LBird
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Pre-class, the 'bodies of armed men' are the tribe in arms. There are no 'bodies of unarmed men'. All producers are warriors. All production is socially controlled.The problem starts when the 'bodies of armed men' are not the tribe in arms, but a select group, and there are bodies of unarmed producers, who produce a surplus, which can support the now unproductive 'bodies of armed men'.
robbo203 wrote:I can read perfectly well LBird. Stop playing games . Refer me to your alleged answer to the question I posed above. I genuinely cannot find your answer amongst the the tons of stuff you have written. Where is it?Yes, robbo, at the bottom of the snake, in box 42.
robbo203 wrote:LBird wrote:robbo203 wrote:LBird is hiding his pure idealist ideology which puts him at odds with "idealism-materialism" by refusing to explain what existed prior to the evolution of human consciousness …You'll have to read the answer that I've already given, robbo.You might not like it, but it's there.When you show that you understand my answer (not 'agree with', but just understand), we can continue to discuss these epistemological issues.We're not getting anywhere by you ignoring (or, worse, failing to understand) what I write.I'm happy to help – try to understand the various claims for the 'subject-object' relationship. I follow Marx on his view of this relationship. I don't hide my ideology.
But you havent provided an answer to the question I posed – what existed before human consciousness evolved if not matter? If you have provided an answer show me where it is . Copy and paste it here for all to see!
If you can't read and understand the first time, a second won't help.You'll have to read for yourself. I can't read for you.
YMS, post #385 wrote:But the social product is a thought, a sign, a signifier, not yellow in itself.You clearly claim to know that something is not 'in itself', so you must know 'in itself' to say that something is not 'it'.
Young Master Smeet, post #388 wrote:LBird wrote:Young Master Smeet wrote:… not yellow in itself.How do you know 'yellow', in itself, YMS?You must have a method that allows you, alone, to 'know' stuff 'in itself'.Your claim is nothing to do with Marx's method, of social theory and practice.
Nope, don't need to have such a method, perfectly legit to say we cannot know the thing in itself.
Now, you claim that "we cannot know the thing in itself".You have to clarify for yourself what you can or can't know, YMS, because you're just contradicting yourself.Or, bit of advice, keep your contradictory claims further apart than 3 posts, because it's too easy to see your mistakes.
robbo203 wrote:LBird is hiding his pure idealist ideology which puts him at odds with "idealism-materialism" by refusing to explain what existed prior to the evolution of human consciousness …You'll have to read the answer that I've already given, robbo.You might not like it, but it's there.When you show that you understand my answer (not 'agree with', but just understand), we can continue to discuss these epistemological issues.We're not getting anywhere by you ignoring (or, worse, failing to understand) what I write.I'm happy to help – try to understand the various claims for the 'subject-object' relationship. I follow Marx on his view of this relationship. I don't hide my ideology.
Young Master Smeet wrote:… not yellow in itself.How do you know 'yellow', in itself, YMS?You must have a method that allows you, alone, to 'know' stuff 'in itself'.Your claim is nothing to do with Marx's method, of social theory and practice.
Young Master Smeet wrote:LBird wrote:What are these 'qualities', YMS?It doesn't matter what they are, all that matters is that they are.
But how do you 'know' what 'they are'?You must have a scientific method which tells you what they are.Also, because you won't have the rest of us employing the same method, and then voting on its results of 'what they are', your method must be an elite one, that the rest of us can't employ.Marx, on the contrary, argues that we 'know qualities' because we act upon inorganic nature, and produce our 'knowledge of qualities'.So, 'qualities' are a social product of a relationship between an active subject and inorganic nature, which produces their 'object'.'Yellow' is a social product. I've said all this before, but like all 'materialists', you refuse to read what I write, and simply insert your own ideological terms (like 'matter'), and proceed to insist that you, individually, 'know qualities'.When you talk of 'yellow', you never mention society, history, Marx, the proletariat, epistemology, subject-object relationship, scientific method……it's almost as if you're employing bourgeois ideology, and think that individuals 'know', outside of all the factors that I've mentioned, and many more.You're not a democratic socialist or a Marxist, YMS. You never mention either when discussing how you know 'yellow'.Why not just come clean about your own ideology?Ahhh, sorry – 'materialists' hide their ideology, so that they can pretend to workers that only the 'materialists' know qualities, and so workers cannot vote upon what they think that 'qualities' are.'Materialism' hides a complete contempt for the masses, and it is fundamentally undemocratic, and thus anti-socialist.Why are you hiding your ideology and method? What have you to fear from telling workers your theory and practice?
Marx, Capital III, p. 959, wrote:Freedom …can consist only in this, that socialised man, the associated producers, govern the human metabolism with nature in a rational way, bringing it under their collective control, instead of being dominated by it as a blind power…[my bold]All about 'intervention' in nature, democratic control, by active, productive, humans, and specifically not being about 'dominated by a blind power', or 'individuals' and their own 'biological touch', passively 'knowing'.Those who argue for 'Eternal Truth', 'Objective Knowledge', 'Absolute Truth' are arguing for a 'blind power' over us.The 'materialists' deny Marx's views.
Capitalist Pig wrote:I think I understand it now. materialism is saying that there are absolute truths in the world and that people are capable of being completly objective in forming their hypothesis. Idealism-materialism is the idea that we are not capable of being completly objective and we are the ones who actually create 'absolute truth' which can change accordingly with our ideas.aaaaaahh my head hurts
That's what's been argued by me, anyway.It fits better with the general approach of Marx, of social productionism, than does Engels' reversion to old-fashioned, passive, elitist, 'materialism'.If you can tell the difference between Marx's and Engels' approaches to 'knowledge production', then you have the power to choose, and especially to decide which provides a better fit for workers who are coming to consciousness of their power to change our world.'Absolute Truth' and 'Finality' are the death of democratic socialism.PS, before the 'materialists' jump on you, '…accordingly with our ideas and practice'.Marx's method is 'social theory and practice'.
It must be clear to all, now, that the SPGB is completely unable to produce a political response to the criticism of 'materialism', and in the absence of any organisational reply, the gap is being filled by ignorant members who always revert to personal abuse.I'm not sure why those who are keeping quiet can't see that this discredits the SPGB.
Young Master Smeet wrote:Lbird, could we produce yellow?Are you Humpty Dumpty in disguise? Are you humpty in disguise?Your ignorance does the SPGB no favours.Personal abuse is not a political response.
Young Master Smeet wrote:Nature is a source of use value, that implies to me that inorganic nature has qualities which restrict what we can do with it.What are these 'qualities', YMS?How do you 'know' them?Marx argues that 'qualities' are relational, products of an active 'intervention' by humans upon 'inorganic nature'.If you're claiming to be able to 'know' inorganic nature without any relationship to it, please tell us how you do so. What is your method?This would require you to argue for passivity, which Marx denied when he looked to the idealists as providing the 'active side'.The subject-object relationship is inescapable.Remember, Marx was big on the term 'relations'.
As I've said many times, YMS, you're approaching Marx from an Engelsist Materialist perspective, so you can't understand that Marx argues for change, not contemplation.As for 'real world', you'll have to read what I wrote earlier.As for 'material', if everybody doesn't already know the difference now between Marx's 'material' and Engels' 'material', they'll never know. I've explained it often enough.
Young Master Smeet wrote:So, unlike Marx Lbird does not believe in an external Nature, and that we are part of Nature, not that Nature is part of us.The SPGB should really begin with basic reading lessons for its members.I've said it, time and again, Marx and LBird agree on 'inorganic nature': this is the 'ingredient into' social labour.This is not 'matter'.Engels started by calling 'inorganic nature' matter. This is nothing to do with Marx's social productionism.
YMS wrote:So, no-one determines the truth. The truth just is.And you'll continue to passively contemplate 'Truth', eh, YMS?And hail your eternal god 'Matter'.And you'll continue to place your trust in the 'elite' who 'know' your God. Or, so they say.Whatever reason could they have for denying, like you, the workers a vote on 'matter'?
alanjjohnstone wrote:But you must think why for over 3 years you ahave been on this forum with moreorless the same arguments. Surely, there must be a psychological reason and not a political reason for why you have persevered so long. We cannot be as bad as you say, otherwise, you could be considered a masochist.The 'materialists' can never self-analyse!You, being a 'materialist', are compelled to regard all this as a 'psychological' issue, rather than a 'political' one, because that's precisely what your ideology tells you, to regard 'individuals' who oppose your claim to 'elite knowledge production'. I must be a 'faulty cog', who questions the 'machine' (a 'material' machine, of course!), and so I've got 'psychological' issues. We all know where 'materialism' went in the Stalinist Soviet Union, regarding 'psychological' dissidents.But… I'll take you on, on both levels.'Psychologically', it's because I was fooled for years by the Leninists into believing in 'materialism', and being a worker, I did not have the abilities to question what I was told. But now I do. But I bear a grudge, and hope to help other workers, who want to see the democratic control of the means of production (socialism), avoid the mistake that I ignorantly made. We're all made ignorant by this society, and we have to fight back, if we get the chance.'Politically', it's because you claim to have a special consciousness, that allows Tim, linda, robbo, gnome, you, etc., etc., to alone 'know' this 'matter'.Logically, this must be a 'special consciousness', otherwise you'd regard other workers as just like you, and allow them to determine for themselves, collectively by voting, whether what you say individually is the truth for them, too. If one is a 'materialist', one can't do this, but must appeal to the god of 'matter', which talks to your elite alone, and must encourage workers to simply have faith in their betters.I persevere for two reasons:1. The SPGB claims to be democratic, and I have faith in the abilities of workers to think critically, and so it might be possible to change some minds;2. The reading that I'm compelled to do has vastly increased my knowledge about these issues, and I'm far more confident in Marx's arguments than I was when I first started posting. Frankly, it's becoming a doddle to run rings round 'materialists', and to show them up as the elitists that they are.So, not 'masochism', but workers' self-development. A political task, not a psychological one.
