[Dave B]

I think the catholic church after it entered into the ‘marble halls of power’ after about 500AD say, revised its former ideological base in the same way as Bolshevik ‘communism’ did.Eg from non other than Uncle Joe in 1906; Where there are no classes, where there are neither rich nor poor, there is no need for a state, there is no need either for political power, which oppresses the poor and protects the rich. Consequently, in socialist society there will be no need for the existence of political power.http://www.marx2mao.com/Stalin/AS07.html#c3 Thus to criticise Christianity just in terms of its later revised historical form is like criticising communism and ‘Marxism’ in terms of the form it took under Stalin and the Bolsheviks in general. Which is what most Christians still do. I think it is clear (for what it matters) from nearly all the early Christian material that the Pope’s so called crypto Marxists position is in fact very close to the early Christian ideological position. And thus he is returning to and rediscovering that position which originated, in a very materialist way, out of an economic and political reaction by the poor and dispossessed to the oppression of the ruling class. By over emphasising the metaphysical content of early Christianity one fails to see the wood for the trees and economic base/superstructure, I think. And actually early Christianity ideology was, for its time, very materialistic in terms of its political and economic focus rooted in a class analysis. One of the most authentic early Christian documents is the Epistle of Barnabas. It can be precisely dated from internal incidental dating material to circa 130AD. As well as being referenced to and thus reliably provenanced by several 2ndcentury documents. Fairly early on it rejects the economic status quo and power relationships; you could argue that this is just a matter of another political group being in power and we are not etc, as in retrospect the Bolsheviks. The ‘personification’ of the power of the ruling class as 'Satanic', whilst for these guys taken literally. isn’t I think politically that different, once one ‘abstracts’ it, from even Karl’s analysis of capitalism which ‘vampire like’ sucks the blood of the working class.Thus; ….Since, therefore, the days are evil, and Satan possesses the power of this world…. Then a bit later we have a more proactive interesting analysis? ….untie the fastenings of harsh agreements, restore to liberty them that are bruised, tear in pieces every unjust engagement, feed the hungry with thy bread, clothe the naked when thou seest him, bring the homeless into thy house, not despise the humble if thou behold him..  The attack on; ‘harsh agreements’ and ‘unjust engagements’ I think looks like a rejection of the exploitative economic relations of the time? And following from the economic context? ………. that we should not rush forward as rash acceptors of their laws… And; …..Do not, by retiring apart, live a solitary life, as if you were already [fully] justified; but coming together in one place, make common inquiry concerning what tends to your general welfare…  ……….to such men as know not how to procure food for themselves by labour and sweat, but seize on that of others in their iniquity, and although wearing an aspect of simplicity, are on the watch to plunder others………..  ……..Thou shalt communicate [share] in all things with thy neighbour; thou shalt not call things thine own; for if ye are partakers in common of things which are incorruptible, how much more [should you be] of those things which are corruptible… It is interesting how these Christian translators hate to use the ‘share’ interpretation of this ‘communicate’ word, the dual meaning in Greek itself being interesting I think. …. who turn away him that is in want, who oppress the afflicted, who are advocates of the rich, who are unjust judges of the poor, and who are in every respect transgressors… Do we care? Well maybe not but perhaps early Christianity is closer to the ‘Marxist political heritage’ than modern Christianity is?

[Dave B]

I think people might missing the point somewhat with Russel Brand. Whilst he may have his own peculiar input into what he says etc. What matters is not himself as some kind of Icon, but that his general and somewhat diffuse and imprecise 'message' reflects and resonates with a significant demographic proportion of the population. And he would be nothing in that respect if people didn’t like what he was saying. Notwithstanding that there might be a strong element of simple and mindless adolescent rebellion in it. It should be positive for us I think as 'it' or 'he' seems to transcend that more historically orthodox brand of the rebellious ‘youth’ re 1970’s bolshevism and the nihilism of punk etc etc. ‘His’or ‘the’ core ideas of the ‘phenomena’ as regards at least a critique and understanding of ‘capitalism’ etc are pretty close to some of ours surely?Although I have to confess I have not been paying anything other than a superficial attention to it all and haven't even read his book yet.

[Dave B]

Obviously a lot is made this teleological stuff by the philosophers and social scientists. It revolves around and analysis or philosophy of change; any change. It is in my opinion better expressed by the often common expression used by pragmatic people; is some process being pushed or pulled? The current theory as to the end of the universe will be that it will continue to expand with all matter eventually dissipating towards some defined and specified end of some homogenous uniform lot of photons; or something. Is that potentially teleological? The Entropy laws say something like everything tends to, or is 'pulled towards'  a ‘maximum disorder’ ; even if the end of the universe could be viewed as a perfect and pure platonic order.{there are big rows going on about that being merely a 'statistical 'phenomena' ie push or pull } I think there is a natural bias in the way we look at things in an attempt to predict events from the starting or present position. Whether that is an accurate reflection of ‘reality’ is another matter. I think chemists are maybe the most teleological of beings as we often can see reactions almost just as much being pulled in a particularly direction as being pushed. My objection to 'teleology' is mainly that usually it isn’t very practical.

[Dave B]

I know it all too easy to drop links onto threads but this guy writes some interesting and informed stuff. http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article41505.htm Another little discussed fact apparently is that there isn’t such a clear distinction between ‘Yemeni’s’ and ‘Saudi’s’ eg the Bin Laden family; and that apparently a significant proportion of the ‘Saudi’ Armed forces or boots on the ground ‘grunts’ are ‘cultural Yemeni’s’; and may be not all that ‘reliable’. It is complex I think but may be falling into the American 1960’s ‘Vietnam’ domino theory of ‘foreign relations’. I think this Shia-Sunni thing is mostly a facade or smoke screen and it is more political; as well as being geopolitical.

[Dave B]

Reply to post 249 from Meel. I think there are two possibilities when it comes to incapacity to feel empathy; and it is probably in most cases a combination of the two. One is the more straightforward ie that it is an innate disability. The other is empathy is an innate potential that can be acquired, following on perhaps, from the recent CAT scan mirror neurone research work etc. Thus it must help to feel sympathy or compassion etc if you can relate others experiences to your own personal experiences of pain, suffering, distress and insecurity etc etc. Thus being wealthy and a member of the ruling class might make you less empathic to others general suffering. In the following talk given by a remarkably left of centre ‘capitalist’  Nick Hanauer. He said that a lot of these billionaire capitalists are sociopaths and gives a succinct description of that condition followed by a; if you don’t know or don’t think sociopaths exist it is probably because you are one.  http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b05ndjm9 Emotional experiences are sensations and you will never be able to describe them or convince people of there existence who are not equipped to sense them.  I think it is a mistake to think of sociopaths as sadists who take pleasure from other peoples suffering etc. True sociopaths don’t ‘care’ or feel nothing if people suffer, or not; they are merely pragmatic and rational egotists. The sometimes, and mostly exceptional, more egregious ‘anti-social’ behaviour of sociopaths only manifests itself when they rationally decide to fulfil an overwhelming powerful personal drive or impulse irrespective of consequences it has for another. It is more a matter of whether they can get away with it. However their self serving egotism and rational understanding of legal, and ‘social’, retribution can result in them being law abiding, trustworthy and model citizens as well as even being positively ‘sociable’. There is big difference I think between the feelings of ‘guilt’ and ‘remorse’. Guilt is a fear of being exposed and the potential consequences for the ego both socially re personal relations, and maybe legalistically. Remorse is something different I think; and maybe, according to the trick cyclists, it is just another fear of ones own nagging social empathic conscience attacking ones own ego etc.    Guilt and vulgar morality is undoubtedly an ‘aggregate of social relations’; remorse and empathy are social instincts.

[Dave B]

God knows what this 1300 post thread has all been about so I will have to guess based on similar and much shorter threads I have got involved in elsewhere. One of the arguments  revolved around the advocacy of a technocratic albeit free access society of the Zietgist people.That does have a 'communist' history datring back to the 1930's and Well's  I think. Scientists and engineers would know the best way to get things done and would get on with it with minimal interference from the scientifically illiterate etc. Against this is the non macroscopic idea of; would planes be flown by a democratic committee or decisions about how to put out a fire not be left to the expertise of the trained fire fighters etc? On a macroscopic and anti technocratic scale the argument would be that; scientific and engineering 'cliques', ‘castes’ or ‘classes’ left alone would develop and pursue there own personal agenda’s to the detriment of society as a whole. It not very easy to fathom how this would manifest itself but in an open attempt to propose some examples of my own in the absence of any others? Know thy enemy! Maybe in the scientist deranged priest class search for absolute truth they would have us running around building more pyramids, stone henge’s, hadron colliders, gravity wave detectors and stuff to peer into space to work out what happened 13 billion years ago? Deluding us like they do with the present capitalist ruling class into believing in the miracles, past present and future, of blue sky research in solving all problems whilst in reality just providing more toys for infantile scientists to play with? In the meantime elevating their social ‘priest class’ social status? Blah blah. Funding for that at present or fairly recently is done on an ‘economic impact assessment’ basis, the details of which I will leave. But the issue of whether or not it is all left to a 'caste' of mutually self serving albeit muti-disciplinary ‘scientists and engineers’ is a ‘potential’ problem. Scientists in general are polymaths , and like say chemists, have a pretty good understanding of what the gravel monkey geologists are up to and are more than happy to call foul if they exaggerate the import of their work and vice versa. Even assuming that we are all intrinsically socially irresponsible and groups of sub castes within a greater all encompassing one that wishes to take over the world etc.  When it comes to democratic control of what we are up to etc there is in fact a simple solution put forward by some scientists, like myself. Sceintists or in fact mathematicians/statisticians can prove from first principals that; if you want to know what decision the whole of an idealistically informed, educated and scientifically literate society would make. The stupid solution to that problem would be to educate and inform them all and ask them all to vote. Eg blue sky research into the final solution of nuclear fusion?, wind power etc or fission and is global warming bollocks?    On a 7 billion population global issue you would take a random selected sample of a jury of 10,000? for a year or so and let them be “educated and informed” and then vote. Pure statisticians will tell you that the result will the same, +/- 5%, as if the whole of the population voted after being “educated and informed”. It is an opinion poll; but opinion polls have got a bad name from non pure statisticians. As they say ‘opinion polls’ are polls of people who are prepared to respond to opinion polls which is often less than 40% irrespective of demographic origin etc. And peer pressure and lying etc. You still admittedly have the problem of who is doing the ‘educating and informing’ and judges 'directing' the jury etc. It is called demarchy and has been advocated by people of an anarchist persuasion as well as having a long a-statistical historical precedent. I would expect demarchic decisions to not be final but go through on the nod, or default passed unless voted against.

[Dave B]

I seem to remember two people seriously engaged with me to some extent; Bob Malone and Pieter Lawrence?

[Dave B]

I appreciate your additional material; I had only skimmed through that book.  Yes it was a ‘disclaimer’ on the back of the book I think. Steele is under a gagging order on condition of his ‘settlement’ I think. Perhaps 'we' don’t have any full appreciation of how comprehensive detailed and all encompassing putative ‘gagging orders’ might be? Other than from stuff like? http://www.theguardian.com/society/2013/mar/14/ban-on-nhs-gagging-orders  And therefore we are left to 'imagine'. I think Honeywell would have been unwise not to have put something like that on the back of his book anyway.(see addendum) I don’t dispute that the establishment was upset at the erupting ‘soft marking’ debate the details of which don’t concern me too much; even if it has been a bit of a cause célèbre in its own right. But if the establishment are going to make an example of someone and take them down it is always best to select an otherwise ‘unpopular’ individual. This probably is the most controversial biological life science debate since Darwin himself. I had the piss taken out of me, not for the first time, with the ‘rats tails’ thing when I raised it 10 years ago. So am I not allowed to fling a bit of colourful ‘neo Dawinist papacy’ stuff around? Even now I am not nailing my flag to the mast over it as the scientific ‘truth’. Faculty of Law, Humanities and the Arts 2004 Exposing and opposing censorship: Backfiredynamics in freedom-of-speech strugglesS. Curry JansenMuhlenburg College, Pennsylvania, USABrian MartinUniversityof Wollongong, bmartin@uow.edu.au  In many court cases in which an individual sues a corporation or government,for example over wrongful dismissal, a settlement is reached, often witha payment to the individual. In such cases the settlement frequently includesa clause barring the individual from discussing the case publicly in future,including the very existence of the clause. These ‘confidentiality agreements’,better described as silencing or gagging clauses, serve a dual role, both ascensorship and as a means of hiding the censorship. Such gags may also beimposed, by extension, on employees of an organisation that has participatedin a settlement; employees familiar with but not directly involved in thecharges may also become subject to threats of legal action if they speak aboutthe contested events.  Nominally, the existence of a silencing clause is apparent; an inquisitivejournalist may be told that a settlement prevents the parties from speakingabout the case. But this reduces the news value of the case, reducing furthercoverage and thus ending the matter as far as most people are concerned. Forexample, outspoken biologist Ted Steele was dismissed from the University ofWollongongin February 2001; eventually, following two court cases and longnegotiations, a settlement was reached that included a silencing clause. Thedismissal, previously given prominent attention in the media, immediatelydropped from sight (Martin, 2002).

[Dave B]

This friend who I have known well since 1986 and I so happened to have gone out to a meal with just a few weeks ago; also 'chipped into a national debate’.And was sacked for ‘whistle-blowing’. http://www.communitycare.co.uk/2009/01/29/karen-reissmann-plumps-for-out-of-court-settlement/ I am sure it had absolutely nothing at all to do with her many previous years of active trade unionism. 

[Dave B]

That would depend on whether or not you are a conspiracy theorist or not I suppose. Background to the case from Brian Martin  Ted Steele has a long history as a dissident biologist. He proposed a molecular biological mechanism for environmentally induced changes in certain organisms to be passed on to progeny, and expounded this idea in a book more than 20 years ago (Steele, 1979). Much of his time since then has been spent pursuing this fundamental idea, through experimental work, theoretical elaboration and seeking acceptance from other scientists, including confronting critics and attacking researchers who did not give him what he thought was suitable acknowledgment. That environmental influences could affect genetics has long been rejected in biology. Steele was like a bull battering at the gates of the establishment. http://www.bmartin.cc/pubs/02aur.html Epigenetic Inheritance through Sperm Cells, the Lamarckian Dimension in Evolution  Steele and his fellow researchers were vehemently dismissed and attacked by the establishment throughout the 1980s and 1990s when they continued pushing back the frontiers [8], and are now in danger of being fully vindicated. http://www.i-sis.org.uk/epigeneticInheritanceSpermCells.php    When such a person is then sacked for; ………..just chipping in on a national debate about Australian university standards when he told the Sydney Morning Herald that he had been told to upgrade student marks……….. http://www.proofs.com.au/proofs-articles/2008/8/23/man-of-steele/

[Dave B]

If you mean by Einstien his disbelief in quantum mechanics; I don’t ‘believe it’ either. He postulated a thought experiment on faster than light speed electron entanglement called the spooky effect I think that would disprove quantum mechanics. They did it fairly recently and it passed the quantum mechanics theory test. [The anti quantum mechanics Einstienist then moved the goal posts and claimed it wasn’t really an exchange of information or something.] Quantum mechanics is firming up and has passed every kitchen sink test that they have thrown at it. Pure scientist do not believe in ‘scientific truth’; that is label that is invented by non pure scientists. We do not prove things to be true. In the all important progressive negatation;  we demonstrate that existing ideas are false or based on an incomplete understanding. EG .As below? mentioning twc’s Gould.  “If a good scientist says that a theory has been proved, then he's speaking informally. Mathematics deals in proof, but scientific theories are not proved. Ever.(It is sometimes claimed that the "laws" of thermodynamicsare proved. That is a partial truth. The mathematical part of the "laws" is indeed mathematically proved. The science part is not.)The basic credo is that all scientific knowledge is tentative. Nothing is so firmly known that it cannot, in principle, be overthrown by new evidence. In practice, of course, there have been scientists who clung to old theories. Creationism, for example, hung on at many universities for decades after Darwin. The standard student joke was that evolution spread "one funeral at a time".But belief being tentative does not mean that all theories are equal. Evidence is weighed: belief comes in gradations. For example, Roger Penrose puts theories in four categories: Superb, Useful, Tentative, and Misguided.So, where does the Theory of Evolution fit? There are Creationist claims that scientists feel evolution is in crisis. Others say it's "just a theory", by which they mean Tentative. However, I personally testify that the scientific community rates it Superb.Stephen Jay Gould has said that the evidence is to the point where it would be perverse to treat Common Descent differently from a fact. The most prestigious scientific journals agree, and regularly publish articleswhich assume that Common Descent is a fact. The Theory of Evolution is the theory they useto explain that fact.http://www.don-lindsay-archive.org/creation/proof.html

[Dave B]

I think the reputation when it comes to the pure sciences like chemistry and physics is much better. And we do like, Mancunian  Brian Cox, take the piss out of  ‘the biologists’. We have the advantage though of being more easily performing and reproducing experiments etc. And are less likely to quickly dismiss the outrageously unconventional and think the unthinkable. Eg in Manchester; It was quite the most incredible event that has ever happened to me in my life. It was almost as incredible as if you fired a 15-inch shell at a piece of tissue paper and it came back and hit you. http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Ernest_Rutherford There was another classic one re the age of the sun before any comprehension of nuclear energy etc etc. Assuming that the sun’s energy was from chemical energy and somekind of burning lump of coal or something and it was half way through it life. They calculated that it was about 40 million years old? The gravel monkeys and Darwinists were horrified. To the credit of the cross discipline understanding of chemists and physicists however they accepted they probably had a problem and that there must be something else going on that they knew nothing about. The first Dark energy. We now have Dark Energy II.

[Dave B]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edward_J._Steele 

[Dave B]

I think Engels was remarkably up speed on all scientific developments in his time. I remember reading something he wrote on chemistry type stuff in ani Duhring, and perhaps not being as well up on the history of my own subject as I should be, was surprised that ‘we’ had quite got to that level at that point in history. I think we should be up to speed on what is going on and be aware of the resurrection of 'epigenetic Lamarkism' or ‘meta-Lamarkism’ and its very recent history given our ‘hero’ is still lampooned by our behind the times and out of date Weismannist/neo-Darwinists. There may also be some grist for our L bird ideology of science in this. Around 1979 an Australian scientist produced the ‘first epigenetic’ work. He was dragged before the neo-Darwinist papacy excommunicated for ‘Lamarkism’ and eventually sacked from his academic position. Starting from around 2000 epigenetics started to take off and is now mainstream and is increasingly attracting attention. I raised it as a subject on our old forum around 2005 I think. Going back to the beginning. Darwin came up with his theory or whatever in 1859+ but what people often don’t appreciate is that it did not include any ‘causal’ mechanism for the ‘mutations’. There were various hypotheses including the ‘Lamarkian’ one which as it happens Darwin also tentatively considered in his pangenesis idea. It was a good hypothesis which increasingly looks as though it is was correct. Although Lamark did ridiculously promote it to a ‘Law’; I think Darwin and Engels sensibly kept it at the hypothesis level. It is generally thought incorrectly I think that Engels took his ‘Lamarkian’ idea from Lamark rather than Darwin.  There is a reason for this I suspect; after the ‘Darwinian’ Wiseman in 1896, or whatever, ‘Lamarkism’ was progressively trashed and the embarrassing Darwinian pangensis ‘Lamarkism’ was ‘expunged’ from the literature and sent down the Darwinist memory hole. As Lamark became the easier whipping boy for Wisemanism. Hence we know of the Lamark idea from Lamark and not from Darwin. Or in other words Engels was perhaps expressing pangeneisist ideas rather than Lamarkian ones? But we wouldn’t know that if pangeneisis had been ‘wiped from the pages of history’. Of course epigenetics could still collapse but that is not the point really.

[Dave B]

In the swirling pot of ideas of the time Engels may well have taken his ‘Lamarkian’ idea from other places; or even the same places Lamark got them?   “Huxley pointed out the similarities of pangenesis to the theories of Georges Louis Leclerc, Comte de Buffon, and the Swiss naturalist Charles Bonnetbut eventually wrote encouraging Darwin to publish: "Somebody rummaging among your papers half a century hence will find Pangenesis & say 'See this wonderful anticipation of our modern Theories—and that stupid ass, Huxley, prevented his publishing them'".  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Variation_of_Animals_and_Plants_under_Domestication

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