Abram Moiseevich Deborin (Ioffe) (1881-1963)
http://www.sovlit.org/amd/index.html

This is a terrific project. I was interested in Deborin in the 1980s and early '90s. Not knowing that much, I wrote an article in the perestrojka period advocating his rehabilitation. But apart from summaries in historical works (Wetter, etc.) on Soviet philosophy, the substance of his philosophy was not readily apparent, given lack of translations. So it's also possible that I overestimated him at the time.

During the perestrojka period a number of scholars from the USSR appeared in Washington to work on research projects and deliver talks. I met one Russian mathematician-philosopher who gave me a copy of a 1975 book on Soviet philosophy with a treatment of Deborin--in Russian. He warned me that there was nothing of value in Deborin and ridiculed this stuff as 'naturphilosophie'. He only explained Deborin in generalities, that Deborin had a master plan for organizing scientific research and the philosophy of science, seeking out the contradictions in any natural phenomenon as the master key to his project.

Like many intellectuals chafing under the Stalinist system, this mathematician, now interested in analytical philosophy, game theory, etc., wanted to never hear anything about Marxism again. He mentioned that he visited Lenin's study in the Kremlin and noted the lack of mathematical works (or was it scientific?) in his library.

There are scattered English translations of various articles and they should be collected and uploaded to the site. For example, there is a 1935 article in Bukharin's MARXISM AND MODERN THOUGHT that could be used. You are probably also aware that Deborin was one of the hatchet men used against Lukacs and Korsch.

I was once interested in collecting this stuff and now that someone is working on it and the web exists, it's a natural way to go.

Many years ago a friend in Latin America told me about an anthology of Deborin's works in Spanish that he has. Presumably, someone took the trouble of translating some of Deborin's work into Spanish, that does not exist in English translation. This is another avenue to pursue.

Whether of any intrinsic value or not, a historical investigation into Deborin's work is surely of importance. Yippee!


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