LBird
Forum Replies Created
-
Posts
-
ALB wrote:He's just done it again. He accused me of being the sort of materialist which has "'tangible matter'"as its "central concern".
ALB, I specifically asked you on the other thread what does 'means' (of production) include.I said it includes 'ideas', including physics and maths, and so 'democratic control of the means of production' means ''democratic control of physics and maths'.You argued against this, You said, in effect, 'means' includes only 'tangible stuff' and not 'ideas'.Now, you clown, give us a straight answer:Do you agree that the revolutionary proletariat should democratically control 'maths and physics'?If you say 'No', you're an Engelsist Materialism.If you say 'Yes', like me, you're a Marxist Idealist-Materialist.Fuckin' hell, it's simple enough.Either workers control 'maths' or an elite controls 'maths'.You want 'mathematicians' to control 'maths'; 'physicists' to control 'physics', etc. etc., which will end in a 'party' controlling 'politics'. Engels' materialism leads inexorably to Leninism.
ALB wrote:I rest my case, but I can't keep on correcting your distortions every time you repeat them. It happens so often.ALB, I answered your post on the other thread about Dietzgen, and told you he argued for 'induction' (ie. practice and theory), so he wasn't using Marx's method of 'theory and practice'.You haven't continued that discussion.The only distorter in all this is you.You 'distort' your ideology, and pretend to be a Marxist. You are an Engelsist.This ignoring by you of what you're told 'happens so often', and is always followed by you insulting me, that I can only conclude that you've got a problem with learning.I presume that there is a 'psychological connection' between 'ignorance and insulting', but you'll have to get the 'expert' Tim to explain that one.Meanwhile, if you want to discuss Dietzgen, read what I write, and make some progress.
alanjjohnstone wrote:Just to add some psychological observations of my own, LBird, having read your earlier post on how you consider the Party to be, you must have one of the strongest streaks of masochism i have come across for you persistence in debating and discussing on this forum if you recognise the futility and fruitlessness of it No matter how much you are spurned, you keep coming back for moreIs it unrequited love, Lbird?…https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TwjS3_cZdN8&list=PL5_uypbSMXwCa_nxqQVu46MgJZDPwM4_y&index=10Good one, alan! It made me burst out laughing – perhaps with uncomfortable self-recognition!
Vin wrote:The medical profession will be under democratic control, I don't need to know how to run the canteen.Fair enough, Vin, that's your individual opinion.But who decides who runs the 'medical profession' and 'the canteen'?If you agree with me, that it is democratic society, then it's society that decides what the 'medical profession' does and does not do with its production, not the 'medical profession' itself.If we, for whatever reason, decide that the 'medical profession' cleans the bogs, the 'medical profession' cleans the bogs.The only problem with accepting this formulation is for those who fear that the class conscious, revolutionary proletariat will make our surgeons and doctors clean shithouses, and will order plasterers to do heart surgery!Those stupid workers, eh? Wouldn't trust them to run a piss-up in a brewery, never mind physics and maths!I'll spell it out for you, Vin, because I know you don't do subtlety.It's a philosophical attitude towards the merits of democracy versus elitistism.Those brainwashed by the bourgeoisie fear democracy, because they fear the 'masses', and prefer to look to geniuses and 'special individuals', rather than that great unknown 'the democratic control of the means of production (and operations)'.
Bourgeois thinkers always want to find the root of any issue in individual psychology, eh, Tim, and not in political and philosophical, that is, social and historical, origins?Back to the crayons, Janet and John, and the Ladybird publication "Tim constructs a bourgeois argument", for you.
ALB wrote:…his definition of socialism is not all that far from ours and not nearer to that of the SWP's state capitalism. He does agree that socialism is a society based on the common ownership and democratic control of the means of production which will make money, wages, profits, banks, etc redundant but –and it's a big but — he adds something rather sinister — that democratic control should extent to what people think, i.e thought control, which of course has never been part of the historical definition of socialism[my bold]You're perfectly correct, ALB, we do have much in common.But you're a 'materialist', which has its roots in bourgeois biological individualism. Hence 'tangible matter' as its central concern.Here, I've bolded your ideological concern – 'Individual Free Thought'.No socio-historical, Marxist, analysis of what 'thought' means.Your political and philosophical, unrecognised, unacknowledged assumption is that 'thought' is individual, not a social product.In fact, 'thought' is always a product of societies, not 'genius individuals', so our 'thought' in a democratic society would have to be democratically produced.This is a scary 'thought' for 'individualists', who have been progammed from birth by the bourgeoisie that 'they are individuals!', and that their thought is theirs.It's nonsense of course, and is merely a figleaf for the 'individual thought' of the 'elite', who obviously wish to keep their thought uncontrolled by the producers.So, here we have it – ALB is using standard bourgeois scare-mongering:The Commies will take not only your property, and daughters, but even your thoughts!
ALB wrote:Tim Kilgallon wrote:Vin, I think that's an excellent point. Come on then L Bird, we're all waiting.I'm not. We don't want him contaminating this thread. If we must accommodate him let's try and contain him in a thread devoted to his obession of what is knowlefge. Mind you, I suppose he has his uses as a foil and punchball.
ALB, I'm just returning your abuse in the same terms, you dickhead.On the other thread, I was very patient and courteous, and explained some complexities to you, about your 'materialism'. You didn't abuse me, so I didn't abuse you. I treated you like a grown-up.But, this thread?You seem to be a very slow learner. I despair that you'll ever learn, about either your ill-manners or your ill-education.The SPGB should let alan vet members' posts on here, because at least alan makes the SPGB seem vaguely attractive, unlike youse ignorant louts.This is your party's 'shop window', for god's sake! Even I came here, actively following you and alan from LibCom, to browse initially and perhaps even enter, and build the concern.But… the dummies in the shop window are like a collection of zombies, banging on the glass, trying to eat my brains!
alanjjohnstone wrote:I would welcome LBird to join the Party and take up the fight for socialism with folk who he can still debate and discuss with as comrades-in-arms …if he can't join, we and he should still recognise one another as fellow-workers seeking the same end…the end of capitalism…and regardless of the polarisation of these debates, we are all on the same wavelength politically if not philosophically.Whilst I acknowledge the comradely tone of your post, alan, I've become less sure as time passes that we are 'seeking the same end'.I'm not simply seeking 'the end of capitalism' (as a negative, of what must be destroyed), but also seeking 'the creation of socialism' (as a positive, of what must be built).Years of debates with tories, liberals, anarchists, trotskyists, greens, managers, teachers, academics, has taught me to ask pithy questions which get to the nub of what someone really stands for.And the killer question about workers' democracy (which is what I mean by 'socialism') is 'who or what controls the production of social ideas?'.And by 'ideas' I mean all academic production, including mathematics, physics, logic, meaning, understanding, philosophy, etc., etc.This question always exposes, for example, the Leninists. If they agree with me, I ask when are we removing the central committee. Because by 'we', I don't mean the 'party organisation', but 'the membership'. It soon becomes clear that the Leninists are paying lip service to 'workers' democracy', and that they really want 'democratic centralism'. This is a phony 'democracy', which allow an elite to produce the ideas, policies, culture, structures of the party, not the membership.It must be obvious that I've employed the same method with the SPGB.When asked 'who' will control the production of maths and physics under (the SPGB version of) 'socialism', there is massed bafflement at the question. The simple answer by the SPGB is 'the elite that have always controlled maths and physics!'. The implication is that the elite have done such a good job in the last 350 years, so why change a perfectly good working formula, and let those uneducated, lazy, drunken, scruffs in the working class get their grubby hands on the shining edifice of perfection that is 'science'.No mention of the socio-historical orgins of that 'science', of course. Or its interests, purposes, theories, methods and practices of production.Surely it's clear to you, alan, that I'm the only one who ever mentions terms like 'socio-historical', and gives dates, names, events from hundreds of years ago, to the modern day. Descartes, Galilleo, Bacon, Comenius, Newton, 1660, the English Revolution, Kant, Fichte, Hegel, Marx, Engels, Kautsky, Lenin, 1905 and 1915 with Einstein, Bohr, Labriola, Lukacs, Schrodinger, Heisenberg, Born, Korsch, Pannekoek, Fleck, Kuhn, Lakatos, Feyerabend… I don't know about you, but I'm losing the will to live.And what do my opponents, who will not have democracy in the means of production (and by 'means', they mean physical things, like brick and mortar, instruments, tangible 'stuff', not 'ideas') look to for their basis?Engels' bloody 'materialism'. That's it. 19th century, half-arsed ignorant bullshit, based on a positivism that even the bourgeoisie have jettisoned. And the SPGB is supposed to be a resource for enquiring workers, looking for ideas that can help those workers build for socialism?No, alan, "we are not all on the same wavelength politically or philosophically".In fact, I can honestly say that the 'theoreticians' in the SWP can give a better, more informed, historical and social account of what we're discussing, than the supposed 'democrats' of the SPGB. The SWP still spout nonsense, of course, but at least its thought-out, informed, educated nonsense. As is most of the product of bourgeois academia.The SPGB seems to consist of uneducated, ill-informed, philosopically-illiterate bluffers, who like the sound of 'democracy' and 'socialism', but haven't got a clue what they're talking about.We've even had posters say that they have never read Engels or Marx, beyond a cursory uncomprehending glance by some, never mind physics or philosophy. I seriously doubt that some read books at all – they seem to rely on word of mouth, and they've learned, years ago, to mouth the slogan "Materialism Good, Idealism Bad!". And they're sticking to their potty training and ALB as the arse-wiper, no matter how many wellread workers explain about the modern water closet, soft toilet tissue and self-cleaning.After all this, alan, I could be persuaded that I'm just unfortunate to have encountered online mostly the 'thickoes' of the SPGB, and offline the party does contain literates. I could be persuaded of this if the SPGB could produce just one – one only – who shows some recognition of the complexities of understanding the Marx-Engels relationship, and the meaning of 'scientific knowledge', and the philosophical need for "workers' democracy".But I think that I'm right to conclude that the SPGB is built upon Engels' theory of 'materialism', which existed before the SPGB was formed, and had already contaminated the 'socialist' movement by 1904. Anyone who had encountered the party and already had some understanding of the roots of Leninism (in Engels' 'materialism') would never join, and if they were open minded enough to have developed during their membership, they would have resigned.Anyway, what do you think the chances are of me accepting your warm, comradely welcome, and joining your party?
ALB wrote:I'm not. We don't want him contaminating this thread. If we must accommodate him let's try and contain him in a thread devoted to his obession of what is knowlefge. Mind you, I suppose he has his uses as a foil and punchball.And there's me treating you like a grown-up on the other thread.I suppose that the fool in you will always come out, no matter how courteously you're treated. You never fail to revert to type.You really are an unpleasant crowd in the SPGB, aren't you?You can't discuss philosophy, and so duck the challenge.Make that unpleasant and cowardly. Oh yeah, and ignorant.
ALB wrote:Since you insist, it's this (but it's a theory of science not an "ideology"):http://mailstrom.blogspot.co.uk/2007/04/joseph-dietzgen-workers-philosop… But Dietzgen argued for 'induction', that is, 'practice and theory', ALB, so his ideology was not Marx's 'theory and practice'.As I've said before, if you follow Engels in reducing all philosophy to the 'black and white', 'either/or', 'good or evil' of 'materialism' versus 'idealism', you will try to categorise me, who is not a 'materialist', as an 'idealist'.This is why you're compelled to see me as a 'Kantian'. It's the only option that fits into your ideological schema.But Marx never reduced all philosophy to this simplistic dichotomy, and I've given quotes before to show that he thought he was unifying these two strands into a third, a philosophy of 'theory and practice'.What you really need to do, ALB, is categorise yourself, first, before using this insight into trying to categorise me.Furthermore, even Engels said that they were influenced by Kant, Fichte and Hegel – and how could it be otherwise, since they were under the influence of German Idealism, as much as of Feuerbachian Materialism?
As far as I can tell, ALB, you're missing out Marx's 'theory and practice'.This is nothing to do with experience of phenomena, but the creation of our object.I think that you're making this mistake because, not being prepared to expose your own ideology, you can't understand mine.I'm not a materialist; I'm not an idealist; I'm an idealist-materialist.This can be summed up as 'theory and practice', and anyone who claims to use Marx's 'theory and practice' should be able to tell us just what their 'theory' is.That is, their political ideology, which they use to build their 'science'.
SocialistPunk wrote:LBird,For me it is your ideological thinking regarding this issue that is painfully close to the historical view that humans were at the pinnacle of creation. It allowed a minority to dominate with their humancentric logical views and religions.Placing humanities experience or consciousness squarely in the driving seat of "reality"or "truth" leads us to class divided society. It separates us from nature by declaring our reality is the only reality that is important.Science and socialism for me tells me that we are but a part of nature and as such have no special privileges to dominate and destroy as we see fit. Your creationist communism on the other hand says the collective "reality" is the ultimate "truth" and so the collective mind can never be wrong. So if the collective mind can never be wrong, the collective mind can do no wrong. Scary stuff indeed.Once again, SP, I acknowledge your ideological honesty, but what you're saying seems to be little to do with workers' power, democratic control of social production, active humanity, changing our world, or socialism.We have very different opinions of what constitutes 'socialism'.Perhaps a new thread to determine just what posters here mean by 'socialism', in the light of what's been said here?
SocialistPunk wrote:"Albert Einstein is reported to have asked his fellow physicist and friend Niels Bohr, one of the founding fathers of quantum mechanics, whether he realistically believed that 'the moon does not exist if nobody is looking at it.' To this Bohr replied that however hard he (Einstein) may try, he would not be able to prove that it does, thus giving the entire riddle the status of a kind of an infallible conjecture—one that cannot be either proved or disproved."Don't forget, SP, neither Einstein nor Bohr were Democratic Communists, so they're not the best people for socialists to ask for epistemological advice.In fact, neither understood the issue, as the exchange you quote displays.They could not understand the philosophical issues involved. If you won't take my word, read what they actually wrote.I've some sympathy for Einstein, who at least took politics seriously, and saw himself as some sort of 'socialist', but Bohr's attempts to make sense of epistemology are simply childish and ignorant.I'd go so far to say, that reading Bohr on epistemology is comparable to reading the scrawlings of a six-year-old using a red crayon on cardboard, it's that poor.Don't be taken in by the 'physicist of genius' tag – Bohr hasn't got a clue.That's why bourgeois science is in the mess it is – none of them seem to be able to put down the mud pies and rocks, and ask political and philosophical questions.Of course, they're completely brainwashed by bourgeois science ideology – they think that they don't need to keep 'consciousness and being' together, and really have faith that they are merely 'dealing with reality as it is'.Bourgeois Buffoons.
SocialistPunk wrote:I doubt LBird and myself will ever see eye to eye on this issue as I will never accept his creationist socialism.That's fair enough conclusion, SP, but it leaves open the question of just who does create.Prior to Marx, opinion held that 'creation' was a 'divine' act, and it was precisely this belief that the Young Hegelians were arguing against.I'd argue that if you don't accept Marx's (not simply 'my') 'creationist socialism', then you'll revert to what went before, which will be either 'divine production' or 'passive materialism'.For me, these questions were settled in the 1840s, by Marx, amongst others.
ALB wrote:I don't think you realise the huge concession you have made to "materialism" with your concept of "inorganic nature" as an "externality for consciousness" that is not "isolated in the mind". The difference between your "inorganic nature" and "matter" is only a matter of terminology. You too are separating "being" ("inorganic nature") from "consciousness".No, 'matter' is a product of social theory and practice, ALB.'Inorganic nature' is an unknowable 'in itself' ingredient for active human social theory and practice.This is Marx's 'idealism-materialism' (a term which simply tries to capture the contemporary debate which Marx was engaged in).But, for Engelsist Materialists, of which I think you seem to (perhaps unknowingly) number, 'matter' is not a social product, but an 'externality to consciousness', that can be known.So, Marxists do not separate 'consciousness' from 'being', because for them 'matter' is a social product, better called 'mind-matter'. 'Inorganic nature' cannot be passively known, but can only provide an ingredient to human labour.Engelsists insist that 'matter' can be known 'as it is' (ie. outside of consciousness), and so do separate 'being' and 'consciousness'.
ALB wrote:If you want to call yourself an "inorganic naturist" that's ok as long as the definitions are clear, but personally I still prefer "materialist" despite its range of meanings.But I wouldn't call myself an 'inorganic naturalist', simply because that would separate 'consciousness' from 'being'.I would call myself (in Marx's contemporary terms) an 'idealist-materialist', or a 'social productionist', which insists that the only 'nature' we know is our product, 'organic nature'.I think that I've said many times why I think that you'd be making a mistake to continue to call yourself a 'materialist'. It leaves you open to the accusation that you accept Engels' views about 'matter', which he saw as 'existing out there' rather than as a 'social product'.In political terms, Engels actually undid Marx's work. He laid the basis for Leninist politics, with his talk of 'matter' outside of consciousness. Marx was well aware (given his background in German Idealism and philosophical training), that pretending to take 'matter' outside of consciousness was impossible, and simply let 'consciousness' in through the back door, in the shape of a 'special consciousness' as the 'active side'.This is a bourgeois ideological approach, and allows a part of society to rise above the majority, as Marx warned in his Theses on Feuerbach, which was a text at least as critical of materialism as of idealism.Finally, I've given already the emergence of this separation of being and consciousness, and it's in the reaction in 1660 to the hopes of the radicals of the English Revolution, who wanted the purpose of science to be 'to build a better world for all'.It was the bourgeoisie who introduced the reactionary science of supposedly merely 'telling the Truth of Reality'. That's impossible, but its fixity of 'nature' and the pretence that we play no part in its production, entirely suited a ruling class which was engaged in actively building its world, but wanted to hide that process, and to deny the possibility to contending classes.
