Gnostic Marxist
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Karl Korsch had something of interest to say
Marxist ‘theory’ does not strive to achieve objective knowledge of reality out of an independent, theoretical interest. It is driven to acquire this knowledge by the practical necessities of struggle, and can neglect it only by running the heavy risk of failing to achieve its goal, at the price of the defeat and eclipse of the proletarian movement which it represents. And just because it never loses sight of its practical purpose, it eschews every attempt to force all experience into the design of a monistic construction of the universe in order to build a united system of knowledge. Marxist theory is not interested in everything, nor is it interested to the same degree in all the objects of its interests. Its only concern is with those things which have some bearing upon its objectives, and with everything and every aspect of every- thing the more so as this particular thing or this particular aspect of a thing is related to its practical purposes.
https://www.marxists.org/archive/korsch/1934/why-marxist.htm
In my own words, if it doesn’t contribute to furthering the movement towards socialism, i don’t really give a damn…and i think i have been for a long time critical of the utter sterility of your own idiosyncratic views on what you think Marx meant rather than actually use him constructively in practical politics.
Any gap between theory and practice has been yours, not mine
alanjjohntone wrote: “Karl Korsch had something of interest to say
Marxist ‘theory’ does not strive to achieve objective knowledge of reality out of an independent, theoretical interest. It is driven to acquire this knowledge by the practical necessities of struggle, and can neglect it only by running the heavy risk of failing to achieve its goal, at the price of the defeat and eclipse of the proletarian movement which it represents.”
Doesn’t ‘democracy’ form part of Marx’s ‘practical necessities of struggle’?
If so, the rest of the quote tells you where you and the SPGB are heading – ‘defeat and eclipse’.
alanjjohnstone wrote: “In my own words, if it doesn’t contribute to furthering the movement towards socialism, i don’t really give a damn…”
But ‘materialism’ doesn’t, as we’ve read here, ‘doesn’t contribute to furthering the movement towards socialism’, if that ‘socialism’ is a ‘democratic socialism’, because ‘materialism’ doesn’t regard ‘the active side’ as humanity (as Marx said), but it regards ‘matter’ as the active side, and so does not require human democracy, because ‘matter’ will bring socialism of its own accord (the mythical ‘material conditions’).
But… you do give a damn, don’t you, about ‘materialism’, because you’ve been brainwashed into thinking that the only alternative to ‘materialism’ is ‘idealism’, that is, religion and divine worship.
The third alternative, Marx’s alternative, is ‘social productionism’, which requires human conscious activity to produce its world. This is a reconciliation of both idealism and materialism (as Marx himself wrote). Since this ‘furthers the movement toward socialism’, because it puts mass human theory and practice by democratic means at the centre of building socialism, your ‘not giving a damn’ prevents you from participating actively, and leads you to wait for, not Godot, but ‘the material’.
Keep reading Korsch, alan, but from a Marxist perspective, not from a materialist one. It’s your choice, if you can begin to ‘give a damn’.
Where anywhere does Marx say we will be voting on the ‘truth’ of scientific theories.
Answer this..Another gem from the 1920s.
Matthew Culbert wrote: “Where anywhere does Marx say we will be voting on the ‘truth’ of scientific theories.”
Marx – democrat, social production, err, no you’re right, Matt, anything not specifically mentioned by Marx, like ‘Brown shoes will be allowed’ means that ‘Brown shoes will not be allowed’.
Where do you think ‘truth’ and ‘scientific theories’ come from – clever individuals? God? Matter? Reality? Nature?
And why are you so opposed to them being socially produced by democratic methods? Do you assume that the masses can’t do physics?Materialists, eh? Marx had your number in the 1840s.
Where anywhere does Marx say we will be voting on the ‘truth’.
So he does not and you’ve been spouting mince.
And why are you so opposed to them being socially produced by democratic methods?
The phsysicians and specialists are and will be part of the masses.
So, certainly not so. As previously indicated several times.
The people who make the revolution, will set the determinations.An advanced , post-capitalist society, run by us all, locally, regionally, globally, in democratic administration over resources and not a government over people.
I am just opposed to the stupidity of your claim.
Answer this..
Matthew Culbert wrote: “An advanced , post-capitalist society, run by us all, locally, regionally, globally, in democratic administration over resources and not a government over people.”
But not ‘truth’, eh?
Who, then, is going to ‘run’ that, Matt?
Matthew Culbert wrote: “I am just opposed to the stupidity of your claim.”
Materialists are always opposed to ‘the stupidity of’ democratic claims, Matt. Marx had your number!
You and your elite with a special consciousness are keeping hold of the social production of truth, aren’t you? Lenin and his cadre had the same idea.
Ohh, no, sorry, the ‘material conditions’ made the Bolsheviks do it! Pull the other one, Vladimir Ilyich!
You and your elite with a special consciousness are keeping hold of the social production of truth, aren’t you?
What damned elite? You are havering. You seem to be the one with a special consciousness of minority led Leninist debacles, are needing to,lay out procedures for the revolutionaries to follow.
We say the ones who make the revolution, the immense majority who make the revolution will make it work.
In an advanced , post-capitalist society, run by us all, locally, regionally, globally, in democratic administration over resources and not a government over people.
Answer this..
“Do you assume that the masses can’t do physics?”
Well, I’m one of the masses and my physics is fairly rudimentary (‘O’ level standard, much of it forgotten now).
How about you, LBird? You’re one of the masses aren’t you? How much physics can you do? Are you self-taught, do you have a first class degree in it, or are you proposing to get one before the socialist revolution?
How much physics do we all need to know before we can start the revolution? How about chemistry, biology, quantum mechanics, musical theory and the rules of football? Do you have an estimate of how long it will all take?
Please tell.
How much physics do we all need to know before we can start the revolution? How about chemistry, biology, quantum mechanics, musical theory and the rules of football? Do you have an estimate of how long it will all take? Please tell.
Its pointless trying to reason with our feathered friend, Rod. Its like arguing with a Jehovah Witness. He says truth, maths, scientific theories et al will all be subject to a democratic vote by everyone in socialism – an insanely impractical and pointless idea – and then claims he wants “to engage with the question of by who and how are the practical limits set, which will then lead to what they are”. Which basically means he has already decided on behalf of humanity that there will be no limits. He has already decided on behalf of, and without consulting, humanity that scientific theories need to be voted upon and without even explaining WHY such a vote is needed. Some “democrat”!
As a member of humanity, its within my rights to say 1) I see absolutely no point in voting on the question of whether or anti matter exists 2) I am not qualified to express an opinion one way or another on the question of whether anti matter exists since I am not an astrophysicist and don’t pretend to be. But according to LBird I am not allowed to say these things because that would be “undemocratic”. In the name of his “democracy” I cant express an opinion
LBird’s model of “democracy” is not a recipe for human society but for an ant colony or a beehive. Paradoxically and by default it would lead to a fascist totalitarianism in which an elite will effectively govern in the name of the people
Here is David McLellan’s translation of that passage in the 1844 Paris Manuscripts where Marx is arguing against Creationism:
“But since for socialist man what is called world history is nothing but the creation of man by human labour and the development of nature for man, he has the observable and irrefutable proof of his self-creation and the process of his origin. Once the essential reality of man in nature, man as the existence of nature for man, and nature for man as the existence of man, has become evident in practical life and sense experience, then the question of an alien being, of a being above nature and man — a question that implies an admission of the unreality of nature and man — has become possible in practice. Atheism as a denial of this unreality, has no longer any meaning, for atheism is the denial of God and tries to assert through this negation the existence of man; but socialism as such no longer needs this mediation; it starts from the theoretical and practical sense-perception of man and nature as the true reality.” (Early Texts, pp. 156-7)
In his “Karl Marx. His Life and Thought” McLellan comments on this passage:
“Thus for socialist man the question of an alien being beyond man and nature whose existence would imply their unreality had become impossible. For him the mutual interdependence of man and nature was what was essential and anything else seemed unreal.” (pp. 122-3)
I agree entirely with your Marx quote, ALB.
Marx employs the concept “nature for man”, thus he specifies his subject ‘[hu]man[ity]’ and its object ‘nature’. The active, conscious subject creates its object for itself. There is no ‘nature’ outside of human conscious activity, outside of humanity’s social production.
“…it starts from the theoretical and practical sense-perception of man and nature as the true reality”
‘True reality’ requires the theory and practice of [hu]man[ity]. ‘[Hu]man[ity] and nature’ are inextricably linked.
‘Nature’ is not sitting ‘out there’, awaiting its passive discovery. There is no ‘true reality’ prior to our ‘true reality’. Truth is socially produced.
There is no ‘god’ doing this creation for us. There is no ‘matter’ doing this creation for us. Humanity is its own creator. We create ‘nature for us’.
You still do not answer the question.
Answer Robbo’s very simple straight forward question and point.
Now deal with the arguments that demolish your crackpot non-Marxian idea about the need for scientific theories to be democratically voted upon by the global population.
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