Wez
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Capital is only a ‘torture’ to read for those in our culture because of the lack of dialectical knowledge and approach (something I hope to be addressing in next month’s Standard). Marx was an extraordinary polymath and since the dialectical approach to knowledge is holistic many find the multiplicity of historical/economic/philosophical/artistic references in Capital very confusing. Socialists believe in ‘from each according to his talents’ and so some have the interest and capacity for abstract thinking while others do not – but in socialism there is no hierarchy of talents so there is no danger of ‘undermining the masses’ with elitist intellectual double talk (as there is in Bolshevism etc.).
The original form of the word ‘Poppy Cock’ was Dutch for soft dung so the symbolism is obvious if a little unmarketable.
I’m not sure what Alan and Sussex socialist are advocating here. You both acknowledge that socialism is the only way to stop the degradation of the environment and that is what we’re all working for. Adding a level of hysteria would not aid our cause and no one can second guess what the hatchet men of the ruling class will do or not do. Many have not and do not care about the pollution that has killed and continues to kill millions across the globe – but suddenly when there’s a threat to the ‘first world’ people start to worry.
If they were carbon based aliens then to achieve the requisite technology to get here they would already have gone through capitalism and their visit to Scotland would hold no surprises – assuming that the process of historical materialism is universal as the original post implies. If this is so then, obviously, there could be no chance of 'imposing' socialism.
I realize that this is a waste of time (and off subject) but this 'might' be of interest to L Bird as it tells the story of the divergence between science and the bourgeoisie. More often than not these days science confronts bourgeois ideology rather than supports it: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3490543/
I believe the very first writing (discovered in Mesopotamia) was a form of accounting (digitally) and this predates the arrival of the bourgeoisie by some millenia. Marx often uses the dialectical process of quantity transforming into a quality – such as when money becomes capital. Is this an example of the digital being converted into the analogue?
There's no reason to believe that Leninists are any closer to socialist consciousness than your average liberal or conservative.
I don't know why you're using the print version above – complete with A4 cropping marks!? Use the online version I sent you.
This is quite interesting on Adam Smith and his views on the 'free market': http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b052ln55
I can see it would be pointless in continuing a debate with you Ms. Lichtenstein as you are contemptuous of any ideas you don't agree with. This forum is a strange place. I've been informed here that Marx was not a materialist and now that he was not a philosopher – it's like a parallel universe. At least the old boy would be pleased that we're still talking about him – whatever he was or was not. I still believe that without Kant and Hegel there would be no Marx and that politics is a synthesis of economics, history, science and philosophy. I take my leave of you before the moderator gets me.
