But wait! Either I'm not remembering my own post correctly or you're mixing up my arguments.
BTW, Engels says something even more forceful: "The real unity of the world consists in its materiality, and this is proved not by a few juggled phrases, but by a long and wearisome development of philosophy and natural science." Friedrich Engels, Anti-Dühring http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1877/anti-duhring/ch02.htm Yeah, Engels got it right much of the time. My problem with Engels was also articulated by Jean Van Heijenoort: a mixing up of logical and empirical arguments. It's another discussion, one we had before that failed. Now what contrast did I make between Marx and Engels on the 'end of philosophy'? I don't recall saying anything against Engels. Rather, they engated in different arguments in different contexts making different claims. Engels makes claims that others have made, starting with Hume, and takes them up a notch. Marx's concern over the obsolescence of metaphysics involves both a philosophical-epistemological-methodological claim and a radical social claim about alienation--which are ultimately combined. I'm not suggesting that Engels did or could not understand this, but that Marx's approach is unique in a way that's rarely understood. Prating about the unity of theory and practice doesn't help either because everybody who quotes the 11th thesis is too lazy to enquire into the intellectual context that generated it. Now here is where something Hegelian comes in. The ultimate conceptual unity of epistemological and sociological (using 'bourgeois' language) argumentation has its origin in Hegel, but the objective idealist mystification postulating an organic unity in the unfolding of Geist was thrown out by Marx as the anti-scientific impediment it was. Marx's argument is not a sociologistic argument, nor an economistic argument, nor anything of the sort. (And Raya Dunayevskaya, regressing to Left Hegelianism, doesn't have much to say in the long run, either.) The proper Marxian approach is to understand concretely both the objective knowledge embodied in the accumulated intellectual patrimony of the human race and its shaping (and warping) by the state of society at a particular time. It sounds trite when I state it as a truism, but it's one that's not well understood even today. It's something that can only be understood once Marxism-Leninism is put out of the way. As for bourgeois philosophers--these people are even more stupid than you think they are. If you had to spend one day in Washington in my shoes you'd run screaming for the hills. -----Original Message----- From: Charles Brown <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Sent: Dec 12, 2005 11:17 AM To: 'Forum for the discussion of theoretical issues raised by Karl Marx and the thinkers he inspired' <marxism-thaxis@lists.econ.utah.edu> Subject: [Marxism-Thaxis] end of philosophy ? (2) Ralph: Remember, I said that the 'end of philosophy' had to be brought about concretely,in every dept. of knowledge, not merely schematically. ^^^^ CB; When we read the actual quote from Engels, it is clear that far from "mucking it up", Engels said what Ralph says above long before Ralph did . What continues is "materialism" , which is synonymouos with "science". Obviously, Engels doesn't mean an abstract or schematic end of philosophy, as Ralph attributes to Engels in a strawman argument against Engels. Engels says very clearly that the issues are worked out concretely in each "separate science." i.e. "department" or "discipline." To attribute to Engels a proposal to "schematically" end philosophy is patently false upon reading the below. "Modern materialism," wrote Engels in Anti?Dühring (1878), "no longer needs any philosophy standing above the other sciences. As soon as each separate science is required to get clarity as to its position in the great totality of things and of our knowledge of things, a special science dealing with this totality is superfluous. What still independently survives of all former philosophy is the science of thought and its laws?formal logic and dialectics. Everything else is merged in the positive science of nature and history." Ralph Dumain's The Autodidact Project http://www.autodidactproject.org The C.L.R. James Institute http://www.clrjamesinstitute.org _______________________________________________ Marxism-Thaxis mailing list Marxism-Thaxis@lists.econ.utah.edu To change your options or unsubscribe go to: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/marxism-thaxis
