the difference between Marxism and original communist theory/ideology

[LBird]

DJP wrote:

This idiot should be banned permanently. And that's the truth.

[my bold]Another of the thickoes ventures an opinion, eh?Just because I showed that your ideological hero Searle was a bourgeois individualist, and you haven't the wit to argue back with me.Childish bastard.

[moderator3]

Reminder:7. You are free to express your views candidly and forcefully provided you remain civil. Do not use the forums to send abuse, threats, personal insults or attacks, or purposely inflammatory remarks (trolling). Do not respond to such messages.

[Sympo]

ALB wrote:

Does the "correct" theory of truth have a name?

[LBird]

Sympo wrote:

Does the "correct" theory of truth have a name?

The problem is, Sympo, that 'correct' is a social judgement. What we're debating is the various 'social judgements' (or, 'ideologies') which produce the various 'theories of truth'.So, your 'correct' will be related to your choice of your own 'ideology'.

[LBird]

Some socio-historic context behind these issues.Dead on Arrival: The Fate of Nature in the Scientific Revolution

David Kubrin wrote:

The widespread social tensions, including the many dislocations, economic instabilities (rising rents, years of bad harvest, enclosures of common lands, etc.), growing landlessness among the peasantry, peasant uprisings, the Reformation and Counter-Reformation, widespread religious warfare, and the various other transformations and upheavals of early modern times led to an actual Civil War and revolution in England. This lasted from 1642 until 1653. Then Oliver Cromwell took power as Lord Protector, replacing the monarchy, which was cut down with the revolutionary execution of Charles I in 1649.The Civil War appeared to pit Parliament against the Crown. But a number of truly radical groups, some on the fringes of power and composed for the most part of journeymen and apprentices, pushed for changes so revolutionary that they greatly alarmed the propertied classes represented by both the royalists and Parliament. These more radical groups, many holding to an absolute egalitarianism ("leveling") that to them was implicit in the Reformation, questioned and defied the most fundamental beliefs and customs. This included notions of private property and of sin (for a number of the radicals, the two were closely connected, if not indeed identical), as well as sexual behavior, the social role of women, and more. Some of the radicals were accused of engaging in group copulation in churches as part of their religious practice.

http://culturechange.org/issue20/deadonarrival.htmThese issues are related to 'materialism', which is a bourgeois ideology.

[LBird]

Quote:

…from around 1600 to 1700 a profound transformation in consciousness occurred, initially among the educated classes of Europe and England, but soon spreading, nearly everywhere through pamphlets, sermons, theater, and popular culture. In a nutshell, the new teaching was that nature consisted of dead matter. Through this lesson, a whole different understanding of "reality" was imposed on the population.

[Bijou Drains]

Hi L BirdYou may find Brian's thread about Donald Trump provides you with a little bit of insight into your own life.

[LBird]

Tim Kilgallon wrote:

Hi L BirdYou may find Brian's thread about Donald Trump provides you with a little bit of insight into your own life.

Hi TimYou may find engaging with this discussion provides you with a little bit of insight into your own ideology.

[Bijou Drains]

Your reply seems to indicate a grandiose sense of self importance and arrogant haughty behaviours. Two diagnostic points in one sentence. Well done, only 3 to go to meet the diagnostic criteria!

[LBird]

Tim Kilgallon wrote:

Your reply seems to indicate a grandiose sense of self importance and arrogant haughty behaviours. Two diagnostic points in one sentence. Well done, only 3 to go to meet the diagnostic criteria!

'a grandiose sense of self importance and arrogant haughty behaviours'?That sounds like two insults.Let's hope no-one is watching, eh?

[moderator3]

Tim Kilgallon wrote:

Hi L BirdYou may find Brian's thread about Donald Trump provides you with a little bit of insight into your own life.

1st Warning: 7. You are free to express your views candidly and forcefully provided you remain civil. Do not use the forums to send abuse, threats, personal insults or attacks, or purposely inflammatory remarks (trolling). Do not respond to such messages.

[moderator3]

Reminder: 14. Rule enforcement is the responsibility of the moderators, not of the contributors. If you believe a post or private message violates a rule, report it to the moderators. Do not take it upon yourself to chastise others for perceived violations of the rules.

[ALB]

Sympo wrote:

Does the "correct" theory of truth have a name?

The first point to note is that the Socialist Party does not lay down a "correct" theory of "truth". As far as we're concerned to be a member, as long as someone accepts that there's an "external world" outside mind and that no god or gods have intervened, are intervening or will intervene in the course of human affairs that's ok.Having said that, for those more interested in the question, we refer to those writers in the "Marxist tradition" already mentioned (Joseph Dietzgen, Anton Panneloek, Paul Mattick) who argue that what scientists are doing is not so much "discovering" the ouside world "as it is" as describing its course in a way that it can be more or less accurately predicted and so used to serve human purposes. Perhaps the clearest exposition of this point of view is Anton Pannekoek's Lenin As Philospher here.In this sense, what is "true" would be what is "useful to human survival". That's my view but other members may have a different approach. I think it has something in common with this view of Marx's that  "truth" is demonstracted by practice.As he put it, in his Theses on Feuernach:

Quote:

The question whether objective truth can be attributed to human thinking is not a question of theory but is a practical question. Man must prove the truth — i.e. the reality and power, the this-sidedness of his thinking in practice. The dispute over the reality or non-reality of thinking that is isolated from practice is a purely scholastic question.

Even so, some of us seem to enjoy discussing "scholastic" questions.

[Dave B]

Thanks Adam Just before I went out for a curry I wrote the following but decided not to post it but did save it to word.  

---

 There seems to be conflation of for me two different kinds of truth. Social ‘scientific’ truth that isn’t scientific in my opinion. And the so called scientific truths of pure science that doesn’t exist in the opinion of most pure scientists who don’t believe in truth. A lot of science is based on collecting data and trying to make sense of it or coming up with a logical explanation. A very simple example would be observing that ice cream consumption increases with temperature; or that there is a correlation implying a cause and effect. You could choose that eating ice cream increases temperature. Or an increase of temperature increases ice cream consumption. You could actually test the first hypothesis and if it worked we could solve the global warming crisis; which is the point of science. Ie determining or discovering laws of cause and effect and using it to predict an influence effects. Scientific Laws are in fact just formal mathematical expressions of empirically observed facts, evidence, data etc. A scientific theory or plausible logical explanation is just that; ie not the truth. But if it works then use it. We don’t give a shit if the theory is true really. If you take a scientific theory you sort of must question whether or not it is general or eternal universal ‘truth’, if you like, or whether or not it is just an artefact of a specific set of narrow empirical observations, data. If the theory is a general or eternal universal ‘truth’ then it will continue to operate in ‘applicable’ conditions outside of those from which it was derived. The Newtonian ‘theory’ of gravity failed that test and was displaced by the Einstein theory. They actually knew fairly early on that Newton’s theory was imperfect due to anomalies in the orbit of Mercury. Bad science is a result of fraudulent data or the undue or premature application and predictions therefof  of an untested theory. Sometimes it is not easy to test a theory properly, like global warming, as kind of experiment that might be perilous to perform? 

[robbo203]

Dave B wrote:

  A scientific theory or plausible logical explanation is just that; ie not the truth. But if it works then use it. We don’t give a shit if the theory is true really. 

 Yes indeed.  Which makes the whole idea of voting on a scientific theory particularly pointless. I am still at a complete loss to know what LBird's justification  is for such a vote. If I believe the sun revolves around the earth I am not going to be persuaded to change my mind just because a majority think otherwise. A majority think capitalism is OK. Does that mean we should give up trying to promote socialism?If it is not to persuade people to change their mind about a scientific theory on the grounds that a majority support or oppose it (which incidentally  is a recipe for bad science and for converting science into a stagnant dogma) then what is the point of such a vote. I can certainly understand the point of a vote when it comes to deciding on some  practical course of action, But this is not about that at all.Voting on a scientific theory strikes me as stupendously pointless, not to say time consuming and massively wasteful of human resources.

[Author]

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