Gnostic Marxist
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Once more, to try to help clarify the issue…
… you mention ‘astrophysics’. And then go on to ask questions based on this concept.
But, given that the commencement of democratic communism, a new, revolutionary, mode of production, will produce a ‘revolutionary science’ which will replace ‘[bourgeois] science’, how can one predict that the discipline of ‘astrophysics’ will not be replaced by a more ‘unified’, interdisciplinary, ‘science’, which has different categories of study, compared to present-day ‘science’?
It might be retained; it might not be. It might be partially kept/transformed/replaced (aufheben/sublated).
This determination can only be made by those actively involved in socially producing their new mode of production, by democratic methods.
So, your political, philosophical and ideological assumption about ‘astrophysics’ can be questioned.
I hope this helps clarify the depth of these problems.
So if everything that is social produced must be subject to democracy, presumably, this would also include music, art, literature,etc. as all are socially produced.
Yes, he is mixing up to the two senses of “social production”. As (a) the production of goods and services (which will obviously be subject to democratic control in one way or another) and (b) ideas as arising out of humans as social animals; in fact the mind (as opposed to the brain) is a social product if only because no one can think without language and language is a obviously one. But making what people should think the subject of social control, even if by majority vote, is not only not practical but if it was would be totalitarian, as Robbo has pointed out.
Freedom of thought is also as essential a part of democratic practice as voting (and which we apply to him here even though he is a thundering bore and a lying bastard).
Our feathered friend is all over the place philosophically and politically and only worth arguing with (if at all) to hone our arguments to face critics whose ideas need to be taken more seriously.
ALB – Although I agree with you, I must take you up on the point you make “because no one can think without language”, Babies don’t have language, but it would be wrong to assume that babies do not think. The concept of pre verbal thinking is acknoledged from Freud to Vygostksy.
Depends what you mean by “thinking”. I meant abstract thinking as thinking with symbols ( (words created by humans in society to designate observed parts of external reality), ie about something that is not immediately present to the senses.
LBird
It seems that no matter how hard I try to make you understand what I am saying you don’t seem to be interested in actually engaging with my arguments or those of others here on this forum You blithely ignore what they say and address only a completely spurious made-up version of what you like to think they are saying
And you never answer a point blank question directly when it is put to you – like “will scientific theories be voted upon in socialist society?” Your entire argument points to the fact that this is indeed what you think will be the case but you don’t want to explicitly say this because you know deep down this is a particularly silly idea and you don’t want to appear foolish . So you skirt around the question and witter on vaguely about the “ideological assumptions” underlying the question
ALB is right. You are all over the place politically and philosophically. You are completely muddled and confused on a lot things
A quick example
In post 215197 you say of me:
“You (apparently) don’t want democratic communism, which is fine by me, but means you don’t share my ideology”
Yet in post 215212 you say:
I’m not ‘misrepresenting’ you, robbo.
I argue: “I hold that communism would be “democratically organised”“.
You argue “I hold that communism would be “democratically organised””So you acknowledge that I support the notion that communism should be democratically organised but you don’t think that I want democratic communism, huh? Hmmm. You need to make up your mind on what you think your opponent is saying before criticising it.
This whole debate is NOT about whether or not there will be democratic organisation in communism – I have said all along that there will be far more democratic decision making in communism than is the case today and that I am fully for that. Rather the arguments is about the LIMITS of democratic decision making – how far you can sensibly take it
You say:
“I argue ‘scientific theories’ are socially produced.
You argue ‘scientific theories’ are * produced (I’ve never got you to tell us what * represents). If something is ‘socially produced’, since ‘I hold that communism would be “democratically organised”’, I argue that social production would be democratically organised.”I spent probably the best part of half an hour explaining to you earlier that just because production is social does not mean the total pattern or the entire structure of production can be democratically organised. I gave you the example of my laptop. Directly or indirectly millions upon millions of workers right across the world have made possible the manufacture of this laptop.
Does that mean that all these millions and millions of workers should be able to democratically control every aspect of, and every stage in, the process of manufacturing my lap top??? Of course not. That would be absolutely absurd and impossible
What is possible, on the other hand, is that they democratically control their own workplaces, for instance. I have no problem with this but (allegedly) democratic society-wide central planning, which is what you seem to want, is totally out of the question. Its just not possible
You then go on to say
I argue ‘scientific theories’ are socially produced.
You argue ‘scientific theories’ are * produced (I’ve never got you to tell us what * represents).If something is ‘socially produced’, since ‘I hold that communism would be “democratically organised”’, I argue that social production would be democratically organised.
You seem to argue for, on the one hand, ‘democratically organised’ communism, but on the other, regard ‘scientific theories’ as not part of ‘communism’.I don’t know how you imagine that I regard scientific theories as “not part of communism” and, contrary to what you claim, I explicitly said “scientific theories are socially produced” . So what was the point of your comment that “You argue ‘scientific theories’ are * produced (I’ve never got you to tell us what * represents).” I’ve said how they are produced.
However to reiterate – just because something is socially produced does NOT automatically mean it ought to be democratically organised
Some aspects of the production of goods and services in a socialist society can and ought to be democratically organised such as the set up within individual production units. Some aspects of the praxis of science can also be democratically organised and I gave you a specific example
But the origination and validation of Scientific theories as such ? Nope That’s neither possible nor desirable. Even if the scientific theories are socially produced this is no grounds whatsoever for suggesting that this particular aspect of science should be democratically organised
As you know very well there are 2 reasons why I hold this view
1) There is absolutely no point in wanting to subject scientific theories to a vote. What purpose does this serve? You have never explained. One can understand the purpose of holding a democratic vote to decide on where to construct a new school in one’s town because if option C is voted for this precludes options A and B. But this argument simply does not apply in the case of a scientific theory since knowledge has the characteristic of being non-excludible and non-rivalrous unlike tangible goods – to use the jargon (google the terms if you are unsure as to their meaning). The origination and validation of scientific ideas should be completely free of any form of control – whether by a so called elite or society as a whole
2) It is totally impractical to subject scientific theories to a vote by everyone. To be be democratic such a vote would indeed have to involve everyone in society – about 8 billion people – since you such theories are socially prpduced. There are tens of thousands of scientific theories , past and present , each of which according to you, will needed to be voted upon.
More than likely for any particular theory the vast majority of us will know little or nothing about the theory or indeed have any interest in the theory. You will be lucky indeed to get 0.001 percent of the population to vote any theory at all. How democratic is that? By the time they get round to voting on scientific theory Number 12 – with 120,000 more theories still to vote on – they will have given up on this particularly pointless and timewasting procedure. I know I wouldn’t bother and I am sure this is case with everyone else on this forum probably even you. I haven’t even touched on the mammoth logistics such vote would entail (and we are talking about multiple global plebiscites corresponding to multiple theories)
Sorry LBird, but to say you are plugging a lost cause would be a gross understatement
ALB, I think there’s a whole different thread on when abstract thinking begins, however there is a plethora of evidence that shows that abstract thinking is a process that infants use, even before they develop language. There is similar evidence that similar processes continue into adult life, it’s just that we are less aware of that form of thinking.
That’s why Paul Gascoigne, who can hardly string a sentence together can be considered a genius with a football, similar for musical genius, artistic genius, etc. None of which require thought in the form of language.
Does this apply to some animals as well or just to infant humans? I am suspicious of Freud who seems more of a speculative philopher than anything else.
You do right to be suspcious of Freud, but fair play to him he did have moments of high insight (the unconscious mind for instance).
I would argue that in a more limited sense abstract thinking is present in some some animal minds. If you think of Pavlov and his dogs, the association between ringing bells and food is to an extent abstract.
I would argue that in human babies that abstract is far greater, Attachment theory suggests that out experiences of the first two years of our lives are highly important for all kinds of symbolic thought and associations, Object Relations theory and Fairbairns six ego positions theory are all very much based on the importance of symbolic thought in pre verbal children (although a word of caution, the whole world population have not had a vote on any of these theories)
I am more into philosophy than psychology and physiology but that makes sense. Since humans are a species of social animals whose individuals are utterly dependent on abstract thinking with symbols to survive, you would expect there would be a some sort of biological propensity for this and that scientific research would confirm this.
By “abstract” I meant thinking about something in the absence of an immediate physical stimulus from it; being able to delay a reaction to an outside stimulus and “think” about what any reaction could or should be. Which I don’t think Pavlov’s dogs were able to do.
In any event, what other animal species can do that resembles what humans do is only very rudimentary in comparison. A highly developed capacity for abstract thinking is one of the defining characteristics of the human species.
Bijou Drains wrote: “So if everything that is social produced must be subject to democracy, presumably, this would also include music, art, literature,etc. as all are socially produced.”
If these social products were not subject to democracy, BD, who do you have in mind that would have power over them?
Although you never seem to answer me when I ask who is the social subject, I can make the assumption that your answer would be either ‘individuals’ or ‘an elite’. How am I so confident that you’ll posit a social subject as a minority in society?
Marx, Theses on Feuerbach, wrote: “The materialist doctrine concerning the changing of circumstances and upbringing forgets that circumstances are changed by men and that it is essential to educate the educator himself. This doctrine must, therefore, divide society into two parts, one of which is superior to society.”
https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1845/theses/theses.htm
BD, your ‘materialist’ assumption leads you to downplay the power of ‘ideas’, which is the other side of the coin from regarding ‘matter’ as basic. This clashes with Marx’s views, which was that human social conscious activity (which requires both consciousness and being, as equal factors) was the source of the ‘ideal’ and the ‘material’.
The most famous example, I think, of a ‘materialist’ poo-poo-ing the power of ideas, was Stalin’s response to Laval’s question about Catholics – “The Pope! How many divisions has he got?“.
Obviously, given the collapse of the Soviet Union and the role that Catholicism played, we know that the materialist was wrong to assume the power of ideas was less than the power of the material.
Politics is about power, and who wields it, BD. And ‘music, art, literature, etc.’ are powerful. As is religion.
Bijou Drains wrote: “So if everything that is social produced must be subject to democracy, presumably, this would also include music, art, literature,etc. as all are socially produced.”
If these social products were not subject to democracy, BD, who do you have in mind that would have power over them?
The answer, LBird, is NO-ONE!
You seem obsessed with the need to control everything and to exert “power” over everything. This is control freakery gone haywire!
What about freedom of expression ? Marx argued that “the free development of each is the condition for the free development of all” Next, I suppose you will be calling Marx a bourgeois individualist!
This is NOT to negate the need for democratic control, only to limit the extent of its expression to where it is actually needed – in situations where there is an actual or potential clash of interests for example. My liking one brand of music is not going to prevent you from liking another. Let a thousand flowers bloom.
Diversity is the spice of life. It is capitalism that is intent upon undermining diversity and replace it with the cultural monotony of bourgeois commercialism. You mirror the selfsame logic of capitalist thinking on this subject with your obsession with the need for totalitarian uniformity and social approval. Only you wish to replace the market with the vote as the mechanism for absolute social control and the means by which a flourishing human society can be transformed into something more akin to a beehive for bees
robbo203 wrote: “The answer, LBird, is NO-ONE!”
No, that’s your political answer, robbo.
It’s an individualist ideology that pretends to workers that ‘no-one’ has ‘power’, and so hides from them just who does have power. And ‘someone’ always does.
Bijou Drains wrote: “So if everything that is social produced must be subject to democracy, presumably, this would also include music, art, literature,etc. as all are socially produced.”
L Bird wrote “If these social products were not subject to democracy, BD, who do you have in mind that would have power over them?”
So we’re going to have a society that votes on whether or not a song can be produced, whether or not a book can be produced, whether or not a painting can be produced.
I don’t think your a Socialist after all, you’re really Simon Cowell’s evil twin, who’s been taking too much bad acid!!
No doubt if you get your way all we’ll get to listen to will be The Birdy Song and the Feckin Beatles (the world’s most over rated band)
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