[LBird]

Vin wrote:

LBird wrote:

 the view that 'consciousness' is an 'objective condition', which not only must exist, but also Communists must help to develop within the working class.

As a materialist I agree with this statement

The issues for you to figure out, Vin, are1. why call 'consciousness' material, when to any worker, ideas are not material? It only confuses workers, rather than helps them to develop; and2. why use material when that is the very term that the comrades you disagree with, use themselves? Can't you see that there is a connection between the use of that term and the opposition to your (and mine) position?

Vin wrote:

I cant understand why your post was flagged as it is very pertinent to the discussion. I continue to be disturbed by SPGB members trying to control and prevent open debate and rather than flag your post they could have explained the problem they have with it.

If 'matter' talks to them, who am I to say it doesn't? Clearly, I'm just a troublemaker who must be silenced, rather than a worker experienced in showing charlatans up, for what they are.

Vin wrote:

The objective conditions for socialism do not exist while class consciousness is absent

Yes, because the only meaning that 'objective' can have for humans is 'socially objective'. The alternative is 'physical, outside of being, objective', which is precisely what you are arguing against, Vin: the notion of 'materialism'.

[LBird]

SocialistPunk wrote:

Then why come out with the following eye opener, in the first place?

Young Master Smeet wrote:

5) It would not move socialism one step nearer, nor improve the class struggle, objective conditions and class relations outweigh anythign we could add to the fight.

[my bold]Because YMS wishes to avoid the view that 'consciousness' is an 'objective condition', which not only must exist, but also Communists must help to develop within the working class.YMS, like the rest of the 'materialists/physicalists', holds to the bourgeois ideology that 'matter' will, one day, talk to humans, and that 'material conditions' will convince workers.It's the belief that 'rocks talk to humans', and that no social consciousness is involved in 'knowing' the 'material'.Thus, the nasty issue of "workers' democracy" can be neatly sidestepped, by the 'knowing elite' who supposedly have access to 'Truth' in physics and maths.This is the belief and method of Lenin, out of Engels. It is essentially a bourgeois and anti-worker view of 'reality', a 'reality' that can't be changed, and denies Marx.

[LBird]

SocialistPunk wrote:

Such a set up would have meant visitors would only be exposed to views favourable to the SPGB position and be unable to debate with party members.

It's ironic that visitors are being exposed to my views of scientific method which are favourable to the SPGB position about proletarian democracy, whereas SPGB members posting here are debating from an anti-democratic viewpoint: they won't have workers' control of physics or maths, for example.That is, a 'no debate' site would 'objectively' () favour an anti-SPGB elite. No wonder DJP 'saw little benefit in a discussion forum'!DJP 'knows The Truth', and won't have uppity workers challenging his elitism and demanding that if their views outvote his, that they are right.DJP has a 'special consciousness' that allows him, to the exclusion of all of us, to 'know nature'.How other Communists can't see the Leninism inherent in this ideology, beats me!The real political question is 'Who controls physics?'. Unless the answer for 'democratic socialists' is 'society by democratic means', then something is wrong with that 'materialist' philosophy.

[LBird]

DJP wrote:

Collecting only facts that support a certain point of view is what psuedo science does.To be scientific it should also collect facts that (at least seem to) go against the argument.

Sorry, I can't resist challenging this mystification of the so-called 'scientific method'.This is bourgeois ideology, that 'facts' exist outside of 'a certain point of view'.The bourgeoisie broke the 'being-consciousness' link (or, 'subject-object') because it favoured their own class practice, based upon the philosophical separation of 'private property' from any supposed 'social controls'. For them, 'physical nature' must be completely separate from 'human society and its consciousness'.The proper 'scientific method' is to expose one's 'certain point of view', so that the so-called 'facts' selected from that viewpoint can be compared with 'facts' selected from a differing viewpoint. To collect 'facts opposing' would be to make no selection, and to have to collect everything, an impossibility.Sometimes they will 'match', sometimes they won't.The solution, for the class conscious proletariat, is to vote to determine which 'fact' is to their liking.The bourgeoisie cannot adopt the democratic scientific method, because it will lead to their loss of property. Thus, they must pretend that an elite to their liking has a 'neutral method' for ascertaining 'facts' favourable to their class interests.Physics and maths both fall into this class viewpoint, never mind sociology or politics.

[LBird]

Socialist Punk wrote:

A confident, reasonably knowledgeable party speaker can probably come across quite well at a traditional physical meeting/debate. Online is a whole different ball game. It's often more like being circled by a pack of hyenas.

Speaking as an 'attention seeking, troublesome, moaning, hyena' [thanks for the list, Vin], I can reassure any passing onlookers that the corpse of the 'traditional' SPGB has been well and truly gutted.'Physically' and intellectually.[Ooops… they only recognise the 'physical', but don't mention Marx, and they're happy, passing onlooker]

[LBird]

ajj wrote:

Lbird while i acknowedge our party has remained an insignificant influence, let's be blunt, your reflect the views of a party of one, as you yourself are fully aware.

My views reflect the views of Marx, (Engels at times), Dietzgen (in part), Pannekoek, Korsch, Hook, Avineri, etc. etc. (I've given lists of names who've influenced me many times). Your party's refusal to recognise that my views are widely held, is part of the problem. Marx held them.Whereas your views reflect an uncritical acceptance of Engels' 'materialism', which influenced the Second International, Lenin, SPGB, etc. etc.

ajj wrote:

Nor have we touched the forelock to our "intellectual betters" who frequently advocated and promoted ideas that could not withstand deeper scrutiny. We have not been slaves to the sociologists and economists and historians and philosophers who sought to interpret that world.

Yes, the party has.The unscrutinised forelock-tugging to 'elite experts' is here for all to see. Ask how many members agree with the democratic control of physics and maths? ….. [extended silence]I've even given you the pamphlet name and page number, so you can check where Engels started all this 'materialist' nonsense. You are all slaves to a defunct 19th century ideology, called 'positivism', which Engels called 'materialism'.

ajj wrote:

This is as far i have ventured to declare. What we can do, we should endeavor to do and not try and accomplish the unachievable.

Unless we accomplish the 'unachievable', we won't have had a revolution.Why the party has got anything whatsoever against either Corbyn or religions, baffles me. By 1904 the die was cast. The SPGB isn't a revolutionary party. It's based upon Engels, which even Engels tried (unsucessfully) to repudiate.What's more, the religious overtones of the replies to my detailed discussions, arguments, quotes are clearly those of the faithful.No quote from Marx, where he says things which contradict the religious belief of the faithful in 'matter', ever have any effect.They know The Truth, and they're not going to have workers criticising it, and undermining their own importance as elite thinkers, who are there to tell workers The Truth.At least I think my views should be under democratic control, but the 'elite experts' do not think that theirs should be.For them, 'physics' comes from 'out there'.For them, 'maths' comes from 'out there'.For them 'rationality' comes from 'out there'.No room for workers' democratic control in anything with real power. Because the 'elite experts' have a special method, based upon their special consciousness, which tells them, and only them, what 'out there' says.Just like Lenin and his party.

[LBird]

ajj wrote:

Socialism hasn't happened because its time has not yet come to paraphrase that well known saying. Why is not an easy question to answer but if the objective conditions now exist for its establishment then there are subjective reasons why it has not occurred. In defence of the Party, we have always been a negligible influence so how can it be said we are culpable. This can be widened to the Left as a whole.

Not least of the reasons that 'it has not occurred' is because so-called 'revolutionaries' have been telling workers for 130 years that 'the rocks talk to the revolutionaries'.I was shocked to find that the SPGB also does this.If workers can't democratically control physics, why should they be able to democratically control politics?Unless maths, physics and all scientific knowledge production, which is always social, is under our class' control, then we can't control 'the means of production'.Whilst the 'revolutionaries' are telling workers that 'workers can control the factory production of widgets, but not the clever stuff', why should workers have any faith whatsoever in either themselves or the 'revolutionaries'?It's elitism, pure and simple. And so anti-democratic.

[LBird]

alanjjohnstone wrote:

I think we should identify and emphasise in our language our membership of a common humanity (DannyL does this effectively) and not just the working class. How many of us cringe when we hear that term "proletariat" used…

But I'm not a 'member of a common humanity', alan.I'm a worker (proletarian) who, together with the rest of the working class on this planet (the proletariat), is in an exploited relationship with a boss (bourgeois) who, together with the rest of the boss class on this planet (the bourgeoisie), is in an exploiting relationship with workers.This is a social structure, not a collection of individuals, and the structure is internally divided, not a commonality.I think that anyone stressing 'common humanity' and cringing at the term 'proletariat' is blind to exploitative social relationships, and is essentially some sort of liberal.

ajj wrote:

No i am not advocating the rejection class politics or class analysis but for us to consider the way we express it. Occupy was successful in avoiding the "working" v "middle" class red-herring…we are the 99%…"Power to the People" as John Lennon sang.

If you wish to argue that 'we are the 99%' or that you wish to see 'power to the people', we have no politics in common, alan.I'm not part of any 99% (the proletariat is probably about 80%, with the petit-bourgeoisie 15% and the bourgeoisie 5%), and the term 'the people' just hides this exploitative structuring of humanity.I wish to see the 80% physically and ideologically destroy the other two classes. This doesn't mean destroying the 'individuals' in those classes, but destroying the exploitative relationships that allows 20% of humanity to exploit 80%.I'd rather be open about this revolutionary and democratic position (80% will tell 20% what is going to happen), and stop pretending that changing terms or phrases will change the world.I'm a Communist, Marxist, Proletarian Democrat.Whilst the rest of the proletariat isn't, my politics will remain sidelined, and capitalism will continue.Unless class consciousness develops in the proletariat, then the bourgeoisie will remain in power. And talking about '99%' or 'the people' only harms that development.

[LBird]

Vin wrote:

You have no faith in workers being able to work it out for themselves.

That's right, Vin.I didn't 'work it out for' myself and you didn't 'work it out for' yourself.We both heard and read arguments made by other workers.You, like robbo and YMS, seem to believe that my arguing for social production of social knowledge is 'elitist'.And that the democratic control of that social knowledge production is out of the reach of workers.

Vin wrote:

Socialism has not happened because of 'The failure of the revolutionaries' ? If only those with knowledge could explain to the workers! This is an elitist position. By your own definition.

You haven't a clue, Vin.If your inane thoughts are the best that the SPGB can produce, we workers are better off remaining with Corbyn, no matter his political shortcomings.At least he doesn't claim that 'ideas' are 'material', or that 'thoughts' are 'concrete', or any of the other Engelsist nonsense that has passed for 'philosophy' amongst socialists for the last 130 years.This 'materialism' is a dead end for workers, Vin, and you're welcome to it. Until you back out of the cul-de-sac, with help from workers like me, you'll remain in a small sect.This bollocks has to be challenged, before we can take on Corbyn and Labour.

[LBird]

You're one of the main culprits, Vin.

[LBird]

SocialistPunk wrote:

I was thinking. If Corbyn is successful in winning the Labour leadership, all that will be achieved is a further distraction  from revolutionary thinking, as our class will once again be led down a blind alley of mainstream reformist promises, as Labour attempt to retake the "left" by jumping on the anti austerity band wagon.  I'm probably stating the obvious?

Another way of looking at it, SP, is that there is no 'revolutionary thinking' within our class, and there never has been, which is why Labour periodically gets elected to run capitalism.Labour don't 'lead' anywhere, not even 'down blind alleys of reformist promises'.I put it down to a complete failure of revolutionaries to actually explain anything to their fellow workers, and to even have any faith in the abilities of those non-Communist workers to develop themselves.There are even supporters of the so-called Socialist Party here who won't have workers' democratic control of production. Why any worker should think that some elite form of 'socialism' should be any better than capitalism, these non-democrats never explain.Elitism in socialists points to Labour. From this perspective, Corbyn is the good guy.

[LBird]

On pages 110-111, Mason has started to discuss 'value' and the balance of the relationship between ideal and material (information/data and physical; intangible and tangible; real and "nothing real").Up until now, he has clearly been employing the familiar, but outdated, Engelsist, not Marxist, concepts of 'materialism' and the 'concrete'. I take it this dates back to his erroneous acceptance when younger, that Engels' ideas are also Marx's ideas, and so Mason accepts the myth of the mystical unity of the single thinker 'Marx-Engels'.I'm not sure where he's going with all this yet, but if I can make sense of it from a Marxist idealist-materialist perspective, I'll say some more later.For now, I'd give the advice to anyone reading the book to clarify both one's own ideology (if one is an Engelsian 'materialist', at least be open to oneself) and also Mason's own ideology.So far, he's called Marxism "Conventional Marxism" (p. 30), "Orthodox Marxism" (p. 34) and plain old "Marxism" (p. 33), but it's not clear at all what he means by these terms, or if he himself is employing a "Marxist" perspective (read "Engelsist").

[LBird]

alanjjohnstone wrote:

Herman Gorter wrote:

…their thoughts are nonetheless born from the process of production; their thoughts are only distinguished by the different property relations in which the two “sisters” find themselves. 

[my bold]Yeah, 'thoughts' of all humans are 'born from the process of production'.That applies not only to women, but also to physicists (of both sexes), too.'Production' produces 'thought', 'material' does not produce.Engels' 'matter-in-motion' does not produce consciousness; consciousness is produced active humans, by social production, as Marx argued.Theory and practice (criticism and creation) by societies produces consciousness, of both our material and ideal world.Change the producing society, change the knowledge produced of nature.Change the producing class, change the knowledge produced of nature.Proletarian science – you know it makes sense.

[LBird]

Thanks alan. From the fifth paragraph of Gorter's text:

Herman Gorter wrote:

But the worker who wants to become a free being, who wants to place the State under the power of his class and seize the means of production from the possessing classes, this worker must understand that the bourgeoisie, with its way of depicting things, turns them on their head and that it is not mind which determines existence [nor, it is implied, 'existence alone which determines mind], but social existence which determines mind.

[my italic insert and bold]So, three positions:1. Mind determines existence (idealism);2. Existence determines mind (materialism). Social existence determines mind (idealism-materialism).Marx (and Gorter, so it seems – I haven't read all the text) argue for 'social existence', that is, human production as the determining factor.Marx unified 'object-subject', 'existence-mind', 'being-consciousness', 'ideal-material' in a philosophy of 'theory and practice', from which socio-historical 'truths' are created by humans.This is the basis of a proletarian science.

[LBird]

robbo203 wrote:

…I had always understood communism would break the link between your productive contribution to society and what you take from society…

You've 'always understood' this, robbo, because you're not a Communist, but an individualist.Your use of the term 'your' (referring to 'an individual') shows this.The Communist phrasing would be 'our'.'Our productive contribution' is by nature linked to 'our taking from society'.You discuss 'individuals', Communists discuss 'social production and consumption', and its democratic control by all.

[Author]

Posts