty and a 
>>transparent theory of language. 
> 
>_What_ Enlightenment epistemological foundation guarantees certainty? 
_Who_ 
>in the set of Enlightenment thinkers ever thought that language is 
>"transparent"? 
 
Good questions indeed.  Although I do have some sympathies for what 
some post-modernists are doing (and even more for McCloskey's work), 
I do think it's about time that those of us who do think something good 
and important came out of "the Enlightenment" start to question the 
caricature of those thinkers that is frequently the target of post- 
modernist criticisms.  The term "straw man" frequently seems all too 
appropriate. 
 
And...if the term "post-modern" lumps together a variety of different 
ideas, what about the term "*the* Enlightenment"?  Which enlightenment 
are we talking about, French, Scottish, which?  It goes without saying 
that Decartes and Hume might both be called "Enlightenment" thinkers, 
especially by the enlightenment's critics, but it is equally true that 
their differences are at least as great as their commonalities. 
 
I should add that question "which enlightenment" could also be turned 
into "which liberalism" in the face of post-modern type critiques of 
liberalism, as if that term referred to one homogenous lump of ideas. 
 
Steven Horwitz 
Eggleston Associate Professor of Economics 
St. Lawrence University 
Canton, NY 13617 
TEL (315) 379-5731 
FAX (315) 379-5819 
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