[LBird]

alanjjohnstone wrote:

I referred to the fact that historians could verify and document how the elite dominated the SPD and the Bolsheviks. They could refer to Party rules, Party resolutions, and describe the relationships these parties  had with workers organisations such as trade unions and workers councils and, later,  historians could detail the actions both took in their respective civil wars to impose their will by the force of the State. Can you demonstrate any conference decision or party rule that gives an elite control over the SPGB?Can you show any actual policy or action of the SPGB which undermines the independence of the workers in their organisations?

I thought that I had answered this question, alan.I can only go by what I read on here. I have already said that I'm not a member, have never been a member, nor have any knowledge of SPGB actions having been elected to control even a parish council, for me to examine.Unless you are going to take a legalistic approach (that because 'materialism' hasn't been openly declared in a policy document, that it doesn't exist or have any purchase in the party), then I think that it's enough to read what party members and party supporters say here when asked about the party's overall viewpoint (perhaps we could call these unwritten, undeclared, even hidden, 'Party rules, resolutions, policies, decisions').I could be more persuaded that this 'hidden agenda' doesn't exist, if there was clearly open debate and disagreement amongst members, which would be evidence that there is no hidden agenda. But… there is no dissent whatsoever against the open statements by members that they will not have workers' democracy in the means of production, and that their (undeclared policy in) philosophy is materialism.If I could quote just one example of a member saying 'I agree with Marx and not Engels', I would revise my views. But, the open, and also passive, support for materialism is 100%!Surely any observer who reads these threads, unsure initially of whether the SPGB looks to materialism, would be convinced by now that it does indeed: all of the members who contribute say so, and those who don't contribute, don't deny it.

ajj wrote:

Where in these policies is the intent to deny workers democratic control?  On the contrary, it is emphasising the independence of workers to determine their own democracy…

But this is simply not true, going by the contributions of members on this and other threads. When asked directly, 'will workers democratically control the production of scientific knowledge (including maths and physics) for the purposes of the direct producers?', they most emphatically deny it. They openly say that only a elite has the ability to make decisions, only an elite has the right to decide the purpose of science.

ajj wrote:

I think this secret conspiracy of the SPGB to thwart workers' democratic control of production cannot be shown to exist from the historic record to its behaviour now. And i keep asking for you to offer actual examples as evidence and you fail to do so.

'Materialism' is 'this secret conspiracy', which has affected all organisations, since the Second International and Kautsky, which look to Engels' materialism. The SPGB, founded in 1904, supped from the same philosophical sources as Lenin, and with the same results: belief that there is something called 'matter' which, outside of any relationship to human consciousness, has to be taken account of. This has its roots in bourgeois science, the history of which I've pointed to a few times.No matter how much evidence I supply, for a materialist, like you, there is no evidence. You won't even admit openly to the board that you are a materialist, but simply pretend to be 'ignorant' of philosophy, and yet hold forth about the political implications of a philosophy which you claim to know nothing. The political implications of materialism are anti-democratic, and if you knew nothing, you would at least have an open mind, and would weigh the written evidence on this thread. FFS, they keep writing it!

ajj wrote:

Not once has anyone ever said the importance of ideas people hold is not the prime one. Ideas are very much part of the material conditions that will help build socialism…

No, no, no, alan!'Ideas' are not 'material' (ie. being, or 'matter'); they are 'ideas' (ie. consciousness).They are part of (to use terminology contemporaneous with Marx) the 'ideal-material conditions'.By 'material', Marx did not mean 'matter'; that was Engels' viewpoint, ignorantly influenced by the powerful bourgeois ideology and its apparent successes of his time. Marx meant 'social production', and social production contains 'ideas'.To argue that 'theory and practice' is something to do with timeless, asocial 'matter' is nonsense. Marx was interested in socio-historical production of our world, which, because we produce it, we can change.Whilst you keep (apparently ignorantly, from your own testimony) using the phrase 'material conditions' (and thinking this is something to do with 'matter' telling us 'what it is'), then you'll unavoidably take the side of an elite who claim to 'know matter', and won't allow a vote on 'what matter is'.Notwithstanding SPGB policies, to you, if matter speaks in the future, you'll be forced to ditch the 'policy of democracy' and turn to the 'experts'. After all, that's precisely what all your party comrades openly argue here, with no dissent, so me predicting what you and your party are likely to do in the future, is not me reading a chrystal ball. You say it.You all look to materialism, either openly like some, or 'ignorantly', like you. 'Matter' is your 'active side', not 'social consciousness'.

[LBird]

jondwhite wrote:

I could troll you and say maths is the only truth in society? I just read a comic book called Logicomix about Bertrand Russell's quest for truth in mathematics. Unfortunately that is about my level of contribution to this debate.

You could read Godel and 'incompleteness theorem' on maths, JDW. He destroyed Russell.The upshot is, there is no 'Truth' in maths, and Gallileo was talking through his arse, when he claimed that 'maths was the language of nature'.Funnily enough, maths turns out to be a socio-historical invention by humans, and those boards full of symbols, beloved of physicists, are written by humans! Matter never even picked up a stick of chalk!Marx was right, once again.

[LBird]

jondwhite wrote:

Apologies for the maths, that is my own stupidity and I have edited the post. Five in three hundred is of course closer to two per cent not 0.01 percent. Apologies.

No problem, JDW!You had me racking my brains for a moment, wondering why I couldn't figure it out!The first challenge on this thread for me, even if because of an error, so go to the top of the class!Let's hope 'talking shite' doesn't catch on with the rest of the party, eh?Oh…

[LBird]

Young Master Smeet wrote:

LBird wrote:

Marx, Theses on Feuerbach, wrote:

IIIThe 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

Standing superior to society does not mean that they get to dictate, but that they standard apart as if they were not effected by the happenings of society, and 'above the fray'.

A novel political interpretation of 'superior to society', YMS. Perhaps Charlie had better things to do, that day, than go on about politics and power, yet again.Matter speaking to you, again, perchance? Indeed, for you.

[LBird]

Marx, Theses on Feuerbach, wrote:

IIIThe 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

[LBird]

JDW wrote:

being generous, five out of three hundred make 0.01% not 1%.

My maths must be really shit.I always thought that 1 in a 100 was 1%, y'know, one per cent, one in hundred.So, 3 in 300 would be, errmmm…. yeah, 1%, too.So, 5 in 300 makes about, roughly, nearly 2%.So, not being generous at all, JDW, but vastly underestimating the support for materialism in the SPGB.Not 0.01%, but nearly 2%. That's about 200 times bigger than your estimate, isn't it?I thought that 'the material facts' spoke to you guys, and consciousness played no part?Perhaps 'matter' has had an active week this week, and is now tired out and taking a well-earned rest from advising the materialists 'what to say', on this very thread?Poor old matter, eh?

[LBird]

YMS wrote:

A ruling class defends itself through obscurantism…

And they don't come any more 'obscurantist' than 'materialism'.Its adherents pretend that 'matter' tells them, and them alone, what 'it is'.It's elitist, through and through, which Marx warned about. The materialists will always divide society into two, the smaller part dictating to the larger part.Many of the physicists seem to think that they know better than us! Imagine that, a handful of bourgeois ideologists think that they will know better than billions of organised workers! As if!Although, some admit that they're no more than plumbers.And, most crucially of all, they're not Democratic Communists (ie. class conscious workers).But, this plays no part in the concerns of the Religious Materialists, who look to their god, Matter, and its divine offspring Differentiated Matter, who walks amongst us, here, on Earth.

[LBird]

Young Master Smeet wrote:

LBird wrote:

Perhaps socialism to you is merely an administrative task, and the workers should keep their ignorant noses out of administration and out of science?

Workers already run the administration of capitalism from top to bottom, why should they stop when we have socialism?

LBird wrote:

YMS fears 'the mob' ruining his science, and them not becoming class conscious, but passively following a demagogue. Perhaps you do, too.Whatever, there's no sign of any socialism I can recognise in YMS's bourgeois bluffing. Or robbo's individualist concerns.

I was simply asking, which one is more likely to be elitist, a philosophy of the world in which the word of a king can be contradicted by evidence, or one where the king can demand a vote to recognise that he can turn the tides?  Also, note, I said nothing about mob rule, but organised mobilised dictatorship of the Leninist type.

'Kings' in workers' councils?'Leninist consciousness' in workers' councils?Boy, you do have a low opinion of those thick workers, YMS!Unlike all those clever elitists, who have been busy fucking up the planet for 300 years, and happily supporting, not just bourgeois rule, but the fuckin' Nazis! Not just Mengele, but Heisenberg. And who was the WW1 German physicist who developed the poison gas to massacre workers?I wonder why no physicist ever said 'Physicists have known sin'? And the Eugenicists in the USA and UK, cutting bits out of unwashed workers…No, there is no 'elite sin' for you, is there, YMS?They know what they're doing, without the grubby workers intervening, in their 'Objective Search for The Truth' [TM bourgeoisie, 1660]

[LBird]

jondwhite wrote:

LBird wrote:

As to the SPGB, not one single member or supporter has come out against 'materialism', so I think we can safely say that the whole party is infected with the hidden disease.

There is around three to four hundred members of the SPGB and only four or five have ever commented on materialism on this forum in topics you have also commented in. At most that is about one tenth in a hundred.

And this circumstance, of course, is mere coincidence!Let's see, let's use maths, so beloved of the physicalists!In favour of materialism: 1%.Opposed to materialism: 0%.Ignorant of philosophy: 99% ? (readers alone, or whole wider party?)Given what I've read, and what support I've conspicuously lacked, I'll bet that materialism is rife!It's just like the SWP! Except, then I was ignorant, and talked the same shite that's been talked here, which is why I can recognise it as such.But, just like the guy who was turned into a newt by the witch in MP, at least I got better.

[LBird]

alanjjohnstone wrote:

But you don’t, that is my problem.

But I do, and the fact you can't recognise that, is your problem. It's a product of your unacknowledged materialism. I keep saying this, and you continue to fail to address the question of your ideology, and continue to affect a disarming 'but, but… I'm ignorant… I'm a simple soul just dealing with 'reality', as I see it…'. Of course, this is materialism, so you won't address it.And now, you'll wring your hands, plea ignorance of "big boys' philosophy", and feign mystification, and lament my failure to answer you.

ajj wrote:

This is like saying there is an SPGB Illuminati 

Hmmmm… how close you are, alan!The Materialist Illuminati! Brilliant! I'll remember that one for future use, when I'm warning workers about the SPGB's secret intent to deny workers' democratic control of production.

ajj wrote:

DENIES any such group any social power to thwart democratic control of society. No commissar or intellectual can allot ones share of the collective wealth, this is self-determined…

But the materialists define 'the collective wealth' not to include physics and maths! Buttons only, for the workers.So, a materialist intellectual will determine, and the class will not self-determine.Of course, this is all still going over your head, isn't it, alan? Y'know, the politics of science, the power to determine. After all, these are political issues, and apparently, like philosophy, it's of no concern to you.Perhaps socialism to you is merely an administrative task, and the workers should keep their ignorant noses out of administration and out of science?YMS fears 'the mob' ruining his science, and them not becoming class conscious, but passively following a demagogue. Perhaps you do, too.Whatever, there's no sign of any socialism I can recognise in YMS's bourgeois bluffing. Or robbo's individualist concerns.As to the SPGB, not one single member or supporter has come out against 'materialism', so I think we can safely say that the whole party is infected with the hidden disease.

[LBird]

alanjjohnstone wrote:

But these ideas have not produced a Party dictatorship either existing in the present or aspiring for the future. Nor does our interaction and engagement with fellow workers betray such a tendency to a hierachy of intellectuals, hoarding social knowledge to exert and apply control for whatever personal advantage you think they could have for such behaviour.

As I've said, alan, you will not acknowledge your materialism, and so you can't 'see' what's in front of your eyes.Don't you think YMS, robbo, twc, etc., etc., are 'aspiring to a future' physics that workers don't control? How you keep missing this baffles me, because they keep saying that they 'aspire' to a democracy-free production of knowledge.Don't you think, by what the materialists have said, that have "a tendency to a hierachy of intellectuals, hoarding social knowledge to exert and apply control"? Well, I can see it, alan, even if you can't. And that difference between us is a result of our differing ideologies: I'm a Marxist, you're an Engelsist. I look to 'socio-historical production', you look to 'eternal matter'.

Quote:

I keep showing how our principles do not support such claims and are doing the opposite – building the  foundations of an autonomous not authoritarian society.

But your Party has the 'secret clause', the 'hidden principle', that it pretends doesn't exist: 'Religious Materialism'.A simple way to reveal the adherents to the Secret SPGB Principle would be to take a vote about workers' power, about democratic control of the production of scientific knowledge, and the Secret would be revealed! The very idea of workers' power! If this happened to be rejected by newer members, they materialists would desert the party which no longer adheres to their secret, anti-worker, bias.

ajj wrote:

I knowi must be off on a limb because nobody but me seems to think this is of any importance to get an answer from you

Well, I keep answering your question, alan, but you apparently don't recognise an answer.What part of "Workers will not control physics and maths" do you see as 'democratic' or non-elitist?You seem to be saying, 'Trust us, workers, we say one thing (no democracy), but in power, we'll do another (workers' democracy). We haven't been in power, yet, so no-one can prove the opposite.'Yeah, right! Pull the other one, alan, it's got bells on it!

[LBird]

YMS wrote:

You can find matter for yourself…

Of course you can, and bollocks to socio-historical production, eh?Individualist and bourgeois crap. No wonder robbo and you espouse materialism.No need for science, when biological individuals can 'touch matter', and, like hippies "Find it for yourself, maaaannn!".And finally, you admit that 'you have to know, prior to change' – the complete opposite of Marx, who argued that 'we know by changing', 'we are active producers of our knowledge'. It doesn't simply 'sit out there', 'waiting to be known', but is produced by active workers.It's laughable bourgeois nonsense, your ideology, YMS.No wonder you NEVER mention democracy in the 'finding' process. Unlike Democratic Communists, who always mention democratic production.

[LBird]

YMS wrote:

The point is that we can all look to the world, look to the data, confirm our theories.

Not implement our theories.Passively 'look to the world, to data, to matter', you workers! Don't change your world!The elitist materialists will surreptitiously provide the 'theories to be implemented' and pretend that they aren't.Beware, workers. The elite 'know matter'.

[LBird]

alanjjohnstone wrote:

That is my quandary. If you are correct, LBird, then why is this anti worker democracy not visible. Are you saying we are ideologically blind to it, and if you are saying that, then it should be apparent to you, yourself so please present the actual appearance of the anti-workerism in what the Party says and does. If possess a diseased philosophy, then what are the symptoms of it that we are showing? Once you have done that then we can settle down to the treatment and the cure.

[my bold]Any worker reading this thread alone (never mind lots of others) can read what SPGB members and supporters have written.One can find plenty of statements of 'anti worker democracy', so it is entirely visible, to those who would see.Of course, 'materialists' are 'ideologically blind to it': the thread is full of 'the anti-workerism in what the Party says' (I can only go by what is said, I'm not a member and never have been, so only current or ex-members can tell me if there is a tendency within that argues for and organises around 'democratic science', though I suspect not).As to 'what are the symtoms of it that you are showing?'Look at YMS's ideological inability to understand what I'm writing – he can only understand it from the perspective (which he hides) of Engels' 'materialism'.I write time and time again that 'inorganic nature' has to be transformed by socio-historical theory and practice into 'organic nature'. Again, and again, and again…So, is there 'differentiation' in 'organic nature'? Of course there is – socio-historical differentiation, that's why we have modes of production.But, YMS can't understand this reply, because it is meaningless to his ideology, which is concerned with 'inorganic nature', or, as Engels termed it 'matter'. YMS wants to discuss 'matter', not Marx's socio-historical production of 'organic nature'.This category of 'matter' is supposedly outside of consciousness, that is, not in any relation to a consciousness, and is a concern of materialists.Marx was concerned with a social product, not an ahistorical, asocial 'matter'.

ajj wrote:

I’m struggling to see how its materialism is as bad a threat as you say because there are no signs of it, that I can see. So help me a bit on my problem. Where is this Leninist anti-democracy elitism exhibiting itself in the SPGB?

Well, since you still pretend to be 'ignorant' of science, philosophy, epistemology, etc., AND YET I'VE GONE TO GREAT LENGTHS TO EXPOSE THE MATERIALISM THAT YOU HOLD, and so I can only now presume that you don't want to expose your own materialism, and will continue to 'play dumb' in these discussions.Of course, the very moment you acknowledge your own ideological viewpoint (of Engels' materialism), all this will fall into place, the scales will fall off your eyes, and you will end your 'struggle to see'.alan, simply read the thread again, and note just who argues for workers' democracy in all production, and who wants an elite to control the production of ideas. The problem is, if you continue to espouse materialism, you'll only 'see' SPGB members wanting to 'know matter', an entirely reasonable aim, for bourgeois science. But it's nothing to do with Marx's socio-historical production. Marx isn't interested in 'matter, out there', but a 'product, by us'. We can change our product, but can only interpret 'matter'.The rest have used up my patience, and I've only wrote this post for you because of your previous comradely efforts, but I think I'm close to calling it a day, even with you.

[LBird]

Oh well, it looks like 19th century materialism has won the vote.A triumph for the SPGB?Well, it'll be safe from workers demanding the democratic control of the means of production.'Matter' has the final say.I must say, though, that I'm disappointed that not one member or supporter has defended democracy.Well, that's not entirely true – the SPGB has no problem with workers controlling widget production, but won't have the important stuff 'interfered with' by workers.That's for the 'materialist' elite to determine, although they'll pretend to workers that 'matter' is speaking to the elite, alone.Congrats!

[Author]

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