LBird
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Capitalist Pig wrote:the outcomes of experiments can have a certain bias toward the interests of the investors of them, this is true, but I don't believe it would be productive to classify all science as bias toward the interest of the capitalist class because they were funded by its members. I think this would be like burning books simply because almost all science today and in the past was funded by the ruling class
You're entitled to follow the what the bourgeoisie have told you, CP, but since you haven't answered my question about your view now about 'all science', after my previous post, I'll leave our exchange at this point.All I can say, to you as I've said to the others, is that, if you don't have any worries about 'science' and you think it has a non-political 'neutral method', and it produces 'The Truth', why bother to ask me to explain?You have to already have come to have serious doubts about those premises before asking for clarification of your doubts. All I can do is to deepen your existing worries, and propose an alternative that you already know is necessary, even if you don't yet know what that alternative is. That is, the discussion has to be about 'what alternative?', rather than 'There is no alternative!'.I've said this before, too: I find it strange that comrades who have already come to see through 'capitalism', 'the free market' and Thatcher's mantra of 'There Is No Alternative' (hence her nickname, TINA), and realise that the alternative can't be explained through the premises of neo-classical economics, but has to be explained by revolutionary ideas which undermine capitalism at its roots, can't see that similar problems exist, which requires a revolutionary and critical approach, and which also applies to 'science'.Sorry, CP, it looks like you're going to have to wade through several threads here, and dozens of books and articles quoted therein, to get to the point of being critical of 'science'.Perhaps there isn't a shortcut, and I've been entirely wrong in that premise.Whilst you think that my views "classify all science as bias toward the interest of the capitalist class" and that they entail "burning books", we're not going anywhere soon.If you do believe that, it's no wonder you want to stick with 'science', the non-political sort. The fact that this is a 19th century belief, a myth still propagated, and widely believed today, shows to me the power of ruling class ideas.Whilst the 'atom' is non-political, the 'commodity' will remain non-political.
You're a tenacious bleeder, CP!OK, I'll take the bait.
CP wrote:I believed all science was 'science' regardless of the social background of the scientist but apparently this is untrue?What about Dr. Mengele?http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Josef_MengeleBy all the definitions of 'scientist', he was a scientist.As a scientist, he was employing the 'scientific method'.Yet, we regard his 'social background' as playing a massive part in his science, and condemn his science for that reason.So, here is an example of 'science' of which it is 'untrue' to say we are 'regardless of the social backgound of the scientist'.Do you still believe what you thought about 'all science'?
Capitalist Pig wrote:metaphiysics dealing with the nature of being and epistemology which has to do I guess with the interperatation of solid beliefs and opinions. so this thread isn't actually about communist theory but epistemology and ontology?confused…So is everybody else, CP, and I'm clearly not helping!All the things that you mention are interlinked, and the several threads on 'science' here discuss it all in great detail.
No offence, CP, but I've been through these issues on a number of threads, and if you want to believe, from what you've read so far by my 'interpreters', that I think that 'everyone can specialize in all branches of scientific study' and that I desire 'individual uniformity', then I'll have to let you continue to hold on dearly to those myths!If you want to know what I actually think, you'll have to read those threads, and take account of what I actually say, rather than what others tell you that I say.If you're interested in ontology and epistemology, and do some background reading (of which I've done decades' worth), then you might be able to ask some questions to tempt me into further discussion. I started these threads simply to help other comrades avoid that long toil, and hopefully, help myself to develop further. But, on the former, I've failed. On the latter, I've advanced by leaps and bounds, but under my own steam, rather than collectively, as I wished.But, if that's not your bag, and you don't really want to understand why I don't argue that 'everyone can specialize in all branches of scientific study' (and the answer involves ontology and epistemology), then just pass over this thread, too.I'm sure that you can think of far more interesting things to do with your time! I can!
Some food for thought, for those opposed to ‘politics in physics’, on the context of the emergence of this longstanding bourgeois view of the relationship between science and politics. This is a view which Communists should replace with one that argues for the democratisation of all science and truth-production.
W. Schafer(ed) Finalization in Science (1983) pp. 252-3, wrote:The traditional relationship between science and politics was based upon a historic compromise worked out in the mid-seventeenth century. The New Science of “experimental philosophy” relinquished all of the moral, political, educational and social aims established for it by Bacon, Comenius, Winstanley and many others in the early-seventeenth century. The absolutist state rewarded the renunciation of the ideals of science as a radical project for socio-political reform with the offer of wide-ranging privileges for “pure” natural science; the founding of the Royal Society in London(1662) and the Academie Royale des Sciences in Paris(1666) formed part of this process. Royal support for the New Science was paid for by separating science from politics.[my bolds]http://www.bokus.com/bok/9789027715494/finalization-in-science/
One fine day, robbo, you'll actually read what I write.Meanwhile, I hope Richard is getting some benefit from all this, and has grown in his understanding of the relational aspect of 'class'.It's not 'individuals' but the relationship between them, that is the focus of 'class'.If one stresses the 'individual' existence, and think that enquiring closely into that reveals what we want to know, then we will miss the most important factor: not the individuals, but the nature of their relationship.Think of a vampire and its victim: of course, both exist in a biological sense, but to talk of their 'individuality' (which exists, of course), is to miss their exploitative relationship.One is a individual vampire, and sucks blood from the individual victim. The fact that two individuals are involved is not only the least important aspect of what there is to know about them, but focussing upon them as individuals actually detracts from an examination of their relationship.The key is, one is a vampire, and the other is a victim, and they have opposed interests. The vampire cannot exist without the victim, but the victim can exist without the vampire. So, their relationship is an exploitative one, and the vampire inescapably exploits (the individual vampire can't choose to stop sucking blood), whilst the victim is told that the vampire actually injects 'lifeforce' into the victim, so the victim comes to believe that the victim is also dependent upon this relationship, and that it is mutually beneficial. That is, the vampire takes blood and gives lifeforce, whilst the victim takes lifeforce and gives blood.You'll notice that their is no mention is this explanation of the individual characteristics of either vampire or victim, but the whole explanatory stress is upon the nature of their exploitative/exploited relationship.While we spend our time discussing the individuality of the relationees, we are not discussing the essential factor of their relations.We aren't really concerned with how either dresses or speaks, their hobbies or tastes, their likes or dislikes, the sizes of their houses or income, their nationality or sexuality, their sex.A tall, well-spoken and educated, opera loving, straight male vampire IS IDENTICAL to a small, poorly-spoken and educated, bingo loving, gay female vampire.A small, poorly-spoken and educated, bingo loving, gay male victim IS IDENTICAL to a tall, well-spoken and educated, opera loving straight female victim.Looking at these four as individuals, and focussing on their own personal characteristics, will only obscure the relationships involved.It's the exploitative relationship, comrade!No one is saying that individuals don't have their own characteristics, but that the most important factor in analysing our society is not their various specifics, but that it is their exploitative relationship.The vampires know it, and when necessary, drop all pretence of being 'individuals' and band together to maintain their bloodsucking.The victims don't yet know it, and so far in history have always sided with 'their' vampires, which the vampires have persuaded them that they have a real connection.We need to bring to the fore the relational aspects of society, and not the 'individuality' of all.'Individuality' is a bourgeois ideological concept, which keeps us victims separated into our own little world of one.
robbo203 wrote:But then conveniently you don't exist, you are not an "individual".I predicted to Richard that you'd say this.As long as Richard, and any other comrades trying to get to grips with 'class' and why it should be used for analysis of our society, and want to find a better way of explaining it to other workers, so that we can help develop our consciousness, I'm happy.You stick to 'individuals', robbo. And you keep helping to explain to others, whilst using a bourgeois concept.Ooooo… I know what comes next: "LBird says individuals aren't real, He says we're all just a concept!"
robbo203 wrote:…as I have told him often enough, LBird is quite wrong to characterise my position as an "individualist" one. An individualist perspective is fundamentally an atomistic one which sees individuals as primary and society as a derivative phenomenon (the so called "social contract" idea). That is not my position but LBird cannot seem to get his head around thatHmmm… OK, let's read robbo further…
robbo203 wrote:In any case, the argument is not about this but about whether one identify such a thing as individual capitalists in this capitalist world we live in. I assert that indeed we can.But, why would we want to 'identify individual capitalists'?Surely, it's their social role that is the key to understanding them as 'individuals'? In fact, not their individualness, but their exploitative role within a society. Their class position within a society. Not them as biological entities.
robbo203 wrote:He seems to think this makes my position an "individualist" one because I can point to and identify such individual capitalists.Yes, why the hell are you so concerned with 'individuals'? Well, I ask rhetorically, because I know your view of future "workers' power" requires it, because you think, like anarchists do, that 'communism' equals 'free individuals', rather than a social power, a structural role for democracy.
robbo203 wrote:Exploitation is indeed a social process but if you cannot identity a subset within society – a class of individuals – that exploits another much larger class – then notion of capitalism being an "exploitative society" becomes meaningless…We're back to examining 'individual bricks', after our encounter with the rabid wolf, to see if the big tear in our arse can be explained by the 'individual brick'.'A class of individuals'. A concept guaranteed to shift focus from 'class' to 'individuals'. In fact, ideologically, it's doing the work of the bourgeoisie for them.Unless workers can start to get past their bourgeois-implanted fascination with 'individuals', and start to examine how the structure works, outside of looking at the individuals who make it up, then we'll remain static in this society.I think that the real ideological issue, between robbo and me, is in our ideological identification of ourselves.robbo regards himself as an 'individual'.I don't. I'm not an individual. That is a concept that emerged historically with bourgeois society. It suits the purposes of the bourgeoisie for everybody to regard themselves, as does robbo, as an 'individual'.I'm a 'worker'. This is a structural concept, which implies its exploitative opposite, a 'boss'. My understanding of my birth, family background, education, socialisation, development and future, is linked, not to my biology, my physical existence as an 'individual' being, but to my class position within the social structure in which I live. Thus, the tug of conflicting ideologies, ruling class ideas and exploited class ideas, has played the key part in my life. I used to think that I was an 'individual', as we are all told we are, but now I know better.But whilst the majority of workers continue to examine themselves through the prism of 'individuality', and view society similarly, and worry about 'individuals' or 'classes of individuals', we'll remain slaves of an ideology not of our own making.I'm a 'wallist', robbo, not a 'brickist', as you are. That's why you continue to talk about bricks. You can't even bring yourself to just say 'wall', but have to stress a 'wall of bricks'. And when I insist on discussing the structure of 'walls', you immediately shout 'What about the bricks? LBird says bricks don't exist!' And Richard is confused. He thinks 'wallists' deny the existence of 'bricks'.With your 'help', robbo, workers asking questions about capitalism will continue to be confused, by talk of individuals.
Richard wrote:This has turned out to be a very interesting thread. For now, I agree with robbo203 that society is made up of individuals. On the other hand, I agree with LBird that exploitation is the key to understanding capitalism.The problem is, Richard, is that no-one argues that society is not made up of individuals.The issue is the structure within which individuals find themselves, a structure which pre-exists them, and which they are fitted into from birth.The 'key to understanding capitalism' is precisely that: that it is a structure which embodies exploitation. This cannot be found by examining individuals, so looking at individuals does not tell us anything about exploitation, because exploitation is a structural characteristic. So, your 'classes of individuals' concept is meaningless. Of course, classes consist of 'individuals', but that is not what explains 'exploitation' (ie. it is not 'individual greed' or 'individual genes'). The explanation lies in understanding the characteristics of the structure of capitalism, not in 'understanding the individuals'.Perhaps an analogy will help you to grasp this difference in approach.A wall, quite clearly, consists of 'individual bricks'. No-one says it doesn't.But, a jumbled pile of bricks scattered on the ground consists, too, of 'individual bricks'.If we focus on 'individual bricks', we learn nothing more than the individual characteristics of bricks: size, shape, colour, hardness, etc.But if we want to understand the protection that a load of bricks, precisely structured together into a wall, gives to us from attackers (savage dogs outside our house, or attacking enemies outside our castle), we have to examine the wall, not the individual bricks.The structural qualities of a wall are not present in its constituent bricks. Try hiding from a rabid wolf behind a pile of bricks: it won't help; the wolf will simply go over or around the pile of bricks, and bob's your uncle, your arse is its meal. After you get out of hospital, going back to the pile of bricks, and picking them up, each individuallly, and asking why the individual brick didn't protect you, is a fool's errand.No, the wall, just as society does, has qualities that are produced by its structure, and which are not to be found in its bricks, just as not in individuals, but are to be found in an examination of the structure. That is, the wall, or capitalism.So, the lesson is, Richard, don't be fooled by bourgeois ideologists who harp on about 'individuals', and instead focus your attention upon the structure of capitalist society, and its structural inequalities (which are not individual qualities) and its structural purpose of exploitation (which is nothing to do with individual greed or genes).If you turn your attention to individuals, you're losing focus on our real problem. And beware of ruling class ideas, about concerns for 'individuals'. That's precisely what they want you to look at, and thus to ignore the exploitative structure of society.
robbo203 wrote:What that means is that of course you can in principle "place" individuals according to their class.Why would one want to do this? Only if one is more interested in 'placing individuals' (a concern of liberals, rather than Marxists), would one do this, in 'principle' or in 'practice'.
robbo203 wrote:Of course, we are not saying he is a capitalist because of his habits, his clothes, his accent etc etc but rather because of his significant ownership of capital.No.Not 'he'; capitalists can be female.And not 'significant'.The exploitative relationship is the key, not amounts. Relatively poor individuals can be capitalists, because they exploit even poorer workers.
robbo203 wrote:That is what counts in the Marxian class schema and on that basis you can certainly differentiate between individuals. In fact. if you think about it, if you could not do this then the whole concept of class would be rendered meaningless.[my bold]'Differentiating between individuals' is not a concern of class analysis.It's a concern of yours, robbo, because, as other threads have shown, you employ an individualist perspective, regarding both society and your place in it in the future.
robbo203 wrote:I think it is important to understand that the notion of "class" in the Marxian sense is an abstraction and that, in reality, there is a grey area where one class shades into the other.Yeah, the Marxian perspective on 'class' has nothing whatsoever to do with 'placing every individual' in an 'individualist schema' of society.It is an approach to understanding, describing, criticising and analysing a society, at the level of a society.A society is not a collection of individuals. It is more than the sum of its parts.Marxian 'class' is nothing to do with individuals, their pay, their income level, their accents, their clothes, their habits, their education, or their cultural views. It is nothing to do with 'appearances', that can be easily seen.'Class' is a social relationship, a relationship of exploitation.It presumes exploitation at the societel level.If someone doesn't share that presumption, they will not agree with 'class analysis'. Other factors, rather than discussing 'class', will have to intervene, to bring people to that presumption.If someone is looking to place individuals in a comprehensive ladder of appearances, 'class' is of no use.They are better employing 'status', which liberal sociology often mistakenly identifies with 'class'. This is why some people think 'class' is about accents, clothes, attitudes, whippets, keeping pidgeons, going to the opera and ballet, speaking posh or rough, etc.
Richard wrote:Fair enough, although that means there must be a fairly arbitrary cut off point between working class and capitalist.One thing you should bear in mind, Richard, is that ‘class analysis’ (ie., including the identification of ‘workers’ and ‘capitalists’) is not concerned with placing every individual in a ‘perfect category’. In the sense meant by non-Marxists, this will appear ‘fairly arbitrary’, because non-Marxists tend to have an ‘individualist’ perspective, and so are far more concerned with identifying the ‘cut off point’ between which every individual can be placed.I’m not sure of your views about Marx and class analysis, but if you do not share those views, it’s important not to misunderstand what’s being said. You can disagree, of course, whilst still understanding why this ‘fairly arbitrary cut off point’ is perfectly acceptable and not a problem for Marxists, even if it isn’t acceptable for liberals, for example.The best way that I’ve thought of explaining this is by analogy to a colour spectrum. No rainbow has clearly defined ‘cut off points’ between its various colours: there are zones of blurring of adjacent colours. If one is concerned to accurately specify every particle of colour, then one has a problem, because there are numerous ‘mixed colours’ outside of the seven core colours, which we regard as making up a rainbow. But if one is merely concerned, for one’s purposes, to identify the seven colours, to teach what a rainbow is, then this is sufficient.In the same sense, if one is concerned with indentifying every individual’s class category, for one’s own reasons, then the ‘fairly arbitrary cut off points’ of Marxists are, well, fairly arbitrary and so unscientific and useless. But, if one is concerned, as a Marxist, to understand the dynamics of a class society, these ‘fairly arbitrary cut off points’ are perfectly acceptable, because the blurring of individuals' positions does not prevent us from understanding the society, which is like a spectrum.The placing of individuals within the categories of ‘working class and capitalists’ is not an important concern, rather the understanding of the relationship between these two ‘colours’ is our concern.As I’ve said, you can disagree that this is acceptable in helping to analyse society, but you can still come to understand the difference in these two approaches, the ‘individualist/pointillist’ versus the ‘society/spectrumist’, in understanding ‘classes/colours’.Hope this helps.
Surely the only reason for a worker to vote for the SPGB is because that worker wants to see parliament closed down?I've suggested before that the party, for this strategy, should adopt the term 'Parliamentary Suicide'.This will clarify the strategy for those socialist comrades who are also critics of a supposed 'parliamentary approach', like those on LibCom. They fear, rightly, that the SPGB aims to employ parliament as a political centre, from which commands will be issued.On the contrary, all political commands must issue from self-developed Workers' Councils, which are democratic from their inception, and are totally structured to reflect the wishes of the class conscious workers, organised as a political force.The purpose of capturing parliament is merely to legitimise the 'closing down' of bourgeois power sources, so that 'legitimate authority' for the armed forces, police, civil service, etc. is clearly and openly handed to Workers' Councils. Of course, 'illegitimate authority' will already have been established, and the only reason for parliamentary activity is to undermine bourgeois 'legitimate authority' in the eyes of those who still claim to recognise it. That is, those liberal officers of the state forces who already reject any attempts at an unconstitutional coup by the reactionaries within the state forces, but who haven't yet, like the majority of the workers within those forces, come to accept a revolutionary position.Put simply, the policy of 'Parliamentary Suicide' is to place those liberals who are within the state, legitimately in their own eyes, onto the side of the revolution.The reactionaries within the state will obviously have to be arrested by a combination of Workers' Councils' units and those units of the state that have come over to the revolution (that is, a revolutionary rank-and-file, revolutionary junior officers, and any liberal senior offices who maintain their declared loyalty to parliament, and thus accept the legitimacy of the transfer of control from the heads of the armed forces to the Workers' Councils).Any units which maintain their previous cohesion, and loyalty to any unelected authority, and determination to resist our legitimate claiming of democratic power, will have to be broken by force.Don't forget, this scenario is taking place in the middle of a huge upheaval, the end of a process during which ever-greater numbers of people will have rejected the market and the state, and will have become class conscious about the need for breaking of state power.The thermometer reading determining the 'heat' of this 'process' is the votes for the SPGB.Do I think that it will happen like this? Quite possibly not, but I agree that all avenues of peaceful transformation should be explored, and if electing a majority of the SPGB to parliament can help this transition, then I'm all for it.Do I think that the SPGB parliament will be giving any orders to workers? No.Do I think the the SPGB parliament will be giving orders to state personnel to transfer their loyalty to Workers' Councils? Yes.That's its final act. End of parliament. End of a phase of history. It commits suicide.
alanjjohnstone wrote:I happen to believe workers councils will be strongly featured because workers are already effectively organised at the point of production.This is not clear enough a statement of political intent, alan.Workers' Councils 'will be strongly featured because' they'll embody Workers' Power. They will be both economic and political bodies, not simply 'production' bodies.
robbo203 wrote:I think you would be far better advised to shift your focus of attention away from abstract philosophy for a while to something a little more practically oriented and down to earth, to be brutally frank. You've been reading too many philosophy books lately. Time to take a break!I know that your advice is well-meant, robbo, and comradely.But, in fact, having been active and 'practically oriented and down to earth', just like every other worker who gets involved in 'revolutionary politics', if there's one thing that I've learnt, it's that 'abstract philosophy', if left to 'our betters', will dominate our ideas.And, 'to be brutally frank', you haven't been reading enough philosophy books lately.But, I agree, 'time for a break'.
Vin wrote:With regard Lbird, it is your views that are dogmatic and unchanging…. Before you go, just for my own curiosity, what DO you mean by 'Communism'?By 'Communism', I mean the democratic control of production.Since 'truth' is a social product, I also mean that 'truth' must be under our control.'Dogmatic and unchanging', to the end.
