[ALB]

We are not alone. The ICC have been banned too:http://libcom.org/forums/general/spgb-london-anarchist-bookfair-20082014#comment-543006It remains to be seen if the CWO are allowed in this year as they were last year. Probably not as they're more party-ist than the ICC.

[ALB]

Here's the good news (extract from SPGB August EC Minutes):

Quote:

Following on from the proposal he made to the November 2013 EC to have a
collection of his Free Lunch Cartoons published, Cde P Rigg wrote on the
22nd July and 26th July, informing the Party that he has arranged for the
publication of 750 copies of the new Free Cartoon Collection booklets. He
will send 100 copies to Head Office, and Party will be able to advertise
and sell them like any other Party literature and keep the proceeds. The
first batch will be posted in September 2014. He will arrange to sell the
remainder copies privately. He also suggested a price of £5.00 per copy.
He sent two copies to Head Office, which were shown to EC members. The EC
agreed the following –
– a price of £5.00 plus postage and packing per copy
– add to the list of Party publications in the Socialist Standard and the
website
– to thank Cde P Rigg for allocating 100 copies of a well produced booklet
to the Socialist Party.

So, available from 52 Clapham High St, London SW4 7UN from next month for £5 + postage (£2.50 from UK).

[ALB]

To prove Slobberjabber wrong.

[ALB]

SocialistPunk wrote:

Perhaps an answer to the question regarding Scottish independence and the party name might be forthcoming. Has it even been discussed?1st Warning:  1. The general topic of each forum is given by the posted forum description. Do not start a thread in a forum unless it matches the given topic, and do not derail existing threads with off-topic posts.

Try this thread instead:http://www.worldsocialism.org/spgb/forum/world-socialist-movement/scottish-referendum?page=1

[ALB]

Young Master Smeet wrote:

Some may find the Wikipedia article useful:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Critical_realism_%28philosophy_of_the_social_sciences%29

Yes, interesting. I see there's also an "International Association for Critical Realism":http://criticalrealismblog.blogspot.co.uk/Looks a bit esoteric to me. But, LBird, is this what you also mean by "critical realism" or are you an offshoot of it? I can see some similarities.

[ALB]

Of course I think Newton and anybody else can be "wrong". But what do we mean by being "wrong" or "right"?

LBird wrote:

[PS, comrade, how about moving on to discussing Critical Realism, and its usefulness (or otherwise) for the proletariat when discussing scientific method?]

OK, what is the "reality" that the "realism" in the name is referring to?

[ALB]

LBird wrote:

You won't believe this, but when I said that whether 'the sun goes round the earth' or 'the earth goes round the sun' is a 'truth' that depends upon which society is saying it, some, employing bourgeois ideology, denied it!

To continue the banter, how, then, can it be said that Newton was wrong, as somebody wrote last night?

[ALB]

LBird wrote:

I glad that you seem to be agreeing with me, that ‘there is no such thing as an ideology-free science’

I should perhaps clarify that I agree with your point that the mind plays an active role in understanding nature and that the categories into which it  classifies nature are in the mind not in nature, but I don't agree with calling this "ideology". But that's an argument about terminology not substance. It follows from this that, as you and many others are saying, that science is not uncovering the True nature of nature but classifying it in a particular way and which could, in some cases, be class-biased.

LBird wrote:

Whether any ‘science’ is ‘class-based’ is to be examined, rather than assumed

I agree. That was my point. It's a basic methological principle.

LBird, post #385 wrote:

I prefer a scientific method that openly examines 'theory' first, and then puts it into practice, and then votes on the results to see whether they are considered 'socially true' or not.Using this unified method, it is up to the proletariat to decide, after scientific investigation, whether any 'science' produced by the bourgeoisie is 'true' for us, too. Perhaps it will be, in some areas of science, perhaps it won't be, in other areas of science.

Not at all sure about this, though. Can't see how it would work. Who gets a vote? All "proletarians" (in which case there might be some bizarre results as religion and the paranormal are so widespread today under capitalism)? Or just class conscious proletarians, i.e socialists/communists (in which case wouldn't that be "elitist" or "substitutionist)?

LBird wrote:

I’m interested in the issue of method, rather than trying to imagine what objections the proletariat might come up against bourgeois ideas within any particular scientific discipline, from physics, chemistry, biology, psychology, sociology, politics, to history, and every other discipline in between. Why treat physics any differently from sociology? Unless one has already assumed that physics and sociology are sciences of a different methodological order?

This seems a bit of cop-out to me and in contradiction to what you wrote above about the need to examine each science on a case by case basis. Also, of course you have imagined (as in the thread on Piketty) what objections can be raised against, for instance, bourgeois economics. Is that because (like me) you are more confident about talking about economics than physics?

Quote:

Is physics a 'special' science? The bourgeoisie have been saying it is, for centuries, and that its method alone produces Truth. We know since Einstein that this isn't the case, as Rovelli admits, that 'Newton was wrong'.

Not meaning to be funny, but who are the bourgeoisie who have been saying this "for centuries"?  Until a hundred years or so ago I would have thought that most of the bourgeoisie would have thought that "the Truth" was to be found in the bible — the Protestant ethic and all that. In any event, as you point out, whoever has been saying this is wrong, as is now widely recognised in bourgeois as well as socialist/communist circles.

[ALB]

SocialistPunk wrote:

Hi AdamI was wondering, if as you point out in your post, the party has accepted the use of the party names as outlined above, then how come it isn't being implemented in the case of (. You mention the whittling away of the party decision, but how can that have happened when a democratic decision was made by the party? 

Sorry, I missed this till now. It was whittled away by subsequent Conference decisions, one in 2008 and again this year.A fuss could have been kicked up of a Party Poll not being amended by another Party Poll as Rule 26 states "The results of a Party Poll shall overrule all other decisions (i.e. EC, Conference or previous Party Poll decisions" which implies that a Party Poll decision cannot be overruled except by another Party Poll.However, these days, since every member votes on Conference motions the vote on them is virtually a Party Poll so a formal Party Poll is likely to have the same result. Though not necessarily since a Party Poll motion is subject to a much wider discussion and reflection by Party members. Maybe those of us who want to keep  "of Great Britain" restricted to legal, historical and international occasions only should have been more insistent.Actually, a case can be made for saying that the last paragraph of the  2008 Conference was (and still is) out of order as contrary to Rule 26:

Quote:

This Conference resolves that the Party's full name, 'The Socialist Party of Great Britain', be used in the following cases:A. legal documents; B. Party forms; C. Party membership cards; D. publication credits, including the masthead of the Socialist Standard; E. listings of World Socialist Movement parties and publications; and F. the title of the Party's website.It is encouraged to use the abbreviated form 'The Socialist Party' in any other context where confusion with other similarly named organisations is unlikely. This resolution supersedes the 1986 and 1988 Conference resolutions respecting the use of the Party's names.

Constitutionally, it may have superseded the previous Conference resolutions but not the 1991 Party Poll that confirmed the 1988 resolution.

[ALB]

alanjjohnstone wrote:

Quote:

Despite repeated requests to post less (even from blog committee members and a recommendation from the internet committee) nobody takes any notice.

ALB, we do take notice but just happen to disagree with that position which you yourself prefer which is simply another member expressing their own personal views.

It is my opinion but not "simply" my individual one. It is also the opinion of the Internet Committee in its report on activities in 2013 and included in the EC's Report to this year's Conference:

Quote:

Part of the Committee's role is oversight of the Party's blog, Socialism or Your Money Back. Cdes Johnstone and Surman contributed on a regular basis and there were often three or more posts daily. While the Committee is happy with the volume of blog posts over the past year, we feel that one daily, topical post to the Party's blog would be a good minimum, and that any extra ones could be submitted instead to the blogs of the Companion Parties in order to help bring them out of dormancy.

Unfortunately the report of the discussion of this report is not yet available. 

[ALB]

Agree it looks good but don't think we should automatically copy stuff from our SOYMB blog there. There's already too much stuff on the blog, sometimes more than 3 posts a day, which defeats the purpose as followers won't read so much. One post a day, as with most other blogs, should be enough. Despite repeated requests to post less (even from blog committee members and a recommendation from the internet committee) nobody takes any notice.

[ALB]

There was actually quite a good reply (along side two other letters praising Bird's bullshit) in the next issue:

Quote:

The official World War One fanfare represents a tragic smokescreen about the contradictory truths of this devastating war. I am the grandson of a Sikh soldier who left home in north India to fight for Britain and its allies in France in World War One.There is no honour in World War One, except heroism of civilians and soldiers. World War One was an extension of the murky politics of Europe's competing governments, heads of state and rulers, in endeavoui to get a bigger slice of the global cake. Millions of civilians and hundreds of thousands of British, European, Sikh, Gurkha, Indian and African soldiers we used as military fodder to further the interests of the elite.Decision-makers sat back in their capitals and secure hide-outs while ordinary people bore bombings, starvation and death. Civilians and soldiers were ordered to fight to secure territory for their masters. Jagdeesh Singh, Sikh Community Action Network.

 

[ALB]

LBird wrote:

To be 'convinced' is not to be 'open', and ALB's belief in the separation of 'science' from 'sociology' is an ideological belief, which he's learnt from our society. But he doesn't declare where he 'learnt' this, and so leaves us with the impression that it's his individual opinion.When I 'prefer' something, I'm recommending it to the proletariat for a vote, and I openly tell the proletariat where I've got my ideas from (Marx, Pannekoek, Schaff, Lakatos, etc.).So, my scientific method is 'democratic' and 'exposed', whereas ALB's is 'personal' and 'hidden'. The latter is a bourgeois method.

That's bollox. I was merely using the word "personally" to show that this was my view and not necessarily the views of the others continuing the discussion here (YMS, DJP, Vin). And could just as easily have used the word "prefer" as "convince". I can edit my comment in that way if you want. Believe it or not, I was actually starting from a position of agreement with you !The question I was raising was not incompatible with your view that there is no such thing as an ideology-free science. I was just questioning whether the ideology had always to be a class ideology. You yourself say (I think) that in socialism/communism this will not be the case. I was just asking whether, for some things, this could not be the case under capitalism too. (Incidentally, I prefer to think that the physical science biology is also class-ideology based).You haven't answered this.

[ALB]

SB_UK wrote:

Politics and the legal establishment are a major part of the problem – and I'd argue more so than money.

In that case, all the more need to win control of political power and dismantle it. So that those who currently control it can't use it to resist the establishment of a world community based on the Earth's resources being the common heritage of all and which will make money redundant.  

[ALB]

After Putin another bull-shitter. The August 4-10 Big Issue carries a three-page article defending the First World War by John Bird, "Founder and Editor-in-Chief of The Big Issue":http://www.bigissue.com/features/4204/john-bird-the-necessary-warAs is well-known he's a pompous and pontificating ass and he lives up to his reputation. Pity the poor sods obliged to sell this and pity those who bought it thinking they were helping the homeless but found instead that they were re-inforcing pro-war propaganda (both that.of 1914-18 and of today).Having said that the same issue containing our usual ad stating:

Quote:

The Socialist Party aims at building a moneyless world community based on common ownership and democratic control with production solely for use not profit. It opposes all leadership, all war.

[Author]

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