LBird
Forum Replies Created
-
Posts
-
First of all, ALB, I have to say that we’re not very far apart, with your description of ‘social conditions’ as the meaning ‘material conditions’, which human activity creates and can thus change.
But…
ALB wrote: “Whatever it is that humans experience, it is not like social conditions, i.e., a product of human activity. Humans only describe it. They focus on a part of the world of experience (abstract it) and give it a name. This applies as much to tables and chairs as it does to “matter”. But this is not same as creating (bringing into existence) what is being described. That is there independently of human descriptions of it.”
You’re still separating ‘it’ from ‘product of human activity’. Thus, this ‘it’ can only be passively ‘described’. This denies ‘conscious human activity’ or ‘social production’. For Marx, anything outside of human production is a ‘nothing for us’.
The key point is how can this ‘it’ be ‘independent of human description’?
I suspect that the problem is that often people assume ‘independent’ means “outside of a biological individual’s brain”. Of course, this (unconscious?) assumption is precisely the same one that allows ‘value’ to supposedly be determined, not by social relations, but by ‘individual preference’. That was not Marx’s starting point.
By ‘independent of humanity’ is meant ‘outside of social human conscious activity’. But ‘matter’, ‘material’, ‘it’, etc., are all social products, which change over time, especially between modes of production.
For Marx, there is nothing outside of social production, because anything we know is a social product of our own conscious activity. Thus, we can change ‘it’ (whatever we call it) – whether ‘matter’, ‘hard stuff’, ‘the universe’, ‘the physical’, etc.
Once again, ALB, thanks for your thoughtful post – it provides a good basis for further discussion.
ALB wrote: “Two more pieces confirming that Marx was a materialist (without scare quotes). The debate about whether or not this is the case must surely be over. Perhaps it is.”
I hope that you are proved correct, ALB. Once everyone agrees that ‘material’ for Marx meant ‘human’ (as opposed to ‘ideal’ meaning ‘divine’), and that all ‘material conditions’ means for Marx is ‘social conditions’, then all socialists can get down to work on how we, collectively, democratically, can change our ‘social conditions’.
ALB wrote: “Materialism is basically a rejection of theological explanations of experience rather than a commitment to a particular theory of the nature of “matter”.”
Yes, but Marx not only rejected the ‘theological’, but replaced it with the ‘human’, which is why he wasn’t simply a ‘materialist who rejects the theological’.
ALB wrote: “Materialists can have all sorts of theories about that or none. They can even be agnostic about it.”
Perhaps ‘materialists’ (of the ‘old’ variety, Pre-Marx) can, but Marxists certainly can’t. Marxists hold to the theory that humans create ‘matter’, and since ‘matter’ (as Engels said (quote above), it’s a human product) is a socio-historical product by humanity, we can change it. In a future democratic socialist society, any changes being made to ‘matter’ would be democratically decided, unlike in the capitalist mode of production, where an elite determines whether ‘matter’, or ‘mass’, or ‘energy’, or whatever comes next, is our social product. They change it undemocratically now, and we can change it democratically in the future.
Another recommendation for reading, concerning the nature of Marx’s ‘new materialism’.
Peter Osbourne How To Read Marx (2005) Granta
Esp. chapters 2 and 3 ‘A New Materialism (1): Practice‘ and ‘A New Materialism (2): History‘
I’ve just come across these two answers to the question “What are the differences and similarities between German idealism and Marx’s philosophy?“:
The first answer, by Peter Stillman, is one I would recognise.
The second, by Shayn McCallum, is one ‘materialists’ would recognise.
Yeah, BD, I’m sure beer would ‘oil the wheels’ of debate to a great extent!
On my side, after about 10 years of being a hanger-on, I joined the SWP. Of course, at the time I believed all the Leninist guff about ‘materialism’, and the evils of the dastardly ‘idealists’!
But mention “workers’ democracy”, and the smiles dropped. No, this wasn’t needed, because ‘material conditions’ were going to change workers’ consciousness, and the party had a special consciousness which meant that the ‘material conditions’ didn’t apply to them! Now, it seems laughable that anyone fell for it, but we did, and have done for generations. Hopefully, Marxists in the 21st century will begin to read Marx, and try to get to the bottom of his ideas.
Whether the SPGB will be at the forefront, or even that Marx’s ideas will survive, I’m not sure. One thing I am sure of is that ‘materialism’ is dead, and those parties that make a fetish of ‘matter’ are doomed.
Thanks, BD.If I were to put it in Marx’s terms, ‘matter’ is a fetish, a social product endowed by its producers, with attributes which really belong to its producers themselves. Much the same as sexual fetish by men gives ‘objects’ (eg. high heels) the subjective sexuality of women. So, ‘matter’ supposedly produces ‘mind’, whereas we know that ‘mind’ is social, and is produced and reproduced by humans.
‘Materialists’ fetishise what even Engels described as “Matter as such is a pure creation of thought and an abstraction” (CW 25, p. 533).
What humanity socially creates, humanity can change.
Bijou Drains wrote: “Matt – eventually he will admit how much he loves us. Come on Birdy, let it all out!!!!!”
Well, I’m happy with our relationship, BD!
In the last five-ish years, I’ve literally bought and read hundreds of books, which is why all the arguments built up by socialists and scientists throughout the 20th century are at hand, when we debate.
I can only thank you all (including ALB, who introduced me to Bogdanov) – it’s just a pity the educational process wasn’t a social one, shared by all contributors, even though this is what I set out to do. I’d probably have been a party member for years by now. Still, I haven’t lost out, but it could have been better.
Matthew Culbert wrote: “..and is this not what we have been saying to him all the damn time?“.
No, none of you have been saying this, Matthew. Not one.
Otherwise, you’d all have agreed with Marx’s democratic method, rather than Lenin’s elitist ‘materialism’.
Marx is concerned with how we externalise our nature (Entausserung); Lenin, like all bourgeois elitists, is concerned with contemplating the ‘material’, or a ‘Nature’ which supposedly pre-exists our production of it.
If we are the ‘externalisers’, we can change what we create; if we passively contemplate ‘What Already Exists’, we can’t change it.
That’s why Marx’s revolutionary science requires an active humanity, organised democratically.
Bijou Drains wrote: “Wouldn’t disagree with most of that, however not sure about “purse strings” and “funding”, but assume you mean that in terms of allocation of resources, as opposed to money??????”
Yeah, BD, I was simply replying using the same terms that alan had already used.
All scientific ‘resources’ have to be allocated according to our democratically-expressed wishes. And, to be clear, by ‘resources’ I also mean ‘academic’ or ‘intellectual’ or ‘conscious’ or ‘theoretical’ (take your pick) resources – not just ‘things’ we can touch, like buildings, test tubes, CERN, etc.
ALL the resources that society produces, ALL to be democratically-allocated.
alanjjohnstone wrote: “Don’t the ruling class hold the purse strings to what is studied? As such, don’t they ultimately determine the outcomes of scientific research?
A parallel would be that reforms must be compatible with capitalism or the reforms simply don’t transpire. If science or technology is not in line with the capitalist wishes, they won’t get funding and won’t become a reality.
It is a dichotomy that exists between those who seek to study “pure abstract science” and the need for it to have applications for the capitalists to benefit.
Scientists are as BD suggests, servants of the ruling class.”
Yes, agree with all your points, alan.
Perhaps a simple way to put it is – ‘the science within capitalism is a capitalist science’.
Implicit in what you’ve written, is that ‘science’ within a democratic socialist mode of production would based upon very different ‘purse strings’, ‘outcomes’, ‘compatible with socialism’, ‘democratic wishes’, ‘funding’ and ‘reality’, and an end to the ‘dichotomy’ between ‘pure abstract’ and human ‘need’. And indeed, our ‘scientists’ would become ‘servants’, not of a ruling class, but of humanity.
Wez wrote: “As far as I know a ruling class always derives its political power, in the final analysis, from the ownership and control of the means of production. How could a ‘scientific elite’ achieve this?”
Yes, I think any Marxist would agree with you, on that.
Bourgeois ‘science’ is, of course, part of the means of production. Without ‘thinking’, there would be no ‘production’. Marx always linked ‘theory and practice’. We need to identify which mode of production we Marxists are talking about, to discuss the ‘scientific elite’. The ‘scientific elite’ of any mode are a key part of the ruling class, and help to justify its rule.
Within the capitalist mode of production, the university system, its rules, selection procedures for its elite, teaching ideology, even buildings, are produced to the design of the ruling class. Clearly, any ruling class denies this, and claims its priests/professors are dedicated servants of humanity. Any Marxist knows that the ruling class tells lies.
Workers believing professors of physics, is like serfs believing priests of religion. We have to build our own democratic science, and introduce the elective principle to any positions of power within our science.
Bijou Drains wrote: “L Bird, you appear to be backing away from your previous view that scientific theory should be voted on, can you clarify your current position on this?”
You’re in luck this morning, BD, because I can give you the answer from both ideological positions!
If by ‘science’, you mean the bourgeois social activity that alleges that it has a disinterested elite, trained in their best universities, who are entirely free from ideology and socio-historical changes, who claim that ‘reality’ is just sitting there waiting for this elite to ‘discover’, who produce ‘Truth’, and always have the best interests of the whole of humanity at heart, and won’t have the ignorant, ill-educated masses interfering in their elite activity… then the answer is ‘No voting on scientific theory’.
If by ‘science’, you mean Marx’s socio-historical product, a social activity that should be under the control of the revolutionary proletariat, so that all of humanity can democratically determine its scientific social products (etc.)… then the answer is ‘Voting on scientific theory’.
Marx argued that ‘materialists’ will choose the former, as they are determined to separate society into two – a ‘scientific’ elite and a benighted mass. So, I’ll go with Marx on this question.
I just know which a materialist like you, BD, will choose!
Bijou Drains: “So you are saying that you do not believe that “scientific theory” should be voted on?”
What has “scientific theory” got to do with “the rising and setting of the sun”, which is the example you gave earlier?
This is what I mean by ‘materialists’ building straw men, and destroying their own creation.
What’s the point of taking the time to have a political/philosophical discussion, if you’ve no real interest in politics and philosophy? It baffles me, BD.
Bijou Drains wrote: “For example I have not come across another living person who thinks that we should vote on whether or not the sun rises in the East and sets in the West, or who thinks that if we voted in the contrary the sun would conveniently fit in with our voting patterns and start rising in the west.”
I, too, have never come across another living person who thinks this, either, BD.
Just why ‘materialists’ continue to make up false stories, and then prove them false, and are satisfied with this charade, is a mystery to me. Perhaps the only answer can be that political and philosophical problems seem not to concern them – that is, the problems of social production – since they believe that matter’s own actions will produce their desired ends.
Still, since this stance apparently passes for ‘Marxism’ and ‘Democratic Socialism’ amongst ‘materialists’, it’s no wonder that this ‘Marxism’ and ‘Socialism’ has less and less influence in the 21st century, and the SPGB, just like the Stalinists and the Trots, is dying out.
I’m still unsure why ‘materialists’ are not interested in discovering the real positions of democratic Marxists (and there are many), and then formulating answers to them, in a bid to win the political debate – it seems the obvious way to go for political party.
Lenin’s method of trashing his political opponents, of telling his mostly ignorant supporters that his opponents are dangerous heretics, is a road to nowhere. It’s certainly not the way to build a democratic socialist society.
Finally, I’m sure you mean to be humorous by calling me ‘mad as mince’ and ‘off my rocker’, but it’s no substitute for a political argument.
Thanks, BD.
Given what pgb wrote earlier, I’d be interesting to hear from you what you think will be the organising method for social production within a socialist society, if not democracy.
It is very enlightening to find out more about the SPGB and its notion of socialism. It’s revealing, too, that you think I’m the only Marxist in the world that argues for democracy.
Why is it that the SPGB will spend years defending ‘matter’, ‘material’, ‘science’… but not spend one post defending democracy – and I mean, as all Marxists do, ‘democratic social production’, not ‘parliamentary’ or ‘liberal democracy’.
Why does ‘democracy’ seem so laughable to the SPGB? Are you really all anarchists, who think that any ‘social authority’ (and its power) will simply disappear when ‘socialism comes’? That ‘politics’ will vanish?
