The Long Awaited Materialism thread

[Anonymous]

This is not a rejection of historical materialism as a determinist system. " Engels emphasised the point that whilst it is the economic conditions which ultimately condition historical development," Besides 'determinism' refers to causality   

[Anonymous]

twc wrote:

 To Marx, the consciousness of the capitalist class resides in its social superstructure — in capitalist society's laws, its institutions, its arts, sciences — just as Marx describes the social superstructure of the capitalist mode of production.Now that we all know where the consciousness of capitalist society, when considered as an single entity, resides — where else could it be located — will LBird demand his money back from Amazon.You construe the social superstructure as far too crude a category for serious consideration. Presumably, for you, Marx didn't mean what he said in his scientific manifesto that A determines B, that [as in all deterministic science] base determines superstructure, that social being determines thought.That is precisely what the Party's case is based on, and what it can never relinquish, and what this forum is an appropriate place to thrash out.

 That is what Marx defined as ideology

[Anonymous]

Supporters of capitalism say that problems like war, poverty and crime do not have a single cause. What is the socialist answer to that?  That the economic base of capitalism does not cause these problems? That there is not a determinist relationship at work.?  And what about this piece of determinism That this antagonism can be abolished only by the emancipation of the working class from the domination of the master class, by the conversion into the common property of society of the means of production and distribution, and their democratic control by the whole people.As long as the ownership of the means of production and distribution rests with the minority capitalist class, this antagonism will continue to exist. The antagonism is caused by the necessarily differing interests of the classes. No matter how nice capitalists may be on a personal level, they will always have different interests than the working class. It is not a matter of good and evil or anything like that, it is inherent in any class system. Therefore the only way to eliminate the antagonism is to eliminate the class system and establish a system of common ownership where the previous antagonism has no basis.

[DJP]

The point is..

Hardy wrote:

[…] that whilst it is the economic conditions which ultimately condition historical development, it should not be overlooked that all the derivative factors, political, juridical, philosophical, religious and artistic, not only interact with each other but also “react upon the economic basis”.

[Anonymous]

DJP wrote:

Hardy wrote:

The summary of the Materialist Conception of History in the Preface to the Critique of Political Economy, is a compressed statement which should be read together with further explanations in Marx and Engels’ writings. I would like to deal with what is meant by “the relations of production”. The reference from the Preface to the Critique is as follows: “In the social production of their life, men enter into definite relations that are indispensable and independent of their will, relations of production which correspond to a definite stage of development of their material productive forces”. Engels was asked a question in 1894 about the “relations of production”, and he answered it on 25th January, 1894 by listing what constituted “the relations of production”. First, the entire technique of production and transport. Second, the geographical basis in which they operate. Third, the survivals of earlier stages of economic development. Fourth, the external environment which surrounds this form of society.In other words, Engels was saying that economic relations must not be interpreted narrowly, that they go into a whole field, that they take in not merely the technique of production, but a number of other things as well. In the same letter, Engels emphasised the point that whilst it is the economic conditions which ultimately condition historical development, it should not be overlooked that all the derivative factors, political, juridical, philosophical, religious and artistic, not only interact with each other but also “react upon the economic basis”. Engels is saying that it should be recognised that there is an economic basis and that it produces a superstructure corresponding to it, but these various aspects of the superstructure interact with each other, and all of them react on the economic basis itself, so things are not simply in a watertight compartment like economic basis and the rest, nor should it be thought that the rest is simply the result of the economic basis.http://www.worldsocialism.org/spgb/education/study-guides/materialist-conception-history

 The concept of historical materialism has been reduced to a simplistic and narrow  idea by the leftwingers and the Leninists, and as it has been expressed above, it does include many factors which are integrated  each others. In that aspect Engels was  totally correct, and in 1894 he had more matured conceptions,  it does contradict what he had said prior on a private letter that ideology was false conscience. PS The Critique to the Political Economy in some way was the one work that Marx was able to finish,therefore, Marxism is not a fihished socialist theory as  it has been indicated for so many years by the so called Marxist-Leninists. .He said that his complete works must be written again, it shows that he was not the founder of a conception named Marxism, it was Engels the founder, and it was Engel who indicated that communism was a doctrine, which is also a false statement

[Brian]

DJP wrote:

The point is..

Hardy wrote:

[…] that whilst it is the economic conditions which ultimately condition historical development, it should not be overlooked that all the derivative factors, political, juridical, philosophical, religious and artistic, not only interact with each other but also “react upon the economic basis”.

But surely its this reaction on the economic basis which determines what happens next?I'll now leave the pub and join Alan!

[twc]

That isn't the point, it's the sideshow.Scientists don't rip off their balls, neuter themselves, or turn hermaphroditic, in order to accommodate conflicting appearance.For Marx, the concrete world is all struggle [while for Hegel, the ideal world was all struggle]. It's always struggle that needs to be comprehended.  The world for man is a world of struggle.Struggle is always the real issue, whether in the concrete or in thought, abstractly.  Life is compelled to resolve struggle. Struggle is its driving force — for us, class struggle.  No ifs or buts.Consequently, as in all successful human practice, struggle needs to be comprehended deterministically, to be settled, or not at all.  Successful practice and thought can never surrender to the easy imbecility of syncretism, or dualism, as it's politely called in academic philosophical circles.  Dualism leaves struggle to simmer on unresolved.Socialism is consistently materialist.  Materialism is born as determinism. Materialism explains thought from being. There could be nothing more determinist than that:  being determines thought. It goes to the core of existence. If there is something more determinist than materialism, please tell us what is.Marx's materialism is inseparable from determinism, just as Hegel's idealism is. Materialism is deterministic point-blank, no ifs or buts, period.  It cannot be other than deterministic.  Possibly determinism, as a tainted but terrifying phrase, sounds terribly "crude" to polite philosophical sensibility, but the fact that materialism is ipso facto deterministic is incontestably irrefutable.Both materialism and idealism aim to explain concrete appearance deterministically.  They both have the courageous virtue, and mental stamina, to stick to their guns. They are both schools of principle, and not gangs of convenience.Can you show us how anyone can explain anything non-deterministically.  You won't find the answer in the Amazon bestseller philosophy list.  Just carry out a simple exercise yourself to see if you can explain anything — explain anything at all — non-deterministically.Think man.  Can materialism ever be non-deterministic?  Can socialism succeed if it's not determined, but merely willed?  Can socialism succeed if it is opposed by determinism?The Party case is materialist, and thereby concomitantly, determinist.  It cannot repudiate determinism.

[LBird]

twc wrote:

Materialism explains thought from being. There could be nothing more determinist than that: being determines thought. It goes to the core of existence. If there is something more determinist than materialism, please tell us what is.

What 'being' is being spoken of?

Marx wrote:

It is not the consciousness of men that determines their existence, but their social existence that determines their consciousness.

http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1859/critique-pol-economy/preface.htm'Being' (reality, concrete, material) does not determine 'thought'.'Social being determines consciousness'.If it means anything, it means our human society 'determines' what individuals think.The 'material' is not the source of creative and critical thought. Once we remove society, culture and history, we're back to consulting the rocks about what they think we should do.And for that task, since workers can't tell what rocks say, we're back to needing an interpreter. A party above the class.

[DJP]

twc wrote:

Can you show us how anyone can explain anything non-deterministically.  You won't find the answer in the Amazon bestseller philosophy list.  Just carry out a simple exercise yourself to see if you can explain anything — explain anything at all — non-deterministically.

LOL. The whole of quantum physics runs on probalistic models (i.e is not deterministic) I would have thought that explains quite a lot..

[Anonymous]

Brian wrote:

 But surely its this reaction on the economic basis which determines what happens next?I'll now leave the pub and join Alan!

But was this reaction determined by the base?  For example government policies to remove war and poverty? Get the pints in 

[Brian]

Vin Maratty wrote:

Brian wrote:

 But surely its this reaction on the economic basis which determines what happens next?I'll now leave the pub and join Alan!

But was this reaction determined by the base?  For example government policies to remove war and poverty? Get the pints in 

I'm not sure, but I'm determined to find out!

[twc]

DJP wrote:

LOL. The whole of quantum physics runs on probalistic models (i.e is not deterministic) I would have thought that explains quite a lot.

Your LOL demonstrates how readily a syncretic philosophical mind falls for appearance.  Socialism, by the way, is nothing if we fall for appearance about society.Classical Probability TheoryProbability theory is a deterministic mathematical science.  It is the only way we can determine the likely outcomes of random events, like the toss of a coin, when we don’t know and can’t control the physical conditions precisely enough to determine the outcome from first principles.Probabilistic determinism does not annihilate physical determinism; it merely acknowledges physical determinism as contingently inappropriate to the task at hand.  It is our human ability that is deficient, and our human inability forces us to resort to probabilistic determinism.Probabilistic DeterminismProbability theory operates at the phenomenological level, by treating random events as subsets of the superset of all possible random outcomes, and it considers probabilities as the relative sizes of subsets and the superset.Example.  For a coin toss, the superset comprises {heads, tails}, and its size is 2 because it contains all of the two possible event outcomes.  A throw of “heads” comprises the subset {heads}, and its size is 1 because it contains the only one possible outcome that is “heads”.  The probability of throwing “heads” is the ratio of the size of the “heads” subset to the superset, or 1 / 2.Probability theory lacks any knowledge of the underlying determinism at work, and consequently can’t determine the precise outcome of any given coin toss, but it can determine the precise average of a long run of coin tosses.  In gambling, a determinate long-run average is all the house needs to rob its mug punters, without ever resorting to any actual physical determinisms, known and controlled, that surreptitiously rig the short-run odds in its favour.Sorry, but determinism is alive and well, and living in Las Vegas and Monte Carlo.  Otherwise these star-studded peddlers in voluntaristic freedom-from-proletarian dreams would have gone bust long ago.  Viva las determinismo!Quantum DeterminismWe formerly discussed the serious problems of interpreting quantum mechanics, where concrete appearance is entirely probabilistic.  But to repeat…Bohr grabbed the quantum nettle and simply accepted the reality of probability being just how nature is at the microscopic level, and agreed to get along with it.  Natural probability lies at the heart of Bohr’s Copenhagen interpretation and, even if it remains disturbingly problematic for some, this interpretation remains the comfortable lingua franca for most.Everyone knows that Einstein was reluctant to give up classical determinism [he was inspired by thoughts similar to those given in my argument (immediately above) about classical probability not annihilating determinism but only being ignorant of it; Einstein fought for a covert determinism beneath the probability].What most people don’t know is that Bohr was mainly able to meet Einstein’s many objections from the vantage of his consistent quantum viewpoint, by pointing out Einstein’s dualistic [or unconsciously syncretistic] mixture of classical and quantum viewpoints that sunk his counter-case.  Bohr’s great putdown of Einstein’s familiar quote about god and dice is “Einstein, stop telling god how to behave!”There is, of course, also the celebrated, alternative, overtly deterministic, interpretation by Bohm, that considers the universe to be physically deterministic at the microscopic level.  As in a previous post, I declare my incompetence to rush in where angels fear to tread, and will not offer any opinion here. Inconclusive Forefront of ScienceHowever, LBird knows how to solve the problem of quantum interpretation, because it falls within the category of something he has expert knowledge of — a problem at the inconclusive forefront of science — which he vehemently cast a strong opinion on in a recent post.LBird solves all problems, especially those at the inconclusive forefront of science by voting on them.  Voting?  Yes, by voting on the inconclusive forefront.  A standup could make a hilarious routine out of this.However, he is not joking.  He is fanatically serious.  He and his big-C Communists will decide what scientists are allowed to think by a poll  That'll keep such distrusted elites in their proper place.  I’m afraid that universal mediocrity is our sorry lot under big-C Communism.LBird romantically condemns anyone who refuses to go along with his hair-brained franchise, to vote on the nature of nature, as being anti-democratic and anti-proletarian.  I am not joking.  Sadly, this is the serious babble of a more-democratic-than-thou, pro-proletarian, poseur.Voting is entirely inadequate to the task at hand.  Voting is impotent in the face of nature’s determinism, which determinism is something proletarian scientist LBird refuses to allow of nature herself, but only to us.For idealist LBird [actually he’s an idealist-leaning syncretist], nature is non-deterministic, and determinism being our social construct has a perfect right to be voted in or out, particularly at the inconclusive forefront of science.This is slurping the dregs of the residual stultifying Kantianism of Popper, partly evident in his influential students.  LBird is a dualistic casualty of learning his science, ignorant of the context, primarily through such folks.Quantum ProbabilityQuantum mechanics, as abstract theory, is thoroughly deterministic.Quantum phenomena at the concrete level are incontestably probabilistic.  But phenomenal appearance is not explanation, but that which is to be explained.Quantum mechanical theory, of whatever stripe, solves the deterministic wave equation, or put another way, the wave function evolves deterministically, thereby providing an explanation of the phenomenal appearance.  Determinism explains the concrete probability.I’m afraid quantum mechanics has turned out to be far-and-away the most precise deterministic theory we have, and it relies entirely on determinism to explain concrete probabilities.Determinism is the stuff of explanation.

[LBird]

twc wrote:

However, LBird knows how to solve the problem of quantum interpretation, because it falls within the category of something he has expert knowledge of — a problem at the inconclusive forefront of science — which he vehemently cast a strong opinion on in a recent post.LBird solves all problems, especially those at the inconclusive forefront of science by voting on them. Voting? Yes, by voting on the inconclusive forefront. A standup could make a hilarious routine out of this.However, he is not joking. He is fanatically serious. He and his big-C Communists will decide what scientists are allowed to think by a poll That'll keep such distrusted elites in their proper place. I’m afraid that universal mediocrity is our sorry lot under big-C Communism.LBird romantically condemns anyone who refuses to go along with his hair-brained franchise, to vote on the nature of nature, as being anti-democratic and anti-proletarian. I am not joking. Sadly, this is the serious babble of a more-democratic-than-thou, pro-proletarian, poseur.Voting is entirely inadequate to the task at hand. Voting is impotent in the face of nature’s determinism, which determinism is something proletarian scientist LBird refuses to allow of nature herself, but only to us.For idealist LBird [actually he’s an idealist-leaning syncretist], nature is non-deterministic, and determinism being our social construct has a perfect right to be voted in or out, particularly at the inconclusive forefront of science.This is slurping the dregs of the residual stultifying Kantianism of Popper, partly evident in his influential students. LBird is a dualistic casualty of learning his science, ignorant of the context, primarily through such folks.

Coming from someone of your elitist political perspective, twc, this is a tremendous accolade, which I willingly accept.I'm a Communist of the type that is denigrated and insulted for arguing in favour of complete proletarian democracy, both as the basis for our organising in this capitalist society, and as forming the basis of our future Communist society.I'm happy to be condemned as a democrat, because for the entirety of the 20th century, Communists were associated with undemocratic politics.I'm a Communist for the coming 21st century, unlike you, twc, and your outdated and discarded elitist politics of the 20th.If science isn't under our class's control, then it'll be under the control of those with power. Of course, those wanting to control science will argue that it is a neutral activity, of no political consequence. Just like those in favour of 'elite economics' argue that the 'market is neutral'.We have to learn, comrades, that a revolution will see 'the world turned upside down' in every sphere of human activity, including science.

[twc]

Firstly, the SPGB has been democratic in all aspects of its existence as a democratic political party, with a democratic political Objective and democratic political means, enshrined in its politically democratic Declaration of Principles, for over a century, and you know it, or else prove otherwise.It is you who are doing the catching up, and we recognize it, and appreciate it.Secondly, the SPGB was opposing the undemocratic politics of big-C Communism, that you are fleeing from, long before you were born, and has always without exception opposed anti-democratic political big-C Communism since big-C Communism emerged as a political force nearly a century ago, and you know it, or else prove otherwise.It is you who might acknowledge the SPGB's consistency in the face of big-C Communist denigration, insult and worse, throughout the 20th century, so that you don't have to start off democratically opposing capitalism from scratch, on your own, but in the company of committed democrats, within a century-long established tradition of socialist democratic politics and socialist democratic objective.Thirdly, for the entirety of the 20th century, the SPGB was never part of big-C Communism, whose unconscious role, it recognized from the start, was predetermined for big-C Communism by material circumstances of its existing pre-capitalist worlds, to act as mere brutal engines of capitalist primitive accumulation, as the precondition for bringing capitalism to its backward parts of the world.Fourthly, democracy simply can't dictate to nature what to do.  That's when democracy, when it's brainlessly applied to circumstances for which it is inappropriate, turns into dictatorship.As I asked you before, will you be able to hang onto your hair brained imposition of democracy over human thought, when human thought rebels under the yoke?Fifthly, there will be no social classes in socialism, when the necessary resources and implements of social reproduction are commonly owned and democratically controlled by the whole community. We've read your arguments that scientists will become the new ruling class, unless kept in check, but that is pure paranoia.Sixthly, and lastly [like Falstaff], it's pure nonsense to parrot meaningless phrases, that have cryptic meaning to yourself, like elite economics and the market is neutral.The capitalist market is not the problem — it is the only possible solution to capitalist social reproduction.  It is only a consequence, but not the source.  To make the market the issue is just as dangerously anti-socialist, and wrong-headed, as to make government the issue, along with the anarchists.  The market and government are consequences of the real issue.The real issue is private ownership and private control by a social class of the necessary resources and implements of social reproduction.  Remove that by socialist democratic politics, and you remove the market and government, by removing the social base upon which these phenomena rest.It is your attack that remains entirely at the level of ideas, that is the most dangerous aspect of trying to bring about something and removing something else which generate the ideas you attack, but leave the material causes untouched.  

[LBird]

twc wrote:

Fourthly, democracy simply can't dictate to nature what to do.

This shows that you don't understand the problem, twc. No-one has argued that 'democracy will dictate what nature does'.I've tried a number of times to turn this and other threads into a discussion with you, but you won't discuss, and so you're not learning.'Nature' and 'knowledge of nature' are not the same thing, unless one is a naive realist and holds to a reflection theory of knowledge.Not only am I not a naive realist (and don't hold to a reflection theory of knowledge), but I don't think Marx was, either.If one starts from the assumption that 'knowledge of nature' is not the same thing as 'nature', then we have to ask who (and how do they) produces (and thus controls) 'knowledge of nature'.The tragedy of all these exchanges between us, twc, is that you're clearly interested in science (and I think that you have something to teach, as well as learn, and so I've tried several times to get you to discuss science), but you are unwilling to engage in essentially philosophical questions.I'll say it once again, comrades, if we don't collectively and democratically control the production of scientific knowledge, then that process of production will remain in the hands of a minority, who will thus have power over society.Marx warns us about this, in the Theses on Feuerbach.

[Author]

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