Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] O, Dialectics! :Bakhurst (response toarrowlessness)

[Victor]

Steve,
Enjoyed it immensely.  Also helped considerably in "finalizing" (if that's 
possible) the concepts I've been working with.  Must do it again some time.

Regards,
Oudeyis

- Original Message - 
From: "Steve Gabosch" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
To: "Forum for the discussion of theoretical issues raised by Karl Marx and 
thethinkers he inspired" 

Sent: Wednesday, July 06, 2005 13:36
Subject: Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] O, Dialectics! :Bakhurst (response 
toarrowlessness)



At 12:00 PM 7/5/2005 +0200, Oudeyis wrote: "Steve, I really do not have 
enough time to devote to answering this message as it deserves.  So please 
excuse the briefness of my responses."


No problem at all.  I am happy to let that response be the last major word 
on this discussion for now, which we can certainly return to when time 
permits.


As for the final question asked, "What say you comrade?" I say, thank you 
for the stimulating discussion, we'll get back to these important and 
stimulating topics as time goes on.


Below are some passages that stand out for me as excellent thinking and 
research points for me to work with.


Victor suggests, asks, points out:

*  that I am "... arguing that all reflective thought is ideal ..."

* "So what do you call reality?  Ilyenkov is quite clear as to what he 
calls reality ..."


* "What is virgin materiality?  If by virgin materiality you mean that 
part of nature men have yet to have contacted ..."


* Sorry, but I'm afraid your argument that thought as a function of 
practice and thought as received social wisdom are both ideal are not 
acceptable to me or to Ilyenkov."


* "Your views that all reflective thought is ideal is much more consistent 
with the views of Lukacs, Adorno, Marcuse and Horkheimer and more recently 
of Habermas than with Ilyenkov ..."


* "... you've determined that all human consciousness is ideal ..."

* "Wow! I wrote the previous paragraph before reading this one ..."

* " ... you are confirming my description of your argument as more 
consistent with Critical Theory than with EVI's Marxist-Leninism."


* "The identification of scientific theory as an integral part of the 
ideal is an invention of Lukacs that was expanded by his Critical Theorist 
epigones."


* "At no point does Ilyenkov describe scientific work as ideal."

* "What say you comrade?"  Oudeyis

I say: thanks again,
- Steve





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Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] O, Dialectics! :Bakhurst (response to arrowlessness)

[Steve Gabosch]

At 12:00 PM 7/5/2005 +0200, Oudeyis wrote: "Steve, I really do not 
have enough time to devote to answering this message as it 
deserves.  So please excuse the briefness of my responses."


No problem at all.  I am happy to let that response be the last major 
word on this discussion for now, which we can certainly return to 
when time permits.


As for the final question asked, "What say you comrade?" I say, thank 
you for the stimulating discussion, we'll get back to these important 
and stimulating topics as time goes on.


Below are some passages that stand out for me as excellent thinking 
and research points for me to work with.


Victor suggests, asks, points out:

*  that I am "... arguing that all reflective thought is ideal ..."

* "So what do you call reality?  Ilyenkov is quite clear as to what 
he calls reality ..."


* "What is virgin materiality?  If by virgin materiality you mean 
that part of nature men have yet to have contacted ..."


* Sorry, but I'm afraid your argument that thought as a function of 
practice and thought as received social wisdom are both ideal are not 
acceptable to me or to Ilyenkov."


* "Your views that all reflective thought is ideal is much more 
consistent with the views of Lukacs, Adorno, Marcuse and Horkheimer 
and more recently of Habermas than with Ilyenkov ..."


* "... you've determined that all human consciousness is ideal ..."

* "Wow! I wrote the previous paragraph before reading this one ..."

* " ... you are confirming my description of your argument as more 
consistent with Critical Theory than with EVI's Marxist-Leninism."


* "The identification of scientific theory as an integral part of the 
ideal is an invention of Lukacs that was expanded by his Critical 
Theorist epigones."


* "At no point does Ilyenkov describe scientific work as ideal."

* "What say you comrade?"  Oudeyis

I say: thanks again,
- Steve





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Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] O, Dialectics! :Bakhurst (response to arrowlessness)

[Victor]

Wha' happened to the arrows??
- Original Message - 
From: "Victor" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
To: "Forum for the discussion of theoretical issues raised by Karl Marxand 
thethinkers he inspired" 

Sent: Tuesday, July 05, 2005 11:47
Subject: Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] O, Dialectics! :Bakhurst


Steve,
I really do not have enough time to devote to answering this message as it
deserves.  So please excuse the briefness of my responses.
__
- Original Message - 
From: "Steve Gabosch" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>

To: "Forum for the discussion of theoretical issues raised by Karl Marx and
thethinkers he inspired" 
Sent: Monday, July 04, 2005 19:36
Subject: Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] O, Dialectics! :Bakhurst


Here is a follow-up on a passage Victor offered
in an interpretation of an Ilyenkov quote.  I
made some claims and promised to try to show
their basis.  First, I deconstruct both of these
passages from my viewpoint and criticize Victor's
formulation.  Second, I touch on why Victor's
formulation reminds me more of Hegel than
Ilyenkov.  But I do this in a (hopefully) more
relaxed way than the manner in which I initiated
this thought on 6/26, which on retrospect may
have been unnecessarily sharp and
argumentative.  I hope this post does not come off in that way.

At 11:18 AM 6/22/2005 +0200, Victor wrote:

Paragraph 54: It will be appreciated that the main difficulty and, 
therefore, the main problem of philosophy is not to distinguish and 
counterpose everything that is "in the consciousness of the individual" to 
everything that is outside this individual consciousness (this is hardly 
ever difficult to do), but to delimit the world of collectively 
acknowledged notions, that is, the whole socially organised world of 
intellectual culture with all its stable and materially established 
universal patterns, and the real world as it exists outside and apart from 
its expression in these socially legitimised forms of "experience". 
(Ilyenkov The Concept of the Ideal 1977)


[Victor's interpretation:]
The delimitation of what Ilyenkov calls the "whole socially organised world 
of intellectual culture" and the "real world as it exists outside and apart 
from its expression in these socially legitimised forms of "experience." 
can only be based on the distinction between the socially learned and 
confirmed concepts or ideas of the tribe and the concepts formulated by 
reflecting on practical material activity, i.e. labour activity: the 
operations carried out, the physical and material response of the 
instruments and material of production to these activities and finally the 
effectivity of the operations relative to their purposes.


Allow me to break these complex passages into
smaller pieces and comment on them:

Paragraph 54 (Ilyenkov The Concept of the Ideal 1977):
It will be appreciated that the main difficulty and, therefore,
the main problem of philosophy
is not to distinguish and counterpose everything
that is "in the consciousness of the individual"
to everything that is outside this individual consciousness
(this is hardly ever difficult to do),
but to delimit the world of collectively acknowledged notions,
that is,
the whole socially organised world of intellectual culture
with all its stable and materially established universal patterns,
and
the real world as it exists outside and apart
from its expression in these socially legitimised forms of "experience".

Steve comments:
This is a huge statement by EVI: he is defining
"the main problem of philosophy."  He is
suggesting that the main historical division of
philosophy between idealism and materialism,
emphasized so much by Marx and Engels, revolves
around a different kind of boundary than is
usually assumed.  The usual boundary is between
that which is "inside" and "outside" individual
consciousness.  EVI polemicizes again and again
against using this division in this
essay.  Instead, EVI proposes a different
boundary.  It is where EVI places this
alternative boundary that is the source of debate.

I believe, although his formulations are less
than transparent, that EVI is delimiting the
fundamental difference as that between the ideal
- "the world of collectively acknowledged
notions" - and the "real world as it exists outside and apart" from the
ideal.


[Victor 6/22:]
The delimitation of what Ilyenkov calls the
"whole socially organised world of intellectual culture"
and the "real world as it exists outside and
apart from its expression in these socially legitimised forms of
"experience."
can only be based on the distinction between
the socially learned and confirmed concepts or ideas of the tribe
and
the concepts formulated by reflecting on practical material activity,
i.e. labour activit

Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] O, Dialectics! :Bakhurst

[Victor]

Steve,
I really do not have enough time to devote to answering this message as it 
deserves.  So please excuse the briefness of my responses.
- Original Message - 
From: "Steve Gabosch" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
To: "Forum for the discussion of theoretical issues raised by Karl Marx and 
thethinkers he inspired" 

Sent: Monday, July 04, 2005 19:36
Subject: Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] O, Dialectics! :Bakhurst


Here is a follow-up on a passage Victor offered
in an interpretation of an Ilyenkov quote.  I
made some claims and promised to try to show
their basis.  First, I deconstruct both of these
passages from my viewpoint and criticize Victor's
formulation.  Second, I touch on why Victor's
formulation reminds me more of Hegel than
Ilyenkov.  But I do this in a (hopefully) more
relaxed way than the manner in which I initiated
this thought on 6/26, which on retrospect may
have been unnecessarily sharp and
argumentative.  I hope this post does not come off in that way.

At 11:18 AM 6/22/2005 +0200, Victor wrote:

Paragraph 54: It will be appreciated that the main difficulty and, 
therefore, the main problem of philosophy is not to distinguish and 
counterpose everything that is "in the consciousness of the individual" to 
everything that is outside this individual consciousness (this is hardly 
ever difficult to do), but to delimit the world of collectively 
acknowledged notions, that is, the whole socially organised world of 
intellectual culture with all its stable and materially established 
universal patterns, and the real world as it exists outside and apart from 
its expression in these socially legitimised forms of "experience". 
(Ilyenkov The Concept of the Ideal 1977)


[Victor's interpretation:]
The delimitation of what Ilyenkov calls the "whole socially organised world 
of intellectual culture" and the "real world as it exists outside and apart 
from its expression in these socially legitimised forms of "experience." 
can only be based on the distinction between the socially learned and 
confirmed concepts or ideas of the tribe and the concepts formulated by 
reflecting on practical material activity, i.e. labour activity: the 
operations carried out, the physical and material response of the 
instruments and material of production to these activities and finally the 
effectivity of the operations relative to their purposes.


Allow me to break these complex passages into
smaller pieces and comment on them:

Paragraph 54 (Ilyenkov The Concept of the Ideal 1977):
It will be appreciated that the main difficulty and, therefore,
the main problem of philosophy
is not to distinguish and counterpose everything
that is "in the consciousness of the individual"
to everything that is outside this individual consciousness
(this is hardly ever difficult to do),
but to delimit the world of collectively acknowledged notions,
that is,
the whole socially organised world of intellectual culture
with all its stable and materially established universal patterns,
and
the real world as it exists outside and apart
from its expression in these socially legitimised forms of "experience".

Steve comments:
This is a huge statement by EVI: he is defining
"the main problem of philosophy."  He is
suggesting that the main historical division of
philosophy between idealism and materialism,
emphasized so much by Marx and Engels, revolves
around a different kind of boundary than is
usually assumed.  The usual boundary is between
that which is "inside" and "outside" individual
consciousness.  EVI polemicizes again and again
against using this division in this
essay.  Instead, EVI proposes a different
boundary.  It is where EVI places this
alternative boundary that is the source of debate.

I believe, although his formulations are less
than transparent, that EVI is delimiting the
fundamental difference as that between the ideal
- "the world of collectively acknowledged
notions" - and the "real world as it exists outside and apart" from the 
ideal.



[Victor 6/22:]
The delimitation of what Ilyenkov calls the
"whole socially organised world of intellectual culture"
and the "real world as it exists outside and
apart from its expression in these socially legitimised forms of 
"experience."

can only be based on the distinction between
the socially learned and confirmed concepts or ideas of the tribe
and
the concepts formulated by reflecting on practical material activity,
i.e. labour activity:
the operations carried out,
the physical and material response of the
instruments and material of production to these activities
and finally the effectivity of the operations relative to their purposes.

Steve comments:
Victor suggests the boundary EVI is speaking of
is revealed in the following distinction: between
the ideas/concepts of the tribe - and reflections
o

Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] O, Dialectics! :Bakhurst

[Steve Gabosch]

Here is a follow-up on a passage Victor offered 
in an interpretation of an Ilyenkov quote.  I 
made some claims and promised to try to show 
their basis.  First, I deconstruct both of these 
passages from my viewpoint and criticize Victor's 
formulation.  Second, I touch on why Victor's 
formulation reminds me more of Hegel than 
Ilyenkov.  But I do this in a (hopefully) more 
relaxed way than the manner in which I initiated 
this thought on 6/26, which on retrospect may 
have been unnecessarily sharp and 
argumentative.  I hope this post does not come off in that way.


At 11:18 AM 6/22/2005 +0200, Victor wrote:

Paragraph 54: It will be appreciated that 
the main difficulty and, therefore, the main 
problem of philosophy is not to distinguish and 
counterpose everything that is "in the 
consciousness of the individual" to everything 
that is outside this individual consciousness 
(this is hardly ever difficult to do), but to 
delimit the world of collectively acknowledged 
notions, that is, the whole socially organised 
world of intellectual culture with all its 
stable and materially established universal 
patterns, and the real world as it exists 
outside and apart from its expression in these 
socially legitimised forms of "experience". 
(Ilyenkov The Concept of the Ideal 1977)


[Victor's interpretation:]
The delimitation of what Ilyenkov calls the 
"whole socially organised world of intellectual 
culture" and the "real world as it exists 
outside and apart from its expression in these 
socially legitimised forms of "experience." can 
only be based on the distinction between the 
socially learned and confirmed concepts or ideas 
of the tribe and the concepts formulated by 
reflecting on practical material activity, i.e. 
labour activity: the operations carried out, the 
physical and material response of the 
instruments and material of production to these 
activities and finally the effectivity of the 
operations relative to their purposes.


Allow me to break these complex passages into 
smaller pieces and comment on them:


Paragraph 54 (Ilyenkov The Concept of the Ideal 1977):
It will be appreciated that the main difficulty and, therefore,
the main problem of philosophy
is not to distinguish and counterpose everything 
that is "in the consciousness of the individual"

to everything that is outside this individual consciousness
(this is hardly ever difficult to do),
but to delimit the world of collectively acknowledged notions,
that is,
the whole socially organised world of intellectual culture
with all its stable and materially established universal patterns,
and
the real world as it exists outside and apart 
from its expression in these socially legitimised forms of "experience".


Steve comments:
This is a huge statement by EVI: he is defining 
"the main problem of philosophy."  He is 
suggesting that the main historical division of 
philosophy between idealism and materialism, 
emphasized so much by Marx and Engels, revolves 
around a different kind of boundary than is 
usually assumed.  The usual boundary is between 
that which is "inside" and "outside" individual 
consciousness.  EVI polemicizes again and again 
against using this division in this 
essay.  Instead, EVI proposes a different 
boundary.  It is where EVI places this 
alternative boundary that is the source of debate.


I believe, although his formulations are less 
than transparent, that EVI is delimiting the 
fundamental difference as that between the ideal 
- "the world of collectively acknowledged 
notions" - and the "real world as it exists outside and apart" from the ideal.



[Victor 6/22:]
The delimitation of what Ilyenkov calls the 
"whole socially organised world of intellectual culture"
and the "real world as it exists outside and 
apart from its expression in these socially legitimised forms of "experience."

can only be based on the distinction between
the socially learned and confirmed concepts or ideas of the tribe
and
the concepts formulated by reflecting on practical material activity,
i.e. labour activity:
the operations carried out,
the physical and material response of the 
instruments and material of production to these activities

and finally the effectivity of the operations relative to their purposes.

Steve comments:
Victor suggests the boundary EVI is speaking of 
is revealed in the following distinction: between 
the ideas/concepts of the tribe - and reflections 
on practical/labor activity.  Simplifying even 
more what I believe Victor is suggesting, he 
appears to place the essential boundary between 
the ideal, on one hand, and reflections on activity, on the other.


My opinion - and of course, Victor's 
interpretation of his own words takes precedence 
over any opinions I may express - is that 
Victor's distinction does not capture the point 
EVI was making.  In fact, as I see it, Victor's 
formulation quite dramatically loses the very 
distinction between the ideal and the "real world 
as it e

[Marxism-Thaxis] O, Dialectics! :Bakhurst

[Charles Brown]

Hello Victor ,

Comments below

1. We tend to exaggerate the importance of linguistic communication or at
least the importance of developed language in linguistic communication.[Noam
Chomsky is the paragon of this.  He's so impressed by the size and
complexity of the syntactic analytical system he developed to explain the 
formation of well-formed sentences that he despairs of men's ability to
learn and use it].

Vygotsky among many others, especially novelists and playwrights, have noted
just how little a vocabulary (much less syntax) is needed to communicate
complex information.  Personally I've had quite a few fairly rich
conversations consisting almost entirely of the F and S words.  Looking over
some of the recordings made by discourse analysts like Potter and Antaki it
appears in many cases that in elaborating of the language tool man has
developed an A Bomb to crack a walnut.


CB: Yes, I don't disagree with this. However, some very elementary language
and symbolling, not nearly as complex as modern language which has , of
course, written language impacting spoken, etc, etc., very elementary
language is a qualitative leap for learning as compared with only imitation.
The early humans still had imitation, but they had rudimentary language and
_symbolling_ . Symbolling is a bit more general than just language.

^^^

Then too, much practical learning cannot really be carried out by verbal
description.  For Ethiopian farmers one of the greatest hurdles for learning
to use the computer  was simply to learn how to use the mouse and keyboard.
The physical activity, that is, the logic they picked up right away. It was 
almost impossible to describe to them just how hard to hit the keys or how
far to jiggle the mouse.  The best tool was demonstration, often with the
instructor guiding the student's hand with his own.  I've also taught
sketching and while there are a good many interesting tricks for teaching
people how to see and translate what they see into marks on paper and so on,
almost none are verbal.

It seems to me that our theories of language use are not nearly concrete
enough to accurately explain many features of actual language use and its 
role in social life.

2. When we compare human information transmission systems with those of
other life forms, we tend to use our own highly developed communication
systems as the typical human system.  It isn't really very typical at all.
In the some 200,000 years of H. Sapiens's existence on the planet, his
technological array only began to show serious signs of surpassing that of
his close relatives about 60,000 years ago.  

^^^
CB: True. What is the implication of this fact for the issue of the role of
labor and toolmaking in the transition from ape to man ? Seems to imply that
the growth of labor and tool use was very slow.
Wouldn't you agree that at the points that you mark leaps in labor and
toolmaking , learning is predominantly by symbolic communication, not
imitation ? The traditions that are developed rely necessarily on symboling
and culture ?

^^^


Settled human life begins maybe 10,000 years ago while writing is no older
than about 5,000 years ago. 
Almost all the fancy equipment we now use to communicate with and by is less
than 100 years of age.  But this is not all. The repertory of human
artefacts remains disappointingly small (for most men) until up to nearly
modern times.  The probability is that men had much less to say to each
other than we are accustomed to and much of what they had to communicate
could better (see above) by means other than language.

^
CB: To the extent the human repertory of artefacts was small, that's not
time we are trying to explain, if you follow me. We are trying to explain
the times when the repertory of human artefacts leaped foreward.  Were the
leaps based on a system of passing on information to youth mainly by
imitation or mainly and critically language and ideality saturated ( even if
less complex language than in modern times and Chomsky's theories). 

Also, lets imagine a hunting group.  How is imitation going to give as
rapid, flexible and precise communication as language ? It's not close.  As
Marx said, human labor is distinguished by imagination, planning first. This
is not done by "imitation".  The hunting group can sit around and plan the
hunt before they do it when they have language. This makes it much, much
more effective. They can plan to have one group chase the prey into a
waiting group with arms. All types of things that cannot be organized if
imitation is the only way to communicate.

^

 The point is that the development of modern human information systems and
the rich collection of subjects of interest is the product of the
dialectical development of human culture from very simple origins to its
present developed state.  It is quite likely that we would find that the
great gulf of language and culture that separates men from the more
developed animals was far less ev

Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] O, Dialectics! :Bakhurst

[Victor]

CB,
Good points.  The one concerning the development of language as a instrument 
of reproduction is particularly interesting.  I've been playing around with 
the idea of a dialectical prehistory/history of information systems as the 
development of reproductive systems (starting with the highly abstract 
systems of subcellular organic reproduction to the very very concrete forms 
of learned human communication systems).  Maybe some day.


You are of course correct all human learning is always thoroughly saturated 
with talk and language.

BUT,
1. We tend to exaggerate the importance of linguistic communication or at 
least the importance of developed language in linguistic communication.[Noam 
Chomsky is the paragon of this.  He's so impressed by the size and 
complexity of the syntactic analytical system he developed to explain the 
formation of well-formed sentences that he despairs of men's ability to 
learn and use it].


Vygotsky among many others, especially novelists and playwrights, have noted 
just how little a vocabulary (much less syntax) is needed to communicate 
complex information.  Personally I've had quite a few fairly rich 
conversations consisting almost entirely of the F and S words.  Looking over 
some of the recordings made by discourse analysts like Potter and Antaki it 
appears in many cases that in elaborating of the language tool man has 
developed an A Bomb to crack a walnut.


Then too, much practical learning cannot really be carried out by verbal 
description.  For Ethiopian farmers one of the greatest hurdles for learning 
to use the computer  was simply to learn how to use the mouse and keyboard. 
The physical activity, that is, the logic they picked up right away. It was 
almost impossible to describe to them just how hard to hit the keys or how 
far to jiggle the mouse.  The best tool was demonstration, often with the 
instructor guiding the student's hand with his own.  I've also taught 
sketching and while there are a good many interesting tricks for teaching 
people how to see and translate what they see into marks on paper and so on, 
almost none are verbal.


It seems to me that our theories of language use are not nearly concrete 
enough to accurately explain many features of actual language use and its 
role in social life.


2. When we compare human information transmission systems with those of 
other life forms, we tend to use our own highly developed communication 
systems as the typical human system.  It isn't really very typical at all. 
In the some 200,000 years of H. Sapiens's existence on the planet, his 
technological array only began to show serious signs of surpassing that of 
his close relatives about 60,000 years ago.  Settled human life begins maybe 
10,000 years ago while writing is no older than about 5,000 years ago. 
Almost all the fancy equipment we now use to communicate with and by is less 
than 100 years of age.  But this is not all. The repertory of human 
artefacts remains disappointingly small (for most men) until up to nearly 
modern times.  The probability is that men had much less to say to each 
other than we are accustomed to and much of what they had to communicate 
could better (see above) by means other than language.


The point is that the development of modern human information systems and 
the rich collection of subjects of interest is the product of the 
dialectical development of human culture from very simple origins to its 
present developed state.  It is quite likely that we would find that the 
great gulf of language and culture that separates men from the more 
developed animals was far less evident for the first 120,000 years of human 
development and only now appears to be absolutely insurmountable.

Oudeyis



- Original Message - 
From: "Charles Brown" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
To: "'Forum for the discussion of theoretical issues raised by Karl Marx 
andthe thinkers he inspired'" 

Sent: Tuesday, June 28, 2005 20:03
Subject: [Marxism-Thaxis] O, Dialectics! :Bakhurst



Victor :

CB,
Continued from last message.

First, let's not forget that a lot of human learning is "human see human
do."  And some of the things we learn this way are as complex as 
ant-fishing
with a straw.[it's actually quite a complicated affair to get it just 
right.

I've tried
it though I drew a line at eating the ants.]



CB: Yes, but, the human see-do learning is always thoroughly saturated 
with

talk and language. Imagine trying to teach all the human see-do stuff
restricted to pantomime.  It is not close. Symbols allow the "imitation" 
of

the actions of dead people; "imitation" without direct observation.

^^^


According to Vygotsky, a truly creative relation to cultural conventions
(the development of conceptual speech) is a rather late stage in the
development of the child.


CB: Most of the symbol

Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] O, Dialectics! :Bakhurst

[Ralph Dumain]

I've not had time to keep up with your ongoing debate on Ilyenkov.  Since 
you are apparently preparing something for publication, I hope you will 
apprise us of the finished product.  This line of enquiry, it seems to me, 
is much more important than most philosophical projects being undertaken.


I have yet to address our last round on science as labor.  I'll have to 
review the last few posts so that I can state my misgivings more 
clearly.  I seem to be suffering from the aftereffects of the Stalinist 
equation of science with production.


At 09:03 AM 6/27/2005 +0200, Victor wrote:

Steve and Ralph,
Thanks for all the help.
Oudeyis



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Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] O, Dialectics! :Bakhurst

[Victor]

CB,
Sorry for the delay.
Getting through a real tough passage in my rewrite on Ilyenkov.

No argument with you concerning the tool using activities of non- and 
proto-human life forms.  I would distinguish between their toolmaking and 
that of men , as I understand you do, by the universal relevance of tool 
making and using for all human life activity.  All human activity is 
instrumentally enhanced if not enabled.


While I agree that ideality is the essence of tradition, it appears to me 
that primitive and particularistic manifestations of ideality precede its 
universality in human social activity.

Oudeyis

- Original Message - 
From: "Charles Brown" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
To: "'Forum for the discussion of theoretical issues raised by Karl Marx 
andthe thinkers he inspired'" 

Sent: Monday, June 27, 2005 16:49
Subject: [Marxism-Thaxis] O, Dialectics! :Bakhurst






Victor:


I'm not sure of it either.

However, it appears to me that we can distinguish social labour, direct
cooperation, from characteristically human labour, that is social labour
that is special since it involves the production and use of tools for
realization of material social goals.  This distinction allows us to talk
about the simplest and most abstract kinds of ideality as being pre or
proto-human.  It also appears to me that labour has to be social before it
can be instrumental, i.e. involve the development of social practices of
making and use of tools.

^^^
CB: If I might argue with you comradely here. I would say that though
toolmaking and use are famously characterized as uniquely human, there are
examples of chimps and other animals using tools. The qualitative aspect 
of
instrumental action is not unique to humans.  Humans are unique in the 
scale

and complexity of their toolmaking and use, which is possible because
ideality allows a toolmaking _tradition_ to develop.

^^^

Of course once men make and use tools they expand their labour practice 
and
thereby the inventory of objectified activities embodied in idealities, 
and

thereby make culture a universal of human life activity


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[Marxism-Thaxis] O, Dialectics! :Bakhurst

[Charles Brown]

 
> Victor:

I'm not sure of it either.

However, it appears to me that we can distinguish social labour, direct 
cooperation, from characteristically human labour, that is social labour 
that is special since it involves the production and use of tools for 
realization of material social goals.  This distinction allows us to talk 
about the simplest and most abstract kinds of ideality as being pre or 
proto-human.  It also appears to me that labour has to be social before it 
can be instrumental, i.e. involve the development of social practices of 
making and use of tools.

^^^
CB: If I might argue with you comradely here. I would say that though
toolmaking and use are famously characterized as uniquely human, there are
examples of chimps and other animals using tools. The qualitative aspect of
instrumental action is not unique to humans.  Humans are unique in the scale
and complexity of their toolmaking and use, which is possible because
ideality allows a toolmaking _tradition_ to develop.

^^^

Of course once men make and use tools they expand their labour practice and 
thereby the inventory of objectified activities embodied in idealities, and 
thereby make culture a universal of human life activity


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Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] O, Dialectics! :Bakhurst

[Victor]

Steve and Ralph,
Thanks for all the help.
Oudeyis
- Original Message - 
From: "Steve Gabosch" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
To: "Forum for the discussion of theoretical issues raised by Karl Marx and 
thethinkers he inspired" 

Sent: Sunday, June 26, 2005 21:31
Subject: Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] O, Dialectics! :Bakhurst


This 6/26 post by Victor seems like a good
stopping place for the moment - I need to put our
discussion about ideality aside for just a little
while to tend to other projects, but I am
certainly interested.  I will follow up.  Victor
is perfectly correct, I must show what I claim.

BTW, for anyone trying to follow this discussion,
two different essays by Ilyenkov are quoted in
Victor's post, both available on the internet at:
http://www.marxists.org/archive/ilyenkov/index.htm

The main essay Victor and I have been debating interpretations of is:
The Concept of the Ideal
http://www.marxists.org/archive/ilyenkov/works/ideal/ideal.htm

This essay appeared in the book Problems of
Dialectical Materialism; Progress Publishers,
1977 and was scanned by Andy Blunden.  The
numbering both Victor and I have been using
refers to the sequence of 142 paragraphs in that
essay.  In Victor's 6/26 post, he quotes from paragraphs 49, 50 and 51.

I have an important side point to bring up about
this essay.  In my scrutiny of this on-line
version, the only version I have, I believe there
are some scanning errors and possibly some
original translation errors to contend
with.  There is also some reason to wonder if the
original Russian that the translation was based
on may also contain editorial errors.  In other
words, this version must be read with caution,
and if something does not make sense, it may not
be Ilyenkov's original writing.  I bring this up
because there are a handful of places in the
essay where publishing errors like these seem to
contribute to confusion over what Ilyenkov was really saying.

In his 6/26 post Victor also quotes Ilyenkov
using paragraph numbers  57, 58, 59,
60.  However, these are from a different essay -
chapter 8 in DIALECTICAL LOGIC (1974), Part Two ­
Problems of the Marxist-Leninist Theory of Dialectics
8: The Materialist Conception of Thought as the Subject Matter of Logic
http://www.marxists.org/archive/ilyenkov/works/essays/essay8.htm

The scanned book is Dialectical Logic, Essays on
its History and Theory; Progress Publishers,
1977; English translation 1977 by H. Campbell
Creighton; Transcribed: Andy Blunden; HTML Markup: Andy Blunden.

BTW, these paragraphs (found on pages 285-288)
are from the same essay Victor mentioned on 5/26
and I quoted from on 5/30, and which were
discussed a little on this list.  The question of
the ideal is a major topic of this essay and I
agree with Victor that it should be discussed in
conjunction with the Concept of the Ideal essay
when we take this topic up again.

The philosophical work we are doing here is to
try to untangle the ideal and the material,
closely studying Ilyenkov's work on this complex
question in doing so.  In the process, it seems
we should also seek to keep untangled which
citation by our philosopher-teacher we are talking about.

:-))
Best,
~ Steve




___
At 07:32 PM 6/26/2005 +0200, Oudeyis (Victor) wrote:


- Original Message - From: "Steve Gabosch" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
To: "Forum for the discussion of theoretical issues raised by Karl Marx and 
thethinkers he inspired" 

Sent: Sunday, June 26, 2005 12:40
Subject: Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] O, Dialectics! :Bakhurst



I am responding to a 6/22/2005 post from Victor, which I quote from.

The quote below is a good example of where I think Victor gets Ilyenkov 
wrong 180 degrees.  In the general section of Ilyenkov's 1977 essay "The 
Concept of the Ideal" that Victor quotes from, I believe Ilyenkov is 
making just the opposite point that Victor attributes to him.


Victor quotes Ilyenkov:
"Paragraph 53:  It is this fact, incidentally, that explains the 
persistent survival of such "semantic substitutions"; indeed, when we are 
talking about nature, we are obliged to make use of the available 
language of natural science, the "language of science" with its 
established and generally understood "meanings". It is this, 
specifically, which forms the basis of the arguments of logical 
positivism, which quite consciously identifies "nature" with the 
"language" in which people talk and write about nature.


Paragraph 54: It will be appreciated that the main difficulty and, 
therefore, the main problem of philosophy is not to distinguish and 
counterpose everything that is "in the consciousness of the individual" 
to everything that is outside this individual consciousness (this is 
hardly ever difficult to do), but to delimit the world of collectively 
acknowledg

Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] O, Dialectics! :Bakhurst

[Steve Gabosch]

This 6/26 post by Victor seems like a good 
stopping place for the moment - I need to put our 
discussion about ideality aside for just a little 
while to tend to other projects, but I am 
certainly interested.  I will follow up.  Victor 
is perfectly correct, I must show what I claim.


BTW, for anyone trying to follow this discussion, 
two different essays by Ilyenkov are quoted in 
Victor's post, both available on the internet at:

http://www.marxists.org/archive/ilyenkov/index.htm

The main essay Victor and I have been debating interpretations of is:
The Concept of the Ideal
http://www.marxists.org/archive/ilyenkov/works/ideal/ideal.htm

This essay appeared in the book Problems of 
Dialectical Materialism; Progress Publishers, 
1977 and was scanned by Andy Blunden.  The 
numbering both Victor and I have been using 
refers to the sequence of 142 paragraphs in that 
essay.  In Victor's 6/26 post, he quotes from paragraphs 49, 50 and 51.


I have an important side point to bring up about 
this essay.  In my scrutiny of this on-line 
version, the only version I have, I believe there 
are some scanning errors and possibly some 
original translation errors to contend 
with.  There is also some reason to wonder if the 
original Russian that the translation was based 
on may also contain editorial errors.  In other 
words, this version must be read with caution, 
and if something does not make sense, it may not 
be Ilyenkov's original writing.  I bring this up 
because there are a handful of places in the 
essay where publishing errors like these seem to 
contribute to confusion over what Ilyenkov was really saying.


In his 6/26 post Victor also quotes Ilyenkov 
using paragraph numbers  57, 58, 59, 
60.  However, these are from a different essay - 
chapter 8 in DIALECTICAL LOGIC (1974), Part Two ­ 
Problems of the Marxist-Leninist Theory of Dialectics

8: The Materialist Conception of Thought as the Subject Matter of Logic
http://www.marxists.org/archive/ilyenkov/works/essays/essay8.htm

The scanned book is Dialectical Logic, Essays on 
its History and Theory; Progress Publishers, 
1977; English translation 1977 by H. Campbell 
Creighton; Transcribed: Andy Blunden; HTML Markup: Andy Blunden.


BTW, these paragraphs (found on pages 285-288) 
are from the same essay Victor mentioned on 5/26 
and I quoted from on 5/30, and which were 
discussed a little on this list.  The question of 
the ideal is a major topic of this essay and I 
agree with Victor that it should be discussed in 
conjunction with the Concept of the Ideal essay 
when we take this topic up again.


The philosophical work we are doing here is to 
try to untangle the ideal and the material, 
closely studying Ilyenkov's work on this complex 
question in doing so.  In the process, it seems 
we should also seek to keep untangled which 
citation by our philosopher-teacher we are talking about.


:-))
Best,
~ Steve




___
At 07:32 PM 6/26/2005 +0200, Oudeyis (Victor) wrote:


- Original Message - From: "Steve Gabosch" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
To: "Forum for the discussion of theoretical 
issues raised by Karl Marx and thethinkers he 
inspired" 

Sent: Sunday, June 26, 2005 12:40
Subject: Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] O, Dialectics! :Bakhurst



I am responding to a 6/22/2005 post from Victor, which I quote from.

The quote below is a good example of where I 
think Victor gets Ilyenkov wrong 180 
degrees.  In the general section of Ilyenkov's 
1977 essay "The Concept of the Ideal" that 
Victor quotes from, I believe Ilyenkov is 
making just the opposite point that Victor attributes to him.


Victor quotes Ilyenkov:
"Paragraph 53:  It is this fact, 
incidentally, that explains the persistent 
survival of such "semantic substitutions"; 
indeed, when we are talking about nature, we 
are obliged to make use of the available 
language of natural science, the "language of 
science" with its established and generally 
understood "meanings". It is this, 
specifically, which forms the basis of the 
arguments of logical positivism, which quite 
consciously identifies "nature" with the 
"language" in which people talk and write about nature.


Paragraph 54: It will be appreciated that 
the main difficulty and, therefore, the main 
problem of philosophy is not to distinguish 
and counterpose everything that is "in the 
consciousness of the individual" to everything 
that is outside this individual consciousness 
(this is hardly ever difficult to do), but to 
delimit the world of collectively acknowledged 
notions, that is, the whole socially organised 
world of intellectual culture with all its 
stable and materially established universal 
patterns, and the real world as it exists 
outside and apart from its expression in these 
socially legitimised forms of "experience&quo

Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] O, Dialectics! :Bakhurst

[Victor]

- Original Message - 
From: "Steve Gabosch" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
To: "Forum for the discussion of theoretical issues raised by Karl Marx and 
thethinkers he inspired" 

Sent: Sunday, June 26, 2005 12:40
Subject: Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] O, Dialectics! :Bakhurst



I am responding to a 6/22/2005 post from Victor, which I quote from.

The quote below is a good example of where I think Victor gets Ilyenkov 
wrong 180 degrees.  In the general section of Ilyenkov's 1977 essay "The 
Concept of the Ideal" that Victor quotes from, I believe Ilyenkov is 
making just the opposite point that Victor attributes to him.


Victor quotes Ilyenkov:
"Paragraph 53:  It is this fact, incidentally, that explains the 
persistent survival of such "semantic substitutions"; indeed, when we are 
talking about nature, we are obliged to make use of the available language 
of natural science, the "language of science" with its established and 
generally understood "meanings". It is this, specifically, which forms the 
basis of the arguments of logical positivism, which quite consciously 
identifies "nature" with the "language" in which people talk and write 
about nature.


Paragraph 54: It will be appreciated that the main difficulty and, 
therefore, the main problem of philosophy is not to distinguish and 
counterpose everything that is "in the consciousness of the individual" to 
everything that is outside this individual consciousness (this is hardly 
ever difficult to do), but to delimit the world of collectively 
acknowledged notions, that is, the whole socially organised world of 
intellectual culture with all its stable and materially established 
universal patterns, and the real world as it exists outside and apart from 
its expression in these socially legitimised forms of "experience". 
(Ilyenkov The Concept of the Ideal 1977)



Victor comments:
The delimitation of what Ilyenkov calls the "whole socially organised 
world of intellectual culture" and the "real world as it exists outside 
and apart from its expression in these socially legitimised forms of 
"experience." can only be based on the distinction between the socially 
learned and confirmed concepts or ideas of the tribe and the concepts 
formulated by reflecting on practical material activity, i.e. labour 
activity: the operations carried out, the physical and material response 
of the instruments and material of production to these activities and 
finally the effectivity of the operations relative to their purposes.


Victor says the delimitation that Ilyenkov makes (I am adding ...'s to 
make Victor's complex sentence a little more readable) "can only be based 
on the distinction"  "between the socially learned and confirmed 
concepts or ideas of the tribe" ... and  ... "the concepts formulated by 
reflecting on practical material activity, i.e. labour activity: the 
operations carried out, the physical and material response of the 
instruments and material of production to these activities and finally the 
effectivity of the operations relative to their purposes."


But this is decidedly *not* the distinction Ilyenkov makes.

The essential discussion we are having here is over this question: where, 
precisely, is the boundary between ideality and materiality?


Victor draws the boundary between socially learned concepts, on one hand, 
and conceptualizing practical activity/carrying out practical activity/the 
consequences of practical activity - on the other.


Ilyenkov draws a very different distinction.  Ilyenkov is investigating 
the distinction - and he refers to this as the "main problem of 
philosophy" - between the "whole socially organised world of intellectual 
culture" and "the real world as it exists outside and apart from" this.


I believe I can draw on Ilyenkov, and: a) show where Ilyenkov makes his 
distinction between the ideal and the real and b) demonstrate that Victor 
is committing the very idealist error that Ilyenkov criticizes Hegel and 
Bogdanov for making.  In the essay "The Concept of the Ideal," my 
annotations offer the subtitles "Hegel's Concept of the Ideal" to 
paragraphs 45-49, "The Secret Twist of Idealism" to paragraphs 50-53, and 
"The Distinction Between the Ideal and the Real" to paragraphs 54-57. 
Interestingly, my reading of Victor's writings on the question of the 
ideal, such as in the quote above, is that his concept of the ideal is 
much closer to Hegel's than Ilyenkov's or Marx's, he is actually 
performing the same kind of "secret twist of idealism" that Ilyenkov 
attributes to Hegel and others, and Victor's distinction or boundary 
between the ideal and the real is not consistent with Ilyenkov's.


It'

Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] O, Dialectics! :Bakhurst

[Victor]

This is going to take a little time, you raised some heavy questions here.
Oudeyis
- Original Message - 
From: "Ralph Dumain" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>

To: 
Sent: Wednesday, June 22, 2005 17:17
Subject: Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] O, Dialectics! :Bakhurst



At 02:12 PM 6/22/2005 +0200, Victor wrote:

Hegel regards objectification as simply the alienation of spirit in the
object.  The ideal itself is the alienated spirit that has become a
universal through the mediation of language.  True, I've not addressed the
problem of whether Hegel regarded labour activity (transformation of the
ideal as consciousness joined with language forms by its expression in
labour activity) but if I recall correctly he does not really concern
himself with this problem. The question of the effect, if any, of labour
activity on the ideal certainly does not appear in the Logic. Marx in his
1844 Critique of Hegelian Philosophy takes Hegel to task for regarding the
nature that becomes the subject of logos as the abstracted nature of
theory rather than the material nature external to intellect.  It is
however an interesting question, and I would appreciate any additional
information on this.  Meanwhile I'll do some investigation on my own.


I can't help you answer my question, but it _is_ the question (Hegel's
specific view of labor activity) which you did not clearly address in your
exposition.


Hegel wrote quite a bit on labour, but it appears that most of his
commentary on the subject is in regards to its social rather than
epistemological role.  The master-slave stuff from the Phenomenology and his
discourses on the Korporations and such in his Philosophy of Right.  See
Ashton's interesting discussion on the subject in the MIA:
www.marxists.org/reference/archive/hegel/txt/ashton.htm

Hegel's discussion of the relation of the ideal to life is about as close as
one can get to a Hegelian epistemology of the relation of
the ideal to the practical:

Interestingly, but expectedly, the resemblances and differences between
Hegel and Marx's concepts of the practical are exactly paralleled in those 
of

their respective concepts of the ideal.  Ilyenkov describes Marx as adopting
the meaning or essence of Hegel's ideal  but revising Hegel's
concept of ideality:

61.  In Capital Marx quite consciously uses the term "ideal" in this formal
meaning that it was given by Hegel, and not in the sense in which it was
used by the whole pre-Hegelian tradition, including Kant, although the
philosophical-theoretical interpretation of the range of phenomena which in
both cases is similarly designated "ideal" is diametrically opposed to its
Hegelian interpretation. The meaning of the term "ideal" in Marx and Hegel
is the same, but the concepts, i.e., the ways of understanding this "same"
meaning are profoundly different. After all, the word "concept" in
dialectically interpreted logic is a synonym for understanding of the
essence of the matter, the essence of phenomena which are only outlined by a
given term; it is by no means a synonym for "the meaning of the term", which
may be formally interpreted as the sum-total of "attributes" of the
phenomena to which the term is applied." Concept of the Ideal 1977)

Hegel describes the ideal as the reification of human activity, i.e. the
embodiment of activity - "pure activity", "pure form-creating activity"in
the form of a thing.  Hegel's explanation of the relation of activity to its
objective form is, of course, his theory of activities as a function
conceptualised (objective) social ideas that describe and circumscribe
ethical social life.  To explain how concepts become material activity Hegel
describes the production of activity as the consequences of the operations
of consciousness and will. Consciousness and will are the "transcendental"
pattern of the psyche and the will that realises the ideal form, the ideal
form being the law that guides man's consciousness and will, as the
objectively compulsory pattern of consciously willed activity.

While Marx adopts the essence of the Hegelian ideal as the embodiment or
reification of activity as social practice, he regards the ideal as a
product of activity rather than as its law and guide.  Take for example the
ideal concept of Value: " Value-form is understood in Capital precisely as
the reified form (represented as, or "representing", the thing, the
relationship of things) of social human life activity. Directly it does
present itself to us as the "physically palpable" embodiment of something
"other", but this "other" cannot be some physically palpable matter... in
the sphere of economic activity this substance was, naturally, decoded as
labour, as man's physical labour transforming the physical body of nature,
while "valu

Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] O, Dialectics! :Bakhurst

[Steve Gabosch]

I am responding to a 6/22/2005 post from Victor, which I quote from.

The quote below is a good example of where I think Victor gets Ilyenkov 
wrong 180 degrees.  In the general section of Ilyenkov's 1977 essay "The 
Concept of the Ideal" that Victor quotes from, I believe Ilyenkov is making 
just the opposite point that Victor attributes to him.


Victor quotes Ilyenkov:
"Paragraph 53:  It is this fact, incidentally, that explains the 
persistent survival of such "semantic substitutions"; indeed, when we are 
talking about nature, we are obliged to make use of the available language 
of natural science, the "language of science" with its established and 
generally understood "meanings". It is this, specifically, which forms the 
basis of the arguments of logical positivism, which quite consciously 
identifies "nature" with the "language" in which people talk and write 
about nature.


Paragraph 54: It will be appreciated that the main difficulty and, 
therefore, the main problem of philosophy is not to distinguish and 
counterpose everything that is "in the consciousness of the individual" to 
everything that is outside this individual consciousness (this is hardly 
ever difficult to do), but to delimit the world of collectively 
acknowledged notions, that is, the whole socially organised world of 
intellectual culture with all its stable and materially established 
universal patterns, and the real world as it exists outside and apart from 
its expression in these socially legitimised forms of "experience". 
(Ilyenkov The Concept of the Ideal 1977)



Victor comments:
The delimitation of what Ilyenkov calls the "whole socially organised 
world of intellectual culture" and the "real world as it exists outside 
and apart from its expression in these socially legitimised forms of 
"experience." can only be based on the distinction between the socially 
learned and confirmed concepts or ideas of the tribe and the concepts 
formulated by reflecting on practical material activity, i.e. labour 
activity: the operations carried out, the physical and material response 
of the instruments and material of production to these activities and 
finally the effectivity of the operations relative to their purposes.


Victor says the delimitation that Ilyenkov makes (I am adding ...'s to make 
Victor's complex sentence a little more readable) "can only be based on the 
distinction"  "between the socially learned and confirmed concepts or 
ideas of the tribe" ... and  ... "the concepts formulated by reflecting on 
practical material activity, i.e. labour activity: the operations carried 
out, the physical and material response of the instruments and material of 
production to these activities and finally the effectivity of the 
operations relative to their purposes."


But this is decidedly *not* the distinction Ilyenkov makes.

The essential discussion we are having here is over this question: where, 
precisely, is the boundary between ideality and materiality?


Victor draws the boundary between socially learned concepts, on one hand, 
and conceptualizing practical activity/carrying out practical activity/the 
consequences of practical activity - on the other.


Ilyenkov draws a very different distinction.  Ilyenkov is investigating the 
distinction - and he refers to this as the "main problem of philosophy" - 
between the "whole socially organised world of intellectual culture" and 
"the real world as it exists outside and apart from" this.


I believe I can draw on Ilyenkov, and: a) show where Ilyenkov makes his 
distinction between the ideal and the real and b) demonstrate that Victor 
is committing the very idealist error that Ilyenkov criticizes Hegel and 
Bogdanov for making.  In the essay "The Concept of the Ideal," my 
annotations offer the subtitles "Hegel's Concept of the Ideal" to 
paragraphs 45-49, "The Secret Twist of Idealism" to paragraphs 50-53, and 
"The Distinction Between the Ideal and the Real" to paragraphs 
54-57.  Interestingly, my reading of Victor's writings on the question of 
the ideal, such as in the quote above, is that his concept of the ideal is 
much closer to Hegel's than Ilyenkov's or Marx's, he is actually performing 
the same kind of "secret twist of idealism" that Ilyenkov attributes to 
Hegel and others, and Victor's distinction or boundary between the ideal 
and the real is not consistent with Ilyenkov's.


None of my opinions or claims, of course, negate Victor's good advice and 
inspiration to me to study and make copious notes about the other books 
Ilyenkov has in English, as well as study relevant writings by Marx, Lenin, 
and Hegel.  Nor do my philosophically sharp criticisms of what I perceive 
as erroneous interpretations by Victor of Ilyenkov's theory of the ideal 
take away from the respect and admiration I have for Victor's many 
intellectual accomplishments, which I have been privileged to learn much 
from in various internet venues.  In all worthwhile discus

Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] O, Dialectics! :Bakhurst

[Victor]

- Original Message - 
From: "Charles Brown" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
To: "'Forum for the discussion of theoretical issues raised by Karl Marx 
andthe thinkers he inspired'" 

Sent: Wednesday, June 22, 2005 17:38
Subject: [Marxism-Thaxis] O, Dialectics! :Bakhurst



Victor:
Ilyenkov (and I suggest Marx as well) argue that the ideal originates as a
tool for regulation of social life and only later is appropriated 
(hijacked

may be too strong a word) to the purposes of describing material reality
(labour activity).


> CB: I'm not so sure about this. At the origin of the ideal, symboling, 
> the

"social" and social labor are all kind of one big thing together. There
isn't the separation between "social life" and "labour activity" implied
above. The origin of humanly unique labor is in its sociality. The leap in
productivity of human labor is due precisely to its increased sociality. 
The

ideal thrives at its origin in human society _because_ it allows expansion
of the sociality or socialness exponentially and qualitatively.


I'm not sure of it either.

However, it appears to me that we can distinguish social labour, direct 
cooperation, from characteristically human labour, that is social labour 
that is special since it involves the production and use of tools for 
realization of material social goals.  This distinction allows us to talk 
about the simplest and most abstract kinds of ideality as being pre or 
proto-human.  It also appears to me that labour has to be social before it 
can be instrumental, i.e. involve the development of social practices of 
making and use of tools.


Of course once men make and use tools they expand their labour practice and 
thereby the inventory of objectified activities embodied in idealities, and 
thereby make culture a universal of human life activity.



The ideal doesn't just regulate social life,though it does that. The idea
allows expansion of the amount and qualitity of social connections through
expanded communication.

The word "communication" is perfect here. The ideal allows creation of the
original communes.


Agreed.
Oudeyis

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Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] O, Dialectics! :Bakhurst

[Victor]

- Original Message - 
From: "Ralph Dumain" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>

To: 
Sent: Wednesday, June 22, 2005 17:45
Subject: Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] O, Dialectics! :Bakhurst



At 11:18 AM 6/22/2005 +0200, Victor wrote:

This is pure Ilyenkov.  He uses this argument to explain how
ethical/cultural descriptions are given the status of statements on
Nature. For example a statement that nature provides man with a natural
calendar in the yearly solar and lunar cycles, a natural compass in the
North star and a clock in the revolution of the zodiac and the daily
changes of position of the sun are all pseudo-scientific statements about
nature that accord to humanly created instruments the status of natural
phenomena.  On the one hand they accord to nature the tool-making faculty
of man and on the other anthropomorphize nature imparting to it the
purposes of men.


I have a vague idea of what you're getting at, but the logic of this
argument escapes me.  Calendars, compasses, and the movements of heavenly
bodies as time markers are human conceptual or material artifacts built up
on objective realities.  The meaning of the word 'natural' in your
sentence above is not sufficiently specific to enable determination as to
whether this is anthropomorphizing nature.  None of these assertions would
be considered scientific statements by anyone.  They are metaphorical
expressions.  It well may be 'natural' for us to orient ourselves to
natural phenomena in this way, even though 'nature' didn't intend for us
to do this.



The logic of the argument:

1. Calendars, compasses, and clocks are human idealities (material 
representations of concepts) that objectify the active division of duration
into hierarchies of commensurable units. The function of these concepts and 
the material forms embodying them is as a means for imaging and transmitting 
information about the timing, sequence, and duration of activities essential 
for coordinating  objective collaborative operations.


2. Regular celestial phenomena used to indicate regular units of time are 
not self-evident natural phenomena.  All represent selection of some
objective celestial phenomena over others because of the appropriateness of 
their regular manifestations to the particular social requirements to be 
fulfilled by their use.  As with the use of gold as a universal commodity of 
trade, the determination of the utility of a celestial regularity is a
function of the fitness of its duration as useful units for temporal 
organization of social activity.  The orientation of human time measuring 
practice to regular natural occurrences is natural is only true to the 
extent that all human social practice has its ultimate origins in pre or 
proto-intellectual conditions.


3.The concept of  clock, compass, or calendar as having their origins in 
nature were not invented by me.  They are common usage and reflect the 
normal human practice of treating ideality as identical to material reality:
"Ideality" in general is in the historically formed language of philosophy a 
characteristic of the materially established (objectivised, materialised, 
reified) images of human social culture, that is, the historically formed 
modes of human social life, which confront the individual possessing 
consciousness and will as a special "supernatural" objective reality, as a 
special object comparable with material reality and situated on one and the 
same spatial plane (and hence often identified with it)." (Ilyenkov 1977 
Concept of the Ideal, paragraph 42)
Marx's discussion of the common interpretation of reified social practice as 
natural phenomena may be found in Capital, Chapter 1, Section 4, "The 
Fetishism of Commodities and the Secret Thereof"


4. I'm not familiar enough with the relevant fields to discuss whether the 
transmutation of reified social practices of measuring duration are or are 
not incorporated into scientific theory, but I have no problem arguing that 
the identification of reified social productive practice with natural 
(material) reality forms a basis for most modern economic theory starting 
with game theory and extending into virtually every nook and cranny of this 
supposedly scientific field.



The delimitation of what Ilyenkov calls the "whole socially organised
world of intellectual culture" and the "real world as it exists outside
and apart from its expression in these socially legitimised forms of
"experience." can only be based on the distinction between the socially
learned and confirmed concepts or ideas of the tribe and the concepts
formulated by reflecting on practical material activity, i.e. labour
activity: the operations carried out, the physical and material response
of the instruments and material of production to these activities and
finally the effectivity of the operations relative to their purposes.


I&

Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] O, Dialectics! :Bakhurst

[Ralph Dumain]

At 11:18 AM 6/22/2005 +0200, Victor wrote:
This is pure Ilyenkov.  He uses this argument to explain how 
ethical/cultural descriptions are given the status of statements on 
Nature. For example a statement that nature provides man with a natural 
calendar in the yearly solar and lunar cycles, a natural compass in the 
North star and a clock in the revolution of the zodiac and the daily 
changes of position of the sun are all pseudo-scientific statements about 
nature that accord to humanly created instruments the status of natural 
phenomena.  On the one hand they accord to nature the tool-making faculty 
of man and on the other anthropomorphize nature imparting to it the 
purposes of men.


I have a vague idea of what you're getting at, but the logic of this 
argument escapes me.  Calendars, compasses, and the movements of heavenly 
bodies as time markers are human conceptual or material artifacts built up 
on objective realities.  The meaning of the word 'natural' in your sentence 
above is not sufficiently specific to enable determination as to whether 
this is anthropomorphizing nature.  None of these assertions would be 
considered scientific statements by anyone.  They are metaphorical 
expressions.  It well may be 'natural' for us ot orient ourselves to 
natural phenomena in this way, even though 'nature' didn't intend for us to 
do this.


The delimitation of what Ilyenkov calls the "whole socially organised 
world of intellectual culture" and the "real world as it exists outside 
and apart from its expression in these socially legitimised forms of 
"experience." can only be based on the distinction between the socially 
learned and confirmed concepts or ideas of the tribe and the concepts 
formulated by reflecting on practical material activity, i.e. labour 
activity: the operations carried out, the physical and material response 
of the instruments and material of production to these activities and 
finally the effectivity of the operations relative to their purposes.


I'm having trouble understanding this sentence.  Furthermore, this constant 
use of phrases such as 'labor activity', 'production',  'practical material 
activity' unfortunately fail to characterize the nature of scientific 
research and theory construction.


 "the representation of scientific knowledge involves "hijacking" the 
mode of representation of ethos and using it to represent theories 
regarding the universal laws etc. involved in the practical realization 
of ideas through labour and regarding the relevance of these laws to the 
work at hand."
Let's put it this way.  When we produce scientific theory the rational 
process for reflecting upon labour activity, i.e. the dialectical process 
and the tools we use to describe the outcomes of thought to others, i.e. 
language forms are exactly the same used by the idealist philosopher in 
his investigation and proclaimations concerning the ethical life and by 
the theologian in his construction and revelation of the true nature of 
god. The essential difference is in the subject of our rational activity 
and, social expression.


Ilyenkov (and I suggest Marx as well) argue that the ideal originates as a 
tool for regulation of social life and only later is appropriated 
(hijacked may be too strong a word) to the purposes of describing material 
reality (labour activity).


Does that help?


No.  To me this is nonsense.  I have an especial dislike for this sentence:

Ilyenkov (and I suggest Marx as well) argue that the ideal originates as a 
tool for regulation of social life and only later is appropriated 
(hijacked may be too strong a word) to the purposes of describing material 
reality (labour activity).




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Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] O, Dialectics! :Bakhurst

[Ralph Dumain]

At 02:12 PM 6/22/2005 +0200, Victor wrote:
Hegel regards objectification as simply the alienation of spirit in the 
object.  The ideal itself is the alienated spirit that has become a 
universal through the mediation of language.  True, I've not addressed the 
problem of whether Hegel regarded labour activity (transformation of the 
ideal as consciousness joined with language forms by its expression in 
labour activity) but if I recall correctly he does not really concern 
himself with this problem. The question of the effect, if any, of labour 
activity on the ideal certainly does not appear in the Logic. Marx in his 
1844 Critique of Hegelian Philosophy takes Hegel to task for regarding the 
nature that becomes the subject of logos as the abstracted nature of 
theory rather than the material nature external to intellect.  It is 
however an interesting question, and I would appreciate any additional 
information on this.  Meanwhile I'll do some investigation on my own.


I can't help you answer my question, but it _is_ the question (Hegel's 
specific view of labor activity) which you did not clearly address in your 
exposition.


In respect to the relation between reason and nature for sure (see above). 
While it is true that the laws and principles that govern material 
practice directed towards the realization of the objectives of labour 
activity are abstract theoretical representations they or at least their 
application are subject to the test of nature which is not dependent 
solely on human knowledge but also involves phenomena that is entirely 
indifferent to the intellectual creations of men.


How does this differ from Hegel's view?  Hegel as an inheritor of idealist 
tradition would not express himself this way, but presumably he has a way 
of accounting for the testing of our subjective notions about nature.


Thus theory, even natural science theory, can never precisely describe 
actual labour activity if only because the natural conditions confronting 
labour are in a constant state of change. Thus the natural laws or 
application of natural laws incorporated into the design of any given 
labour activity will never be exactly  those encountered in the course of 
actual labour activity.


This is what bugs me about your conception of scientific theory, which is 
not about labor activity.  I don't like this way of expressing things.


 This, by the way, is how Lenin regards Engels theory of freedom and 
necessity in human activity.
"Secondly, Engels does not attempt to contrive "definitions" of freedom 
and necessity, the kind of scholastic definition with which the 
reactionary professors (like Avenarius) and their disciples (like 
Bogdanov) are most concerned. Engels takes the knowledge and will of man, 
on the one hand, and the necessity of nature, on the other, and instead of 
giving definitions, simply says that the necessity of nature is primary, 
and human will and mind secondary. The latter must necessarily and 
inevitably adapt themselves to the former. Engels regards this as so 
obvious that he does not waste words explaining his view. It needs the 
Russian Machians to complain of Engels' general definition of materialism 
(that nature is primary and mind secondary; remember Bogdanov's 
"perplexity" on this point!), and at the same time to regard one of the 
particular applications by Engels of this general and fundamental 
definition as "wonderful" and "remarkably apt"!


Thirdly, Engels does not doubt the existence of "blind necessity." He 
admits the existence of a necessity unknown to man. This is quite obvious 
from the passage just quoted. But how, from the standpoint of the 
Machians, can man know   of the existence of what he does not know? Is it 
not "mysticism," "metaphysics," the admission of "fetishes" and "idols," 
is it not the "Kantian unknowable thing-in-itself" to say that we know of 
the existence of an unknown necessity? Had the Machians given the matter 
any thought they could not have failed to observe the complete identity 
between Engels' argument on the knowability of the objective nature of 
things and on the transformation of "things-in-themselves" into 
"things-for-us," on the one hand, and his argument on a blind, unknown 
necessity, on the other. The development of con-sciousness in each human 
individual and the development of the collective knowledge of humanity at 
large presents us at every step with examples of the transformation of the 
unknown "thing-in-itself" into the known "thing-for-us," of the 
transformation of blind, unknown necessity, "necessity-in-itself," into 
the known "necessity-for-us." Epistemologically, there is no difference 
whatever between these two transformations, for the basic point of view in 
both cases is the same, viz., materialistic, the recognition of the 
objective reality of the external world and of the laws of external 
nature, and of the fact that this world and these laws are fully knowable 
to man but can never 

[Marxism-Thaxis] O, Dialectics! :Bakhurst

[Charles Brown]

Victor:
Ilyenkov (and I suggest Marx as well) argue that the ideal originates as a
tool for regulation of social life and only later is appropriated (hijacked
may be too strong a word) to the purposes of describing material reality
(labour activity).



CB: I'm not so sure about this. At the origin of the ideal, symboling, the
"social" and social labor are all kind of one big thing together. There
isn't the separation between "social life" and "labour activity" implied
above. The origin of humanly unique labor is in its sociality. The leap in
productivity of human labor is due precisely to its increased sociality. The
ideal thrives at its origin in human society _because_ it allows expansion
of the sociality or socialness exponentially and qualitatively.

The ideal doesn't just regulate social life,though it does that. The idea
allows expansion of the amount and qualitity of social connections through
expanded communication.

The word "communication" is perfect here. The ideal allows creation of the
original communes.


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Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] O, Dialectics! :Bakhurst

[Victor]

Comments on the commentary included below.
- Original Message - 
From: "Ralph Dumain" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>

To: 
Sent: Wednesday, June 22, 2005 10:25
Subject: Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] O, Dialectics! :Bakhurst



Comments to selected extracts below

At 01:43 PM 6/19/2005 +0200, Victor wrote:
Ideality like spoken language is not one thing or another, but two things, 
the objectified notion in consciousness and its material representation by 
some form of language, united as a more concrete concept, the ideal. The 
ideal cannot just be a manifestation of consciousness (Dubrovsky's 
argument) in which case it would be a purely subjective product, at best 
the internal expression of the individuality of the thinker (whatever that 
might be). Nor can it be just the symbolic representation since this after 
all is ultimately just a thing, a material object.  It is only when 
consciousness is given material form by symbolic representation and the 
material artefact is made significant by its embodiment of conscious 
reflective thought that the ideal can be said to exist.


Fascinating.

.In short, ideality is expressed in a cultural artefact through 
human labour informed by the image of the object of his labour activity. 
For an idealist such as Hegel who regards human activity as beginning and 
ending with the ideal, the outcome of human labour is a simple 
materialization of the ideal.


I can see the Hegelian view that the empirical world is a materialization 
of Geist, but does Hegel make this specific claim about human labor?


Hegel regards objectification as simply the alienation of spirit in the 
object.  The ideal itself is the alienated spirit that has become a 
universal through the mediation of language.  True, I've not addressed the 
problem of whether Hegel regarded labour activity (transformation of the 
ideal as consciousness joined with language forms by its expression in 
labour activity) but if I recall correctly he does not really concern 
himself with this problem. The question of the effect, if any, of labour 
activity on the ideal certainly does not appear in the Logic. Marx in his 
1844 Critique of Hegelian Philosophy takes Hegel to task for regarding the 
nature that becomes the subject of logos as the abstracted nature of theory 
rather than the material nature external to intellect.  It is however an 
interesting question, and I would appreciate any additional information on 
this.  Meanwhile I'll do some investigation on my own.


For a Marxist materialist, labour practice involves far more than just the 
expression of the ideal in material form.  Labour activity involves the 
interaction between men as creatures of nature (you know; arms, legs, 
hands, eyes and things like that.) and nature and therefore the 
"intervention" of natural laws and principles that are external to the 
ideal and are entirely indifferent to the social conventions of mankind. 
Thus the outcome of labour is a considerably more complex product than the 
idealists would have us believe it is.


OK, but is Hegel's view really contravene your characterization of labor?
In respect to the relation between reason and nature for sure (see above). 
While it is true that the laws and principles that govern material practice 
directed towards the realization of the objectives of labour activity are 
abstract theoretical representations they or at least their application are 
subject to the test of nature which is not dependent solely on human 
knowledge but also involves phenomena that is entirely indifferent to the 
intellectual creations of men.   Thus theory, even natural science theory, 
can never precisely describe actual labour activity if only because the 
natural conditions confronting labour are in a constant state of change. 
Thus the natural laws or application of natural laws incorporated into the 
design of any given labour activity will never be exactly  those encountered 
in the course of actual labour activity.  This, by the way, is how Lenin 
regards Engels theory of freedom and necessity in human activity.
"Secondly, Engels does not attempt to contrive "definitions" of freedom and 
necessity, the kind of scholastic definition with which the reactionary 
professors (like Avenarius) and their disciples (like Bogdanov) are most 
concerned. Engels takes the knowledge and will of man, on the one hand, and 
the necessity of nature, on the other, and instead of giving definitions, 
simply says that the necessity of nature is primary, and human will and mind 
secondary. The latter must necessarily and inevitably adapt themselves to 
the former. Engels regards this as so obvious that he does not waste words 
explaining his view. It needs the Russian Machians to complain of Engels' 
general definition of materialism (that nature is primary and mind 
secondary; remember Bogdanov's "perplexity" on this point!), and

Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] O, Dialectics! :Bakhurst

[Victor]

I've isolated the difficult passages and commented on them below.
- Original Message - 
From: "Ralph Dumain" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>

To: 
Sent: Wednesday, June 22, 2005 10:16
Subject: Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] O, Dialectics! :Bakhurst


I am confused by this beyond the reasonably clear first and third sentences 
of the first paragraph and the first sentence of the second paragraph.


At 07:51 PM 6/20/2005 +0200, Victor wrote:
I regard Ilyenkov's contribution rather as the Logic (method or met) for a 
practical (materialist or natural science) of ethics (ethos).


There is a restriction as to what degree social relations are actually 
embodied in all cultural objects, this restriction being those imposed by 
the universal natural laws and principles as they apply to the interaction 
of labour, instruments and the subjects of production (materia, parts 
etc.) involved in the productive process.


It is the irreducible fact that production involves relations that are 
entirely indifferent to human social activity and to human consciousness 
collective
or otherwise that compromises any hypothesis that artefacts may be the 
'representations' of ideals or of social life.


You're right, 'representations' should be changed to "replications".  My 
problem here was how to respond to Bakhurst's argument that artefacts are 
ideal representations.


I would go further than this and argue that it is the very irreducibility 
of human labour to a simple replication of idealized objects that forms 
the material basis for the dynamics of human development and the 
indeterminism intrinsic to all human endeavor.


Ilyenkov by presenting a materialist theory of the ideal, the ideal as a 
product of men's "socialization" of productive experience be of his own 
labour or of mobilizing and controlling the labour of others, provides us 
with a model for explaining how practical activity becomes ethical 
activity.


This is extremely important not only to Marxist theory but to the general 
model of historical development, since the ideal as the means whereby men 
coordinate their activity with others is not the creative activity that 
enables

human adaptation to world conditions.


Less than crystal clear, but in essence correct.  The first part "the 
general model of historical development" refers to the serious difficulties 
reconciling synchronic and diachronic theories of culture history common to 
the whole body of social theory (including orthodox Marxism).  The second 
part of the sentence specifies that the problem with these theories is that 
they fail to distinguish, as does Ilyenkov between ethical theory and 
natural scientific theory or in other words theory regarding correct social 
practice and theory regarding effective labour activity.


It more than any other theory of social life explains the contradiction 
implicit in 'adaptively'; conservation of historical developments together 
with creative modification of labour and means of production in response to 
changing natural conditions.


'Adaptively' is a typo it should be "adaptivity".
Adaptation is a dialectic process in which  past historical developments are 
sublated in the creative response of labour activity to changing natural 
conditions.



Oudeyis



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Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] O, Dialectics! :Bakhurst

[Victor]

The originals were certainly rubbish and needed revision.  Your objections 
to the revisions need to be explained.
- Original Message - 
From: "Ralph Dumain" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>

To: 
Sent: Wednesday, June 22, 2005 10:11
Subject: Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] O, Dialectics! :Bakhurst


As I see it, your clarifications are even more nonsensical than your 
original statements.


 "Science is the representation of reflections on practical labour 
activity rather than on social activity."


 "Comment: it is the identity of the means of representation of ethics and 
of science both in conscious thought and in material symbolical form that 
is the source of confusion regarding the distinction between the ideal and 
the real."


This is pure Ilyenkov.  He uses this argument to explain how 
ethical/cultural descriptions are given the status of statements on Nature. 
For example a statement that nature provides man with a natural calendar in 
the yearly solar and lunar cycles, a natural compass in the North star and a 
clock in the revolution of the zodiac and the daily changes of position of 
the sun are all pseudo-scientific statements about nature that accord to 
humanly created instruments the status of natural phenomena.  On the one 
hand they accord to nature the tool-making faculty of man and on the other 
anthropomorphize nature imparting to it the purposes of men.


"Paragraph 53:  It is this fact, incidentally, that explains the 
persistent survival of such "semantic substitutions"; indeed, when we are 
talking about nature, we are obliged to make use of the available language 
of natural science, the "language of science" with its established and 
generally understood "meanings". It is this, specifically, which forms the 
basis of the arguments of logical positivism, which quite consciously 
identifies "nature" with the "language" in which people talk and write about 
nature.


Paragraph 54: It will be appreciated that the main difficulty and, 
therefore, the main problem of philosophy is not to distinguish and 
counterpose everything that is "in the consciousness of the individual" to 
everything that is outside this individual consciousness (this is hardly 
ever difficult to do), but to delimit the world of collectively acknowledged 
notions, that is, the whole socially organised world of intellectual culture 
with all its stable and materially established universal patterns, and the 
real world as it exists outside and apart from its expression in these 
socially legitimised forms of "experience". (Ilyenkov The Concept of the 
Ideal 1977)




The delimitation of what Ilyenkov calls the "whole socially organised world 
of intellectual culture" and the "real world as it exists outside and apart 
from its expression in these socially legitimised forms of "experience." can 
only be based on the distinction between the socially learned and confirmed 
concepts or ideas of the tribe and the concepts formulated by reflecting on 
practical material activity, i.e. labour activity: the operations carried 
out, the physical and material response of the instruments and material of 
production to these activities and finally the effectivity of the operations 
relative to their purposes.



 "the representation of scientific knowledge involves "hijacking" the mode 
of representation of ethos and using it to represent theories regarding 
the universal laws etc. involved in the practical realization of ideas 
through labour and regarding the relevance of these laws to the work at 
hand."


Let's put it this way.  When we produce scientific theory the rational 
process for reflecting upon labour activity, i.e. the dialectical process 
and the tools we use to describe the outcomes of thought to others, i.e. 
language forms are exactly the same used by the idealist philosopher in his 
investigation and proclaimations concerning the ethical life and by the 
theologian in his construction and revelation of the true nature of god. 
The essential difference is in the subject of our rational activity and, 
social expression.


Ilyenkov (and I suggest Marx as well) argue that the ideal originates as a 
tool for regulation of social life and only later is appropriated (hijacked 
may be too strong a word) to the purposes of describing material reality 
(labour activity).


Does that help?

Utter nonsense!  You started out with something original to say and now 
you're sabotaging your own efforts with this gibberish.


At 10:46 AM 6/21/2005 +0200, Victor wrote:


- Original Message - From: "Ralph Dumain" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
To: 
Sent: Tuesday, June 21, 2005 10:17
Subject: Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] O, Dialectics! :Bakhurst



What in bloody hell does this mean?

At 09:32 AM 6/21/2005 +0200, Victor wrote:
Science is founded as ideas, but

Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] O, Dialectics! :Bakhurst

[Ralph Dumain]

Comments to selected extracts below

At 01:43 PM 6/19/2005 +0200, Victor wrote:
Ideality like spoken language is not one thing or another, but two things, 
the objectified notion in consciousness and its material representation by 
some form of language, united as a more concrete concept, the ideal. The 
ideal cannot just be a manifestation of consciousness (Dubrovsky's 
argument) in which case it would be a purely subjective product, at best 
the internal expression of the individuality of the thinker (whatever that 
might be). Nor can it be just the symbolic representation since this after 
all is ultimately just a thing, a material object.  It is only when 
consciousness is given material form by symbolic representation and the 
material artefact is made significant by its embodiment of conscious 
reflective thought that the ideal can be said to exist.


Fascinating.

.In short, ideality is expressed in a cultural artefact through 
human labour informed by the image of the object of his labour 
activity.  For an idealist such as Hegel who regards human activity as 
beginning and ending with the ideal, the outcome of human labour is a 
simple materialization of the ideal.


I can see the Hegelian view that the empirical world is a materialization 
of Geist, but does Hegel make this specific claim about human labor?


For a Marxist materialist, labour practice involves far more than just the 
expression of the ideal in material form.  Labour activity involves the 
interaction between men as creatures of nature (you know; arms, legs, 
hands, eyes and things like that.) and nature and therefore the 
"intervention" of natural laws and principles that are external to the 
ideal and are entirely indifferent to the social conventions of 
mankind.  Thus the outcome of labour is a considerably more complex 
product than the idealists would have us believe it is.


OK, but is Hegel's view really contravene your characterization of labor?


"I would also add here that not only is production a unity of 
consciousness (ideality) and physical/sensual activity, but so too is the 
acquisition of labour skills.
A person cannot pass the ideal as such to another person, as the pure form 
of activity. One can observe the activity of a painter or an engineer as 
long as one likes, striving to catch their mode of action, the form of 
their activity, but one can thus only copy the external techniques and 
methods of their work but never the ideal image itself, the active faculty 
itself. The ideal, as the form of subjective activity, is only masterable 
through active operation with the object and product of this activity, 
i.e. through the form of its product, through the objective form of the 
thing, through its active disobjectification. The ideal image of objective 
reality therefore also only exists as the form (mode, image) of living 
activity, coordinated with the form of its object, but not as a thing, not 
as a materially fixed state or structure." (Ilyenkov Dialectical Logic 
Chapter 8 paragraph 50)


Fascinating.


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Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] O, Dialectics! :Bakhurst

[Ralph Dumain]

I am confused by this beyond the reasonably clear first and third sentences 
of the first paragraph and the first sentence of the second paragraph.


At 07:51 PM 6/20/2005 +0200, Victor wrote:
I regard Ilyenkov's contribution rather as the Logic (method or met) for a 
practical (materialist or natural science) of ethics (ethos).


There is a restriction as to what degree social relations are actually 
embodied in all cultural objects, this restriction being those imposed by 
the universal natural laws and principles as they apply to the interaction 
of labour, instruments and the subjects of production (materia, parts 
etc.) involved in the productive process.  It is the irreducible fact that 
production involves relations that are entirely indifferent to human 
social activity and to human consciousness collective or otherwise that 
compromises any hypothesis that artefacts may be the representations of 
ideals or of social life.  I would go further than this and argue that it 
is the very irreducibility of human labour to a simple replication of 
idealized objects that forms the material basis for the dynamics of human 
development and the indeterminism intrinsic to all human endeavor.


Ilyenkov by presenting a materialist theory of the ideal, the ideal as a 
product of men's "socialization" of productive experience be of his own 
labour or of mobilizing and controlling the labour of others, provides us 
with a model for explaining how practical activity becomes ethical 
activity. This is extremely important not only to Marxist theory but to 
the general model of historical development, since the ideal as the means 
whereby men coordinate their activity with others is not the creative 
activity that enables human adaptation to world conditions. It more than 
any other theory of social life explains the contradiction implicit in 
adaptively; conservation of historical developments together with creative 
modification of labour and means of production in response to changing 
natural conditions.

Oudeyis



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Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] O, Dialectics! :Bakhurst

[Ralph Dumain]

As I see it, your clarifications are even more nonsensical than your 
original statements.


 "Science is the representation of reflections on practical labour 
activity rather than on social activity."


 "Comment: it is the identity of the means of representation of ethics and 
of science both in conscious thought and in material symbolical form that 
is the source of confusion regarding the distinction between the ideal and 
the real."


 "the representation of scientific knowledge involves "hijacking" the mode 
of representation of ethos and using it to represent theories regarding the 
universal laws etc. involved in the practical realization of ideas through 
labour and regarding the relevance of these laws to the work at hand."


Utter nonsense!  You started out with something original to say and now 
you're sabotaging your own efforts with this gibberish.


At 10:46 AM 6/21/2005 +0200, Victor wrote:


- Original Message - From: "Ralph Dumain" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
To: 
Sent: Tuesday, June 21, 2005 10:17
Subject: Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] O, Dialectics! :Bakhurst



What in bloody hell does this mean?

At 09:32 AM 6/21/2005 +0200, Victor wrote:
Science is founded as ideas, but unlike Hegel's ideal (which as Marx put 
it is "as nothing else but the form of social activity represented in 
the thing or conversely the form of human creativity represented as a 
thing as an object") Science is the idea as a reflection on practical 
labour activity rather than on social activity.

-
Sorry, wrote this in a hurry.  It should read:
Scientific knowledge is represented in the form of ideas, but unlike the 
ideal (which as Marx put it is "as nothing else but the form of social 
activity represented in the thing or conversely the form of human 
creativity represented as a thing as an object") Science is the 
representation of reflections on practical labour activity rather than on 
social activity.


Comment: it is the identity of the means of representation of ethics and 
of science both in conscious thought and in material symbolical form that 
is the source of confusion regarding the distinction between the ideal and 
the real.


That is to say, in Science the idea is "hijacked" to formulate theories 
regarding the universal laws etc. involved in the practical realization 
of ideas through labour and regarding the relevance of these laws to the 
work at hand.

--
This should be rewritten to read:
That is, the representation of scientific knowledge involves "hijacking" 
the mode of representation of ethos and using it to represent theories 
regarding the universal laws etc. involved in the practical realization of 
ideas through labour and regarding the relevance of these laws to the work 
at hand.

Oudeyis



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Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] O, Dialectics! :Bakhurst

[Victor]

- Original Message - 
From: "Ralph Dumain" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>

To: 
Sent: Tuesday, June 21, 2005 10:17
Subject: Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] O, Dialectics! :Bakhurst



What in bloody hell does this mean?

At 09:32 AM 6/21/2005 +0200, Victor wrote:
Science is founded as ideas, but unlike Hegel's ideal (which as Marx put 
it is "as nothing else but the form of social activity represented in the 
thing or conversely the form of human creativity represented as a thing as 
an object") Science is the idea as a reflection on practical labour 
activity rather than on social activity.

-
Sorry, wrote this in a hurry.  It should read:
Scientific knowledge is represented in the form of ideas, but unlike the 
ideal (which as Marx put it is "as nothing else but the form of social 
activity represented in the thing or conversely the form of human creativity 
represented as a thing as an object") Science is the representation of 
reflections on practical labour activity rather than on social activity.


Comment: it is the identity of the means of representation of ethics and of 
science both in conscious thought and in material symbolical form that is 
the source of confusion regarding the distinction between the ideal and the 
real.


That is to say, in Science the idea is "hijacked" to formulate theories 
regarding the universal laws etc. involved in the practical realization of 
ideas through labour and regarding the relevance of these laws to the work 
at hand.

--
This should be rewritten to read:
That is, the representation of scientific knowledge involves "hijacking" the 
mode of representation of ethos and using it to represent theories regarding 
the universal laws etc. involved in the practical realization of ideas 
through labour and regarding the relevance of these laws to the work at 
hand.

Oudeyis

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Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] O, Dialectics! :Bakhurst

[Ralph Dumain]

What in bloody hell does this mean?

At 09:32 AM 6/21/2005 +0200, Victor wrote:
Science is founded as ideas, but unlike Hegel's ideal (which as Marx put 
it is "as nothing else but the form of social activity represented in the 
thing or conversely the form of human creativity represented as a thing as 
an object") Science is the idea as a reflection on practical labour 
activity rather than on social activity.  That is to say, in Science the 
idea is "hijacked" to formulate theories regarding the universal laws etc. 
involved in the practical realization of ideas through labour and 
regarding the relevance of these laws to the work at hand.



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Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] O, Dialectics! :Bakhurst

[Victor]

CB,
See below:
- Original Message - 
From: "Charles Brown" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
To: "'Forum for the discussion of theoretical issues raised by Karl Marx 
andthe thinkers he inspired'" 

Sent: Monday, June 20, 2005 21:06
Subject: [Marxism-Thaxis] O, Dialectics! :Bakhurst




Victor victor

I regard Ilyenkov's contribution rather as the Logic (method or met) for a
practical (materialist or natural science) of ethics (ethos).

There is a restriction as to what degree social relations are actually
embodied in all cultural objects, this restriction being those imposed by
the universal natural laws and principles as they apply to the interaction
of labour, instruments and the subjects of production (materia, parts 
etc.)

involved in the productive process.  It is the irreducible fact that
production involves relations that are entirely indifferent to human 
social
activity and to human consciousness collective or otherwise that 
compromises

any hypothesis that artefacts may be the representations of ideals or of
social life.

^^^

A correction or, better, an elaboration of the last sentence.

For Hegel the representation of spirit (activity) in the object (not by the 
simple material object but by the object of activity which is the idea that 
serves as the goal of labour activity as described by Marx in his 
description of Labour activity in Capital) is spirit alienated by its 
embodiment in a thing (remember, this is not a material thing but a thing an 
object imaged in conscious thought).


Marx in his 1844 critique of Hegelian philosophy argued that Hegel's theory 
of alienation of spirit in thingness was a topsy turvey representation of 
the true state of the relation of thought to experience.  For Marx it is the 
abstraction of thought that alienates human perception of the world from the 
physical/sensual concreteness of nature as it confronts men as whole beings 
having a few more avenues for percieving reality than the operations of 
mind.  The artefact as a product of human labour certainly does represent 
the impact of the ideal on the labour process, but this is hardly the same 
as saying that the ideal is what is produced by human labour or that it is 
only the impact of the ideal that determines the outcome of labour.  The 
outcome of labour like the ideal itself is a dialectical product that 
sublates the ideal in physical material processes that result in a material 
artefact.  The artefact itself is no more ideal or a social product than it 
is a manifestation of the natural laws etc. that were involved in its 
production. The product of absolute men in an absolute nature.

^^^

I would go further than this and argue that it is the very
irreducibility of human labour to a simple replication of idealized 
objects
that forms the material basis for the dynamics of human development and 
the

indeterminism intrinsic to all human endeavor.

^^^
CB: When an idea grips masses, it becomes _a_ material force, not all the
material force involved in human affairs.

^
Yes it does, but as a material force it is no longer just an ideal it is the 
concrete and very complex social process of a revolution!

^

Science is ideas which allow a certain finite and sufficient mastery of
nature , and consequent freedom, as pointed out by Hegel and Engels.

^
Science is founded as ideas, but unlike Hegel's ideal (which as Marx put it 
is "as nothing else but the form of social activity represented in the thing 
or conversely the form of human creativity represented as a thing as an 
object") Science is the idea as a reflection on practical labour activity 
rather than on social activity.  That is to say, in Science the idea is 
"hijacked" to formulate theories regarding the universal laws etc. involved 
in the practical realization of ideas through labour and regarding the 
relevance of these laws to the work at hand.

^
Leaving the realm of necessity and entering the "realm of freedom" is
historical materialism, the theory of class society and its history,
rendering itself obsolete. Production can proceed by planning rather than 
by

a process that goes on behind the backs of the producers , etc.

^
I'm less sure of this than I used to be.  Historical materialism as a 
practical science is not necessarily identical with Marx's own view of 
socialism, and certainly not with the historical experiments with socialism 
we've witnessed to date. The history of dialectical materialism is complex 
but the fact that the transformation of Capital from an analysis of the 
capitalist mode of production to a doctrine had the adverse effect on its 
development as a practical science is undebatable.


Take for example the issue of planning production.  Several years back the 
BBC put out an interesting documentary on the decline and fall of the Soviet 
system in which it was argued that it was th

[Marxism-Thaxis] O, Dialectics! :Bakhurst

[Charles Brown]

 Victor victor 

I regard Ilyenkov's contribution rather as the Logic (method or met) for a 
practical (materialist or natural science) of ethics (ethos).

There is a restriction as to what degree social relations are actually 
embodied in all cultural objects, this restriction being those imposed by 
the universal natural laws and principles as they apply to the interaction 
of labour, instruments and the subjects of production (materia, parts etc.) 
involved in the productive process.  It is the irreducible fact that 
production involves relations that are entirely indifferent to human social 
activity and to human consciousness collective or otherwise that compromises

any hypothesis that artefacts may be the representations of ideals or of 
social life.  I would go further than this and argue that it is the very 
irreducibility of human labour to a simple replication of idealized objects 
that forms the material basis for the dynamics of human development and the 
indeterminism intrinsic to all human endeavor.

^^^
CB: When an idea grips masses, it becomes _a_ material force, not all the
material force involved in human affairs. 

Science is ideas which allow a certain finite and sufficient mastery of
nature , and consequent freedom, as pointed out by Hegel and Engels.

Leaving the realm of necessity and entering the "realm of freedom" is
historical materialism, the theory of class society and its history,
rendering itself obsolete. Production can proceed by planning rather than by
a process that goes on behind the backs of the producers , etc.

^

^

Ilyenkov by presenting a materialist theory of the ideal, the ideal as a 
product of men's "socialization" of productive experience be of his own 
labour or of mobilizing and controlling the labour of others, provides us 
with a model for explaining how practical activity becomes ethical activity.

This is extremely important not only to Marxist theory but to the general 
model of historical development, since the ideal as the means whereby men 
coordinate their activity with others is not the creative activity that 
enables human adaptation to world conditions. It more than any other theory 
of social life explains the contradiction implicit in adaptively; 
conservation of historical developments together with creative modification 
of labour and means of production in response to changing natural 
conditions.
Oudeyis


CB: We need ethical theory to answer , once again, the question "what is to
be done ?"


- Original Message - 
From: "Charles Brown" http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/marxism-thaxis> >
To: "'Forum for the discussion of theoretical issues raised by Karl Marx 
andthe thinkers he inspired'" http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/marxism-thaxis> >
Sent: Monday, June 20, 2005 15:24
Subject: [Marxism-Thaxis] O, Dialectics! :Bakhurst


>
> Victor
>
>> As I see it, the key concept in this regard that Ilyenkov offers is that
> just as Marx discovered how social relations can be "embodied" into things
> in the form of commodities - through the incorporation of abstract labor
> into the value-form - so too, Marxists can explain that social relations 
> are
> embodied in all cultural objects - through the incorporation of meaningful
> cultural activity into the ideal form.
>
> 
> CB: When an idea grips masses ( is social), it becomes a material force.
>
>


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Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] O, Dialectics! :Bakhurst

[Victor]

I regard Ilyenkov's contribution rather as the Logic (method or met) for a 
practical (materialist or natural science) of ethics (ethos).


There is a restriction as to what degree social relations are actually 
embodied in all cultural objects, this restriction being those imposed by 
the universal natural laws and principles as they apply to the interaction 
of labour, instruments and the subjects of production (materia, parts etc.) 
involved in the productive process.  It is the irreducible fact that 
production involves relations that are entirely indifferent to human social 
activity and to human consciousness collective or otherwise that compromises 
any hypothesis that artefacts may be the representations of ideals or of 
social life.  I would go further than this and argue that it is the very 
irreducibility of human labour to a simple replication of idealized objects 
that forms the material basis for the dynamics of human development and the 
indeterminism intrinsic to all human endeavor.


Ilyenkov by presenting a materialist theory of the ideal, the ideal as a 
product of men's "socialization" of productive experience be of his own 
labour or of mobilizing and controlling the labour of others, provides us 
with a model for explaining how practical activity becomes ethical activity. 
This is extremely important not only to Marxist theory but to the general 
model of historical development, since the ideal as the means whereby men 
coordinate their activity with others is not the creative activity that 
enables human adaptation to world conditions. It more than any other theory 
of social life explains the contradiction implicit in adaptively; 
conservation of historical developments together with creative modification 
of labour and means of production in response to changing natural 
conditions.

Oudeyis


- Original Message - 
From: "Charles Brown" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
To: "'Forum for the discussion of theoretical issues raised by Karl Marx 
andthe thinkers he inspired'" 

Sent: Monday, June 20, 2005 15:24
Subject: [Marxism-Thaxis] O, Dialectics! :Bakhurst




Victor


As I see it, the key concept in this regard that Ilyenkov offers is that

just as Marx discovered how social relations can be "embodied" into things
in the form of commodities - through the incorporation of abstract labor
into the value-form - so too, Marxists can explain that social relations 
are

embodied in all cultural objects - through the incorporation of meaningful
cultural activity into the ideal form.


CB: When an idea grips masses ( is social), it becomes a material force.



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Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] O, Dialectics! :Bakhurst

[Victor]

Right
and I'd like to see someone wear "The coat".  Must be a truly mystical 
experience.

Oudeyis
- Original Message - 
From: "Charles Brown" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
To: "'Forum for the discussion of theoretical issues raised by Karl Marx 
andthe thinkers he inspired'" 

Sent: Monday, June 20, 2005 15:43
Subject: [Marxism-Thaxis] O, Dialectics! :Bakhurst





Victor


The social relations are not embodied in a particular coat or in a
particular bale of linen.  These are material objects whose concreteness 
are

beyond the capacity of human conceptualisation.  After all a particular
linen coat may have been made by an apprentice and taken twice as long to
produce than a similar coat made by a master tailor. The linen coats and
bales of linen cloth referred to by Marx are not actual material coats and
cloths but an abstract representation of them.  And that's not all. 
Labour

value itself is not a description of physical and sensual labour activity
but of abstract labour.  Labour from which all concrete relations have
beenabstracted out but for labour time or the average time necessary to
produce a particular object.  It does not take into account whether the
labourer was weakened by starvation, was preoccupied with whether he could
pay next months rent, or couldn't find whetstone to sharpen his scissors.


CB: Sounds like the difference between " the coat" and "a coat".




The 'thing' Marx is referring to is not the physical sensual thing as it
comes off the production line, but the abstract idea of the thing as it is
manifested in the consciousness of the labourer, his boss, the salesman 
who

sells it and the purchaser who buys it. A commodity is not a physical
sensual object but a concept of objects, objects abstracted into things to
be bought and sold and that's it.


CB: "The thing" , for Marx , is to _change_ the world. "Things" are
importantly activity, world changing activity, not just the objects that
result. The thing is practical-critical _activity_.  Goods and _services_
constitute things.

^


Ilyenkov explains that plain materialists and idealists alike make the

error of viewing the boundary between the material and the ideal as being
the world of the inside versus that of the outside of each individual 
human

head.  In contrast, he argues that according to dialectical materialism,
ideality and materiality must be distinguished in terms of the composition
of each
object

^

CB: Object and activity. Objective reality _is_ human activity, practice,
especially, for Marxists.

^^^

- both the composition of the physical

attributes, which of course are the sources of its materiality, and the

composition of its social origins and social context, which are the

sources of its ideality - just as Marx analyzed the composition of the

commodity.  According to Ilyenkov's theory, OBJECTS  within the human
cultural realm objectively possess both materiality and ideality, just as
commodities in a market economy possess both concrete and abstract labor,
possess both use-value and exchange-value.


CB: Objects _and_ activity; an "object" is the human activity in relation 
to
it. Objects: "the ball", "the rock", "the tree", "the star". These _are_ 
the
human activity in relaion to them. "A ball" is an human activity in 
relation

to it.

Labor is activity. The resulting commodity is the labor in it or in 
relation

to it.

^^

This is not, by the way, Ilyenkov's invention, but the essence of Marx's
critique of Feuerbach in Ad Feuerbach and of Lenin's critique of Plekhanov
in the Conspectus.  The boundary between ideal and real is objective,
external to the subjective consciousness of the individual.

^^
CB: Yes, the boundary between the  ideal and real is itself objective to 
the
individual, and both the ideal and real are taken into the consciousness 
of
the individual consciousness, as well. So , the boundary is both inside 
and

outside of the individual.



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Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] O, Dialectics! :Bakhurst

[Victor]

Indeed.
It was Hegel that first made the critique of metaphysical synthesis as 
presented by Kant.  For Kant an antinomy could only be resolved by a choice; 
e.g. in the antinomy presented by the concept of the idea as materialized 
consciousness Kant would insist that we either choose to regard the idea as 
in the head as purely subjective thought or as outside the head in the 
material representations of ideas in language, logic, etc.  Marx following 
Hegel and Lenin and Ilyenkov following Marx entirely rejected Kant's 
metaphysical synthetics and the formal logic that underwrites it.  They 
regarded the antinomy, i.e. the contradiction, as the kernel of the process 
of what Ilyenkov calls ascension from the abstract to the concrete.


By determining the formulation that unites the contradictory elements of an 
antinomy into a single notion (inevitably a more complex or more concrete 
notion of the abstractions of the contradictory notions that comprise it). 
For example, direct commodity exchange involves the unity of two kinds of 
valuation of goods, that of the consumer who is buying the good's use value 
and that of the seller/producer who is selling the investment of labour time 
in production of the good, its exchange value or value. The resolution of 
these two bases in valuation of the good is a concept of universal value 
measured in abstract labour and represented by a single commodity (usually 
precious metals) that represents universal value and describes the value of 
specific goods in accordance to their equivalent value in gold or silver, 
i.e. their price.


Incidentally, a dialectical synthesis does not "eliminate" the antinomy, 
rather it "kicks it upstairs" where it usually reappears in a more complex 
and concrete form.  Thus the establishment of universal value only resolves 
the contradiction between the purchaser's and the seller's evaluation of 
goods on the abstract level of immediate exchange.  The contradiction 
reappears on more concrete levels in the periodic maladjustments between 
capitalist systems of industrial production and the marketability of goods 
(depressions, business cycles etc.).

Oudeyis

- Original Message - 
From: "Charles Brown" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
To: "'Forum for the discussion of theoretical issues raised by Karl Marx 
andthe thinkers he inspired'" 

Sent: Monday, June 20, 2005 15:18
Subject: [Marxism-Thaxis] O, Dialectics! :Bakhurst




And to be more precise, Oudeyis, I think the point below is that the 
matter

of deriving the materiality discussed here based on what is "outside" of a
concrete individual's head, and a concrete individual's interaction with 
her

non-human "outside" is a main error of positivism and much bourgeois
thought.


"...the error of viewing the boundary between the material and the ideal 
as
being the world of the inside versus that of the outside of each 
individual

human head "

This is a materiality that each individual must take account of, but on 
the

other hand each individual must become aware that this is not the main
boundary between materiality and ideality for that person _as an 
individual_

, either. The individual's world is very social as well, though there is
physiology.


Charles



CB
I recall a lecturer on S. Freud that asserted and successfully 
demonstrated

that psychoanalysis is a social psychology.
Oudeyis





Ilyenkov explains that plain materialists and idealists alike make the
error of viewing the boundary between the material and the ideal as 
being

the world of the inside versus that of the outside of each individual
human head.  In contrast, he argues that according to dialectical
materialism, ideality and materiality must be distinguished in terms of
the composition of each object - both the composition of the physical
attributes, which of course are the sources of its materiality, and the
composition of its social origins and social context, which are the
sources of its ideality -



^
CB: This distinction between inside and outside of the individual's head
is
what I was getting at in saying all psychology is social psychology.

^





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[Marxism-Thaxis] O, Dialectics! :Bakhurst

[Charles Brown]

Steve Gabosch 



a) where is ideality "located"?
I would answer a) "in cultural artifacts," using the term in its broadest 
possible sense (tools, signs, all human creations and observations, 
etc.)  I think you would answer a) "in representations."

^
CB: How about in the relationship between the representations and
represented ? Ideality is a relationship.

^^^

b) where is value "located"?
I would answer b) with "each particular commodity."  It appears that you 
would answer b) in concepts of commodities, but definitely not specific 
commodities.

^^
CB: Value is an abtraction. It has no concrete location.

^^

c) what is the "essence" of ideality?
I would answer c) with "human activity."  You answer c) with
"representation."

^^
CB: Doesn't ideality guide human action, as imagination guides the human
laborer unlike the spider or ant or chimp ?

^

d) what is the "essence of value"?
I would answer d) with abstract labor, or socially determined necessary 
labor time.  I am not sure how you would answer this one.

^
CB: The esssence of an abtraction, would be its definition in symbols.

^^

e) what is "represented" in a commodity?
I would answer e) in terms of particular commodities being a combination of 
concrete and abstract labor.  I am not yet clear on how you would answer 
this one.

^^^
CB: Abstract labor represents the concrete labor ?



f) what does the "stamping" of ideality on a cultural artifact?
I would answer f) direct human activity.  You answer f) the interpretation 
of the ideal through human activity, but I am not yet clear on what this 
precisely means.

^
CB: When an idea grips masses it becomes a material force, can make cultural
artifacts ?

^^^

There are several areas to clarify, but the pattern that seems to be 
emerging is that on several important issues I tend to think in terms of 
direct human activity where you tend to think in terms of concepts and 
representations.

Thoughts?

- Steve




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[Marxism-Thaxis] O, Dialectics! :Bakhurst

[Charles Brown]

Victor 


The social relations are not embodied in a particular coat or in a
particular bale of linen.  These are material objects whose concreteness are
beyond the capacity of human conceptualisation.  After all a particular
linen coat may have been made by an apprentice and taken twice as long to
produce than a similar coat made by a master tailor. The linen coats and
bales of linen cloth referred to by Marx are not actual material coats and
cloths but an abstract representation of them.  And that's not all.  Labour
value itself is not a description of physical and sensual labour activity
but of abstract labour.  Labour from which all concrete relations have
beenabstracted out but for labour time or the average time necessary to
produce a particular object.  It does not take into account whether the
labourer was weakened by starvation, was preoccupied with whether he could
pay next months rent, or couldn't find whetstone to sharpen his scissors.


CB: Sounds like the difference between " the coat" and "a coat".




The 'thing' Marx is referring to is not the physical sensual thing as it
comes off the production line, but the abstract idea of the thing as it is
manifested in the consciousness of the labourer, his boss, the salesman who
sells it and the purchaser who buys it. A commodity is not a physical
sensual object but a concept of objects, objects abstracted into things to
be bought and sold and that's it.


CB: "The thing" , for Marx , is to _change_ the world. "Things" are
importantly activity, world changing activity, not just the objects that
result. The thing is practical-critical _activity_.  Goods and _services_
constitute things.

^

> Ilyenkov explains that plain materialists and idealists alike make the
error of viewing the boundary between the material and the ideal as being
the world of the inside versus that of the outside of each individual human
head.  In contrast, he argues that according to dialectical materialism,
ideality and materiality must be distinguished in terms of the composition
of each 
object

^

CB: Object and activity. Objective reality _is_ human activity, practice,
especially, for Marxists.

^^^

 - both the composition of the physical
> attributes, which of course are the sources of its materiality, and the
composition of its social origins and social context, which are the
> sources of its ideality - just as Marx analyzed the composition of the
commodity.  According to Ilyenkov's theory, OBJECTS  within the human
cultural realm objectively possess both materiality and ideality, just as
commodities in a market economy possess both concrete and abstract labor,
possess both use-value and exchange-value.


CB: Objects _and_ activity; an "object" is the human activity in relation to
it. Objects: "the ball", "the rock", "the tree", "the star". These _are_ the
human activity in relaion to them. "A ball" is an human activity in relation
to it.

Labor is activity. The resulting commodity is the labor in it or in relation
to it.

^^

This is not, by the way, Ilyenkov's invention, but the essence of Marx's
critique of Feuerbach in Ad Feuerbach and of Lenin's critique of Plekhanov
in the Conspectus.  The boundary between ideal and real is objective,
external to the subjective consciousness of the individual.

^^
CB: Yes, the boundary between the  ideal and real is itself objective to the
individual, and both the ideal and real are taken into the consciousness of
the individual consciousness, as well. So , the boundary is both inside and
outside of the individual.



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[Marxism-Thaxis] O, Dialectics! :Bakhurst

[Charles Brown]

Victor 

> As I see it, the key concept in this regard that Ilyenkov offers is that
just as Marx discovered how social relations can be "embodied" into things
in the form of commodities - through the incorporation of abstract labor
into the value-form - so too, Marxists can explain that social relations are
embodied in all cultural objects - through the incorporation of meaningful
cultural activity into the ideal form.


CB: When an idea grips masses ( is social), it becomes a material force.



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[Marxism-Thaxis] O, Dialectics! :Bakhurst

[Charles Brown]

 And to be more precise, Oudeyis, I think the point below is that the matter
of deriving the materiality discussed here based on what is "outside" of a
concrete individual's head, and a concrete individual's interaction with her
non-human "outside" is a main error of positivism and much bourgeois
thought.


 "...the error of viewing the boundary between the material and the ideal as
being the world of the inside versus that of the outside of each individual
human head "

This is a materiality that each individual must take account of, but on the
other hand each individual must become aware that this is not the main
boundary between materiality and ideality for that person _as an individual_
, either. The individual's world is very social as well, though there is
physiology.


Charles



CB
I recall a lecturer on S. Freud that asserted and successfully demonstrated 
that psychoanalysis is a social psychology.
Oudeyis




> Ilyenkov explains that plain materialists and idealists alike make the
>> error of viewing the boundary between the material and the ideal as being
>> the world of the inside versus that of the outside of each individual
>> human head.  In contrast, he argues that according to dialectical
>> materialism, ideality and materiality must be distinguished in terms of
>> the composition of each object - both the composition of the physical
>> attributes, which of course are the sources of its materiality, and the
>> composition of its social origins and social context, which are the
>> sources of its ideality -
>
>
> ^
> CB: This distinction between inside and outside of the individual's head 
> is
> what I was getting at in saying all psychology is social psychology.
>
> ^
>



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Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] O, Dialectics! :Bakhurst

[Victor]

Steve,
All but these directions is included in the body of your text.
- Original Message - 
From: "Steve Gabosch" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
To: "Forum for the discussion of theoretical issues raised by Karl Marx and 
thethinkers he inspired" 

Sent: Sunday, June 19, 2005 10:11
Subject: Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] O, Dialectics! :Bakhurst



Victor,
I have read your response carefully.  I think I am getting a handle on our 
differing approaches.  They seem to emerge in the way we understand issues 
such as:


a) where is ideality "located"?
b) where is value is "located"?
c) what is the "essence" of ideality?
d) what is the "essence" of value?
e) what is "represented" in a commodity?
f) what does the "stamping" of human activity on a cultural artifact?

Please correct me if I am getting your views wrong in any way.  On several 
questions, I am not yet clear on what your answer would be.
I am speaking roughly for each of us, hoping to drive out any essential 
paradigm differences.


a) where is ideality "located"?
I would answer a) "in cultural artifacts," using the term in its broadest 
possible sense (tools, signs, all human creations and observations, etc.) 
I think you would answer a) "in representations."


Ideality like spoken language is not one thing or another, but two things, 
the objectified notion in consciousness and its material representation by 
some form of language, united as a more concrete concept, the ideal. The 
ideal cannot just be a manifestation of consciousness (Dubrovsky's argument) 
in which case it would be a purely subjective product, at best the internal 
expression of the individuality of the thinker (whatever that might be). 
Nor can it be just the symbolic representation since this after all is 
ultimately just a thing, a material object.  It is only when consciousness 
is given material form by symbolic representation and the material artefact 
is made significant by its embodiment of conscious reflective thought that 
the ideal can be said to exist.



b) where is value "located"?
I would answer b) with "each particular commodity."  It appears that you 
would answer b) in concepts of commodities, but definitely not specific 
commodities.


Abstract value is indeed a concept and can only be represented in material 
form by symbolic forms such as speech and text.  The specific value of 
concrete goods is price, but this too is only expressible in symbolic forms 
such as dollars and cents and pounds and pence be it in speech, in the 
little labels they attach to marketed goods, or in the exchange of coinage 
for the desired good.


c) what is the "essence" of ideality?
I would answer c) with "human activity."  You answer c) with 
"representation."


The essence of ideality is representation, the subject of ideality is human 
activity represented as the object of that activity.




d) what is the "essence of value"?
I would answer d) with abstract labor, or socially determined necessary 
labor time.  I am not sure how you would answer this one.


Value represents labour activity.  The essence of value is commodity 
production, that is the production of goods for trade.


e) what is "represented" in a commodity?
I would answer e) in terms of particular commodities being a combination 
of concrete and abstract labor.  I am not yet clear on how you would 
answer this one.


A commodity is an article produced for the express purpose of exchanging it 
for other articles. See MIA's encyclopedia of Marxism:
"A commodity is something that is produced for the purpose of exchanging for 
something else, and as such, is the material form given to a fundamental 
social relation - the exchange of labour."




f) what does the "stamping" of ideality on a cultural artifact?
I would answer f) direct human activity.  You answer f) the interpretation 
of the ideal through human activity, but I am not yet clear on what this 
precisely means.


Here Marx's description of labour activity is relevant:
"We pre-suppose labour in a form that stamps it as exclusively human. A 
spider conducts operations that resemble those of a weaver, and a bee puts 
to shame many an architect in the construction of her cells. But what 
distinguishes the worst architect from the best of bees is this, that the 
architect raises his structure in imagination before he erects it in 
reality. At the end of every labour-process, we get a result that already 
existed in the imagination of the labourer at its commencement. He not only 
effects a change of form in the material on which he works, but he also 
realises a purpose of his own that gives the law to his modus operandi, and 
to which he must subordinate his will [emphasis is mine VTFR]. And this 
subordination is no mere momentary act. Besides th

Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] O, Dialectics! :Bakhurst

[Steve Gabosch]

Victor,
I have read your response carefully.  I think I am getting a handle on our 
differing approaches.  They seem to emerge in the way we understand issues 
such as:


a) where is ideality "located"?
b) where is value is "located"?
c) what is the "essence" of ideality?
d) what is the "essence" of value?
e) what is "represented" in a commodity?
f) what does the "stamping" of human activity on a cultural artifact?

Please correct me if I am getting your views wrong in any way.  On several 
questions, I am not yet clear on what your answer would be.
I am speaking roughly for each of us, hoping to drive out any essential 
paradigm differences.


a) where is ideality "located"?
I would answer a) "in cultural artifacts," using the term in its broadest 
possible sense (tools, signs, all human creations and observations, 
etc.)  I think you would answer a) "in representations."


b) where is value "located"?
I would answer b) with "each particular commodity."  It appears that you 
would answer b) in concepts of commodities, but definitely not specific 
commodities.


c) what is the "essence" of ideality?
I would answer c) with "human activity."  You answer c) with "representation."

d) what is the "essence of value"?
I would answer d) with abstract labor, or socially determined necessary 
labor time.  I am not sure how you would answer this one.


e) what is "represented" in a commodity?
I would answer e) in terms of particular commodities being a combination of 
concrete and abstract labor.  I am not yet clear on how you would answer 
this one.


f) what does the "stamping" of ideality on a cultural artifact?
I would answer f) direct human activity.  You answer f) the interpretation 
of the ideal through human activity, but I am not yet clear on what this 
precisely means.


There are several areas to clarify, but the pattern that seems to be 
emerging is that on several important issues I tend to think in terms of 
direct human activity where you tend to think in terms of concepts and 
representations.


Thoughts?

- Steve



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Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] O, Dialectics! :Bakhurst

[Victor]

Yeah I'm writing it up now.
Oudeyis
- Original Message - 
From: "Ralph Dumain" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>

To: 
Sent: Friday, June 17, 2005 18:55
Subject: Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] O, Dialectics! :Bakhurst


This is refreshing after wasting my time reading Rorty's worthless crap. 
Have you published anything on these subjects?


Also, it seems a thoroughgoing analysis of Popper's 3-worlds schema is in 
order.  The Soviets criticized Popper, but not in sufficient detail, it 
seems.


At 01:41 PM 6/17/2005 +0200, Victor wrote:

Steve,
Commentary interleaved with your commentary and citations. [note I do not
comment on every citation, some responses cover more than one citation].

Sorry, I've included very few citations here. I'm in the middle of writing
and somewhat pressed for time. Still the opportunity to try out the ideas 
in

the paper in this response is much appreciated.

...


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Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] O, Dialectics! :Bakhurst

[Victor]

CB
I recall a lecturer on S. Freud that asserted and successfully demonstrated 
that psychoanalysis is a social psychology.

Oudeyis

- Original Message - 
From: "Charles Brown" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
To: "'Forum for the discussion of theoretical issues raised by Karl Marx 
andthe thinkers he inspired'" 

Sent: Friday, June 17, 2005 21:58
Subject: [Marxism-Thaxis] O, Dialectics! :Bakhurst



Ilyenkov explains that plain materialists and idealists alike make the

error of viewing the boundary between the material and the ideal as being
the world of the inside versus that of the outside of each individual
human head.  In contrast, he argues that according to dialectical
materialism, ideality and materiality must be distinguished in terms of
the composition of each object - both the composition of the physical
attributes, which of course are the sources of its materiality, and the
composition of its social origins and social context, which are the
sources of its ideality -



^
CB: This distinction between inside and outside of the individual's head 
is

what I was getting at in saying all psychology is social psychology.

^




just as Marx analyzed the composition of the

commodity.  According to Ilyenkov's theory, objects within the human
cultural realm objectively possess both materiality and ideality, just as
commodities in a market economy possess both concrete and abstract labor,
possess both use-value and exchange-value.


This is not, by the way, Ilyenkov's invention, but the essence of Marx's
critique of Feuerbach in Ad Feuerbach and of Lenin's critique of Plekhanov
in the Conspectus.  The boundary between ideal and real is objective,
external to the subjective consciousness of the individual.



CB: Perhaps from Marx's practical-critical activity, the "practical"
corresponds to Ilyenkov's "material" and the "critical" corresponds to
Ilyenkov's "ideal"



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[Marxism-Thaxis] O, Dialectics! :Bakhurst

[Charles Brown]

Ilyenkov explains that plain materialists and idealists alike make the
> error of viewing the boundary between the material and the ideal as being
> the world of the inside versus that of the outside of each individual
> human head.  In contrast, he argues that according to dialectical
> materialism, ideality and materiality must be distinguished in terms of
> the composition of each object - both the composition of the physical
> attributes, which of course are the sources of its materiality, and the
> composition of its social origins and social context, which are the
> sources of its ideality -


^
CB: This distinction between inside and outside of the individual's head is
what I was getting at in saying all psychology is social psychology.

^




 just as Marx analyzed the composition of the
> commodity.  According to Ilyenkov's theory, objects within the human
> cultural realm objectively possess both materiality and ideality, just as
> commodities in a market economy possess both concrete and abstract labor,
> possess both use-value and exchange-value.

This is not, by the way, Ilyenkov's invention, but the essence of Marx's
critique of Feuerbach in Ad Feuerbach and of Lenin's critique of Plekhanov
in the Conspectus.  The boundary between ideal and real is objective,
external to the subjective consciousness of the individual.



CB: Perhaps from Marx's practical-critical activity, the "practical"
corresponds to Ilyenkov's "material" and the "critical" corresponds to
Ilyenkov's "ideal" 



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Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] O, Dialectics! :Bakhurst

[Ralph Dumain]

This is refreshing after wasting my time reading Rorty's worthless 
crap.  Have you published anything on these subjects?


Also, it seems a thoroughgoing analysis of Popper's 3-worlds schema is in 
order.  The Soviets criticized Popper, but not in sufficient detail, it seems.


At 01:41 PM 6/17/2005 +0200, Victor wrote:

Steve,
Commentary interleaved with your commentary and citations. [note I do not
comment on every citation, some responses cover more than one citation].

Sorry, I've included very few citations here. I'm in the middle of writing
and somewhat pressed for time. Still the opportunity to try out the ideas in
the paper in this response is much appreciated.

...


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Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] O, Dialectics! :Bakhurst

[Victor]

Steve,
Commentary interleaved with your commentary and citations. [note I do not
comment on every citation, some responses cover more than one citation].

Sorry, I've included very few citations here. I'm in the middle of writing
and somewhat pressed for time. Still the opportunity to try out the ideas in
the paper in this response is much appreciated.

- Original Message - 
From: "Steve Gabosch" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>

To: "Forum for the discussion of theoretical issues raised by Karl Marx and
thethinkers he inspired" 
Sent: Thursday, June 16, 2005 4:16
Subject: Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] O, Dialectics! :Bakhurst



Victor,

I spent a little time reviewing Ilyenkov's article "The Concept of the
Ideal" (available on MIA ), and the notes I published on xmca about it
last year.  Below, I have copied paragraphs 66 - 90 from EVI's
142-paragraph essay.  I don't find your comments today about ideality and
materiality consistent with Ilyenkov's theory as I interpret it.

Even were I to somehow convince you of that, it still would not
necessarily make Bakhurst right, of course.  I notice that one big problem
with Bakhurst's presentation in his chapter on the concept of the ideal is
he does not focus on or even mention how Ilyenkov's concept of the ideal
is a generalization of the labor theory of value to all human activity.
In fact, he does not mention the labor theory of value at all.  As I think
about it, this avoidance of the most important argument by Ilyenkov
considerably weakens his presentation.  But as I say, I don't think the
real issue is Bakhurst's comprehension of Ilyenkov's theory of the ideal.
I think the real issue is Ilyenkov's theory itself, whether it can flow
from the labor theory of value, and how does it apply.

As I see it, the key concept in this regard that Ilyenkov offers is that
just as Marx discovered how social relations can be "embodied" into things
in the form of commodities - through the incorporation of abstract labor
into the value-form - so too, Marxists can explain that social relations
are embodied in all cultural objects - through the incorporation of
meaningful cultural activity into the ideal form.


The social relations are not embodied in a particular coat or in a
particular bale of linen.  These are material objects whose concreteness are
beyond the capacity of human conceptualisation.  After all a particular
linen coat may have been made by an apprentice and taken twice as long to
produce than a similar coat made by a master tailor. The linen coats and
bales of linen cloth referred to by Marx are not actual material coats and
cloths but an abstract representation of them.  And that's not all.  Labour
value itself is not a description of physical and sensual labour activity
but of abstract labour.  Labour from which all concrete relations have been
abstracted out but for labour time or the average time necessary to produce
a particular object.  It does not take into account whether the labourer was
weakened by starvation, was preoccupied with whether he could pay next
months rent, or couldn't find whetstone to sharpen his scissors.

The 'thing' Marx is referring to is not the physical sensual thing as it
comes off the production line, but the abstract idea of the thing as it is
manifested in the consciousness of the labourer, his boss, the salesman who
sells it and the purchaser who buys it. A commodity is not a physical
sensual object but a concept of objects, objects abstracted into things to
be bought and sold and that's it.


Ilyenkov explains that plain materialists and idealists alike make the
error of viewing the boundary between the material and the ideal as being
the world of the inside versus that of the outside of each individual
human head.  In contrast, he argues that according to dialectical
materialism, ideality and materiality must be distinguished in terms of
the composition of each object - both the composition of the physical
attributes, which of course are the sources of its materiality, and the
composition of its social origins and social context, which are the
sources of its ideality - just as Marx analyzed the composition of the
commodity.  According to Ilyenkov's theory, objects within the human
cultural realm objectively possess both materiality and ideality, just as
commodities in a market economy possess both concrete and abstract labor,
possess both use-value and exchange-value.


This is not, by the way, Ilyenkov's invention, but the essence of Marx's
critique of Feuerbach in Ad Feuerbach and of Lenin's critique of Plekhanov
in the Conspectus.  The boundary between ideal and real is objective,
external to the subjective consciousness of the individual.

So how do we account for the objectivity of the ideal if it is as an object
manifested only in subjective consciousness?  That's the whole 

Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] O, Dialectics! :Bakhurst

[Ralph Dumain]

Thanks.  Popper has an idea of how the 3 worlds interact (which has direct 
causal impact on which), but I don't remember exactly how.  I'm not happy 
with the terminology, which seems to me misleading, and I'm not certain how 
in his scheme something belongs to more than one world at one time.  But a 
comparison is in order.


I should also remember Sohn-Rethel better.  His key idea is real 
abstraction, which presumably roughly corresponds to ideality (though 
covering a restricted range of phenomena I believe--scientific & 
philosophical abstraction, value form).  Some extracts:


http://www.autodidactproject.org/other/sohn-rethel-x.html

I also vaguely recall Dubrovsky restricted ideality to subjectivity.  I put 
some extracts online some time ago:


http://www.autodidactproject.org/other/dubrov1.html

At 09:19 PM 6/16/2005 -0700, Steve Gabosch wrote:
I am not at all up to speed on the German Marxist Sohn-Rethel (please 
help), but a thought immediately comes to mind on Popper's "Three Worlds" 
cosmology.


If one ignores the positivist framework of these three worlds invented by 
Popper and attempts to make them as dynamic and "dialectical" as possible, 
one might have some success drawing some rough correspondence between a) 
Popper's world 1, the world of physical objects and organisms, and 
Ilyenkov's material world; b) Popper's world 2, of mental activity, and 
Ilyenkov's will and consciousness; and c) Popper's world 3, the products 
of the human mind, and Ilyenkov's realm of ideality.


But there is still a fundamental difference that makes the two world views 
completely different.  If we are to make Popper's three worlds dynamic and 
historical, and assign any meaning to his numbering system, then world 1, 
objects and organisms, must generate an emerging world 2, mental 
activities, which in turn (in conjunction with each other) generate world 
3, the world of products of the human mind.


Ilyenkov, however, makes it crystal clear that he sees just the opposite 
genetic-historic relationship between world "2" and world "3".  He argues 
that it is ideality that generates will and consciousness, not the other 
way around.  See paragraph 76.  Also note Ilyenkov's brief mention of 
Popper in paragraph 77.


To expand on Ilyenkov's discussion of the "secret twist of idealism," 
(discussed earlier in the essay "the Concept of the Ideal), it is this 
"inversion" of ideality, on one hand, and will and consciousness, on the 
other, that creates a major stumbling block in philosophy and 
science.  When plain materialists and empiricists do this, they are 
committing an essential idealist error.  It is one of the most common 
errors in bourgeois social science.


- Steve



At 01:02 PM 6/16/2005 -0400, Ralph wrote:
This is the key.  How would you compare Ilyenkov's view to that of 
Sohn-Rethel, or to Popper's 3-worlds theory?


At 07:16 PM 6/15/2005 -0700, Steve Gabosch wrote:

..

As I see it, the key concept in this regard that Ilyenkov offers is that 
just as Marx discovered how social relations can be "embodied" into 
things in the form of commodities - through the incorporation of 
abstract labor into the value-form - so too, Marxists can explain that 
social relations are embodied in all cultural objects - through the 
incorporation of meaningful cultural activity into the ideal form.


Ilyenkov explains that plain materialists and idealists alike make the 
error of viewing the boundary between the material and the ideal as 
being the world of the inside versus that of the outside of each 
individual human head.  In contrast, he argues that according to 
dialectical materialism, ideality and materiality must be distinguished 
in terms of the composition of each object - both the composition of the 
physical attributes, which of course are the sources of its materiality, 
and the composition of its social origins and social context, which are 
the sources of its ideality - just as Marx analyzed the composition of 
the commodity.  According to Ilyenkov's theory, objects within the human 
cultural realm objectively possess both materiality and ideality, just 
as commodities in a market economy possess both concrete and abstract 
labor, possess both use-value and exchange-value.



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Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] O, Dialectics! :Bakhurst

[Steve Gabosch]

I am not at all up to speed on the German Marxist Sohn-Rethel (please 
help), but a thought immediately comes to mind on Popper's "Three Worlds" 
cosmology.


If one ignores the positivist framework of these three worlds invented by 
Popper and attempts to make them as dynamic and "dialectical" as possible, 
one might have some success drawing some rough correspondence between a) 
Popper's world 1, the world of physical objects and organisms, and 
Ilyenkov's material world; b) Popper's world 2, of mental activity, and 
Ilyenkov's will and consciousness; and c) Popper's world 3, the products of 
the human mind, and Ilyenkov's realm of ideality.


But there is still a fundamental difference that makes the two world views 
completely different.  If we are to make Popper's three worlds dynamic and 
historical, and assign any meaning to his numbering system, then world 1, 
objects and organisms, must generate an emerging world 2, mental 
activities, which in turn (in conjunction with each other) generate world 
3, the world of products of the human mind.


Ilyenkov, however, makes it crystal clear that he sees just the opposite 
genetic-historic relationship between world "2" and world "3".  He argues 
that it is ideality that generates will and consciousness, not the other 
way around.  See paragraph 76.  Also note Ilyenkov's brief mention of 
Popper in paragraph 77.


To expand on Ilyenkov's discussion of the "secret twist of idealism," 
(discussed earlier in the essay "the Concept of the Ideal), it is this 
"inversion" of ideality, on one hand, and will and consciousness, on the 
other, that creates a major stumbling block in philosophy and 
science.  When plain materialists and empiricists do this, they are 
committing an essential idealist error.  It is one of the most common 
errors in bourgeois social science.


- Steve



At 01:02 PM 6/16/2005 -0400, Ralph wrote:
This is the key.  How would you compare Ilyenkov's view to that of 
Sohn-Rethel, or to Popper's 3-worlds theory?


At 07:16 PM 6/15/2005 -0700, Steve Gabosch wrote:

..

As I see it, the key concept in this regard that Ilyenkov offers is that 
just as Marx discovered how social relations can be "embodied" into 
things in the form of commodities - through the incorporation of abstract 
labor into the value-form - so too, Marxists can explain that social 
relations are embodied in all cultural objects - through the 
incorporation of meaningful cultural activity into the ideal form.


Ilyenkov explains that plain materialists and idealists alike make the 
error of viewing the boundary between the material and the ideal as being 
the world of the inside versus that of the outside of each individual 
human head.  In contrast, he argues that according to dialectical 
materialism, ideality and materiality must be distinguished in terms of 
the composition of each object - both the composition of the physical 
attributes, which of course are the sources of its materiality, and the 
composition of its social origins and social context, which are the 
sources of its ideality - just as Marx analyzed the composition of the 
commodity.  According to Ilyenkov's theory, objects within the human 
cultural realm objectively possess both materiality and ideality, just as 
commodities in a market economy possess both concrete and abstract labor, 
possess both use-value and exchange-value.



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Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] O, Dialectics! :Bakhurst

[Ralph Dumain]

This is the key.  How would you compare Ilyenkov's view to that of 
Sohn-Rethel, or to Popper's 3-worlds theory?


At 07:16 PM 6/15/2005 -0700, Steve Gabosch wrote:

..

As I see it, the key concept in this regard that Ilyenkov offers is that 
just as Marx discovered how social relations can be "embodied" into things 
in the form of commodities - through the incorporation of abstract labor 
into the value-form - so too, Marxists can explain that social relations 
are embodied in all cultural objects - through the incorporation of 
meaningful cultural activity into the ideal form.


Ilyenkov explains that plain materialists and idealists alike make the 
error of viewing the boundary between the material and the ideal as being 
the world of the inside versus that of the outside of each individual 
human head.  In contrast, he argues that according to dialectical 
materialism, ideality and materiality must be distinguished in terms of 
the composition of each object - both the composition of the physical 
attributes, which of course are the sources of its materiality, and the 
composition of its social origins and social context, which are the 
sources of its ideality - just as Marx analyzed the composition of the 
commodity.  According to Ilyenkov's theory, objects within the human 
cultural realm objectively possess both materiality and ideality, just as 
commodities in a market economy possess both concrete and abstract labor, 
possess both use-value and exchange-value.



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Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] O, Dialectics! :Bakhurst

[Steve Gabosch]

 with the material artefact it images. In truth, he also 
managed to confuse me as well.


Anyway the ideal as objectification of practice is just that imaged or 
imagined object that Marx describes as the conscious objective of physical 
sensual labour activity.  Marx and certainly Hegel do not describe this 
objectified practice as a material object, it is the socially originated 
and endorsed, authorized, sanctioned etc. etc. object of labour as it is 
manifest in consciousness.  The material representation of the ideal is in 
conventional symbolic forms that have no material resemblance either to 
the objectified practice, the practice objectified, or to the material 
products of that practice.


It is not the artifacts that represent the activity to which they owe 
their existence as artifacts but the it is the ideal artefact (in 
consciousness) that provides the "paragon" by which the labourer measures 
the effectiveness of his work.  The material artefact certainly has 
significance to those who recognize its correspondence in form and 
substance to the imagined ideal, but it cannot ever approach the abstract 
"perfection" of the imagined ideal. Remember Pygmalion either Shaw's or 
the "Rain in Spain" version. The environment of significance that educates 
is not that of the material artefacts themselves, but that of the 
discourse (regarded here broadly) between people.  It is through this 
discourse mediated of course by language that the ideal becomes 
a  consciousness common to the community.


Bakhurst's peculiar rendering of the ideal as the material artefact is 
certainly an original idea.  It's reification with a 
vengeance.  Reification that not even the most committed objective 
idealist dares do.  The Hegelians and Neopositivists are quite content to 
argue that human consciousness is determined by ideality and that human 
knowledge begins and ends with the customs (understood by them as 
concepts) of the tribe.  Bakhurst has declared that material reality is 
ideality or, in other words that custom and only custom determines 
objective reality.  What I don't fully understand yet is why Bakhurst 
agonizes over Ilyenkov's materialism.  After all, if ideality is material 
reality, then being an idealist is being a materialist! I suspect that 
he's not fully convinced by his own arguments, but maybe you have a better 
insight.


   By the way, I'm rewriting the paper I sent you.  I've restricted to 
interpreting how Ilyenkov integrates the ideal into Historical 
Materialist theory and I think you'll recognize his work in this paper. 
Thanks for the help.


Oudeyis

- Original Message - From: "Steve Gabosch" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
To: "Forum for the discussion of theoretical issues raised by Karl Marx 
and thethinkers he inspired" 

Sent: Wednesday, June 15, 2005 4:30
Subject: Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] O, Dialectics! :Bakhurst



Hi Victor,

Interestingly, footnote one in a paper by Lantolf and Thorne that is 
getting discussed on the xmca list - the paper is at
<http://communication.ucsd.edu/MCA/Paper/JuneJuly05/LantolfThorne2005.pdf>Introduction, 
in Sociocultural Theory and the Genesis of Second Language Development - 
has a relevant quote from Bakhurst on the very topic you raise and we are 
discussing, the relationship of material (natural) objects and ideality. 
It is from page 183 in Consciousness and Revolution in Soviet Philosophy 
(1991).


from Lantolf and Thorne:
footnote 1 "David Bakhurst characterizes the production of objective 
culture this way: [BTW, the quoted Bakhurst sentence begins: "To sum up, 
Ilyenkov holds that ..." -sg] '. by acting on natural objects, human 
beings invest them with a significance or "ideal form" that elevates them 
to a new "plane of existence."  Objects owe their ideality to their 
incorporation into the aim-oriented life activity of a human community, 
to their *use*. The notion of significance is glossed in terms of the 
concept of representation: Artifacts represent the activity to which they 
owe their existence as artifacts.' (1991: 183)."


- Steve

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Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] O, Dialectics! :Bakhurst

[Victor]

Nice work!
That's just it. Bakhurst confuses the ideal as objectification of practice 
in consciousness with the material artefact it images. In truth, he also 
managed to confuse me as well.


Anyway the ideal as objectification of practice is just that imaged or 
imagined object that Marx describes as the conscious objective of physical 
sensual labour activity.  Marx and certainly Hegel do not describe this 
objectified practice as a material object, it is the socially originated and 
endorsed, authorized, sanctioned etc. etc. object of labour as it is 
manifest in consciousness.  The material representation of the ideal is in 
conventional symbolic forms that have no material resemblance either to the 
objectified practice, the practice objectified, or to the material products 
of that practice.


It is not the artifacts that represent the activity to which they owe their 
existence as artifacts but the it is the ideal artefact (in consciousness) 
that provides the "paragon" by which the labourer measures the effectiveness 
of his work.  The material artefact certainly has significance to those who 
recognize its correspondence in form and substance to the imagined ideal, 
but it cannot ever approach the abstract "perfection" of the imagined ideal. 
Remember Pygmalion either Shaw's or the "Rain in Spain" version. The 
environment of significance that educates is not that of the material 
artefacts themselves, but that of the discourse (regarded here broadly) 
between people.  It is through this discourse mediated of course by language 
that the ideal becomes a  consciousness common to the community.


Bakhurst's peculiar rendering of the ideal as the material artefact is 
certainly an original idea.  It's reification with a vengeance.  Reification 
that not even the most committed objective idealist dares do.  The Hegelians 
and Neopositivists are quite content to argue that human consciousness is 
determined by ideality and that human knowledge begins and ends with the 
customs (understood by them as concepts) of the tribe.  Bakhurst has 
declared that material reality is ideality or, in other words that custom 
and only custom determines objective reality.  What I don't fully understand 
yet is why Bakhurst agonizes over Ilyenkov's materialism.  After all, if 
ideality is material reality, then being an idealist is being a materialist! 
I suspect that he's not fully convinced by his own arguments, but maybe you 
have a better insight.


   By the way, I'm rewriting the paper I sent you.  I've restricted to 
interpreting how Ilyenkov integrates the ideal into Historical Materialist 
theory and I think you'll recognize his work in this paper. Thanks for the 
help.


Oudeyis

- Original Message - 
From: "Steve Gabosch" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
To: "Forum for the discussion of theoretical issues raised by Karl Marx and 
thethinkers he inspired" 

Sent: Wednesday, June 15, 2005 4:30
Subject: Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] O, Dialectics! :Bakhurst



Hi Victor,

Interestingly, footnote one in a paper by Lantolf and Thorne that is 
getting discussed on the xmca list - the paper is at
<http://communication.ucsd.edu/MCA/Paper/JuneJuly05/LantolfThorne2005.pdf>Introduction, 
in Sociocultural Theory and the Genesis of Second Language Development - 
has a relevant quote from Bakhurst on the very topic you raise and we are 
discussing, the relationship of material (natural) objects and ideality. 
It is from page 183 in Consciousness and Revolution in Soviet Philosophy 
(1991).


from Lantolf and Thorne:
footnote 1 "David Bakhurst characterizes the production of objective 
culture this way: [BTW, the quoted Bakhurst sentence begins: "To sum up, 
Ilyenkov holds that ..." -sg] '. by acting on natural objects, human 
beings invest them with a significance or "ideal form" that elevates them 
to a new "plane of existence."  Objects owe their ideality to their 
incorporation into the aim-oriented life activity of a human community, to 
their *use*. The notion of significance is glossed in terms of the concept 
of representation: Artifacts represent the activity to which they owe 
their existence as artifacts.' (1991: 183)."


- Steve
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Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] O, Dialectics! :Bakhurst

[Steve Gabosch]

Hi Victor,

Interestingly, footnote one in a paper by Lantolf and Thorne that is 
getting discussed on the xmca list - the paper is at
Introduction, 
in Sociocultural Theory and the Genesis of Second Language Development - 
has a relevant quote from Bakhurst on the very topic you raise and we are 
discussing, the relationship of material (natural) objects and 
ideality.  It is from page 183 in Consciousness and Revolution in Soviet 
Philosophy (1991).


from Lantolf and Thorne:
footnote 1 "David Bakhurst characterizes the production of objective 
culture this way: [BTW, the quoted Bakhurst sentence begins: "To sum up, 
Ilyenkov holds that ..." -sg] ‘… by acting on natural objects, human beings 
invest them with a significance or “ideal form” that elevates them to a new 
"plane of existence.”  Objects owe their ideality to their incorporation 
into the aim-oriented life activity of a human community, to their *use*. 
The notion of significance is glossed in terms of the concept of 
representation: Artifacts represent the activity to which they owe their 
existence as artifacts.’ (1991: 183)."


- Steve
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Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] O, Dialectics! :Bakhurst

[Steve Gabosch]

Victor,

Thanks for the refresher course on Rosenburg, which becomes a history of 
the Nazi party from 1921.  It is always good to be reminded of what 
happened in Germany.


Your comments on Dubrovsky are very interesting, as is your analysis of 
Bakhurst.  I also read your descriptions of ideality with great interest.


It would help me if, to start out, (when you have a chance), you would 
locate some specific quotes from David Bakhurst that illustrate these 
observations that you make:


"Bakhurst argues that the material objects themselves are ideal."

"Bakhurst's identification of the ideal with the material goes beyond 
idealist hypostasy and takes idealist reification to ridiculous extremes ..."


Thanks,
- Steve



At 07:08 PM 6/14/2005 +0200, you wrote:

Steve
On Alfred Rosenberg: (Born January 12, 1893- Executed October 16, 1946)
Alfred Rosenberg was a Nazi ideologist and politician.
 Rosenberg was one of the earliest members of the German Workers Party
(later better known as the NSDAP or the Nazi Party), joining in January
1919; Hitler did not join until October 1919
Rosenberg became editor of the Völkischer Beobachter (National
Observer),
the Nazi party newspaper, in 1921. In 1923 after the failed Beer Hall
Putsch, Hitler appointed Rosenberg leader of the Nazi Party, a position the
latter occupied until Hitler was released from prison.
In 1929, Rosenberg founded the Militant League for German Culture. He
became
a Reichstag deputy in 1930 and published his book on racial theory The Myth
of the Twentieth Century (Der Mythus des 20. Jahrhunderts). He was named
leader of the foreign political office of the NSDAP in 1933 but played
little actual part in office. In January 1934 he was deputized by Hitler
with responsibility for the spiritual and philosophical education of the
NSDAP and all related organizations.
   In 1940 he was made head of the Hohe Schule (literally "high school"),
the
Centre of National Socialistic Ideological and Educational Research.
Following the invasion of the USSR Rosenberg was appointed head of the Reich
Ministry for the Occupied Eastern Territories. Alfred Meyer was his deputy
and represented him at the Wannsee conference.
Rosenberg was captured by Allied troops at the end of the war. He was
tried
at Nuremberg and found guilty of conspiracy to commit crimes against peace;
planning, initiating and waging wars of aggression; war crimes; and crimes
against humanity. He was sentenced to death and executed with other guilty
co-defendants at Nuremberg on the morning of October 16, 1946.  He is
considered the main author of key Nazi ideological screeds, including its
racial theory, Lebensraum, abolition of the Versailles Treaty, and
persecution of the Jews and of Christian churches. This article is about
race as an intraspecies classification.

Just another intellectual grotesque become monster.
To separate the 
beasts from the confused.

About Bakhurst:
   Bakhurst is not only a liberal social-democrat, he's also is a
representative of exactly the kind of Logical Positivism, Neo-Kantianism,
Neo-positivism, Machism, Empirio-criticism or what have you (the precise
name of the movement is more a function of the provenience of the theorist
than of his ideas) that motivated Lenin to write Materialism and
Emperio-criticism (1908).  The irony of Bakhurst's current stature as the
interpreter of Ilyenkov is that his kind of thinking is receives more
criticism from Ilyenkov than even the objective idealism of Plato and Hegel.

Bakhurst, like D. Dubrovsky who Bakhurst wrongly calls a mechanist, just
cannot comprehend the essence of dialectical synthesis.  Where Ilyenkov
describes the essence of ideality as the unity of consciousness (the
subjectively imaged object of labour) and material formations (the material
symbolic representations that embody and thereby enable transmission of
ideal objects), Bakhurst argues that the material objects themselves are
ideal.  Material objects certainly acquire significance from their
resemblance (perhaps correspondence is a better word) to the ideal, but
material objects, i.e. physically and sensually perceived objects, as
concrete objects are far to diversified to be regarded as ideal forms.
After all, diversity is a basic property of being for both Hegelian and
Marxist theories of knowledge [check out Hegel's criticism of the identity
of A = A for this].

Dubrovsky, like Bakhurst, does not know how to handle dialectical synthesis,
and his solution of the ideal/material antinomy is to identify the ideal as
pure subjective consciousness. While Bakhurst's identification of the ideal
with the material goes beyond idealist hypostasy and takes idealist
reification to ridiculous extremes, Dubrovsky's restriction of the ideal to
pure subjectivity compels him to regard all conceptualisation as a product
of some internal transcendental features common to all human thought
processes, i.e.

Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] O, Dialectics! :Bakhurst

[Victor]

fuscated representation of one of the  most profound and 
brilliant of Historical Materialist theoreticians.  Too bad.

Oudeyis

- Original Message - 
From: "Steve Gabosch" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>

To: 
Sent: Tuesday, June 14, 2005 2:10
Subject: Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] O, Dialectics! :Bakhurst



Hi Victor,

If I am getting your first point, that Bakhurst incorrectly takes "Diamat"
as serious theory, then you are speaking to what I referred to (perhaps
too softly) as Bakhurst's "tendency to see Stalinism as a form of
Bolshevism."   I see this as a grave error.  It sounds like we may have
agreement on this. Trotsky's discussion of Stalinism's tendency to play
fast and free with theory, using it for its narrow bureaucratic and
political needs of the moment, zig-zagging here, there, everywhere,
transforming Marxism into an obscurantist dogma, and using the consequent
... manufactured crap ... to justify the work of its massive murder
machine and other crimes against the world working classes and toiling
masses - seems very relevant here.  When it comes to either Lenin or
Stalin, Bakhurst is no revolutionary Marxist, and his philosophical
analysis indeed suffers.  As I think you are pointing out, he does attempt
to treat some of the production of the Stalinist apparatus in the
ideological department as "serious" intellectual  work.  It is not.

I have not read Bakhurst's thoughts on the reactionary writings you
obviously speak of facetiously.  If your point is to compare Mein Kampf
etc. with the  "theoretical" work of the Stalinist school of "crap" -
falsification, dogma and tripe -  I agree with the comparison, and accept
your point.  This whole category of reactionary writing - fascist,
Stalinist, etc. - can be considered the product of reactionary Bonapartist
regimes.  It is the opposite of scientific work.

(BTW I am not offhand remembering Rosenburg, please refresh).

But back to Ilyenkov, I do think Bakhurst, up to a point, grasps and
explains Ilyenkov's concept of the ideal, as well as certain central ideas
in Vygotsky's program, in a valuable way.  Debates we have had on Ilyenkov
seem to center on our interpretation of the concept of the ideal, and what
ideality actually is (I identify ideality with the general notion of
meaning).

But I am open to a serious critique of Bakhurst's shortcomings.  His
liberal/social-democratic view of the relationship of Leninism and
Stalinism does give me pause.  Perhaps I am being entirely too soft on
him.  If you like, fire away!

- Steve

PS  Tell us more about your old man!



*
6/8/2005  Victor wrote:

Steve,
Doesn't it make you wonder? A philosopher who regards the Diamat and
all that utter rubbish as theory to be comparable to the works of Marx,
Lenin, Deborin and Ilyenkov?  It's Propaganda, certainly, theory, never!

I'll never forget my old man's colourful reaction to Stalin's perceptive
contribution to linguistics, and he didn't even finish High School!

Do you think D Bakhurst classifies the classic philosophic work, Mein
Kampf, Rosenburg's brilliant meanderings about race and destiny, and
Mussolini's masterful contributions to human thought as serious theory?

Oudeyis

- Original Message - From: "Steve Gabosch" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
To: "Forum for the discussion of theoretical issues raised by Karl Marx
and thethinkers he inspired" 
Sent: Wednesday, June 08, 2005 0:36
Subject: Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] O, Dialectics!



I continue to enjoy this thread, but will be gone for some days and it
will probably be a little while after that before I can reengage.  I will
think about the position Charles and Ralph have taken on the relationship
of the brain to the origins of humanity.  I think Engel's argument about
how labor created the human hand applies also to the brain, language
organs, bipedalism, etc. so I will try to make a case for that.  And I
have been enjoying the exchanges between Ralph and Victor, especially on
the issues of the role of practice in science, the nature of scientific
thought, and the big question, just what is nature - and can humans
really "know" what nature is in any fundamental ontological sense.  I
recently read the book by Bakhurst that Victor mentions, and have a
different take on it.  Briefly put, I disagree with Bakhurst's negative
assessment of Leninist politics, his tendency to see Stalinism as a form
of Bolshevism, and his general opinion of dialectics.  But I agree with
many of his insights into Ilyenkov and Vygotsky.

Oops, got to get packing.  See you all again soon.

- Steve



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Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] O, Dialectics! :Bakhurst

[Steve Gabosch]

Hi Victor,

If I am getting your first point, that Bakhurst incorrectly takes "Diamat" 
as serious theory, then you are speaking to what I referred to (perhaps too 
softly) as Bakhurst's "tendency to see Stalinism as a form of 
Bolshevism."   I see this as a grave error.  It sounds like we may have 
agreement on this. Trotsky's discussion of Stalinism's tendency to play 
fast and free with theory, using it for its narrow bureaucratic and 
political needs of the moment, zig-zagging here, there, everywhere, 
transforming Marxism into an obscurantist dogma, and using the consequent 
... manufactured crap ... to justify the work of its massive murder machine 
and other crimes against the world working classes and toiling masses - 
seems very relevant here.  When it comes to either Lenin or Stalin, 
Bakhurst is no revolutionary Marxist, and his philosophical analysis indeed 
suffers.  As I think you are pointing out, he does attempt to treat some of 
the production of the Stalinist apparatus in the ideological department as 
"serious" intellectual  work.  It is not.


I have not read Bakhurst's thoughts on the reactionary writings you 
obviously speak of facetiously.  If your point is to compare Mein Kampf 
etc. with the  "theoretical" work of the Stalinist school of "crap" - 
falsification, dogma and tripe -  I agree with the comparison, and accept 
your point.  This whole category of reactionary writing - fascist, 
Stalinist, etc. - can be considered the product of reactionary Bonapartist 
regimes.  It is the opposite of scientific work.


(BTW I am not offhand remembering Rosenburg, please refresh).

But back to Ilyenkov, I do think Bakhurst, up to a point, grasps and 
explains Ilyenkov's concept of the ideal, as well as certain central ideas 
in Vygotsky's program, in a valuable way.  Debates we have had on Ilyenkov 
seem to center on our interpretation of the concept of the ideal, and what 
ideality actually is (I identify ideality with the general notion of 
meaning).


But I am open to a serious critique of Bakhurst's shortcomings.  His 
liberal/social-democratic view of the relationship of Leninism and 
Stalinism does give me pause.  Perhaps I am being entirely too soft on 
him.  If you like, fire away!


- Steve

PS  Tell us more about your old man!



*
6/8/2005  Victor wrote:

Steve,
Doesn't it make you wonder? A philosopher who regards the Diamat and 
all that utter rubbish as theory to be comparable to the works of Marx, 
Lenin, Deborin and Ilyenkov?  It's Propaganda, certainly, theory, never!


I'll never forget my old man's colourful reaction to Stalin's perceptive 
contribution to linguistics, and he didn't even finish High School!


Do you think D Bakhurst classifies the classic philosophic work, Mein 
Kampf, Rosenburg's brilliant meanderings about race and destiny, and 
Mussolini's masterful contributions to human thought as serious theory?


Oudeyis

- Original Message - From: "Steve Gabosch" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
To: "Forum for the discussion of theoretical issues raised by Karl Marx 
and thethinkers he inspired" 

Sent: Wednesday, June 08, 2005 0:36
Subject: Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] O, Dialectics!


I continue to enjoy this thread, but will be gone for some days and it 
will probably be a little while after that before I can reengage.  I will 
think about the position Charles and Ralph have taken on the relationship 
of the brain to the origins of humanity.  I think Engels' argument about 
how labor created the human hand applies also to the brain, language 
organs, bipedalism, etc. so I will try to make a case for that.  And I 
have been enjoying the exchanges between Ralph and Victor, especially on 
the issues of the role of practice in science, the nature of scientific 
thought, and the big question, just what is nature - and can humans 
really "know" what nature is in any fundamental ontological sense.  I 
recently read the book by Bakhurst that Victor mentions, and have a 
different take on it.  Briefly put, I disagree with Bakhurst's negative 
assessment of Leninist politics, his tendency to see Stalinism as a form 
of Bolshevism, and his general opinion of dialectics.  But I agree with 
many of his insights into Ilyenkov and Vygotsky.


Oops, got to get packing.  See you all again soon.

- Steve



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