Young Master Smeet
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Smeet wrote:This is on top of straight forward refusing to answer the question, avoiding questions and returning like a stopped clock some while later to put propositions again as if they have never been challenged.Marx wrote:In place of disinterested inquirers, there were hired prize fighters; in place of genuine scientific research, the bad conscience and the evil intent of apologetic.
Square with you Lbird? "as objects independent of him". — Marx
https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1867-c1/p3.htm
Marx wrote:Since 1848 capitalist production has developed rapidly in Germany, and at the present time it is in the full bloom of speculation and swindling. But fate is still unpropitious to our professional economists. At the time when they were able to deal with Political Economy in a straightforward fashion, modern economic conditions did not actually exist in Germany. And as soon as these conditions did come into existence, they did so under circumstances that no longer allowed of their being really and impartially investigated within the bounds of the bourgeois horizon. In so far as Political Economy remains within that horizon, in so far, i.e., as the capitalist regime is looked upon as the absolutely final form of social production, instead of as a passing historical phase of its evolution, Political Economy can remain a science only so long as the class struggle is latent or manifests itself only in isolated and sporadic phenomena.Marx wrote:It sounded the knell of scientific bourgeois economy. It was thenceforth no longer a question, whether this theorem or that was true, but whether it was useful to capital or harmful, expedient or inexpedient, politically dangerous or not. In place of disinterested inquirers, there were hired prize fighters; in place of genuine scientific research, the bad conscience and the evil intent of apologetic.I Wonder if Lbird will continue to support the Leninist notion of the subordination of science and theory to partisan needs?But I suppose humpty will go to work again on this:
Marx wrote:After a quotation from the preface to my “Criticism of Political Economy,” Berlin, 1859, pp. IV-VII, where I discuss the materialistic basis of my method,Of course, where Marx wrote 'materialistic' he meant 'ballet shoes'.And of course, famously:
Marx wrote:My dialectic method is not only different from the Hegelian, but is its direct opposite. To Hegel, the life process of the human brain, i.e., the process of thinking, which, under the name of “the Idea,” he even transforms into an independent subject, is the demiurgos of the real world, and the real world is only the external, phenomenal form of “the Idea.” With me, on the contrary, the ideal is nothing else than the material world reflected by the human mind, and translated into forms of thought.Now, this is considered, published comment, meant to illuminate the reading of Capital (note the misreading stemming from the casual 'reflected' missing out the accompanying 'translating' that leads to Leninist interpretations). I don't subscribe to the early Marx v. Later Marx view, I think they are one in the same). But, I think it is celar that Marx did not consider all science to be ideological."as objects independent of him". — Marx
Can a sponge be a ford fiesta? Can they both be each at the same time as both?These do exist outside human consciousness, because a hydrogen atom is not the same as no hydrogen atom.According to you picking your nose is ideological.Just remember that Democratic communism is not an ideology."as objects independent of him". — Marxp.s. Greek slaves did use logic, btw.
Logic is not based on an ideology: those who claim processes are ideological are usually trying to hide something. Ideology is based on premises (and unstated presuppositions), logic is a set of procedural rules. Nothing can be two mutually exclusive things, else explain how someone can be pregnat and not pregnant at the same time."as objects independent of him". — Marx
If objects are produced by humanity, they cannot be independent of humanity, such is basic logic. Yet marx says they are independent of humanity.I will quote exactkly what you have said on this subject earlier:
Lbird wrote:Once again, boxed into a corner, Lbird begins to try and wriggle away…"as objects independent of him". — Marx
Read him, disagree (lets face facts, the philsophical notebooks are a slender reed for any analysis, weren't meant for publication, and in so many words 'I agree with Feuerbach').
Lbird wrote:Of a producer?It can't.That's the point, of Marx's argument about the subject-object relationship."as objects independent of him".Square that away.
LBird wrote:The 'social' is 'something social'; 'society' is made of 'something social'; the 'stuff that is producing' is 'society'.Marx argues that we are self-creators.Why not read Jordan, and read in detail where he explains all this?So society is the only stuff?
You know, I should be more expansive in my quotes:
Marx wrote:Here we see how consistent naturalism or humanism is distinct from both idealism and materialism, and constitutes at the same time the unifying truth of both. We see also how only naturalism is capable of comprehending the action of world history.<Man is directly a natural being. As a natural being and as a living natural being he is on the one hand endowed with natural powers, vital powers – he is an active natural being. These forces exist in him as tendencies and abilities – as instincts. On the other hand, as a natural, corporeal, sensuous objective being he is a suffering, conditioned and limited creature, like animals and plants. That is to say, the objects of his instincts exist outside him, as objects independent of him; yet these objects are objects that he needs – essential objects, indispensable to the manifestation and confirmation of his essential powers. To say that man is a corporeal, living, real, sensuous, objective being full of natural vigour is to say that he has real, sensuous objects as the object of his being or of his life, or that he can only express his life in real, sensuous objects. To be objective, natural and sensuous, and at the same time to have object, nature and sense outside oneself, or oneself to be object, nature and sense for a third party, is one and the same thing.>To repeat "as objects independent of him".https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1844/manuscripts/hegel.htmCan you guess how often I'm going to quote this at you, Lbird?
Actually, the divide between idealism and materialism pre-dates Engels by a long way.But the social is something: society is made of something isn't it? So what do we call the stuff that is producing?Are ideas subject to causitive analysis? You stick to Lenin's idea of subordinating philosophy to the needs of the movemnt…
Ah, you share Lenin's idea that philosophical investigation is subordiniate to partisan needs.Democratic communism is not an ideology, its is a set of ideas.The 'If' can be subject to reasoned debate, not simply 'choice'.I think the important thing is stuff monism: either everything is ideas, or everything is matter, dualism is, I think the bigger mistake.What matters is that ideas are not a special category, immune from investigation, but subject to the same tools that can be applied to any phenomena: they do not just fall from the sky, but emerge from transformation and translation of the universal existence: nothing is created or destroyed, merely transformed, and that applies to ideas as much as to widgets.
Lets put that to one side: people are material, and the social is material, therefore, isn't it? And, if everything that exists is matter, then ideas are material, and we have direct access to our ideas, don't we?
LBird wrote:The question is, though, whether Marx shared either Engels' or Lenin's views on 'materialism'.The German Ideology? Co-authored?
Lbird wrote:If one reads the context of Marx's works, he clearly means by 'material' an opposition to 'ideal'. This is nothing whatsoever to do with 'material equals matter'. Marx is contrasting the 'human' with the 'divine'.This would require substantiation with a quote. As it is, it doesn't make much sense, it's difficult to read phrases like "man is a corporeal, living, real, sensuous, objective being full of natural vigour" without taking some soprt of physicalist connotation (I'd also add, humans are material, as an aside).
LBird wrote:That's why in almost any passage in Marx's works, where he writes 'material', it can be replaced by 'social'.Love the passive voice: so you're saying now not tahat marx intended such a reading, but that it is a reasonable eading, based on the above premise?Problem is, on a quick search of the Marxist archive, I couldn't find any uses of the word divine that seemed to fit your analysis.
Bit short of time, gonna have to quoite and run:The Dialectical Materialism of LeninZ. A. JordanSlavic ReviewVol. 25, No. 2 (Jun., 1966), pp. 259-286
Jordan wrote:'The term "materialism" may have different senses, and it has actually been understood in many different ways, of which two are important in the present context. It may mean (1) that matter is the ultimate constituent of the universe and that there is nothing else in the world or (2) that mind originates from matter. I call materialism in the first sense "absolute materialism" and in the second sense "genetic materialism." Both kinds of ma- terialism can be found in Engels, who does not seem to have been fully aware of the differ- ence between them. It is clear that absolute materialism involves genetic materialism as its special thesis, but one can support genetic materialism without endorsing absolute material- ism. Genetic materialism should be distinguished from epiphenomenalism (bodily events are the sole cause of mental events) and other forms of materialism which reduce mental processes to physical processes.Jordan wrote:Consequently, materialism seems to favor epistemological monism, that is, the assertion that there are no intermediaries in cognition, that whatever we know we apprehend directly, and that the content or data of perception consist of the same elements of which the external world is composed. Epistemological monism, and not epistemological dualism, seems to imply and to be implied by materialism.Jordan wrote:The important point to be noted in Lenin's definition of materialism is his epistemological concept of matter, to be sharply distinguished from Engels' metaphysical conception. Lenin did not ignore the fact that matter exists in time and space, that it is ever changing and in motion in conformity with the laws of nature; occasionally he referred explicitly to these properties of matter.42 But Lenin did not make any use of these physical characteristics and defined matter in terms of the relation of sensation to its physical cause, of the cognizing subject to the cognized object, of consciousness to the external world. Matter, Lenin argued, is known to us only as that which produces, or is capable of producing, cer- tain impressions on our senses. All that we know about matter for certain is its power to produce these effects.Jordan wrote:At the turn of the century the electromagnetic theory of matter and, more recently, the revolutions in theoretical physics, the relativity and quantum theories, persuaded a considerable number of eminent scientists and philosophers that modern science invalidated the materialism based upon classical physics and supported an idealistic and spiritualistic conception of nature.Jordan wrote:Lenin's socio-cosmic interpretation of the laws of dialectics was reinforced not only by his repudiation of the theory of the relativity of knowledge but also by his instrumentalist conception of philosophy and science…. In his endeavor to answer the questions "What is materialism?" and "What is matter?" Lenin was not guided by the philosopher's or scientist's interest in truth. His tactics, which he himself stated explicitly, were intended to produce a definition of matter and materialism that would be secure from change and never become dated. Lenin regarded this security as desirable and necessary, if any political and social objectives were to be achieved.Jordan wrote:It can be said of Engels that he was genuinely interested in natural science and widely read in the scientific literature of his time. He was, however, always ready to recognize that at best he could claim to be no more than a dilettante or semi-initiate in matters concerning astronomy, physics, chemistry, biology, or geology. He qualified this statement by say- ing that despite his incompetence in matters of fact he was just as entitled as a scientist to voice his own views concerning the general assumptions of natural science, for even the professional natural scientist became a semi-initiate when he passed beyond his own specialty.
