Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] O, Dialectics!
Steve, Well, now I know what comes after the snip. First paragraph: Oudeyis is saying nothing about what nature is, but rather is writing that whatever understandings man has of nature are a function primarily of his active interaction (his labour) with the natural conditions of his existence. The difference between knowing what nature is (i.e. its essential being or nature if you will) and having a working knowledge of world conditions is all the difference between the treatment of nature in Marxist and classical materialist theory. Now then, the only part of nature humanity can know is that part of it with which he has some sort of contact, and at least for Marxism, the only part of nature about which man can develop theories of practice is that which he can or has changed in some fashion. When it comes to explaining the practical foundation scientific cosmology we argue that the theories regarding the behaviour of huge masses of material over barely conceivable periods of time and spatial dimensions are projections based more often as not on experimentation with some of the very smallest of the universe's components; atoms, quarks, and so on). Anyway, its hard to imagine how men would know things about which they have absolutely no experience and how they would know how things work without a working experience with them or with things like them. Divine revelation perhaps? Finally, there is no doubt that nature must also include that which is beyond the observed and acted upon and that its existence is important for the creation of a materialist ideology. There are three ways the unknown makes itself felt in material human experience: 1.The fact that human practice and the science that represents it in thought is open ended or, better yet, appears to have no outward limits is a clear indication of the existence of more to nature than that which is treated by our current state of knowledge and practice. 2. The classic observations by Marx in the first chapter of German Ideology (1845) and the Critique of Hegelian Philosophy (1844) that the physical and sensual interface between man a nature in human labour is far more concrete than can ever be represented by even the most developed dialectics. The rational representation of men's activity in the world is then an inherently uncompletable task. 3. Hegel in his discussion of being makes the point that the logical formula A = A has no demonstrable correspondence with actual experience; diversity is an inherent property of identity (Andy B. presents a pretty thorough discussion on this in his The Meaning of Hegel, Chapter iv section, Diversity(essential Identity ) ). The whole basis of all rational activity, all dialectics, conscious and unconscious, deliberated and automatic, is the unity between the essential transitoriness of experienced moments and the determination of identities; qualities, quantities, measure and all the other things we have to know to develop a working model of the world. It's the unity of logical categorization and the essential temporality of immediate experience that fuels the dialectic and makes it so important a tool for exploration of the unknown. Second paragraph: The clarification of what exactly is the significance of the *objective* nature of nature is probably Ilyenkov's most important contributions to Scientific Marxism. Indeed for orthodox Marxists, including Lenin in his earlier writings (prior at very least to his readings in Hegel in 1914 and possibly as early as his article on Emprio-positivism), did indeed inherit the classical materialist concept of the objectivity of nature in the metaphysical sense of the essential being of nature; known, unknown, whatever. Ilyenkov in the last paragraphs of chapter 8 of Dialectical Logic summarizes the reasoning that is the basis of the concept of nature as prior to and independently of humankind. Here he distinguishes between Marx and Engel's theories of human activity and Hegel's idealism by recapitulating their description of man as a product and force of nature that transforms nature into the instruments of his activity in appropriating nature's goods and producing from them the means for the perpetuation of his body organic and inorganic. Nothing could more clearly describe the independence of abstract nature from the emergence of human activity in the world. After all, if man has his origins in the development of the natural world, then nature as a whole precedes and is a prerequisite for human activity. Nature regarded abstractly cannot be described as a product of human activity Then too, the laws and principles of nature whereby men transform nature into the instruments and products of labour are hardly a product of pure logic, of men's unfettered imagination. The laws of nature as men know and accommodate their actions to them are firmly connected to the physical and sensual properties of man the organism and to the natural conditions he confronts
Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] O, Dialectics!
- Original Message - From: Charles Brown [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: 'Forum for the discussion of theoretical issues raised by Karl Marx andthe thinkers he inspired' marxism-thaxis@lists.econ.utah.edu Sent: Friday, May 27, 2005 6:04 PM Subject: [Marxism-Thaxis] O, Dialectics! [Marxism-Thaxis] Oudeyis -clip- Describing their accomplishment in a dialectical form, the materialism of Marx, Engels and Lenin is not a statement about the world but about the unity of logical and physical and sensual activity in human labour (practice). NOTE, THAT THE ISSUE OF THE RELEVANCE OF LOGIC (DIALECTICS) TO HUMAN HISTORY IS NOT A MATTER OF THE NATURE OF THE WORLD BUT OF MAN'S INTERACTION WITH THE WORLD. ^ CB: For me, this is a good way to say it. I would just add that their attitude was that the best way to conclude what the nature of the world is is to see what works in the world in practice. This is very clever, cunning, desirable to follow, as human's have no interest in the nature of the world except in human interaction with the world. As regards the universality of the laws of dialectics: The abstract laws of dialectics are universalities. We may like McTaggart find them less than perfect, but whatever the modifications, revisions and so on we may make on dialectics is a matter of dealing with universals. That dialectic processes may produce divergent truths is a different issue from the universality of the logical process itself. To understand the emergence of divergent dialectically arrived at truths, we must recognize the diversity of objects and subjects of dialectical activities. Science, the development of practical knowledge, has as its object the realization of men's needs in the transformation of the material world, or, in other words the realization of the needs of men that are ultimately the function of his being a part and force in nature through the transformation of nature in conformance to the specifications implied by those needs. All the components of this description; the object and subject of the activity described, the means and ends of scientific activity, involve states universal to men and to the subject of his activity, hence divergence in science is always a temporary product of differentiated and limited practical experience. For science truth, temporary as it may be, is found in effective practice. ^^ CB: This is fundamental for Marx, Engels , Lenin: Theses on Feurerbach, Anti-Duhring, Materialism and Empirio-Criticism. ^ The divergencies of the dialectics of ethics (ideality) on the other hand are an inevitable and irresolvable consequence of all the differentiating forces that emerge in human social life; the gender distinctions, the division of labour, ethnic segregation, and so on. True, the methods of Natural Science of History, Historical Materialism, can provide scientific universals that enable the development of theory and practice to produce, regulate and revise these distinctions, but these universals, theories and practices should never be confused with the arguments of the dialectics of ethics (the main object of Hegel and to a considerable extent of Kant). In general, where we find irreconcilable (in practice) dialectical arguments we have entered into a debate over ethics or ethos rather than over a scientific issue. Dialectical arguments of this sort are properly the realm of religion and traditional philosophy, classic materialism being an example of the latter. Regards, Oudeyis ^^^ CB: What do you think of treating ethics as a category of practice , since ethics deals with what people as does practice ? One of the most interesting and to me attractive aspects of Ilyenkov's (1977 The Concept of the Ideal, 1974 Dialectical Logic, and 1960 Dialectics of the Abstract and the Concrete) discussion on ideality is the view that Capital is basically a material (or natural scientific) analysis of the ethos and ethics of the capitalist mode of production. I. L. Rubin (1972 -originally 1928 Essays on Marx's Theory of Value) also presents capitalist practice as a working ethical system. Vygotsky (1978 -originally 1930 - Mind in Society) also has a good deal to say on the role of ethics as a means to social ends, particularly as regards the socialization of prospective members of society. Ethics and ethos are social practice. However, the object and means of social practice as ethics are considerably different from the practicalities of science and practical labour. These differences are not always easy to identify since the intellectual tools for theorizing about ethical social practice and about labour practice are virtually the same: e.g. speech forms, texts, graphic representations and of course dialectics. The difference is usually even harder to detect when the subject of theory is social practice. The basic object of ethical theory, and in many
Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] O, Dialectics!
- Original Message - From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: marxism-thaxis@lists.econ.utah.edu Sent: Friday, May 27, 2005 6:14 PM Subject: Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] O, Dialectics! but what about history of nature? I mean before there wasn't anything that can be qualified as man's interaction withthe world. does in your view dialectics start with the appearance of a species that does not simply adjust itself to nature like other animals but starts changibng it more or less conscioulsy by labour? NOTE, THAT THE ISSUE OF THE RELEVANCE OF LOGIC (DIALECTICS) TO HUMAN HISTORY IS NOT A MATTER OF THE NATURE OF THE WORLD BUT OF MAN'S INTERACTION WITH THE WORLD Whether or not nature has a history is a question for nature, of little relevance for the practical realization of human needs. Man, in order to better determine his needs and the means necessary to realize them investigates through reason and practice (experimentation and informed search) the development of the relevant (essential) incohoate features of the natural world, including those of his own activities. The result is the objective determinations of past events in the natural world and of their relevance to the form and substance of our current needs and to the realization of these in practical activity. The laws and principles as well as the developmental schemas produced by our research into what is called Natural History are a product of and the means for realization of strictly human objectives. Is this a history of nature? Well, we are ourselves an integral part and force of the natural world and the massive array of objects we depend on for perpetuation of our life activity have their ultimate origin in nature, but that's a far cry from arguing that human beings and their essential equipage is identical with the totality of nature or that our activity in nature involves nature as a whole. Regards, Oudeyis ___ 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 -- No virus found in this incoming message. Checked by AVG Anti-Virus. Version: 7.0.322 / Virus Database: 267.0.0 - Release Date: 27/05/05 -- No virus found in this outgoing message. Checked by AVG Anti-Virus. Version: 7.0.322 / Virus Database: 267.2.0 - Release Date: 27/05/05 ___ 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
Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] O, Dialectics!
- Original Message - From: Ralph Dumain [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: marxism-thaxis@lists.econ.utah.edu Cc: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Thursday, May 26, 2005 7:45 AM Subject: Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] O, Dialectics! Interesting post! But I don't understand all of it. Comments interleaved . . . At 07:09 AM 5/26/2005 +0200, Oudeyis wrote: In regards to this thread on emergence and dialectics: Your discussion (the whole thread) on dialectics and emergence conflates several contradictory objectives: the dialectics of dialectics, i.e. the essence of emergence in Marxist theory; the determination of the substantiality of emergence in nature as such, and the broader question of the relation of dialectics to nature. Well, I do jump from topic to topic depending on the focus of the moment, but I'm not sure I conflate objectives. The whole thread is, however, rife with conflation. I was referring to the discussion in general, not to your contribution in particular. Several points: 1. The essence of emergence in Marxist theory is the logical process whereby any judgement (for Marx and Hegel alike) regarding the particularities of any universal inevitably sets that particularity against the universal. The negation is that totality of the universal that is left out by the particular judgement. The emergent or what is called by Engels the negation of the negation is the determination of another particularity that includes the original judgement within an action that incorporates that part of the universal that negates the original judgement. All this logical activity is at least for Marx and Engels is what practice; physical/sensual and intellectual is all about. I don't understand the above. The logic of dialectics is essentially the logic of emergence (see next response, below) that is itself the emergent product of a system of emergent categories of logical activity. Having said this (the least important part of the paragraph) we can address the central issue of the description of dialectics. Yeah, back to kindergarten, but it appears that we need some basic reacquaintance with the subject. Hegel regarded dialectics as thought (hence he is, children, an idealist). Marx and Engels, while agreeing with Hegel's logic, argued that it while it effectively represented the active relation of man to nature Hegel's restriction of logic to thought obviated the actual interface between man and nature the physical and sensual dimensions of men's interaction with nature. Clearly, Marx and Engels were not here discussing what nature is all about, but about how logic is manifest in the whole range of men's activities in the world; physical, sensual and intellectual. Still, it's hard to give up old habits, both for idealists and materialists alike (even Marxists regard themselves as having sacred traditions). Millennia of arguing whether the world is ideal or material has made a very deep impression on the thinking of Europeans, and particularly on European intellectuals. At the turn of the last century the two most Hegelian of the Marxist theoreticians had great difficulty in adopting the idea that Marx and Engels were concerned with how men act in and with the world and not with the nature of the world. I suggest that Plekhanov's later Neo-Kantian tendencies arose out of the contradictions implicit in his identification of the dialectic as the mechanism of change of an ontologically material world. Even Lenin's realization of the actual significance came in stages. He began life as a Plekhanov materialist and appears to have only become aware of the dangers of classical materialism in the course of his opposition to the Neo-positivism of the Machists (1908). Even then, I doubt if he really became aware of the full distinction between Marxian and classical materialism until after 1914, after he read and digested fully Hegel's writings on logic and the Philosophy of Right. Lenin's final stand on the issue of dialectics was that it is logic, the theory of human knowledge, and the development of human interaction with nature through labour in all its aspects; conscious and unconscious, individual and collective, and material and intellectual. The issue as to whether nature itself, whatever that may actually mean, is of no interest to Marxian theory since, among other things, it has no real value for the practical objectives of scientific theory of history, the determination of the objectives of revolutionary policy. The fact that the question, is nature dialectical? can still arise in Marxist circles is an indication that we are still very much at the kindergarten stage of learning Hegel and Marx and Engel's use of dialectics. It's like asking whether the world is material or ideal, whether man is truly good or bad and other such childlike questions that were made anachronistic by the works of Kant, Hegel, and Marx and Engels more than a century and a half ago. When we discuss the emergent
Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] Fascist Administration
The best material for learning what's happening in the world is published by and for businessmen and policy makers. One of my favourites is newnations bulletin, but this from Global Policy Forum (just came across it in my files) is most relevant to the Ollmen's article. The strategic context of the Iraq war has little to do with wmd, with S Hussein or with freedom. The burning concern of the American and British govts. for the fate and freedom of the Iraqis or anyone else for that matter is in essence a sales pitch. The war itself is between Euro-Russian consortiums (a bit more investigation would show that the Germans were funding the Russian initiative) and the Anglo-Saxon states. Considering the imminent possibilities of a world energy crisis, the Iraq situation was probably unavoidable. Ironic though. In 1999 the US and her allies invaded Iraq to defend the independence of the sovereign state of Kuwait, now the US and Britain are showing the Iraqis and, of course all the rest of us how to take what you want the right way. Too bad for the Iraqis caught as they are in the middle, they'd best look for somewhere else to live. Considering the stakes involved there, it's unlikely the opposition to the American occupation within and without Iraq will have much success. Iraq: the Struggle for Oil By James A. Paul Executive Director, Global Policy Forum August, 2002 (revised December, 2002) Oil Companies in Iraq: A Century of Rivalry and War (November 2003) Oil in Iraq: the Heart of the Crisis (December, 2002) The Iraq Oil Bonanza: Estimating Future Profits (January 28, 2004) Iraq possesses the world's second largest proven oil reserves, currently estimated at 112.5 billion barrels, about 11% of the world total and its gas fields are immense as well. Many experts believe that Iraq has additional undiscovered oil reserves, which might raise the total well beyond 250 billion barrels when serious prospecting resumes, putting Iraq closer to Saudi Arabia and far above all other oil producing countries. Iraq's oil is of high quality and it is very inexpensive to produce, making it one of the world's most profitable oil sources. Oil companies hope to gain production rights over these rich fields of Iraqi oil, worth hundreds of billions of dollars. In the view of an industry source it is a boom waiting to happen. (1) As rising world demand depletes reserves in most world regions over the next 10-15 years, Iraq's oil will gain increasing importance in global energy supplies. According to the industry expert: There is not an oil company in the world that doesn't have its eye on Iraq.(2) Geopolitical rivalry among major nations throughout the past century has often turned on control of such key oil resources.(3) Five companies dominate the world oil industry, two US-based, two primarily UK-based, and one primarily based in France.(4) US-based Exxon Mobil looms largest among the world's oil companies and by some yardsticks measures as the world's biggest company.(5) The United States consequently ranks first in the corporate oil sector, with the UK second and France trailing as a distant third. Considering that the US and the UK act almost alone as sanctions enforcers (and as advocates of war against Iraq), and that they are the headquarters of the world's four largest oil companies, we cannot ignore the possible relationship of their policy with this powerful corporate interest. US and UK companies long held a three-quarter share in Iraq's oil production, but they lost their position with the 1972 nationalization of the Iraq Petroleum Company.(6) The nationalization, following ten years of increasingly rancorous relations between the companies and the government, rocked the international oil industry, as Iraq sought to gain greater control of its oil resources. After the nationalization, Iraq turned to French companies and the Russian (Soviet) government for funds and partnerships.(7) Today, the US and UK companies are very keen to regain their former position, which they see as critical to their future leading role in the world oil industry. The US and the UK governments also see control over Iraqi and Gulf oil as essential to their broader military, geo-strategic and economic interests. At the same time, though, other states and oil companies hope to gain a large or even dominant position in Iraq. As de-nationalization sweeps through the oil sector, international companies see Iraq as an extremely attractive potential field of expansion. France and Russia, the longstanding insiders, pose the biggest challenge to future Anglo-American domination, but serious competitors from China, Germany and Japan also play in the Iraq sweepstakes.(8) During the 1990s, Russia's Lukoil, China National Petroleum Corporation and France's TotalFinaElf held contract talks with the government of Iraq over plans to develop Iraqi fields as soon as sanctions are lifted. Lukoil reached an agreement in 1997 to develop Iraq's West Qurna
Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] Re: Marxism-Thaxis Digest, Vol 18, Issue 4
- Original Message - From: A. Mani [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: marxism-thaxis@lists.econ.utah.edu Sent: Monday, April 04, 2005 11:27 PM Subject: [Marxism-Thaxis] Re: Marxism-Thaxis Digest, Vol 18, Issue 4 Re : 1. Re: A. Mani : Re : 2/3rd ... (Oudeyis) Greetings, I have considerable doubts about nature's political economic bias. My point was that nature tends to change things with a leftist bias. The changes may be a gradual. Leftist bias and socialism refer respectively to political partizanship and to relations of production, not to nature. While the relations of production have a considerably mediated relation to production and to labour (the actual interaction between men and nature) the relationship concerns men's appropriation of nature's goods for human needs and not conservation as such. In this context the problems of extension of the life-time of necessary natural resources such as clean water and air, arable land and sufficient food, and so on are a matter of expansion and conservation of natural resources through management of nature (just the opposite of nature's intent if she has any). Baran and Sweezy once made the same observation (I forget where and haven't time to check it out) but that was before Chernobyl. On the other hand B S apparently forgot some of the more destructive features of Stalin's Industrial programs, the effects of the Lysenko fiasco, and atmospheric testing of Nuclear weaponry. Undoubtedly capitalist ecology is mostly governed by a complex of needs including profitability, the necessity for testing the means for defence of free enterprise and even the preservation of playgrounds and pleasant parks for those who can afford them. On the other hand hard evidence shows that power politics, bureaucratic stodginess, testing means for defence of socialism, and the preservation of playgrounds and pleasant parks for the politically privileged more or less governed ( and in some places still governs)the ecology policies of the people's democratic republics, soviets, and what have you. Chernobyl was an accident... nothing special. In general socialists governments implement conservation programs in a far better and effective way than capitalist governments. Much of your hard evidence may be the usual right-wing propaganda of the dominant news channels. Even during the cold war, the soviets maintained high ecological standards. Though militarisation did involve drastic methods... of cutting costs. I suspect that here we're both right and both wrong (or at least profoundly uninformed). True Chernobyl was an accident and accidents don't only occur in People's Democratic Republics. On the other hand, I've yet to see any serious work comparing conservation practices in socialist states with those of capitalist ones. Then too, even such comparisons are likely to contrast conservation practice in states that are laying the foundations of industrial production (socialist states) with those that already have built the technical infrastructure for industrial development. Any industrialising society, capitalist and socialist alike, generally goes through a period of massive and frenetic development when both the scale and rate of industrialisation as well as the high costs of means for protecting even the most critical natural resources tend to cause considerable damage to environmental conditions important to human survival. As I see it, this destructive development of productive forces necessary for industrial civilization in general is the analogue of that stage of primitive accumulation essential for the development of industrial capitalism (or for that matter industrial socialism), it is a difficult and even dangerous prerequisite for development. The irresponsibility of military practice regarding any but the primary mission of protecting collective interests by force is inherent in the institution, whatever its social context. My real intention here was to contest the idea that socialism somehow represents an improved relation between man and nature over capitalism. In principle, socialism represents an improved relation of men to their own natures, the problem of the relation of men to world conditions in the context of industrial development is quite a different issue. Actually mankind has been interfering with nature ever since mankind became mankind. As often as not with disastrous effects on human survivability. For example, the so-called ecologically aware Native Americans wiped out the American Elephants, horse, long-horned buffalo; deforested extensive areas of the American Southwest (Chaco Canyon, the Mogollon region of Southern New Mexico, and possibly large areas of the Gila River Basin); and made considerable contributions to the degradation of Riverine ecosystems in the Mississippi, the Rio Grande, and the Ohio River basins. Perhaps the most tragic and dramatic parable of man's destruction of the natural
Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] Re: Imperialism's war for democracy in theMiddle East
- Original Message - From: Fred Feldman [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: standard [EMAIL PROTECTED]; gleft [EMAIL PROTECTED]; 107 [EMAIL PROTECTED]; snews [EMAIL PROTECTED]; change [EMAIL PROTECTED]; rad [EMAIL PROTECTED]; marxism-thaxis@lists.econ.utah.edu; PEN-L@SUS.CSUCHICO.EDU; 620 [EMAIL PROTECTED]; ceoi [EMAIL PROTECTED]; ufpj-news [EMAIL PROTECTED]; kom [EMAIL PROTECTED]; 'gpcafe' [EMAIL PROTECTED]; [EMAIL PROTECTED]; 'gpcafe' [EMAIL PROTECTED]; 'nsan' [EMAIL PROTECTED]; solidarity [EMAIL PROTECTED]; atlantic [EMAIL PROTECTED]; [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Tuesday, March 15, 2005 4:53 PM Subject: [Marxism-Thaxis] Re: Imperialism's war for democracy in theMiddle East The growing striving for popular democracy in the Middle EastFred Feldman Mar 15, 2005 05:01 PST This is a useful summary article in my opinion. The range and variety of aspirations for democracy in the Middle East are part of the breakdown of the old status quo, which the US rulers are trying to take hold of, contain, control, and direct. --Forwarded message From Rudyard Kipling To: Marxmail [EMAIL PROTECTED] Date: Wed, 16 Mar 2005 11:37:41 -0500 Subject: [Marxism] Re: Imperialism's war for democracy in theMiddle East Now it is not good For the Christian's health To hustle the Aryan brown, For the Christian riles And the Aryan smiles And he wearth the Christian down; And the end of the fight Is tombstone white With the name of the late deceased, And the epitaph drear, A fool lies here Who tried to hustle the East. - Rudyard Kipling [vfr] This partly predates, but is being heightened by, the imperialist challenge to the region. It would be a mistake to see the hundreds of thousands who demonstrated in opposition to the Syrian troops in Lebanon, and the hundreds of thousands who have twice mobilized to support Hezbollah against Syria against US-French-UN Security Council intervention as simply opposite sides of the class struggle. This is an example of the growing social tensions, and the growing tendency of the masses mobilize, that Washington is seeking to contain, control, and direct -- including by force of arms. For instance, the term Cedar revolution, now universally adopted by the US media for the largely Christian-Druse Muslim-middle class mobilizations against the presence of Syrian troops and the Syrian predominance over the Lebanon government, did not originate with the protesters but with President Bush. It has specifically Christian sectarian implications, indicating Washington's desire to strengthen the position of the Christian bourgeoisie, traditionally allied with US and French imperialism -- and at times with Israel. Some of the latter have picked up the US-approved designation. But the popular term for the first anti-Syrian mobilizations was intifada or shaking off and anti-Israel and pro-Palestinian sentiment is common even among the Christian masses. The successive governments backed by Syria have certainly not solved any of the problems of the Lebanese masses, and the wearing out of the mass toleration for these regimes can certainly have progressive as well as reactionary consequences, depending on the evolution of the class struggle. It is a fact that the Hezbollah forces tend to have more support and to mobilize more of the poor, especially from among the Shia who tend to make up, along with the Palestinians, the poorest and least represented section of the population. But it is wrong to see these demonstrations as simply representing counterposed pro- vs. anti-imperialist forces. The striving for a democratic opening against the mostly burned-out a unpopular bourgeois nationalist regimes in the region is also an opening for the oppressed and exploited to put their stamp on the process, and not simply participate as followers. Elements of these aspirations for real mass democracy AGAINST what imperialism is bringing to the region appear in both the anti-occupations struggle of the Sunni population in Iraq, and just as much in the mobilization of the Shia around the elections. The people of the region are feeling the need for a new order. US imperialism is trying to take hold of the region to impose its democracy which is counterposed to both national independence and the interests of the most oppressed and exploited. They want regimes that will be reliable guarantors of growing imperialist superprofits, reliable allies against challenges to intensifying imperial ist domination, and reliable barriers to mass organization, protests, and challenges for power. Perhaps the example of Venezuela will begin to be more widely known and discussed in the Middle East in the next period. The struggles and successes in Venezuela are more immediately relevant to the practical situation in Lebanon and Iraq than I tended to assume. The demand for democracy has to be recaptured in the Middle East as a
Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] Does Gödel Matter?
- Original Message - From: Charles Brown [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: 'Forum for the discussion of theoretical issues raised by Karl Marx andthe thinkers he inspired' marxism-thaxis@lists.econ.utah.edu Sent: Thursday, March 17, 2005 6:18 PM Subject: [Marxism-Thaxis] Does Gödel Matter? Oudeyis victor CB: I think Hegel mentions math and jurisprudence as prime areas of the operation of formal logic. VFR: True enough, but I've a strong feeling that there's more to the lawlessness of laws and constitutions than formal logic. ^^ CB: I'm curious to hear your discussion of the more there is to it. I was just thinking that _Goedel_ was likely to find logical problems with the consistency or completeness of jurisprudential laws and constitutions. Or was he a social critic that I don't know about ? VFR Was thinking of Hegel, not Gödel. From his biography, Gödel sounds like he belongs to the same cloud-9, right-wing, mathematician category as Nash. ^ CB: Heisenberg was on good terms with the Nazis. From what I can tell, Goedel was not progressive , but sort of apolitical. I think the article I posted here on Goedel and Einstein as buddies at Princeton said that some Nazis beatup Goedel at one point. Also, for what its worth, would Einstein hangout with a rightwinger ? VTR Why not? Some of them are intelligent and quite charming. Three reasons for hanging out with right-wingers. 1. It's a good way to test your ideas against the toughest competition. 2. Reciprocal intelligence gathering and planting. 3. There's more to human relationships than party membership. ___ 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 -- No virus found in this incoming message. Checked by AVG Anti-Virus. Version: 7.0.308 / Virus Database: 266.7.3 - Release Date: 15/03/05 -- No virus found in this outgoing message. Checked by AVG Anti-Virus. Version: 7.0.308 / Virus Database: 266.7.3 - Release Date: 15/03/05 ___ 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
Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] More Godel
- Original Message - From: Ralph Dumain [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: marxism-thaxis@lists.econ.utah.edu Sent: Thursday, March 17, 2005 6:47 PM Subject: Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] More Godel First of all, the theories of knowledge of Engels and Lenin lack the specificity to grapple with axiomatic systems as we've come to understand them. Secondly, the philosophical extrapolations and analogies presented here are not very good interpretations of Godel. Putting these two components together, much of the reasoning we see here is nebulous and vague verbiage about dialectics, communicating very little. [vfr] Nor should they. Engels and Lenin follow Marx who in turn follows Hegel in discarding formal logic as useless for the development of empirical theories for designing social practice. I can't claim to be an expert in Popper, but I had a specific argument as to why philosophical reasoning is inadequate as a model for the gaining of knowledge through practical engagement with the world. This is becasue reasoning about empirical matters is inherntly fallible, hence no definitive proof is possible. This led Hume to skepticism, Kant to his Cpernican revolution, and Popper to deducing certain consequences from the problem of induction. However, this is a very different problem from formal mathematical deductive inference. [vfr] FORMAL reasoning about empirical matters is inherently fallible regarding empirical matters. Kant makes this a central feature of his science of knowledge. It is also the main reason why Hegel discarded the Law of the Excluded Middle (among other things) to produce a theory on reasoning that could successfully deal with empirical matters. For a whole different approach to these issues, see: On the Dialectics of Metamathematics (Excerpts) by Peter Vardy http://www.autodidactproject.org/other/vardy2.html Some Italian mathematicians also have something interesting to say on the subject. -Original Message- From: Charles Brown [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Mar 17, 2005 11:33 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] More Godel My opinion is that this sort of analogical reasoning doesn't work well here, i.e. when we are talking about formal mathematical systems. CB: Why , would you say, formal mathematical systems don't fit this ? What's special about mathematical systems that makes them an exception to the Marx-Engels-Lenin theory of knowledge, from your analysis and experience with these ? Now, if the topic were a priori philosophical reasoning in general, I might be inclined to agree. In fact, I used a similar argument last year when arguing with critical rationalists (Popperians) about falsifiability and objective knowledge, or the notion that objective knowledge is what survives tests (negative criteria). I don't recall the details, but my argument had something to do with the limitations of the aprioristic mode of reasoning of philosophy. ___ 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 -- No virus found in this incoming message. Checked by AVG Anti-Virus. Version: 7.0.308 / Virus Database: 266.7.3 - Release Date: 15/03/05 -- No virus found in this outgoing message. Checked by AVG Anti-Virus. Version: 7.0.308 / Virus Database: 266.7.3 - Release Date: 15/03/05 ___ 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
Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] Does Gödel Matter?
- Original Message - From: Charles Brown [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: 'Forum for the discussion of theoretical issues raised by Karl Marx andthe thinkers he inspired' marxism-thaxis@lists.econ.utah.edu Sent: Tuesday, March 15, 2005 11:30 PM Subject: [Marxism-Thaxis] Does Gödel Matter? %% CB: I think Hegel mentions math and jurisprudence as prime areas of the operation of formal logic. VFR: True enough, but I've a strong feeling that there's more to the lawlessness of laws and constitutions than formal logic. ^^ CB: I'm curious to hear your discussion of the more there is to it. I was just thinking that _Goedel_ was likely to find logical problems with the consistency or completeness of jurisprudential laws and constitutions. Or was he a social critic that I don't know about ? VFR Was thinking of Hegel, not Gödel. From his biography, Gödel sounds like he belongs to the same cloud-9, right-wing, mathematician category as Nash. ___ 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 -- No virus found in this incoming message. Checked by AVG Anti-Virus. Version: 7.0.308 / Virus Database: 266.7.2 - Release Date: 11/03/05 -- No virus found in this outgoing message. Checked by AVG Anti-Virus. Version: 7.0.308 / Virus Database: 266.7.3 - Release Date: 15/03/05 ___ 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
Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] Van Heijenoort's critique of Engels
them to separate perspectives, then one has to rise to that level of abstraction to construct a unified account of both. This ridiculous meme theory is a noteworthy example of the failure of natural scientists to encompass the social. They've still learned nothing. And Marxists also have their work to do. (I just ran into Sohn-Rethel's first blunder: his account of Galileo's concept of inertia.) BTW, what do you think of this biosemiotics business. The one theoretical biologist I know who is into this is full of crackpot ideas. Im very distrustful: Claus Emmeche Taking the semiotic turn, or how significant philosophy of biology should be done http://mitdenker.at/life/life09.htm Also at this url: http://www.nbi.dk/~emmeche/cePubl/2002b.Wit.Sats.html Note this key passage: More and more biologists are beginning to understand that the essence of life is to mean something, to mediate significance, to interpret signs. This already seems to be implicitly present even in orthodox Neo-Darwinism and its recurrent use of terms like code, messenger, genetic information, and so on. These concepts substitute the final causes Darwinists believed to have discarded 150 years ago, they have become firmly established in molecular biology with specific scientific meanings; and yet they the semiotic content or connotations are rarely taken serious by the scientists to the extant that there is a tendency to devaluate their status as being merely metaphors when confronted with the question about their implied intentionality or semioticity (cf. Emmeche 1999). This secret language, where code seems to be a code for final cause, points to the fact that it might be more honest and productive to attack the problem head-on and to formulate an explicit biological theory taking these recurrent semiotics metaphors serious and discuss them as pointing to real scientific problems. This means that a principal task of biology will be to study signs and sign processes in living systems. This is biosemiotics -- the scientific study of biosemiosis. Semiotics, the general science of signs, thus becomes a reservoir of concepts and principles when it is recognized that biology, being about living systems, at the same time is about sign systems. Moreover, semiotics will probably not remain the same after this encounter with biology: both sciences will be transformed fundamentally while gradually being melded into one more comprehensive field. While many of the ideas adumbrated in this review seem to be quite fruitful, this paragraph is the tipoff that something is rotten in the state of Denmark. At 05:28 PM 3/4/2005 +0200, Oudeyis wrote: Have been following your discussion with considerable interest. Sorry to lurk so long, but I was occupied in finishing up a paper. I was particularly interested in your earlier discussion on emergence. I agree strongly with Jay Gould that dialectics; Hegelian and Marxist alike, describe what I suppose would now be called emergent functions. I have many reservations about Engel's representation of the dialectic and his three so-called laws appear to me to be a snobbish attempt to present Dialectics for the Working Class. Certainly Llyod Spencer and Andrzej Krauze's Hegel for Beginners and Andy Blunden's Getting to Know Hegel are much more successful representations of dialectical theory. A search for emergentism in Marxism would be better served by reinvestigating the methods of Hegel (his Logics) and of Marx (Practice, or, better, labour practice) for the mechanics and process whereby they derive emergent complex moments from simpler prior conditions. I suspect that the concretisation of abstraction through successive negation, unity of labour practice and extant condition in the productive process, and sublation of prior syntheses in extant dialectical moments will have more significance for understanding emergence in human history than the hierarchy theories of Salthe, Swenson, and O'Neil, the emergent semiotics of Hoffmeyer and so on. That is not to say that systems, even cybernetic systems, are not relevant to the investigation, but, we must remember that despite Engel's (sometimes brilliant and sometimes embarrassing) adventures in the dialectics of Nature, that Hegel and Marx theoretical interests were exclusively focussed on human activity and human history and were only interested in Nature as a derived function of human inteaction with material conditions. Even Hegel's dialectics on Nature concerned the Natural Sciences and not Nature as such (as the subject of human contemplation). Which bring us to the problem of Natural science and Marxism. Certainly the Natural sciences are a component of modern history. They more or less emerge in late Mediaeval Europe together with the development of powerful urban commercial and industrial institutions. From the point
Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] Van Heijenoort's critique of Engels
- Original Message - From: Charles Brown [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: 'Forum for the discussion of theoretical issues raised by Karl Marx andthe thinkers he inspired' marxism-thaxis@lists.econ.utah.edu Sent: Tuesday, March 08, 2005 8:44 PM Subject: [Marxism-Thaxis] Van Heijenoort's critique of Engels Marxism-Thaxis] OudeyisHegel, Marx, and, for that matter, Jay Gould (he and Dan Dennett - the American reductionist philosopher - fought over this issue) did not regard development to be incremental or continuous. The dialectic, the successive emergence of negations of previous conditions suggests that development hops and jumps rather than grows by inches. The principle of Quantity is also not a case of incremental change. You can think of it as a teapot on the burner or the apparent lull before a sudden popular rising; the conditions conducive to a boiling pot or a popular uprising cook slowly without any apparent sign of dramatic change until a critical state is reached and then, things happen very suddenly indeed. The concept of Quantity for Engels and Marx as for Hegel refers to the sudden change of state rather than to the accumulation of conditions that engenders it. The issue really is the essentialism that Marx and Engels adopted from Hegel. The significant fact of the sudden boil of the teapot and the popular uprising is the end product of the process that generates them and not the conditions. After all, a teapot on a low fire is just a teapot on a low fire and a long, hot Summer is just a long, hot, Summer; they both only become interesting when they result respectively in a pot of boiling water and an uprising of an angry community. Victor ^ CB: My understanding of this is that there is a long period of exactly continuous or incremental change that is suddenly altered by the leap, the quantum leap or qualitative change. Dialectics doesn't deny continous or incremental change, rather it relates the two types of change, quantitative and qualitative. The temperature of the water is continously increasing, but the surface is not bubbling. At 212 degrees farenheit , continuous, gradual change leaps into bubbles burst on the surface, a qualitative change in the surface of the water. This is quantitative change turning into qualititive change or continuous change turning into discontinuous change. Quantity turning into quality is a change in the type of change; it is quantitative _change_ turning into qualitative _change_. For Hegel and for Marx and Engels, regular incremental changes (magnitude) do not turn into quality, but rather at some critical point, a new quality emerges out of and negates regular incremental change. It is this dialectical moment that Hegel calls Quantity. The determination of both regular incremental change and of differential quality is not only a matter of fact but of the unity of observation and of thought, or fact and essence (significance). If the objective of our activity is the determination of the negation of some prior state by a subsequent one, i.e. dialectical development of relations, then the issue of importance concerning the heated teapot is that critical boiling point of 212 degrees fahrenheit (at sea level) when liquid water is negated by gaseous H2O. Naturally, the transformation of a long, hot Summer into a popular uprising is a much more complex issue (and a more interesting one), but the same principle obtains. Gradual, incremental change (Magnitude) negates immediate identification of quality (Quality), a sudden essential change in quality (Quantity) negates gradual incremental change; that is the negations describe the dialectic, not the states of being that are the moments of the dialectical process. Dialectics is very abstract, (as Marx points out in his criticizing Hegel for regarding the Boiling Teapot and the French Revolution as essential identities). It is ultimately only a method, and like all methods its utility is restricted to certain kinds of objectives (which are themselves only partially a function of mind, dialectically or otherwise expressed). The high school physics teacher can show that the difference between H2O as liquid and as a gas is a matter of the regular, incremental change of the speed of the movement of molecules, and that the change from liquid to gas is a matter of the progressive energization of the water molecules relative to the force of gravitation (atmospheric pressure). For him the process of boiling water is a gradual change of the balance of forces of energization and of gravity. As I see it there is no theoretical or practical problem with the high school physics teacher's description of the process of water vaporization. On the contrary, it is a most useful lesson regarding the conditions for boiling water for tea, including the necessity for packing a pressure cooker if we wish to boil tea at high altitudes. His use of a gradualist paradigm is
Re: Dialectics and systems theory (was Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] VanHeijenoort's critique of Engels)
Jim, To my knowledge Maynard Smith is, or rather was (he died recently 19th of April 2004), a Marxist. The subjects in the Fall 1998 issue of SCIENCE SOCIETY are exactly those I'm currently wrestling with. Is there any way that I can get copies of those articles. Many thanks, Victor - Original Message - From: Jim Farmelant [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: marxism-thaxis@lists.econ.utah.edu Sent: Saturday, March 05, 2005 3:33 AM Subject: Dialectics and systems theory (was Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] VanHeijenoort's critique of Engels) I wrote the following back in 1998 for Proyect's Marxmail list. Jim F. -- The Fall 1998 issue of SCIENCE SOCIETY is a special issue devoted to dialectics: The New Frontier. It features noted Marxist scholars, Bertell Ollman and Tony Smith, as the guest editors and includes articles by such noted Marxists as Frederic Jameson, Richard Levins, Nancy Hartsock, Istevan Meszaros and Joel Kovel amongst others. This issue attempts to cover many of the important questions concerning dialectics why Marxism needs dialectics in the first place, whether Marx's dialectic constitutes a reflection of what the world really is (ontological dialectics)or is it a method for investigating the world (epistemological dialectics)or both. Does the dialectic apply just to history and society or does it apply to nature in general (dialectics of nature)? Is dialectical analysis applicable just to organic interactions within capitalism or is it generally applicable to historical change? Was dialectics for Marx primarily a method of exposition (especially for *Capital*) or was it also a method of inquiry as well? Also, which dialectical categories: contradictions, internal relations, the negation of the negation etc. were of central importance for Marx? One interesting article is the one by Richard Levins, Dialectics and Systems Theory. Levins attempts to answer the question of whether or not the development of a rigorous, quantitative mathematical systems theory makes dialectics obsolete. That is a question that Barkley Rosser and others here (if not on this list then on earlier lists like the old M-I and M-SCI) have dealt with. As Levins notes, his friend the evolutionary biologist, John Maynard Smith, had argued that systems theory has made dialectics obsolete because it offers a set of concepts like feedback in place of Engels' notion of the interchange between cause and effect; the threshold effect in place of the mysterious transformation of quantity into quality and that the notion of the negation of the negation is one that he never could make sense of. Levin, however, disagreed with Maynard Smith and he contended that dialectics should not be subsumed into systems theory while at the same time acknowledging that in his opinion contemporary systems theory does constitute an important example of modern science becoming more dialectical albeit in an incomplete, halting and inconsistent manner. As he pointed out systems theory is a moment in the investigation of complex systems which facilitates the formulation of problems and the interpretation of solutions so that mathematical models can be constructed that will make the obscure obvious. At the same time, Levins stresseed that systems theory is still a product of the reductionist tradition in modern science which emerged out of that tradition's struggle to come to terms with complexity, non-linearity and change through the use of sophisticated mathematical models. Richard Levins in beginning his article with an account of his exchanges with John Maynard Smith over whether or not mathematical systems theory can replace dialectics raises in my mind some interesting questions. First, it is worth noting that Maynard Smith, himself, was best known for his work in the application of game theory to elucidating Darwinian theory. John Maynard Smith has along with other evolutionists like William Hamilton, George Williams, and Richard Dawkins elaborated an interpretation of Darwinism that takes a gene's eye view of evolution - that in other words treats not organisms but individual genes within the gene pool of a given population as the units of selection. This conception arose out of Hamilton's work in developing Darwinian explanations of altruism. Hamilton concluded that altruism could not be explained if we took individual organisms as the basic units of selection since altruistic behavior almost by definition impairs the reproductive fitness of the individual organism by acting in the interests of other organisms at the expense of its own interests. Hamilton argued that such behavior becomes explicable once we realize that it is individual genes that are the units of selection. Thus, if an organism sacrifices itself to protect the lives of its siblings or offspring it is in fact ensuring that its own genes survive into future generations through its
Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] Van Heijenoort's critique of Engels
Have been following your discussion with considerable interest. Sorry to lurk so long, but I was occupied in finishing up a paper. I was particularly interested in your earlier discussion on emergence. I agree strongly with Jay Gould that dialectics; Hegelian and Marxist alike, describe what I suppose would now be called emergent functions. I have many reservations about Engel's representation of the dialectic and his three so-called laws appear to me to be a snobbish attempt to present Dialectics for the Working Class. Certainly Llyod Spencer and Andrzej Krauze's Hegel for Beginners and Andy Blunden's Getting to Know Hegel are much more successful representations of dialectical theory. A search for emergentism in Marxism would be better served by reinvestigating the methods of Hegel (his Logics) and of Marx (Practice, or, better, labour practice) for the mechanics and process whereby they derive emergent complex moments from simpler prior conditions. I suspect that the concretisation of abstraction through successive negation, unity of labour practice and extant condition in the productive process, and sublation of prior syntheses in extant dialectical moments will have more significance for understanding emergence in human history than the hierarchy theories of Salthe, Swenson, and O'Neil, the emergent semiotics of Hoffmeyer and so on. That is not to say that systems, even cybernetic systems, are not relevant to the investigation, but, we must remember that despite Engel's (sometimes brilliant and sometimes embarrassing) adventures in the dialectics of Nature, that Hegel and Marx theoretical interests were exclusively focussed on human activity and human history and were only interested in Nature as a derived function of human inteaction with material conditions. Even Hegel's dialectics on Nature concerned the Natural Sciences and not Nature as such (as the subject of human contemplation). Which bring us to the problem of Natural science and Marxism. Certainly the Natural sciences are a component of modern history. They more or less emerge in late Mediaeval Europe together with the development of powerful urban commercial and industrial institutions. From the point of view of Marxist theory, the interesting thing about the Natural sciences is the relation between the moment of their emergence and the concurrent developments of European society in all its aspects. For example, the optical and astronomical discoveries of the earliest Natural scientists were most useful for the long-range navigation needs of Europe's commercial and colonial enterprises while the mathematical developments in geometry, trigonometry and the calculus were important for the development of improved techniques for the prompt and accurate estimations of volume, mass, and weight of goods as well as managing cannon fire. Even the origin of the Social Sciences can be traced to this period; Machiavelli and de Seyselle's practical analyses of government as well as the contemporary development of double entry accounting and . But, note, that the Marxist interest in these developments is in their practical relations to the needs growing out of the urbanization and commercialization of human life and not as representations of contemplated Nature. Mathematics and the Natural sciences can contribute to the development of Marxist theory, but only in a form that contributes to the objectives of the dialectical explication of historical conditions and events. After all, in Capital, Marx exploits and develops the practices of contemporary accounting to provide mechanical mathematical objectifications of the relations between productive and commercial processes that are critical to the aims of his theory. Marx also demonstrates considerable interest in the physics of machine engineering, but not as an objective description of Nature, but specifically as it relates to the historical development of human productive and social practice. Marx and Engels also adapt contemporary thinking on organism and on pre- and proto-human, behaviour to describe the fundamental material conditions for the development of human practice. In short, the objectives of the practice of the Natural Sciences are distinct from those of Marxist theory, and their products satisfy needs different from those that engender social historical theory. Even the methods are different insofar as the natural scientist enjoys a bit more distance from the subject of his research (except for quantum indeterminism)than the social-historian. Natural Science can be the subject of investigation by social historical scientists and some of its products can, with suitable modifications, be adopted to the objects of social history, but social history has no more qualifications for determining the practices (theory and activity) of Natural science than do the natural scientists for the determination of the practices of social historical science
Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] Ideology and Economic Development (Monthly Review)
Jim, Thanks, I'm sending this to some of my New Socialism friends for a response. Regards, Victor - Original Message - From: Jim Farmelant [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Friday, May 07, 2004 3:00 AM Subject: [Marxism-Thaxis] Ideology and Economic Development (Monthly Review) Ideology and Economic Development by Michael A. Lebowitz http://www.monthlyreview.org/0504lebowitz.htm Michael A. Lebowitz is Professor Emeritus of Economics at Simon Fraser University, in Vancouver, and is the author of Beyond Capital: Marxs Political Economy of the Working Class (Palgrave Macmillan, 2003). He is currently living and working in Venezuela. - --- Economic theory is not neutral, and the results when it is applied owe much to the implicit and explicit assumptions embedded in a particular theory. That such assumptions reflect specific ideologies is most obvious in the case of the neoclassical economics that underlies neoliberal economic policies. The Magic of Neoclassical Economics Neoclassical economics begins with the premises of private property and self-interest. Whatever the structure and distribution of property rights, it assumes the right of ownerswhether as owners of land, means of production or the capacity to perform laborto follow their self-interest. In short, neither the interests of the community as such nor the development of human potential are the subject matter of neoclassical economics; its focus, rather, is upon the effects of decisions made by individuals with respect to their property. Logically, then, the basic unit of analysis for this theory is the individual. This individual (whether a consumer, employer or worker) is assumed to be a rational computer, an automaton mechanically maximizing its benefit on the basis of given data. Change the data and this lightning calculator of pleasures and pains (in the words of the American economist Thorstein Veblen) quickly selects a new optimum position.1 Raise the price of a commodity, and the computer as consumer chooses less of it. Raise the wage, and the computer as capitalist chooses to substitute machinery for workers. Raise unemployment or welfare benefits, and the computer as worker chooses to stop working or to remain unemployed longer. Increase taxes on profits, and the computer as capitalist chooses to invest elsewhere. In every case, the question asked is, how will that individual, the rational calculator of pleasure and pain, react to a change in the data? And, the answer is always self-evidentavoid pain, seek pleasure. Also self-evident are the inferences to be drawn from this simple theoryif you want to have less unemployment, you should lower wages, reduce unemployment and welfare benefits, and cut taxes on capital. But, how does this theory move from its basic unit of the isolated, atomistic computer to draw inferences for society as a whole? The essential proposition of the theory is that the whole is the sum of the individual isolated parts. So, if we know how individuals respond to various stimuli, we know how the society composed of those individuals will respond. (In the words of Margaret Thatcher, there is no such thing as societyjust individuals.) What is true for the individual is true for the economy as a whole. Further, since each economy can be considered as an individualone who can compete and prosper internationally by driving down wages, intensifying work, removing social benefits that reduce the intensity of job searches, lowering the costs of government, and cutting taxesit therefore follows that all economies can, too. To move from the individual to the whole in this manner, though, involves a basic assumption. After all, those individual atomistic computers may work at cross-purposes; the result of individual rationality may be collective irrationality. Why isnt that the conclusion of neoclassical economics? Because faith bars that paththe belief that when those automatons are moved in one direction or another by the change in given data, they necessarily find the most efficient solution for all. In its early versions the religious aspect was quite explicit that instantaneous calculator of individual pleasure and pain was understood to be led by an invisible hand to promote an end which was no part of his intention.2 For Adam Smith it was clear whose hand that wasNature, Providence, Godjust as his physiocratic contemporary, Francois Quesnay, knew that the Supreme Being was the source of this principle of economic harmony, this magic being such that each man works for others, while believing that he is working for himself.3 But the Supreme Being is no longer acknowledged as the author of this magic. In his place stands the Market, whose commandments all must
Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] Fw: [marxistphilosophy] EvaldIlyenkov'sPhilosophy Revisited (Ralph Dumain)
Steve, Well-met. First time I came across Ilyenkov was in Mandel's. Mandel wasn't very enthusiastic about his work - more or less regarded Ilyenkov as just another Stalinist apologist. In the course of reviewing Marxist theory and its relation to Vygotsky's work, about two years ago, I happened upon several writers who regarded Ilyenkov as the Marxist philosopher who fully integrates Vygotsky's works into general theory. Through the good services of MIA and its extensive archive on Ilyenkov it's possible to do a very thorough personal examination of Evald's writings. Then I ran into P Jones articles (yeah the same ones you've read) and shortly thereafter joined the XMCA CHAT site. As you may recall, from my earlier messages, I regard Peter Jones strong distinction between ideal objects and instruments of production etc. to be most consistent with Marx's theory, and a more useful explanatory tool for the kinds of work I do than the Bakehurst-Cole formulations. P. Jones does a very good job showing that Marx and Ilyenkov make a strong distinction between social tools and tools of production, but he's considerably weaker in demonstrating the importance of this distinction for the general theory of political economy. In the general theory the distinction between instruments and subjects of production (which together comprise the means of production and as means of production joined with labour comprise forces of production) and relations of production (which are all those social relations that concern social production, exchange, and distribution of material wealth) is a critical feature of the dialectical analysis of capital. After all it is the continual contradiction between ever developing forces of production and the mode of production ( The method of producing the necessities of life which is a unity of the forces of production and relations of production) that generates the normal revolutionary state of political economic systems. You may recall that one part of my recent critique of Paul Adler's article ---was that he did not consider the importance of the revolutionary (if you are a proletarian you would probably rather call it counterrevolutionary, though in the larger picture most counterrevolutionary strategies usually turn out to be as productive of revolution as revolutionary ones do) role of the personal contract in the preservation of capitalist relations of production under conditions of the growing socialization of labour in the productive process. The personal contract is a strictly social instrument that represents an extensive collection of social relations ranging from the mutual obligations between employee and employer, to the laws concerning rights of labour and property, to the rights and obligations of citizens of the US of A guaranteed by the Constitution of the United States of America etc. etc. While Adler presents a very convincing argument concerning socialization of labour, his analysis is incomplete because he misses the critical changes in the social relations of production that have evolved through the capitalists' efforts to preserve the modes of production of their necessities of life So the importance of the distinction between instruments of production and the ideal objects that are the instruments of social relations of production goes far beyond the issue of their immediate referents or of the particulars of their construction and form. Yours, Victor - Original Message - From: Steve Gabosch [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: Forum for the discussion of theoretical issues raised by Karl Marx and thethinkers he inspired [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Monday, January 19, 2004 11:03 PM Subject: Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] Fw: [marxistphilosophy] EvaldIlyenkov'sPhilosophy Revisited (Ralph Dumain) Hi Victor, I have been lurking on Marxism-Thaxis now for a few weeks. Jim's discussion of Evald Ilyenkov's Philosophy Revisited got my attention, too. Hi, Jim! Thanks for your post on that book, you are always expanding my horizons, as does Victor. On another discussion list last summer, I noticed some comments you made, Victory, about Ilyenkov and Peter Jones and the concept of ideality. I am glad you posted here on this topic. I am still a newcomer to Ilyenkov, but I am excited by what I have read of his so far. The compilation of essays in the book Jim discusses indeed look intriguing. I spent some time last year with a couple different versions of an essay Peter Jones wrote on the concept of the ideal - perhaps this is the essay of his in this compilation. Ilyenkov's essay The Concept of the Ideal was a key reading in one of the components of an internet course the xmca discussion list sponsored last spring, along with relevant writings from David Bakhurst and Peter Jones, who had different takes. This course had a big influence on me in seeing how Marxism and activity theory are connected. Ilyenkov was for me a turning point, along with
Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] Fw: [marxistphilosophy] EvaldIlyenkov'sPhilosophy Revisited (Ralph Dumain) rerun with repairs
Sorry forgot the references! Steve,Well-met.First time I came across Ilyenkov was in Mandel's The formation of the Economic Thought of Karl Marx. Mandel wasn't veryenthusiastic about his work - more or less regarded Ilyenkov as just anotherStalinist apologist. In the course of reviewing Marxist theory and itsrelation to Vygotsky's work, about two years ago, I happened upon severalwriters who regarded Ilyenkov as "the Marxist philosopher who fullyintegrates Vygotsky's works into general theory." Through the good servicesof MIA and its extensive archive on Ilyenkov it's possible to do a verythorough personal examination of Evald's writings. Then I ran into P Jonesarticles (yeah the same ones you've read) and shortly thereafter joined theXMCA CHAT site.As you may recall, from my earlier messages, I regard Peter Jones strongdistinction between ideal objects and instruments of production etc. to bemost consistent with Marx's theory, and a more useful explanatory tool forthe kinds of work I do than the Bakehurst-Cole formulations. P. Jones doesa very good job showing that Marx and Ilyenkov make a strong distinctionbetween social tools and tools of production, but he's considerably weakerin demonstrating the importance of this distinction for the general theoryof political economy. In the general theory the distinction betweeninstruments and subjects of production (which together comprise the "meansof production" and as means of production joined with "labour" comprise"forces of production) and "relations of production" (which are all thosesocial relations that concern social production, exchange, and distributionof material wealth) is a critical feature of the dialectical analysis ofcapital. After all it is the continual contradiction between ever developingforces of production and the mode of production ( The method of producingthe necessities of life which is a unity of the forces of production and"relations of production") that generates the normal revolutionary state ofpolitical economic systems.You may recall that one part of my recent critique of Paul Adler'sarticle "Rethinking Labor Process Theory" was that he did not consider the importance of therevolutionary (if you are a proletarian you would probably rather call it"counterrevolutionary," though in the larger picture most"counterrevolutionary" strategies usually turn out to be as productive ofrevolution as "revolutionary" ones do) role of the "personal contract" inthe preservation of capitalist relations of production under conditions ofthe growing socialization of labour in the productive process. The"personal contract" is a strictly social instrument that represents anextensive collection of social relations ranging from the mutual obligationsbetween employee and employer, to the laws concerning rights of labour andproperty, to the rights and obligations of citizens of the US of Aguaranteed by the Constitution of the United States of America etc. etc.While Adler presents a very convincing argument concerning socialization oflabour, his analysis is incomplete because he misses the critical changes inthe social relations of production that have evolved through thecapitalists' efforts to preserve the modes of production of theirnecessities of life So the importance of the distinction betweeninstruments of production and the ideal objects that are the instruments ofsocial relations of production goes far beyond the issue of their immediatereferents or of the particulars of their construction and form.Yours,Victor ___ Marxism-Thaxis mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] To change your options or unsubscribe go to: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/marxism-thaxis
Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] Fw: [marxistphilosophy] Evald Ilyenkov'sPhilosophy Revisited (Ralph Dumain)
Jim, Thanks for the reference. I'm well acquainted with Bakehurst and Jones's writings on Ilyenkov, but much less familiar with the works of the Japanese School. I expect reading it will be an interesting experience. Regards, Victor - Original Message - From: Jim Farmelant [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Monday, January 19, 2004 12:45 AM Subject: [Marxism-Thaxis] Fw: [marxistphilosophy] Evald Ilyenkov'sPhilosophy Revisited (Ralph Dumain) Unfortunately, this book is hard to come by, and I do not have my own copy, but I did manage to get a look at a library copy. I've put up the table of contents and other basic information: Evald Ilyenkov's Philosophy Revisited http://www.autodidactproject.org/other/ilyenkv2.html Just a few stray notes on the contents: Bakhurst's article focuses on Ilyenkov's aesthetics, which are profoundly humanistic though prejudiced against much of modern art. Zweerde's specialty is Soviet philosophical culture. In this article, he discussed how Ilyenkov interacted with Soviet philosophical culture, in terms of his own interests and original manner of expression, and both how he was curtailed by the Soviet regime while still permitted to function, and what this can tell us about ideological life in the USSR. Silvonen's comparison of Ilyenkov and Foucault is based on Ilyenkov's conception of ideality--his conception of the relation of mind and matter/body--and a comparison with Foucault's notions. Vartiainen makes use of Nonaka Takeuchi's ideas about knowledge creation and M. Polanyi's notion of tacit knowledge, and presents a schema involving conversions between explicit and tacit knowledge. Knuuttila combines Umberto Eco's semiotics and Ilyenkov's ideality. The articles on the logic of Capital in relation to ideality (Jones, Chiutty, Honkanen) are fascinating and merit close study, as does this facet of Ilyenkov's work. Honkanen discusses Ricardo, mathematical modelling, Uno and the Japanese school, and the history of historical vs. logical approaches to Capital. The best thing to hit the internet in years - Juno SpeedBand! Surf the web up to FIVE TIMES FASTER! Only $14.95/ month - visit www.juno.com to sign up today! ___ Marxism-Thaxis mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] To change your options or unsubscribe go to: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/marxism-thaxis ___ Marxism-Thaxis mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] To change your options or unsubscribe go to: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/marxism-thaxis
