[LBird]

Vin Maratty wrote:

I think you have misunderstoodd my point.  –  because you are an idealistMaterial conditions – ideas – can in no way be described as 'rocks'Material conditions refers to our human existence.

Yeah, and 'human existence' includes our ideas about that 'existence'!Our consciousness and understanding of rocks can be described as 'idealist-materialist', simply because both 'ideas' and 'material' are required.Which leads me to return game, set and match point: "I think you have misunderstood my point – because you are a materialist"I, like Marx, am an 'idealist-materialist', because no-one, not even 'materialists' like you, can stick to 'materialism'.

[LBird]

Vin Maratty wrote:

Depends upon how you define 'material' . The MCH tells us that ideas are part of our material conditions.

I couldn't agree more with you, Vin.My problem is who'd have a reason for calling these, as you rightly stress, 'ideas' material.?Why not openly state that, like Marx (and even Engels in his clearer moments!), we are 'idealist-materialists'?The word 'material' has been stressed by the inheritors and misreaders of Engels (like Lenin) to convince us workers (as a class) that the 'real world' of 'material' conditions tells us, without conscious human intervention (ie. by the active use of our 'ideas'), 'what it is', and that the Party has access to a neutral method which tells them 'what the rocks say'. Thus, they, and only they, can tell workers what to think.I put class before party, comrade, as I'm sure you do, too (I don't think SPGB members are Leninists (well, most aren't, anyway!)), which is why I think that what I'm arguing fits better philosophically with the SPGB's political strategy of propaganda and education to develop the whole class prior to a revolution.This is in contrast to the Leninist strategy of a minority with a special consciousness making the revolution prior to the workers themselves en masse.The stress on 'material conditions' and their openness to understanding by those with the correct method is a minority strategy.

Vin Maratty wrote:

…there is nothing outside of these material conditions

But you've just agreed that 'ideas' are 'material', so you must logically agree that it's our understanding of these conditions that is the point of the debate.Human understanding, of the same 'material', changes with the society they live in. That is, the 'material conditions' to a party can be different to those same 'material conditions' to a class.The 'material conditions' don't tell us what they are. That's why Marx stressed the need for science. And our science must be mass science, because we must control production as a class.We must decide collectively what the world is telling us. That requires, as for every act by humans in a Communist society, a democratic method.Those who tell us that they know the 'Truth' of 'material conditions' are lying to us.

[LBird]

stuartw2112 wrote:

PS One final final point. I've just been discussing this with a historian, and she says that you're reading history backwards from a determined (and imagined) end point.

Well, since all history is 'read backwards from a determined end point', she's not telling us much!The only thing perhaps she is surreptitiously telling us is that her particular 'determined end point' is not 'imagined', but is the (supposed) 'real world' of today.Since both 'the future' and 'the present' as a starting point for historians when reading 'the past' contain interpretive elements, I think we can take it as read that her 'imagined' positions about 'past', 'present' and 'future' are simply unexamined (or, she has examined them, but is not telling you about having done this, all the better to denigrate our 'reading of history', so that you retain confidence in her political views and advice about 'history').That's why our history has the potential to be better history: because we're open about our biases, and don't pretend to be producing 'history' that is 'objective'. That doesn't mean our history has to be 'better', though: much 'Marxist' history is laughable. But we have a better starting point: openness about this society today, how it came about, and our hopes for the future.Beware the 'historians' of all stripes, stuart!

[LBird]

Just to say that I agree with SocialistPunk, robbo203 and stuartw2112, that 'morality' is an essential part of the case for socialism.Right and wrong are attributes of human thinking about 'material conditions', and in that sense are as much about the 'ideal' as about the 'material'.The 'material' does not 'throw up' or 'bring forward' a correct moral position to passive humans.Our morality has to also take account of 'unobservables', like 'value'.

Marx wrote:

The value of commodities is the very opposite of the coarse materiality of their substance, not an atom of matter enters into its composition.

[my bold]https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1867-c1/ch01.htm#S3

[LBird]

twc wrote:

Most “historians”, as prodigiously skilled analysts as many of them are, fail to see beneath the concrete contingencies of historical situations. Few are consistent scientists like Marx, and cannot comprehend the scientific, and therefore testable, necessity to explain the concrete by abstract theory — the materialist conception of history — which is a non-trivial task.The sort of history you seem to allude to is largely descriptive, and ultimately like any pursuit that “restricts itself to the facts” finds that the facts themselves are tendentious, and so the “factual” historian is forced against his will to choose his own alternative theory of history to make sense of his “facts” or merely rest his “factual” case upon his own persuasiveness as an author. Yes, Marx is no help to such an “historian”.

There is much to what you say, twc, about 'factual historians' and their method.But 'abstract theory' allows us to comprehend 'unobservables', like structures, which is just what Marx did.To call these 'unobservables' material seems to be stretching the term's meaning too far, though.And as for 'testable', the problem is that it's the 'abstract theory' which often determines what counts as 'evidence' or 'facts', and so whether a 'test' is 'proved' or not, remains a function of the 'theory', not of the 'unadorned facts' (sic).A better name for this approach is Realism, rather than Materialism. If Marx had had this term available to him, he would have written about 'the realist conception of history'.

[LBird]

DJP wrote:

LBird wrote:

Marx was an 'idealist-materialist', as am I. Theory and practice.

No, he wasn't. I think there's only ever been one person who's claimed to be an 'idealist-materialist'. Still I guess that's one up on square circles.

You stick to looking for 'morality' from 'rocks', DJP!

[LBird]

Vin Maratty wrote:

But both morality and logic have been around for thousands of years. Slavery was 'logical' and 'morally right' in it's day. Why has it become illogical and immoral today?

Because 'logic' and 'morality' are social and thus historical?That is, they are not 'eternal' but change.I agree with those comrades who stress these (so-called) ideological factors.Marx wasn't a 'materialist', in the way that Vin (and some others on other threads) has suggested.Marx was an 'idealist-materialist', as am I. Theory and practice.If 'Marxists' think Communism is going to be brought by the 'material' rocks, then, also like Marx, "I'm not a Marxist!".

[LBird]

twc wrote:

LBird wrote:

As for your [twc’s] assertion that "no serious developer writes GO TO's"… it makes me wonder if you live in our world.

If that ain’t endorsing the use of GOTOs by serious programmers, I don’t know what is.

Do you know anything about the computer industry? Or the real world?Dijkstra might have shown that GOTOs are illogical, but Marx showed Capitalism is illogical. Business has ignored both.'Serious developers' use now, and have always continued to use since Dijkstra wrote, GOTOs.Why else would I have written what I did? I know, because I spent years sorting out unstructured programs that employed GOTOs. I specifically attacked the use of GOTOs, in foul language. How much clearer could I have been?I don't know why I'm bothering anymore. Now, you apparently even know more than I do about my own experience of the computer industry.

[LBird]

twc wrote:

With a contemptuous snort, you defend GOTO programming, five decades after Dijkstra² considered it harmful.

LBird, post #280, wrote:

I know, I've had to unravel the shite; fuckin' "GO TO's", they destroy logic.

I'm beginning to think that you're unhinged.

[LBird]

We're going round in circles, twc.You still haven't said whether you think 'ideas' are 'material'.As for your assertion that "no serious developer writes GO TO's"… it makes me wonder if you live in our world.As for your 'object-oriented analogy', you haven't answered my point that humans create both 'objects' and 'classes'.But then, you don't do discussion, do you? Just keep moving the goal-posts, throwing in a load of irrelevent references to other issues……you introduced programming, and have failed to respond to my points. As usual.

[LBird]

twc wrote:

Absolutely lucky! Jackson is ancient history.

Michael Jackson? In music, computers and military!http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_A._Jacksonhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mike_JacksonIf anyone needs a link to the first, I pity you.

twc wrote:

Being forced to submit to it must have been hell. No human creativity in that.

Without theory, computer programs are like spaghetti. Creativity without theory is meaningless. I know, I've had to unravel the shite; fuckin' "GO TO's", they destroy logic.I don't work in computers anymore, so 'Siri' will remain a mystery to me, thankfully, comrade.

[LBird]

twc wrote:

Surely, if you were once an object-oriented software developer, you comprehend, in your creative bones, the distinction between classes and objects — between abstraction and concrete implementation.

Ah, now we're getting somewhere, comrade!Yes, 'classes' are theoretical ideas created by humans, in abstraction.Yes, 'objects' are practical things created by humans, in concrete implementation.Conscious, active, creative humans producing their world! Theory and practice!None of that 19th century 'materialist' nonsense about 'objects' telling humans what the 'object' is, because 'classes' are a 'reflection' of 'objects' (as for Lenin, and, sometimes, Engels).Yes, I was a DEVELOPER. A socialised human, stuffed full of social theories of software development (like Jackson Structured Programming) , handed computer terminals, servers and mainframes created by society, and my creative role was to produce software, which didn't exist prior to my producing of it! By theory and practice, using social knowledge and social tools!I never once had a piece of hardware which spoke to me.You're so lucky, twc!

[LBird]

twc wrote:

Over the posts, you've changed your cherished position from idealism to syncretism; from fiercly repudiating anything written by non-Communists [as if anyone could trust Communists] to lovingly quoting them [not just Pareto, but the trio of philosophers of science, Carr, and even Popper of all people, the arch anti-Marxist]; and now Marx, whom you once relied on for irrefutable quotes, is now contemptuously condemned for being irredeemably vague and contradictory.You are the Pareto chameleon.

I've tried to prompt a discussion, twc. And I'm all for workers reading as widely as possible, in their attempts to understand our world, natural and social. But your latest post is just childish name-calling. Carr is even quoted by SPGB members as a useful source of critical thinking, and Popper was one of the earliest thinkers to attack the smugness of bourgeois positivist and inductivist 19th century science. And given that Popper was attacking a straw-man of what he regarded as Marxism (actually Stalinism), his 'anti-Marxist' views can be taken with a pinch of salt. Popper knew nothing of Marx's actual views.

twc wrote:

I fail to see any point in my participation here if you, and apparently others, can't understand a thing I'm writing.

Yes, I'm coming to this conclusion about your participation, too.How some other SPGB members regard you as a useful 'defender of Historical Materialism' baffles me.This, to me, is becoming a wider issue than that of one poor poster. If you really are some sort of 'guru' for the SPGB on these issues, I'm very worried.

[LBird]

twc wrote:

Why does it matter?

Because I think its important, and so I'm asking you a question, and you're not giving me an answer.Quite frankly, twc, reading your posts is like reading Marx. And anyone who knows my views will also know that is not a compliment.I could draw both conclusions from your post, that 'ideas are material' and 'ideas are not material'.I agree with Pareto's observation about Marx's writings:

Pareto wrote:

Marx's words are like bats. One can see in them both birds and mice.

This is a real problem, because for over a century 'Marxists' have been quoting Marx and Engels at workers, who haven't the foggiest idea what they really mean. It's too easy to draw opposite conclusions from the same texts.Unless we start to answer questions, in the terms and language posed, rather than blathering on about 'dialectics' and 'concrete', we'll remain isolated.I've read Bhaskar, Schaff, et al, and I'd like to critically discuss them (and Lakatos, Kuhn and Feyerabend), but I still don't understand a word you write about them or anything else.

[LBird]

twc wrote:

Written in haste, without necessary correction.

More like 'written in full, without necessary editing'.So, twc, for you, are 'thoughts' and 'ideas' material?A 'one-line' answer will suffice, comrade.[perchance a 'one-word' answer, but we must be grateful for small mercies, I suppose]

[Author]

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