[robbo203]

stuartw2112 wrote:

Yes, I'm using "abundance" in two different, contradictory ways. If you think that in itself destroys the argument, then just pick another word that you like. 

 I'm not quite sure what you mean Stuart. Its not for me to salvage the argument you present but for you to chose the appropriate word yourself that has that effect.  As your argument stands it does indeed come across as contradictory and therefore unconvincing. You seems to have bought into the anarcho capitalist case presented by the likes of Ramsay Steele. Fair enough. Thats your prerogative.  But  I would say that that case turns on a similar confusion of terms.  The concept of "opportunity costs", for instance, conveys this idea of built in scarcity which buttresses your claim that abundance is impossible.  So the opportunity cost of my decision to respond to your post is that I forfeit the possibility of doing something else in this time.  Maybe jogging down to the village to buy a newspaper or perhaps cleaning out the chicken run which is beginning to get a bit smelly.  There is an air of tautological certainty about this argument about opportunity costs which the anarcho caps constantly wield,  which I maintain is based on a psychologically unrealistic perspective. I'm not going to fret about that newspaper I don't have in my hands at this precise moment and if I did I would be frankly unable to concentrate on the task at hand.  That is why I maintain the anarcho capitalist case is 'psychologically empty' . It is based on pure abstraction which has no purchase in the real world we inhabit What I am trying to suggest to you, Stuart, is that if you are going to use a term like abundance then use it consistently so we know what we are talking about. I maintain the abundance is a relation between supply and demand broadly speaking both of which are limited and historically variable depending on the social context 

stuartw2112 wrote:

The idea that human wants are infinite and insatiable cannot be "bourgeois" since identification of the problem is at least 2,500 years old, if not more. We are hungry ghosts with infinite bellies. Capitalism's craziness is in the belief that these can be satisfied and then we'll be happy. In this sense, (free access) socialism is capitalism's deluded child.

 Well, given your anthropological background, Stuart, you will no doubt be aware of Marshall Sahlin's book on the hunter gatherers – the original affluent society – and Sahlins suggestion, which I think you echoed in your earlier post, that there are two ways to affluence – the conventional capitalist approach which is to produce more and the Zen approach which  is to want less.  Hunter gatherers would simply not recognise the  description of  themselves as hungry ghosts with infinite bellies. The idea  that human wants are insatiable may very well have predated capitalism .  It would fit in with the zero sum game of empire building in ancient civilisations in which rulers sought to enlarge their domains at the expense of rivals.  Wherever there is competition of this nature – over material stuff – the logic of such competition pushes one to want to acquire more and more.  Material acquisition converts into social prestige which is unbounded. Nevertheless I would suggest that with the advent of capitalism what was essentially a restricted ruling class outlook became universalised and the concept of infinite wants became formally enshrined in bourgeois economics and through the praxis of capitalism itself with its appeal to mass consumerism.  No other social system in history has this built in predisposition to urge the consumer  to consume more. So I reject utterly your claim that free access socialism is the deluded child of capitalism.  On the contrary, free access socialism is the one and only thing that can ultimately destroy the unlimited pursuit of material wants.  Free access to goods and services means amongst other things that you can no longer secure the esteem and respectful awe of others based on what you possess or consumer and the only way in which can acquire such esteem is through what you contribute to society and not what you take out of it.Also, of course ,there is simply no point in taking more than you need when what you need is sufficiently available.  I live outside a spa town in Southern Spain in which potable water flows freely  in abundance through the many fuentes scattered around the town.  I'm not aware of any frenzied rush of afflicted consumers to the nearest fuente to fill up every conceivable container  they can lay their handsNo, it is capitalism that encourages a scarcity mentality and it is capitalism which also incidentally directly creates scarcity through its systematic and structural diversion of a vast and growing proportion of its manpower and resources away from, and at the expense of, socially useful ends into such socially wasteful activities as banking , insurance, and armaments production.  Such things serve a very clear purpose in capitalism but will have no place in free access socialism whatsoever.

[robbo203]

stuartw2112 wrote:

Free-access socialism is, as I think everyone agrees, only possible on the basis of material abundance. But abundance is unfeasible. In relation to human desires and to the competing uses to which resources and time and energy may be put, resources are always scarce. You need then a method of deciding how to put scarce resources to use. The market provides such a method. Others may be possible, but are unproven (or proven to be disastrous).  Even if it were possible, the attempt to satisfy infinite human desires on the basis of the provision of abundance would surely lead to ecocide – as our current system of state capitalism is doing.  But there is another way to abundance – the practice of satisfying our needs in a minimal way while realising that the way to human happiness is not actually the pursuit of material goods or the satisfaction of all our desires and sensual pleasures, but the pursuit instead of a good life where we take care of one another. The sort of thing Marxists everywhere dismiss as sandal-wearing lentil-munching hippy nonsense because for some reason they want to seem as cynical and materialistic and hardheaded as the capitalists and military.

  Strikes me that the position you are outlining above is curiously contradictory or at any rate, paradoxical   If "abundance is unfeasible" as you claim then how can there be "another way to abundance" as you equally assert? .  Seems you are shifting from one definition of "abundance" to another to suit your argument.  In the first instance it is in relation to the bourgeois dogma of"infinite human desires"; in the second it is in relation to the practice of satisfying our needs in a minimal way while realising that the way to human happiness is not actually the pursuit of material goods or the satisfaction of all our desires and sensual pleasures, but the pursuit instead of a good life where we take care of one another You say  that " Marxists everywhere" dismiss the latter as sandal-wearing lentil-munching hippy nonsense because for some reason they want to seem as cynical and materialistic and hardheaded as the capitalists etc. Really? I can recall Hardy writing in the Socialist Standard years ago arguing that, if anything, in the early days of socialism workers, at least in some parts of the developed world, may have to accept a cut  in living standards  so the rest of the world can catch up.  What we may have to forfeit in quantitative terms we gain in qualitative terms – one reason why I maintain the case for socialism cannot simply be an economic one but inescapably is also a moral one.  Happiness is not something you can buy over the counter and, if that was the case, the mega-rich would be wallowing in blissful contentment.  The evidence suggests otherwise Anyone who considers socialism to be a simply a question of "self interest", thereby applies to socialism a capitalist logic that negates the very possiblity of socialism ever coming about.   For the logic of self interest within a competitive capitalist environment is that there is no limit to what we materially desire since the interests of others are of no account.  Certainly no Marxist I know of would ever go along with the bourgeois myth of "infinite human desires". Where do you get this idea from? The biggest irony of all , Stuart, is that here you are defending the market  and the so called "economic calculation argument" that justifies the existence of the market as the most .. ahem …rational way of allocating scarce resoruces –  actually, if anything, capitalism has become the most horrendously inefficient and irrational mode of resource allocation that has ever existed –  when it is very market system itself you apparently support that enshrines and institutionalises this pernicious dogma that "human wants are insatiable". The unending quest for profit which is built into a competitive system of  capital accummulation has as its corrollary, the need for unending economic growth and hence the limitless expansion of market demand itself,.  That is the logic of capitalism even if what capitalism needs, capitalism may not always get because of its own internal contradictions. Nevertheless, that logic that drives the system also  conditions the consumer – even the mega-rich – to be eternally dissatisfied with his or her material lot and to always want more and more to fill the void in their lives that the system conditions them to feel.  You want things to be otherwise but you dont seemingly want to challenge the system that prevents things being otherwise….

[robbo203]

LBird wrote:

So, that's your ideological take on "workers' democracy"?

 You already know what my take is but are feigning ignorence.  I obviously, as a revolutionary socialist, support "workers democracy" but I argue that there are clear structural limits to the process of democratic decision making in society.  You don't think so but that's because you are an impractical idealist who hasn't thought through this matter at all

LBird wrote:

Why you don't just say that you don't share my ideology, and have done with it, I don't know.

I thought it would have been obvious even to you that I don't share your ideology!  I  am not a Leninist who holds a totally centralised vision of a post capitalist world in which all decision making flows through a single global centre.  That vision,  which you clearly hold, would iroincally completely destroy workers democracy and ensure the relentless rise of an all powerful elite though you don't seem to understand this argument at all 

LBird wrote:

You don't want workers' power (you're an individualist), you don't want workers' democracy (you want elite expert control), you're not a Marxist (you haven't read, and certainly never quote, him), and you're not a Socialist (you're some sort of Liberal).

 You are just being stupid now. Of course I have read Marx and have quoted him. Of course, I favour workers power but my differences with you is over how that power expresses itself. Of course I am not an "individualist"  (you have never understood this term) but that does not mean I don't think individuals don't exist.  I agree with Marx when he says the free development of each is a condition for the free development of all.” 

LBird wrote:

You seem to think 'science' is an ahistoric and asocial activity, rather than regarding even physics as ideological, and you have faith that 'scientific knowledge' must be 'true'

 Absolute rubbish.  I was arguing against the fact-value distinction long before you turned up on this forum trying to teach everyone's grandma how to suck eggs.  You seem to see yourself as some kind of guru on a mission to educate the great unwashed. You're an elitist through and through.  When have I  ever said "scientific knowledge must be true".  On the contrary, part of my objection to your ridiculous idea of democratically voting on scientific theories is precisely that what is true for one person may not be true for another so what is the point of voting on such a thing at all.  What are you going to do with this Truth as democratically established by a global vote?.  If anything, you are the one who is entertaining an absolutist idea of truth.  Its was democratically vote upon by an absolute majority therefore it must be absolutely true…

LBird wrote:

I don't think you've even ever mentioned the bourgeoisie or proletariat, but then you don't recognise classes and exploitation, either.

 Sigh . what can you say in the face of such rambling tosh?

LBird wrote:

Like YMS, you seem to think physics, maths and logic are not human creations, with a social origin which changes over time, but passive reflections of 'reality'.

 I repeat – I was arguing against the fact value distinction and for the ideological nature of human knowledge long  for you turned up like some Johnny come lately smart arse who thinks they and they alone are in possession of the "Truth"

LBird wrote:

You don't seem to have a radical thought in your head, never mind a revolutionary one, and why you're arguing with me about these issues beats me.

Then you obviously haven't read a thing I've written

I have no objections to anyone whatsoever wanting to run physics although of course there wont be a working class in communism – just people who you prefer to call workers.  Nevertheless, in order to "run physics", whatever that means, you have to know something about physics ,right?  This is where you begin to loss the plot and go off the rails completely. If it is not possible for anyone to know everything about everything then in some areas of knowledge you have to defer to those who know something about the subject that you don't. Do you know anything about brain surgery LBird.? I freely admit I know nothing of it. and there is no shame in admitting it.  I wouldnt trust someone like me to operate on my brain when I'm laid out on the operating table. You have seems to have this utterly childish infantile idea that to say something like that is ..er.."elitist". What bollocks! Its  nothing of the sort. Its just being realistic.  There is such a thing as the social division of labour, you know.  It takes year and years of study and practice to become a competent brain surgeon and if we all attempted to become competent brain surgeons where would society be?  Where would our molecular biologists our mechanical engineers , our agronomists etc etc come from if all our time was taken up studying to become brain surgeons?Its high time you grew up, LBird, and snapped out this nonsensical dreamworld you seem to inhibit. I get tired of having to point out the plain obvious to you…

[robbo203]

LBird wrote:

robbo203 wrote:

…or even explain why it is necessary…

I've just done this very thing, in my measured reply to SocialistPunk.If, If, If, [read it, for once], one is a Marxist and wants to see the democratic control of production by the producers, then control of all sources of 'power' is necessary.Now, read carefully, you */$£%, YOU ARE NEITHER a Marxist nor want "workers' democracy", so from YOUR IDEOLOGICAL perspective, you won't agree with me.This ideological disagreement of yours with me is entirely different to me supposedly not explaining.You just don't like my explanation.What can't your tiny mind grasp about this issue? You are not a democrat, nor a Communist. I am. That's the answer.

 Bollocks.  You didn't explain at all why you considered it is necessary that  the truth of a scientific theory had to be subjected to a democratic vote by the global population and, in any case, that was not the question that Socialist Punk asked of you . He asked if you could "put some "meat on the bones" of how knowledge, scientific "truth" etc, can be democratically controlled by a global, socialist  population. I'd still be up for some ideas on the practicalities of your position?" .  You didn't answer that question either  – which is a "how" question rather than a "why" question  – but as usual completely evaded the point with your predictably boring waffle about nothing much in particular. You sneer at the very term "practical" believeing it to be some kind of bougeois prejudice I am more convinced than ever that it is people like you with your Leninistic take on a post capitalist society as some  totally centralised massified society in which all decisions on literally  everything flow through one single global centre , does more damage to the communist cause that any amount of overt capitalist propaganda.  It condemns communism to the status of being a totally impractical  and unrealisable utopia which is exactly what the capitalist propagandists want to achieve. Better that it comes from the mouths of useful idiots such as yourself who claim to be "Marxists" and "democrats" And though you lack the wit to realise this, LBird, the operational principles of  the kind  post capitalist  you want to put in place will spell the most complete and utter destruction of any kind of "workers democracy" and the certain and unstoppable rise of technocratic/political elite – whose world view and interests  you are unconsciously reflecting – in response to the complete social chaos  and social paralysis you are unwittingly wanting to bring down on our heads

[robbo203]

LBird wrote:

Now, to non-Marxists like robbo and YMS, this 'explanation' is entirely useless, because like the good bourgeois that they are, they are 'practical men', who demand 'practical answers', which can be implemented now, in this society.

As expected, our resident Leninist and ex SWPer , LBird, completely evades the question of how to organise a global democratic vote on the production of scientific truth or even explain why it is necessary , but relies instead entirely  on feeble ad hominens to cover his tracks.  It is this sort of thoughtless pie in the sky approach of his to what are actually seriously practical questions – though he sneers at the term  –  that gives Marxism a bad name and reinforces the false idea that socialism is an unobtainable and impractical objective. He  could not be a more effective stooge of the capitalist ruling class if he tried but then at bottom he is a Leninist after all. So that figures

[robbo203]

alanjjohnstone wrote:

Our political position should be based on the effects of  technology as used by capitalist institutions in the here and now, not wishful thinking of how it could be used in socialism. I am sure super-surveillance of the individual with implanted chips can have many benefits in a benign society eg monitoring health or searching for lost little children, but i don't think Cheltenham GCHQ should in capitalism be given that power of technology. It is not Luddism to desire restraint on certain technology because of the simple fact that we already have and have had for a long time the production capability of implementing socialism and ii am not talking about the bread and butter basics for it.  

AlanThere is a huge qualitative difference between the application of technology and the "production of scientific truth" which is what LBird is forever rabbiting on about.  I have never understood the point of subjecting the latter to a democratic vote; nor has he or, at any rate, he has never bothered to explain why. Democracy is about the practical real-world consequences of our actions where these significantly affect large numbers of people; its not about abstract ideas.  Yes, you can take a straw poll among a group to ascertain the level of support for a particular theory if you so wished if only out of curiosity. If then it is discovered that a 76% support the theory and 24% oppose  it, what then? What are you supposed to do with this poll result? LBird doesn't tell us. Is it intended that the minority ought now to relinquish their minority view and toe the line. I would maintain that would be bad for science and bad for democracy too , ironically. This  is to say nothing of the logistics of trying to implement "democratic control of the production of scientific truth".  Socialist Punk has asked LBird whether he could put some "meat on the bones" of how knowledge, scientific "truth" etc, can be democratically controlled by a global, socialist  population. He won't get an answer.  LBird has been asked this question on numerous occassions but has flatly refused to answer.  I would contend that even to organise a global vote on just one single issue alone is a mammoth undertaking in itself in terms of the registration of (approximately 7 billion) voters, the coordination and monitoring of the vote to prevent fraud etc, and counting the figures.   But the so called "democratic production of scientific truth" involves not just one single one-off global vote but multiple tens of thousands of them in every conceivable discipline of science. Its quite absurd. The pie in the sky approach of LBird is to just simply brush aside these issues as being of no consequence.  He is just not being serious, in my view

[robbo203]

Dont kid yourself, LBird. You not a Marxist at all. You are the political equivalent of a Jehovah Witness neophyte who refuses to answer any probing question whatsoever lest  that unsettles his dogmatic fixed  view of the world. Marx's  motto in life was to question everything.  You question nothing.  You are the epitome of the poltical dogmatist The real question is –  what are you doing on this site?

[robbo203]

Your right in some respects  LBird.   I oppose what is effectively  your Leninist  totalitarian pespective on the future  (which probably  owes to your SWP background!) which, though you lack the wit to realise this, is a recipe for the emergence of an all powerful and utterly ruthless  elite out of the complete chaos and social paralysis brought about by the very utopian schema you propose to inflict on  us – notably,  7 billion deciding by means of  a "democratic vote" on all the nuts and bolts of  the entire vast machinery of globalised production , not to mention the veracity of thousands upon thousands of scientific theories churned out each and every year.  It is difficult to organise  something as fairly straightforward as, say,  a capitalist general election.  Yet what you are proposing in terms of the commitment and dedication of time  and resources is probably several trillion times greater and more complicated Only a  complete buffoon who has completely lost touch with reality could propose such a crackpot idea. And you know, LBird, for all your crass sociological naivete and your mindlessly ranting on about "individualism" (which you don't seem to have the foggiest notion about) the very "democracy" that you so brazenly flourish  as the touchstone of your belief system presupposes the very individuals who you want to submerge and obliterate in some kind of collectivist soup – the reflex thought of every elitist – which individuals  you would have us believe are  nevertheless expected (by you) to vote yes or no on the literally millions of plebiscites you want them to be – nay, insist that they be –  engaged in – that is, of course, if they have time to draw breath dashing from one voting booth to the next in your future utopia.  Now thats a rich peice of irony , innit?

[robbo203]

LBird wrote:

Here we have it all: Marx's 'idealism-materialism', social knowledge and 'things' produced by humans, by 'theory and practice', in which human purpose and will determine the production (not passive reception of 'nature', as bourgeois science alleges) of 'organic nature', 'under the control of the general intellect' (which, if it doen't mean "democratic control of the production of 'truth' ", doesn't mean anything at all).

 Of course it doesnt mean that. Only a Leninist central planner with his head in the clouds could possibly arrive at such a daft and impractical suggestion that assimilates the "intellect" or knowledge of discrete concrete individuals  to the "general intellect" of everyone, of society itself.  I repeat what has been said many times before but incredibly  has to yet grasped by LBird.  No one,  not even the most brilliant scientific mind alive, can grasp anything more than a tiny sliver of the sum total of human knowledge.  Democracy presupposes the activity and involvement of discrete individuals qua individuals deciding collectively, but as individuals, whether to support or oppose a specific proposal on the table.  It depends upon informed decision making.  But the growth of socialised knowledge – what Marx calls the general intellect – has vastly outgrown what the discrete individual is capable of comprehending and the gap is steadily widening with the passage of the time and with the increasing complexity of the social division of labour, something which LBird seems not to understand The thoughtless and knee jerk   mantra of his that is the "democratic control of the production" is becoming even more of a mirage and will o the wisp than  it ever was – not because anyone is forbidden from expressing an opinion on any of the countless thousands of new scientific theories that come into circulation each years but because this growth of socialist knowledge has vastly outstripped, and is more and more outstripping, our capacity as individuals to absorb it.   And if we cannot  absorb it as individuals how we can meaningfully make informed decisions and without which democratic decision making itself would be impossible Democratic decision making has therefore to be disaggregated as a concept and tailored to what is realistic and possible and where it is needed in a direct practical sense.  It should not be turned into some pie-in-the-sky dogma, the pursuit of which will actually bring democracy into disrepute and ironically bring about a collapse of those  democratic  strucutures in place when the Leninist central planers take over in the face of social paralysis brought about by the very futile  attempt to initiate society-wide decision making over literally everything,  including "truth production"

[robbo203]

Young Master Smeet wrote:

LBird wrote:

Is that 'bourgeois logic' or 'True Logic, as given to us by God himself'?Back to the playpen, YMS.

Logic you are unable to refute, and which seems to have reduced you to bluster.

Hear hear

[robbo203]

Young Master Smeet wrote:

Quote:

Truth can be elected, and thus the good life for humans can be established, by active humans employing social theory and practice.

This is demonstrably untrue.A) A truth claim can only be verified by a vote. The polity votes on the truth claim.C) The result of the vote is itself a truth claim.D) The result of the vote can only be discovered by a further vote.

 Science is necessarily ideological  in some sense – and I don't think anyone here disagrees with that – but the proposition that we, all 7 billion of us on planet Earth, must therefore vote on scientific theories in order to determine their  supposed "truth" status – a ludicrous  and totally impractical idea anyway – is to completely misunderstand what democracy is about and what it is for.  It is about practical decisions that affect our wellbeing.  In other words its about the application of scientific discoveries to particular end uses not about the process of scientific discovery itself even if the latter may be indirectly influenced by the former. And yes you are right.  There is something inherently absurd about the the whole idea of voting to determine the truth of a scientific theory .  This is an idea that springs from a religious cum dogmatic cast of mind.  So 4.2 billion people vote in favour of String Theory in Astrophysics while 2.8 billion vote against it.  So what?!?  What actually has been accomplished by this grand folly of a gesture?  Absolutely nothing except an incredibly pointless waste of peoples time and resources. Are the 2.8 billion minority of the global population now expected to toe the Party line and renounce their adherence to any rival theory. If that is what is being asked of us than frankly we would still be stuck in a geocentric ptolemaic paradigm of the universe when the great majority of people believed the sun revolved around the earth and not the other way round..  It is intrinsically conservative in its implications The proposition that we should vote on scientific theories is anti scientific and stems from the mindset of religious Ayatollahs albeit dressed up in the paper thin veneer of a commitment to "democracy" but which will soon enough reveal its true character in the crushing and banning of any kind of dissenting scientific opinion in order to give credence to the empty ritual of such a vote in the first place

[robbo203]

LBird wrote:

I'm not allowed to answer you yet again, robbo, on pain of yet another ban.Please stop asking me the same questions (founded upon your wish to deny workers' democracy), all the while continuing to ignore the same answers.This thread is about your Religious Materialism, and I wish to adher to that topic.If you wish to pursue your topic, please read the answers that I've given before, time and time again, on other threads.

 You are clearly suffering from some kind of delusion LBird.  No you havent given the answers to the questions I ve asked at all.  Not at all.  On every single occasion WITHOUT FAIL  you've simply run away from the questions asked.  And now you have the effrontery to lie through your teeth about  it all declaring that I wish to "deny workers democracy". Quite the opposite is true and I said quite explicitly Im all in favour of workers democracy but where it is needed and not where it is not needed.  So, I dont think it is needed to determine , for instance, what I should wear, what I should consume,. where I should live , what music I should listen to, what interests I should pursue  and so on. These are personal choices and it is ridiculous and totally impractical trying to subject them to "democratic decisionmaking".  The same is true of your utterly daft and ill thought out idea of democratic "truth production".  It is such a stupid impractical idea I can hardly believe any rational human being could come up with such a thing. You say this thread is about "religious materialism".  That is ironic because, compared to you, a devotee of the Hare Krishna sect or a Jehovah Witness, would come across as a positively reasonable. You are the quintessential expression of the religious dogmatist who has nothing useful to say and finds some kind of weird comfort in the repetitive utterances of mantras, boring the pants off .all and everyone around him/her in the process.  Youve completely lost the plot, LBird

[robbo203]

LBird wrote:

I can feel yet another ban coming on… to keep the site safe from critical thought, and safe for the Religious Materialists, like robbo, who won't have workers' democracy in truth production.

 So not  content with dodging all my arguments and flinging round the odd cheap insult to cover your tracks , now your are resorting to down right porkies to plug the holes and stem the draining away of what little credibility you have left on this forum.   So I'm a  "religious Materialist" now meaning, in your terms, a positivist, some one who thinks that "rocks talk" as you put it.  Ill have you know, LBird,  that long before you announced your triumphal entrance on this forum in a fanfare of trumpets,  I was doggedly critiquing positivism and the so called "fact- value" distinction .  Your initial comments on the subject actually attracted my support, if you recall.  However, your pattern of behaviour since then – abusing those who dare disagree with you, twisting their arguments or just simply walking away from them when attempting to deal with them would expose your own argument for claptrap it is – has all but lost my sympathy vote.  A case in point  is is this idiotic mantra of yours –  "workers' democracy in truth production".  What the hell does that mean in practice LBird?  You wont say. You adamantly refuse to say time after time after time when repeatedly asked to elaborate.  Frankly, arguing with you is like debating with a Jehovah witness zealot on the merits of creationism. Are you seriously trying to tell us that 7 billion people are going to be voting on the "truth" of thousands upon thousands of scientific theories every year. (why they even need to vote on the truth of such theories is another matter).  It is not as you stupidly continue to assert that  I am saying workers should not be allowed to have an opinion on some scientific theory and that this should be left to expert elite. I have no problems with anyone whatsoever venturing an opinion. I'm just saying that no one individual, however clever or gifted, can ever acquire more than a tiny fraction of the sum total of human knowledge and that consequently for any theory it is more than likely that most people (including the experts in  some other field) will have neither the knowledge or the inclination to pass an informed opinion on the subject,  I  have precious little knowledge of, for example, molecular biology and wouldn't presume to pass an opinion on some theory  relating to this field.  Does that bother me? Nope.  Not at all.  I  am quite happy for the molecular biologists to discuss among themselves the rights and wrongs of this particular theory.  You on the other hand have no conception whatsoever of the simple fact  that there is such a thing as a social division of labour and that with advances in human knowledge this is becoming more and not less pronounced. Your head is completely  in the clouds and that is why you never seem to progress beyond the utterance of empty mantras My point is that there are structural limits to democratic decision making and my interest is in trying to delineate where these lie. I'm all for democratic decision making but where it is needed and  not where it is not needed. Are you trying to tell that global population should determine what I read, where I live , what clothes I wear , what music I should be allowed to listen to and so on,  No? Well then if you say no then you too by implication accept that there must be structural limits to democratic decision making.  That is why I mentioned local or decentralised decision making in a future socialist society.  You didn't seem to understand the point of this example. In fact it serves as an analogy  for the example of expert elites.  If you agree that a local community knows best what it needs locally and does not need the global community to determine whether it requires a local hospital and where to siute it then what is the difference between that and saying that some people know more about a particular theory than others and are therefore in a better position to pass comment. In principle not much  This is nothing wrong in admitting you know less about a particular subject than someone else and it is nothing short of arrogant self delusion to pretend that the situation is different Of course if you dont think there will be some degree of decentralised decionmaking in socialism then that makes you a central planner.  In which case would you care to demonstrate  how you imagine one single plan for the whole of global society is remotely practicable?

[robbo203]

LBird wrote:

Perhaps the real problem, robbo, is that you don't want to explain to workers, and you're quite happy with your own 'individual understanding'. That thesis would certainly fit with your refusal to democratise truth production, and your wish to retain 'elite expert' control in science. You could then pose as the 'elite expert' in philosophy and history, and prevent workers from controlling the production of history writing, too.In fact, this sequence is precisely what happens with the Leninist philosophy, of elite 'special consciousness' being embodied in a cadre party, who will 'lead' the dumb workers to socialism. No workers' democracy there, and none with you, either.

  You do talk a load of tosh at times LBird, as well completely evading my central point – that your so called "critical reading" of Engels may have quite misread what the guy was saying on the first place. As your nonsense about "democraticising truth production" perhaps you might care to respond to the relevant section in my earlier post – reproduced below -something else  you completely evaded, preferring it seems to hide behind cheap and empty smears about "elite experts" and repudiating "workers democracy"  Your problem, L Bird, is that that you dont know what democracy is for, what its purpose is, and that is why you come out with kind of idiotic kneejerk comments such as the above

robbo203 wrote:

Groan.  Not this daft idea again!  It is not a question of anyone trying to stop anyone from saying what is the truth in their view.  Its just a simple fact that none of us however talented or gifted can ever acquire more than the tiniest fraction of the  sum total of human knowlege  and therefore the idea that any of us, let alone all of us , can competently pronounce on the "truth" of everything is just plain ludicrous.  Democratic control of production is a relative thing or are you seriously trying to tell us that the total global workforce (7 billion people) is going to have a say in what goes on in Factory no.156 in William Morris Avenue,  Surbiton, Surrey in the new global communist world order?  Pull another one, LBird! It does not follow from the fact that production is a socialised process that the totality of society has to be involved in literally every single decision made in the global economy.  If this is what you are saying that makes you an advocate of crackpot central planning and an opponent of any kind of decentralised or localised decisionmaking whatsoever. Ironically that would make your perspective more of a Leninist one than you perhaps care to admit

On this last point,  do tell us LBird – what is your take on central planning? Do you believe that the totality of production should be democratically controlled by the total global workforce (i.e. there should be no localised or decentralised decisionaking)  and how in practical terms are you going to achieve this?  C'mon lets hear from you on the subject. Why do you keep mum every time it is brought up?

[robbo203]

LBird wrote:

   Engels then goes on to throw away, once again, Marx’s notion of human ‘production’ (theory and practice, plans and product, human social and historical creativity), and reverts to the ‘economic’ as ‘ultimately decisive’, and specifically says that ‘human minds’ do not play ‘the decisive one’.

Engels, Bloch letter, wrote:

We make our history ourselves, but, in the first place, under very definite assumptions and conditions. Among these the economic ones are ultimately decisive. But the political ones, etc., and indeed even the traditions which haunt human minds also play a part, although not the decisive one.

[my bold] 

 But he doesnt say what you say he is saying.  This is not a "critical" reading of the text  as you claim  but a display of your own prejudices in the pursuit of this  hobbyhorse of yoursThere is a difference between saying Engels "specifically says that ‘human minds’ do not play ‘the decisive one’"  and what Engels actually said viz But the political ones, etc., and indeed even the traditions which haunt human minds also play a part, although not the decisive one."   Can you spot the difference? It is not the human mind as such which does not play a decisive part but rather the political conditions and traditions which haunt the human mind.  There is nothing in what Engels says that the human mind per se (i.e. consciousness) is not also implicated in those conditions that do play an ultimately decisive role i.e. the economic ones Your claim that " His use of ‘economic’ excludes ‘mind’, and so he thinks that the term is equivalent to ‘material’, something to do with ‘matter’, to the exclusion of ‘mind’ is unproven.  You say:  It’s obvious to all that human ‘production’, being social, involves both ideas and materiality, in equal measure.  Assume for the sake this applies to all forms of activity not just production and that that is what Engels actually meant  Is it possible to argue that some forms of activity exhiting this fusion of what you call the ideal and  material can predominate in influencing the course of history while other forms of activity are less influential.  I think it is . Im quite persuaded by Keith Graham's (another ex SPGBer) way of looking at the matter thusRecall that synchronic materialism concerns the relations of a society frozen in snapshot, as it were.  Some of these difficulties of verification may be eased by observing societies in motion, over time.  Although relations of production cannot be observed without accompanying superstructural attributes, any pattern in successive relations of production and their accompaniments may allow inferences of subordination and domination to be drawn  (Keith Graham , 1992, Karl Marx Our contemporary  Harvester Wheatsheaf,  p54-55) Or to ram the point home here is another , and one of my favourite, quotes from Carolyn MerchantAn array of ideas exists available to a given age: some of these for unarticulated  or even unconscious reasons seem plausible to individuals or social groups; others do not.  Some ideas spread; others die out.  But the direction and accumulation of social changes begin to differentiate between  among the spectrum of possibilities so that some ideas assume a more central role in the array, while others move to the periphery.  Out of this differential appeal of ideas that seem most plausible under particular social conditions, cultural transformations develop (Carolyn Merchant, 1980, The Death of Nature: Women , Ecology and the Scientific Revolution,  Harper and Row      p.xviii)It is in this context that economic circumstances can be seen to act as a crucial part of the "sifting process" that leads to cultural transformation – not as something separate from the realm of ideas but as the expression of ideas like the idea of property rights or the idea of self interest, say

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