LBird
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Young Master Smeet wrote:LBird wrote:And if this "Ha'peth of tobacco" is 'not sarcasm', as you insist, could you explain why you find adding 'idealism' to the front of 'materialism' so time-consuming and irritating, and yet have time for a complex scientific term like "Ha'peth of tobacco", which, I admit, I've never heard used for scientific explanation?
According to my stop watch it just took me 1.5 seconds to type idealism. By using the commonly understood term "Fishcakes" without typing idealism, I could save myself upwards of a minute of my life before I die. Likewise, i shall henceforth compound truth/knowling/believing/understanding into the single word "Flap". So, I flap the speed of light, and that'll do pig.
And this is 'science' is it, YMS?I think I prefer theology. At least critical thought is required, rather than merely 'throwing a tantrum' at being asked questions.I hope your 'flapping pigs' come home to roost.
Mike McDade wrote:I acknowledge that a better understanding of materialism will help.I think you might be lead astray, Mike, if you think Marx was concerned with 'materialism'.You need an understanding of 'idealism-materialism' (or 'theory and practice'), if you need a 'better understanding' of anything. Furthermore, this viewpoint might give you more insight into your views about the possibility of a creator.
Young Master Smeet wrote:Lbird,not sarcasm: an expression of irritation of having to treat every five second sentence on an internet discussion as having the precision of a carefully thought out essay. I used word that, if I'd put more effort in, I wouldn't have, but they were good enough, and I appologise for "Bucket of Cod" "Ha'peth of tobacco" would have been more apposite.I understand, YMS! Accuracy causes 'irritation', too!Well, in the future, I presume you'll use the phrase 'idealism-materialism', rather than the misleading term 'materialism', eh? No need for 'carefully thought out essays' then?And if this "Ha'peth of tobacco" is 'not sarcasm', as you insist, could you explain why you find adding 'idealism' to the front of 'materialism' so time-consuming and irritating, and yet have time for a complex scientific term like "Ha'peth of tobacco", which, I admit, I've never heard used for scientific explanation?Wow, who'd have thought 'science' could be so complex?
Vin Maratty wrote:LBird,It is a good thing that Historical Materialism is determinisic. It means human agents can study, analyse, understand and ultimately control the laws that govern social change. Determism is not fatalism, it does not remove the human mind from social change.I couldn't agree more, Vin!It's just strange, isn't it, that comrades should use the term 'materialism', which Marx rejected, when they mean 'Historical Materialism', as you correctly call our ideology.Furthermore, I wonder why some comrades seem to think 'Historical Materialism' doesn't apply to 'science'. They seem to think that 'science' is, well, 'materialist and unhistorical'! Just like the mechanical materialists, like Feuerbach, who Marx criticised. Science is the human method, which is social and thus historical, which produces social knowledge of humans and nature.We can't take the 'human' out of 'science'. Or take 'history' out of 'science'. The only thinkers who believe in the 'End of History' are bourgeois thinkers!
Young Master Smeet wrote:Anyway, i appologise for saying "laws of nature" I meant "buckets of cod".Odd, isn't it, that when people are asked questions which they can't answer, instead of saying that they don't understand, they turn to sarcasm.You must employ a very good scientific method, YMS, if it doesn't even need explaining to humans. And 'models' tell you the Truth, do they, YMS? How quaintly 19th century!I suppose GOD gave you this Truth on tablets of stone? Strange that, isn't it, given the thread and your supposed rejection of 'religion'? You must be a priest of this scientific religion, who knows more than we mere laity."Buckets of god" would be more apt, as to what you 'meant'.
Young master Smeet wrote:It's materialism simplified to one sentence for the benefit of simpification.Why not 'simplify' it to "idealism-materialism"?
YMS wrote:It would be as much to assert that the laws of nature are invariant with regards to location.According to Pannekoek, the 'laws of nature' are a human construct, and so would 'vary' with the society that constructs them.The ideological belief that 'science produces the Truth', which is eternal, is Positivism.As to wikipedia, what is 'matter'? I thought that that particular social construct has been rejected, and replaced by the concept of the 'real'. And 'thought' is 'real'.
twc wrote:So far in our discussion, I haven't adopted any position. But to satisfy your request — the Copenhagen interpretation.Your answer is contradictory, twc. If you are using the 'Copehagen interpretation', that's the 'position you've adopted'.In your opinion, is the Copenhagen interpretation an 'anti-realist' ideology, twc?According to what little I've read so far, the opposing interpretation (the 'hidden variable' or 'pilot wave' or De Broglie-Bohm interpretation) is the causal-realist one. This suggests that the Copenhagen interpretation is anti-realist.Are you a realist or an anti-realist, twc?For what it's worth, I think that a 'Critical Realist' view of science is the one most compatible with Marx and Communism.
Young Master Smeet wrote:…materialism, the basic principle that the world is explicable in terms of observable phenomena…Surely this is pre-Marx 'materialism'?The notion of 'theory and practice' would suggest that Marx would, on the contrary, have stressed "idealism-materialism, the basic principle that the world is explicable in terms of theory and practice".This is a long way from 'observable phenomena'.Bhaskar, for example, stresses three domains of the Real, the Actual and the Empirical. Of these, only the Empirical is directly 'observable'. The Real and Actual require theory to understand them, if Bhaskar is to be believed.Ref: Roy Bhaskar (2008; orig. 1975) A Realist Theory of Science Verso, London
twc wrote:Everybody learns, and communicates, quantum mechanics with the Copenhagen interpretation.The Copenhagen interpretation, despite everything, is more than just an ideology, having won its prominent position by holding its own against reasoned opposition. I, however, have not expressed my own view, which hardly matters in the complex scheme of things relating to quantum mechanical interpretation, for the evolutionary reasons I outlined above.twc, could you tell me which ideology you're using to understand 'quantum physics', please?
twc wrote:The greatness of Bohr is that he wholeheartedly grasped quantum incommensurability from the start, and valiantly defended the strange new quantum beast in its own quantum terms against the onslaught of reacting classicists, especially Einstein, who sought to comprehend that unfamiliar quantum world in familiar [but to Bohr incommensurable] classical terms.twc, could you tell me which ideology you're using to understand 'quantum physics', please?
proletarian wrote:It probably won't surprise you
that in my opinion it's much more 'economic to political'. The political struggle naturally comes out of the economic.No, your view doesn't 'surprise' me! We have differing opinions on whether the notion that 'political struggle naturally comes out of the economic' leads to class consciousness, or not.I don't think 'economic struggle' leads to class consciousness. I think, most of the time, 'economic struggle' remains focussed on 'economic issues': and fighting for 'jobs' or 'higher pay' leads to consciousness of the need for a 'effective wage system' which supplies jobs and higher pay. If this leads to any 'political' awareness, as ajj says, it's likely to lead to negative political effects, like the need for national autarchy in the economy, to protect 'jobs and pay' from 'outsiders'.I don't believe Communism will simply emerge from 'economic struggles'. I think that a class conscious proletariat has to engage on all levels, economic, political, ideological, cultural, in concert, to further their Communist aims, which are openly declared from the start. In this scenario, 'economic struggle' will be the fight to destroy the wage system, not an essentially bourgeois fight for jobs and higher wages.I know we disagree, proletarian, but I think it is of the utmost importance for the various Communist strands to keep discussing this issue: SPGB, ICC, other organisations and the presently non-aligned.Furthermore, as I've said already, I think that there are differing philosophical bases to this overt political disagreement. That is, it's not simply a tactical disagreement over which gets priority, economic (struggle) or political (propaganda), but is a strategic debate about the objective/subjective, matter/consciousness, transition periods, organisation, etc.I don't think that the answers to this issue lie in appeals to 'authority' or in digging through 'historical examples', but in clarification of our 'ideas'. Philosophy is always at the basis of human actions. Ideas drive activity, as Marx said, not the other way around. In my opinion, anyway, comrade!
link wrote:Whilst I think we can all say, that limited economic struggles are not enough and that only political struggles of class conscious workers can lead to socialism.That seems to be a point we all agree on, link. SPGB, ICC and all those non-aligned, here. But…
link wrote:I want therefore to emphasise the link between economic and political struggles within capitalism.The problem is, which way does the main transmission flow? From economic to political, or from political to economic? As you say,
link wrote:The question here is how what is the relationship of one to the other and I would like to hear how the SPGB explains this.I can't answer for the SPGB, but my present opinion is that the main transmission is 'from political to economic'. That is, propaganda and ideological struggle to develop our class consciousness, so that workers are Communist, is the 'starting point'. Of course, we'd all agree that once the process is up and running, the influences flow both ways to some extent, and that economic struggle can lead to 'lessons learned', but, really, your question is about the origin and main influence.It's my opinion, that the underlying philosophical assumptions behind these positions are:'economic to political': Engels and 'materialism', or 'positivist science'; and'political to economic': Marx and 'idealism-material', or 'theory and practice', or 'praxis'.I'd be very interested to hear opposing arguments to my schema. I don't think 'struggle' necessarily leads to 'consciousness', to put it another way.
Please send my warm thanks to Comrade Paddy Shannon!Here's a random quote about (from?) Smolin's book:
Sabine Hossenfelder (re Smolin) wrote:Philosophy used to be part of the natural sciences – for a long time. For long centuries during which our understanding of the world we live in has progressed tremendously. There is no doubt that times change, but not all changes are a priori good if left without further consideration. Here, change has resulted in a gap between the natural sciences where questioning the basis of our theories, and an embedding into the historical and sociological context used to be. Even though many new specifically designed interdisciplinary fields have been established, investigating the foundations of our current theories has basically been erased out of curricula and textbooks.[my bold]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Trouble_with_PhysicsWe're still at this stage, of keeping human philosophy separate from 'natural sciences'. This is the deleterious effect of positivism, which also infects our views of 'Marxism', which pretends that the 'world' can be known in itself, separate from human thinking, and goes under the name of 'materialism'. This view believes that the 'scientific method' produces eternal Truth about reality, and that, once known, it is true forever and for every observer, independently of social context.As for 'erasing theoretical foundations from curricula and textbooks', it makes 'physics' sound like current 'economics'!The Market and Science, as twin truths for humanity.Anyway, thanks again, and I'll try to get a copy of the book, and see if I can understand anything about Quantum theories.
ALB wrote:LBird wrote:Hence, I see the role of propaganda and the battle of ideas within our class as a fundamental one, rather inclined to think that there is a necessary link between Engels' positivist view of science, and the notion that 'struggle/experience' leads to consciousness. The Left Communists, I think, espouse Engels, rather than Marx, on this issue.I wouldn't have thought that Engels can be made to carry the can for their peculiar ideas on how socialist consciousness arises, as what Engels wrote in his introduction to a reprint in 1895 of Marx's Civil War in France directly contradicts their view:
Quote:The time of surprise attacks, of revolutions carried through by small conscious minorities at the head of unconscious masses, is past. Where it is a question of a complete transformation of the social organization, the masses themselves must also be in it, must themselves already have grasped what is at stake, what they are going in for [with body and soul]. The history of the last fifty years has taught us that. But in order that the masses may understand what is to be done, long, persistent work is required,I think Engels is with us (both of us) on this one.
Yeah, he's with us 'on this one'.But many Marxists insist on following Engels' stance on the philosophy of science, not his political or historical views. When we've discussed this previously, I think you made the mistake of thinking that I was condemning Engels' entire body of work, whereas I'm only condemning his positivist views on science, which I think are at odds with his (and Marx's) views on society.But, I think the obsession with 'material' factors/conditions, the 'concrete', etc., and the underplaying of the subjective role of ideas in human affairs (both scientific and political), has its philosophical roots in Engels, not Marx. That is, in the crafted unity known as "Marx-Engels"! To question "Marx-Engels" is to be a heretic, and to be condemned to burn at the stake, for the religious crime of 'Idealism'.Or should that be "Apostatic Idealism"?
ALB wrote:There is no point in being dogmatic about it at this stage. What will happen will happen irrespective of what we today think should happen.I'm not so sure about this, ALB. Surely,what we workers think should happen will be an inescapable factor in what will happen? And if we Communists insist that the class must also be Communists for a proletarian revolution to take place, that will play a part. If 'what happens' happens 'irrespective of what we today think should happen', what's the point of propaganda?No, I think being 'dogmatic' about the need for workers themselves to come to a Communist class consciousness, to build their own democratic delegate organisations, and to struggle against the wage system and money, is just about what we should be doing at every stage!
ALB wrote:This being so, and since most unions have sufficiently democratic constitutions, if the members become socialist-minded they could transform the union.I'm less confident about this, too, ALB. I think that 'most union' bureaucracies will expel members/officials/branches that adopt delegate structures and propagandise with their union for others to do the same. As with capitalism (or indeed Leninist parties), the 'democratic consitutions' aren't worth the paper that they're written on.Real power relationships within political organisations are rarely (ever?) captured in 'constitutions'. That's why we need an active class, not an active 'leadership', as for 'democratic centralists'. Workers will have to actively participate in the daily running of their society, and democratically change 'constitutions' as they see fit.
ALB wrote:OK, they might prefer to break away and form a new organisation, but I don't think we can completely rule out the transformation from within of existing unions.If you were to offer a bet, I think I'd put a fiver on that, against your view, ALB!
