[LBird]

So, twc, would Australian Aborigines from 5000 years ago be able to 'tie their shoelaces', even though they'll never have been taught how to? Would they even recognise 'shoes' for what we use them for?I think Marx would argue that 'tying shoelaces' is a social activity, learned from a specific society, in specific historical circumstances, in a society that has access to relatively advanced technology, that has a need for shoes.Your very long post will be meaningless to most people.Surely what we should be trying to do is explain what Marx means?He argues for socio-historic specificity, and socially-produced theories which allow social practice to take place. That's how we learn and produce knowledge.Kids learn to tie their shoelaces from their parents.

[LBird]

YMS, post #856, wrote:

…got in…

YMS, post #858, wrote:

…got out…

Sounds like your making it up, as you go along, YMS, merely as a response to what I say, rather than as a principled position which you take on these questions.In the first, you argue 'information' comes from the outside, from external reality to passive human senses.In the second, you argue 'information' comes from the inside, from critical human thinking to external reality.I don't think that you've really given it much thought, have you?

[LBird]

YMS wrote:

Lbird,there are only six ways information gets into the meatbot. Five are the senses, the 6th is DNA…

Ah, yes, I forgot you're 'meatbot man'.No chance of you realising that humans create information, in their minds, using social theories, by critical assessment, and not from your six 'individualist, biological senses' routes.Reading your previous post, I was nearly in seventh heaven, there…

[LBird]

YMS wrote:

In many ways, it is a plaussible claim to make that knowledge is distortion…

Y'know, I could cry.Instead of developing this vital insight, that knowledge is distortion, you immediately fall back into individualist answers.

YMS wrote:

… if we are each of us. As we grow into our senses and our networks of information, we each become a focus for shaping our own world. If we are presumed to be wrapped up in ideology, we'd need priets to see us clear, but if we can each make up our own minds…

[my bold]'Knowledge' is a social product, YMS, and the inevitable 'distortion' of it has social roots.If only you could ditch the bourgeois brainwashing of 'your individuality', and start to examine the 'social production' of yourself, you might take your insight further.You're a 'worker', not an 'individual'. A social product, not a mere isolated biological entity. Accepting that premise is the beginning of wisdom.

[LBird]

alanjjohnstone wrote:

i suggested it once before. Why can't you join the party and instead of pissing into the tent, you can piss out of it.

This was at least a possibility (I won't put it any higher than that) when I started to post last year (especially because of your and ALB's contributions on LibCom about 'free access communism'), but I'm afraid now I'd put it no higher than very, very, improbable. The fact that you can characterise my acts as 'pissing in' (I know it's a joke, but still revealing) tells me something: I think I'm trying to help comrades become aware of the choices we have within the philosophy of science, based upon my years of extensive reading, but I'm clearly regarded as a troublemaker, who is being subject to warnings (and an inadvertent ban) for only answering other posters who post in an unneccessarily hostile tone to me. I'm just better and funnier at 'hostility', and an outsider.

ajj wrote:

Your disagreements are not incompatble with membership as far as i can judge and the party has demonstrated its flexibility for the extensive debates on philosophy topics.

As far as I can judge, my disagreements are entirely incompatible with every other member who posts on here. To me, the party is constantly demonstrating its religious adherence to 'bourgeois science' (individualism, biological senses, induction) rather than demonstrating an 'open mind'. I should temper that statement with the fact that some members (ex-?) have been more open to persuasion, but haven't posted in my support due to their own confusion about these issues. It's difficult to overthrow a lifetime's brainwashing about the nature of science, both by the bourgeosie and other comrades taken in by Engels.

ajj wrote:

I doubt you have any real alternatives or other options, do you, except to continue as that lone voice in the wilderness, isolated from possible comrades and denied opportunities for activity.

I could give up being 'that lone voice in the wilderness', and just continue to educate myself in the arcane issues of ontology and epistemology for my own enjoyment and enlightenment; or even ditch Socialism/Communism/Marxism in its entirety, and laugh from the sidelines at the pretensions of those still stuck within 19th century frameworks of thought.I mean, 'practical observation'. FFS.Any individual can go outside, stand with their arms on their hips, and be sure that they are not moving: yep, the earth is stationary. Then, passively observe the facts of the sun going round the earth (and you can 'see' it doing just this). Then, and only then, 'let the theory emerge'. Yeah, "the sun goes round the earth", the result of Brian's 'practical observation by an individual using their own senses'.Has no-one else ever read Marx? Never mind some 20th century philosophy of science.No, Alan, I just don't do religious sects, with their unthinking certainty and abuse of heretics.

[LBird]

Brian wrote:

Which when considered together unreservably places matter in its rightful place – ahead of the queue – in terms of ideas springing from the practical observation of matter in motion.

I should just comment on this allegation, too.'Ideas' don't spring from either 'practical observation' (ie. induction) or from 'matter in motion' (ie. rocks talking to us). This is Engelsian rubbish.'Ideas' spring from creative, critical humans. This is Marx's 'active side' that he admired in idealism.

Brian wrote:

…you've become myopic to all the arguments put to you regarding materialism versus idealism.

'Myopia' is a feature of every ideology: that's what I've been explaining for hundreds of post now. 'Selection' is necessary, and that means ignoring some 'matter/facts' and choosing other 'matter/facts'.So, I haven't 'become myopic' – we are all inescapably myopic, because that is the nature of science and the human production of knowledge.Further, I don't regard the debate as 'materialism versus idealism', because I can read the Theses on Feuerbach, and can clearly see that Marx selected aspects from both idealism and materialism (and anyone reading that text can see this), and thus Marx became an 'idealist-materialist' (or, 'historical materialist', 'critical realist', etc.).I've said all this before, but you still haven't cottoned on, have you, Brian?We disagree in our philosophies, but mine is democratic and can provide a basis for the SPGB's political strategy, whereas yours isn't and can't.It's pointless you just reiterating your ideology, as if the last 800+ posts hadn't happened.And no-one, not you or any other member of the SPGB, has attempted to give a unified scientific method that can apply to both rocks and value, as I have at least tried to do.

[LBird]

Brian wrote:

But being dismissive of all scientific and academic thought, just because according to you they are all ideologically unsound in terms of class bias, is a misjudgement and unproven.

I'm not sure where this notion of anyone 'being dismissive of all scientific and academic thought' has come from, but it hasn't come from me.Well, I think that if no-one wants to discuss the outlines I've given about Critical Realism, and its use for understanding both physical and social phenomena (including Marx's 'value'), and its potential to provide a basis for a unified scientific method (as sought by Marx), then I suppose that the thread has run its course.If anyone in the SPGB can provide an alternative basis for the democratic control of the means of production by the proletariat, to the one that I've tried to provide, I'll be keen to read it. Perhaps anyone who wishes to do so could start a new thread.

[LBird]

Brian wrote:

In order to bolster your hypothesis you make the claim that Marx puts theory first…

I'm not sure where you're going with this, Brian.Don't you agree that 'Marx puts theory first'? I thought that that claim was uncontroversial.

[LBird]

twc wrote:

If you aren’t inclined to critique my exposure of the hitherto-unnoticed⁴  “objectivity-of-social-practice” thread running through Marx’s—not Engels’s—Theses on Feuerbach, then you might favour us by solving a much simpler problem that we ordinary folks can only accomplish daily by taking our apprehension of sensuous and practical activity as objective:Unlike the rest of us, you do not take our sensuously perceived shoes and shoelaces as objective sensuousness.Unlike the rest of us, you do not take our shoelace-tying practice as objective practice.How then, unlike the rest of us, do you—an anti-objective social constructionist—manage to anti-objectively tie anti-objective shoelaces on anti-objective shoes by anti-objective practice, unless your anti-objective conceptions of anti-shoes, anti-shoelaces, anti-shoelace-tying, and the anti-world in which this anti-objective mystery is anti-objectively acted out are actually objective in the first place—and are all actually conceived by you to be objective?.

This is just 'individualist' nonsense, and nothing whatsoever to do with 'science' and the production of 'knowledge'.According to this method, 'tying one's shoes' allows both the shoes and laces to tell us what they are called, how to manufacture them, the molecular constituency of them, how to lace our shoes, etc. etc.'Shoes, laces and their tying' are social activities, in their naming, production, learning, and chemistry.Unless you're really saying that a native Australian Aborigine of 5000 years ago would, without a moment's hesitation when presented with 21st century polished leather shoes, know the names of their constituents, be able to knock up a pair, tie them immediately from intuition, and give us a breakdown of their molecular form…Do us a favour, twc… go and read some Marx and Engels. Even Fred would have no time for your asocial, ahistoric, bourgeois individualism of 'biological senses'.

[LBird]

The usual Stalinist approach, eh, twc? Play the man not the ball. Smear the person's character, rather than answer their questions.'Duplicitous', 'playing a dirty game'… oh dear!Do you froth at the mouth, too, when compiling your diatribes against me?I'm so confident of my arguments that I give links to people who disagree with me, to encourage wider reading, whereas you never engage in the pros and cons of positions, but just fulminate at my 'devious' character.You would do well to read what I actually write, twc, like some comrades obviously do.And wipe your mouth.Moderator1 2nd Warning:  7. You are free to express your views candidly and forcefully provided you remain civil. Do not use the forums to send abuse, threats, personal insults or attacks, or purposely inflammatory remarks (trolling). Do not respond to such messages.

[LBird]

Brian wrote:

And your democracy in science derives from your theory and practice hypothesis, which not many agree with.

Yeah, just who was the thinker who pushed that 'theory and practice hypothesis, which not many [here] agree with'?

[LBird]

For anyone who's interested in these issues, of "Engels versus Marx", reading this from John Rees of the SWP will prove enlightening. He makes a very good opening, outlining the criticisms and arguments that I've also made of Engels, but then, in contrast to me, goes on to defend the unity of "Marx-Engels".http://www.marxists.org/history/etol/writers/rees-j/1994/xx/engels.htmReading this might provide some good arguments for those who disagree with me; but perhaps they'll then end up following Rees' politics, too!

[LBird]

I agree with much of what you say, mcolome1. I'm always attacking academics, not least the idiot Piketty, and agree that both Marx and Engels made mistakes. We even agree that workers need class consciousness and 'advanced sociological and anthropological knowledge'.But this is our key difference:

mcolome1 wrote:

I do not think you understood what I wrote,or what I was trying to express, or probably you do not know Leninism pretty well. I will repeat again: Lenin did not adopt his concept of the vanguard party, and the concept of the cadres from Engels, he adopted it from the Second International, that conception came after Engels, he did not have an elite mentality

I do understand what you're writing, and you're expressing it well. The problem is, I disagree about your view of Engels and his philosophy of nature. It was not only Lenin, but also the Second International in its entirety, that looked to Engels for guidance on these matters. Marx didn't write much on the issue of science/ontology/epistemology, and what he did write wasn't published until well after the Russian Revolution of 1917. So, the nature of 'Marxism' for those who adopted it prior to the publication of the Economic and Philosophic Manuscripts was, in fact, 'Engelsism'.This is what we have to deal with. Much of what passes, even today, as 'Marxism', is actually 'Engelsism'. We can see that on this very thread. Marx was an 'idealist-materialist' (if you can accept that terminology as it refers to the concepts used in the Theses on Feuerbach), not a 'materialist'. Engels' 'materialism' was a throwback to before the Theses, and ditched the insights Marx provided, into the 'active side' of humanity. Rocks do not talk to humans. Humans ask questions of rocks.The outcome of this philosophising, though, is fundamentally about our politics.If we accept that 'rocks talk to us' (materialism/physicalism), then those who claim to be able to hear the rocks are a separate minority from society, because humans can't hear rocks. The minority lie to us, whether in science or politics. Leninists are the scientists of society. Both are an unelected elite, who maintain their power by pretending to know something that the masses don't.Engels 19th century positivist understanding of science is responsible for this erroneous basis to 'Marxism'.As I keep saying, for the worker confused by these issues, they simply have to ask 'Do you agree with democratic controls on all of your activities? The academic, elite scientist will answer 'No!', and the cadre, elite Leninist will answer 'No!'. This is actually the answer on this thread from a number of posters, who are members of the SPGB: 'No to workers' democracy in science'.I'm a Communist and Marxist, mcolome1, and believe that the proletariat can come to consciousness of all its activities, political, economic, social, cultural, ideological, scientific, and must employ democratic methods in all of these areas.Those who look to Engels' philosophy of science cannot do this. This thread proves that.Engels' philosophy is not a suitable basis for the SPGB's strategy of democracy. Marx's radical democracy is.

[LBird]

Vin Maratty wrote:

LBird wrote:

I fundamentally disagree with you here, comrade.We do need the proletariat to produce its own intellectuals, and it needs to be a mass movement, too. Workers need to develop as thoereticians…

[my completion of quote] Elite? 

No, just selection, driven by your theory, rather than 'objective facts'.

[LBird]

mcolome1 wrote:

Vladimir Lenin used certain conception of Frederick Engels, but it does not mean that Engels was completely wrong like Lenin was, and he did not distort socialism like Lenin did, therefore, I do not see the relationship between Leninism/ Bolshevism and the Socialist Party.I have my personal critiques against Engels, but I do not think that he was a proto-Leninist, personally, I am grateful toward the works of Engels because by reading him I was able to get into the workers movement, and I was able to have in my hands volume 2 and 3 of Capital which were edited by him.

I'm not criticising Engels as a historian, as good friend of Marx, as an editor or as a revolutionary. I admire him in those aspects. But I've said this before, to other comrades who seem to think that any criticism of Engels (or, indeed, Marx) is beyond the pale. Well, it isn't, if we profess to be critical thinkers.I'm criticising Engels as a shit philosopher, whose complete nonsense about 'materialism' and 'dialectics in nature' gave politicians like Lenin the fig-leaf of philosophical cover for their anti-proletarian ideology, that only a select few of cadre can come to class consciousness. It merely reflects 19th century elite thinking, that bourgeois academics are required to do the thinking for humanity, and the rest of us are too dumb to run our world. This infected both politics and science.

mcolome1 wrote:

We do not need intellectualism in the socialist movement, that is an old petty bourgeois conception that I went theoreticians many years ago, surrounded by a bunch of theoreticians, what we need is a simple socialist theory to be inserted in our heads in order to overthrow capitalism, and we are not going to overthrow capitalism pretending to know more than anybody else.

I fundamentally disagree with you here, comrade.We do need the proletariat to produce its own intellectuals, and it needs to be a mass movement, too. Workers need to develop as thoereticians, and the last thing we need is 'a simple socialist theory inserted in our heads'. We need our class to produce more and more critical thinkers, in order to combat the bourgeoisie's academics, like Piketty, who will only derail our movement. I'm all for simplifying much of Marx's output, in order to generate some understanding and thus discussion, but building Communism will never be 'simple'.And we do need to 'know more than anybody else'. If we don't believe that 'we know best', and draw confidence from that knowledge, then we are beaten before we begin. We have to attract the best thinkers in our society, both proletarian and bourgeois, to undermind the ruling class at its heart. This can't be done by 'simple socialist theory', but only by educated, confident, critical workers, determined to run their own world.

[Author]

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