King of infinite space (were it not that I have bad dreams)

I'm sorry if this bores you to tears, but I'm pretty sure that at least a few of you (Stephen, Andy, Dave) will find this interesting. I've been doing some more reading through Jack Caputo's commentary in Deconstruction in a Nutshell (a book that I would place at the top of Dave's book list if he has any bookstore gift certificates left), and I thought I would try sharing enough of this fabulous book to entice you into reading it for yourselves. Everyone who plans on spending any more time in the university (or who ever feels tempted to comment on Derrida, "deconstruction", or "post-modernism") would benefit immeasurably from this relatively short and lucid book. It is very difficult to pick only a few sentences to represent either deconstruction or Caputo's work in this book, but I chose this collection of passages (from pages 54-55, if you're interested) because they are related to a post I've been wanting to write but never found the right time (I would have called it "Is Enlightenment Rationality a Phallacy?"). Anyways, I hope this is as good for you as it is for me:

"While Derrida is often made out to be the sworn enemy of the Enlightenment, he would contend, and we with him, that in fact the deconstruction he advocates is a continuation of what is best about the Enlightenment, but by another means...For it may be that what the Enlightenment seeks cannot be found on the basis that the Enlightenment lays...Derrida's doubts about the absolute judicial authority claimed by and for Enlightenment Reason, by and for 'pure Reason' (capitalized), do not constitute an outright attack upon reason, upon giving good reasons, the best you can under the circumstances. If the old Enlightenment makes everything turn on 'Reason,' the New Enlightenment wants to know the reason for reason, wants to take responsibility for what at a specific point in history calls itself reason and the age of reason, and to consider carefully what is being declared 'irrational' in the name of reason...But the effect of this new Enlightenment would be not to jettison reason but to redefine and redescribe it, for example, by steering clear of the simple opposition of reason and faith and seeing the extent to which reason is deeply saturated by faith...In the new Enlightenment, things are always more unlikely and complicated than the simple oppositions favored by the old Aufklarers-- like Kant and Marx-- might suggest."

Other fantastic titles for things I need to write (or wrote but gave a more mundane nomenclature) include : "Banging in the Bower: Ante-lapsarian Depictions of Human Sexuality in Milton's Paradise Lost" and "Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Beings unto Death: When Stoppard Stops Hiding Heiddeger".