[Marxism-Thaxis] Infrastructure does not micromanage the economy
Infrastructure does not micromanage the economy ___ Marxism-Thaxis mailing list Marxism-Thaxis@lists.econ.utah.edu To change your options or unsubscribe go to: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/marxism-thaxis
[Marxism-Thaxis] Graham Priest vs Erwin Marquit
I know that's right. Well, well, well. You might want to take a look at that collection of articles, _Dialectical Contradictions : Contemporary Marxist Discussions_. Somebody mentions, maybe Lawler, the square root of negative one. There is an article by Narski there. Marquit (1981) endeavors to clarify the three 'laws of dialectics' beginning with a formulation of what he calls law zero, the law of universal interconnection. ^^^ CB: Cornforth emphasizes interconnectedness first in his book critiquing Popper. It is the issue of the whole and parts. Anti-reductionism, so important in Caudwell, derives from holistic emphasis, moving from the whole to the parts primarily rather than from parts to wholes. Lewontin and Levins emphasize this in _Dialectical Biologist_. It may be that Marxist philosophy developed outside of the SU in the Stalinist period. Britain had Caudwell and others. A changing object exists in a given state and not in the given state at the same time. CB: This is the general paradox in Zeno's paradox for displacement, I believe. It is the paradox inherent in conceiving of motion in this way. But what other way is there to conceive of motion ? It's a trivial paradox in a way. CB (1)Ralph Dumain : Erwin Marquit's articles in Science and Society offset the two articles by Graham Priest previously described. Marquit, Erwin. Dialectics of Motion in Continuous and Discrete Spaces, Science and Society, vol. 42, Winter 1978-79, 410-425. Marquit, Erwin. Contradictions and Dialectics and Formal Logic, Science and Society, vol. 45, no. 3, Fall 1981, 306-323. Marquit, Erwin. A Materialist Critique of Hegel's Concept of Identity of Opposites, Science and Society, vol. 54, no. 2, Summer 1990, 147-166. See also Marquit's article in NST: Marquit, Erwin. Distinctions Between the Spheres of Action of Formal Logic and Dialectical Logic, Nature, Society and Thought, vol. 3, no. 1, 1990, 31-37. Both Marquit (1981) and Priest (1990-91) refer to Marquit (1978-79). Marquit also refers to Marquit (1981) and Marquit's article in NST. Marquit (1990) reacts to Priest (1989-90), and Priest (1990-91) reacts to Marquit (1990). There, now that we've cleared that up . . . Marquit (1981) endeavors to clarify the three 'laws of dialectics' beginning with a formulation of what he calls law zero, the law of universal interconnection. He then clarifies the logic of the famed three laws and their relation one to one another. His next step is to clarify objective and subjective dialectics and their relation to one another. Taking examples of antinomial statements which seem to embody logical contradictions, Marquit then argues that dialectical contradictions are not logical contradictions. (319). Examples chosen from Hegel, Engels, and quantum mechanics can be expressed in the form: A changing object exists in a given state and not in the given state at the same time. Other views are brought in from Ilyenkov, F.F. Vyakkerev, Gottfired Stiehler, and D.P. Gorskii. Marquit's main inspiration is Igor S. Narski. While I have not really described Marquit's argument, I will give him credit for treating this matter in an uncommonly precise and sophisticated manner, which Priest (the logician!) unaccountably shortchanges. I don't know what I've seen by Narski if anything, though I am familiar with the name. Also in evidence is the increasing professionalism and sophistication of Soviet philosophers following the death of Stalin. ___ Marxism-Thaxis mailing list Marxism-Thaxis@lists.econ.utah.edu To change your options or unsubscribe go to: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/marxism-thaxis
[Marxism-Thaxis] written history of society is a history of class struggles.
WL: The issue is your definition of history as class struggle. I reply that history is not class struggle but rather the progressive accumulation of productive forces and society moving in class antagonism. The bourgeoisie role in revolutionizing production is irrelevant to the definition of history you state. Here is what you wrote, and what I directly quoted and the above was my reply. CB: All I said was what Marx and Engels's said about history. To be more precise , the written history of society is a history of class struggles. The discussion on this thread is about class society ,not preclass society. Capitalism is class society. The history of all hitherto existing society(2) is the history of class struggles. 2. That is, all written history. In 1847, the pre-history of society, the social organisation existing previous to recorded history, all but unknown. Since then, August von Haxthausen (1792-1866) discovered common ownership of land in Russia, Georg Ludwig von Maurer proved it to be the social foundation from which all Teutonic races started in history, and, by and by, village communities were found to be, or to have been, the primitive form of society everywhere from India to Ireland. The inner organisation of this primitive communistic society was laid bare, in its typical form, by Lewis Henry Morgan's (1818-1861) crowning discovery of the true nature of the gens and its relation to the tribe. With the dissolution of the primeval communities, society begins to be differentiated into separate and finally antagonistic classes. I have attempted to retrace this dissolution in The Origin of the Family, Private Property, and the State, second edition, Stuttgart, 1886. [Engels, 1888 English Edition and 1890 German Edition (with the last sentence omitted)] http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1848/communist-manifesto/ch01.htm #a2 WL: History is the progressive accumulation of productive forces(Engels) CB:Better said, to discover the various uses of things is the work of history. Marx: Every useful thing, as iron, paper, c., may be looked at from the two points of view of quality and quantity. It is an assemblage of many properties, and may therefore be of use in various ways. To discover the various uses of things is the work of history.[3] So also is the establishment of socially-recognized standards of measure for the quantities of these useful objects. The diversity of these measures has its origin partly in the diverse nature of the objects to be measured, partly in convention 3. Things have an intrinsick vertue (this is Barbon's special term for value in use) which in all places have the same vertue; as the loadstone to attract iron (l.c., p. 6). The property which the magnet possesses of attracting iron, became of use only after by means of that property the polarity of the magnet had been discovered. http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1867-c1/ch01.htm#3 ___ Marxism-Thaxis mailing list Marxism-Thaxis@lists.econ.utah.edu To change your options or unsubscribe go to: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/marxism-thaxis
[Marxism-Thaxis] The bourgeoisie, by the rapid _improvement_ of all instruments of production
The bourgeoisie, by the rapid improvement of all instruments of production, by the immensely facilitated means of communication, draws all, even the most barbarian, nations into civilisation. The cheap prices of commodities are the heavy artillery with which it batters down all Chinese walls, with which it forces the barbarians' intensely obstinate hatred of foreigners to capitulate. It compels all nations, on pain of extinction, to adopt the bourgeois mode of production; it compels them to introduce what it calls civilisation into their midst, i.e., to become bourgeois themselves. In one word, it creates a world after its own image. Marx and Engels are not talking about the bourgeoisie fettering the development of the forces of production here. ___ Marxism-Thaxis mailing list Marxism-Thaxis@lists.econ.utah.edu To change your options or unsubscribe go to: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/marxism-thaxis
[Marxism-Thaxis] The Ontological Status of Women and Abstract Entities
[Bibliographic note: Following is the conclusion of a lecture that the logician Alonzo Church presented at Harvard University on April 18, 1958. In this excerpt, which was first published on the web site of Cathy Legg, Church was arguing against the nominalistic approach of the philosophers Nelson Goodman and Willard van Orman Quine. ] The Ontological Status of Women and Abstract Entities by Alonzo Church Goodman says somewhere that he finds abstract entities difficult to understand. And from a psychological viewpoint it is certainly his dislike and distrust of abstract entities which leads him to propose an ontology from which they are omitted. Now a misogynist is a man who finds women difficult to understand, and who in fact considers them objectionable incongruities in an otherwise matter-of-fact and hard-headed world. Suppose then that in analogy with nominalism the misogynist is led by his dislike and distrust of women to omit them from his ontology. Women are not real, he tells himself, and derives great comfort from the thought -- there are no such things. This doctrine let us call ontological misogyny . There are various forms which such a doctrine may take. The misogynist may follow the example of Ryle and say that the world of women has no independent existence, it does not exist in addition to man's world but is an aspect of it; and though it may be convenient to speak of women independently, it is also misleading, and actually one should not ask such questions as whether women exist. But if this doctrine stands in isolation and does not affect the circumstances under which he agrees to my assertion that there is a woman in the room, or admits that some women have made important scientific discoveries, then it is clear that the denial of ontological status to women is only a matter of psychological comfort to the misogynist and has no further significance. Instead of this the misogynist may take the more profound course which follows Goodman and Quine, attempting to construct a comprehensive theory that is adequate in general for purposes of understanding and communication, but at the same time avoiding ontological commitment to women. It is an interesting logical question how far such a theory is possible (without inconsistency with experimental and observational results). I think it may have at least as much success as has attended the corresponding search for a nominalist theory. Just as propositions are replaced by inscriptions in order to avoid ontological commitment to the former, so a woman might be replaced by her husband. Instead of saying that a woman is present, we might speak of men as having two kinds of presence, primary presence and secondary presence, the observational criteria for secondary presence of a man being the same which the more usual theory would take as observational criteria for presence of a woman. And similarly in the case of other things that one might think to say about women. Certain difficulties arise over the fact that some women have more than one husband and others none, but these are no greater than the corresponding difficulties in the case of propositions and inscriptions. Actually the task might be lightened by taking advantage of the fortunate circumstance that every woman has only one father. And for this reason ontological misogyny is a doctrine much easier to put into satisfactory nominalistic theory, and probably more logical order than is the Quine-Goodman finitistic nominalism. But the question of the logical possibility of such a theory must be separated from the question of the desirability of replacing the ordinary theory by this ontologically more economical variant of it. Quine and Goodman emphasize the economy of nominalism in supposing the existence of fewer entities. But the economy which has commonly been the concern of the logician, and of the mathematician dealing with foundations, has been simply economy of assumption, which might be thought to include (among other things) economy of ontological assumption, but certainly not as its primary or most important element. Surely there are other criteria by which to judge a theory. And though we may be obliged to grant that the ontological misogynist has made a successful application of Ockham's razor, in that he has reduced his ontology without losing the adequacy of his theory, we may still prefer the more usual theory which grants existence to women. To return to Quine and Goodman, it is possible, even likely, that the failure of their program will demonstrate the untenability of their finitistic nominalism. But the success of their program, like that of ontological misogynist, would leave us to choose between the rival ontologies on other grounds. It is only in the former case that Quine and Goodman could be said in any sense to have settled the nominalist-realist controversy. But it is in any case a major contribution to have clarified the meaning of the dispute, by putting the
Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] Graham Priest vs Erwin Marquit
At 10:09 AM 9/18/2005 -0400, Charles Brown wrote: I know that's right. Well, well, well. You might want to take a look at that collection of articles, _Dialectical Contradictions : Contemporary Marxist Discussions_. Somebody mentions, maybe Lawler, the square root of negative one. There is an article by Narski there. Since I have this book, I darn well should look at it. ^^^ CB: Cornforth emphasizes interconnectedness first in his book critiquing Popper. It is the issue of the whole and parts. Anti-reductionism, so important in Caudwell, derives from holistic emphasis, moving from the whole to the parts primarily rather than from parts to wholes. Lewontin and Levins emphasize this in _Dialectical Biologist_. This would be Cornforth at his best. Popper himself was forced to abjure reductionism, per his three-worlds theory. Too bad he would never acknowledge a debt to Hegel or Marx. It may be that Marxist philosophy developed outside of the SU in the Stalinist period. Britain had Caudwell and others. Britain also had the highly creative Australian Jack Lindsay. Caudwell was so creative because he worked in isolation. The Soviets and the British CP tried to make Lindsay's life miserable. But of course there was creative activity in the UK and elsewhere. A changing object exists in a given state and not in the given state at the same time. CB: This is the general paradox in Zeno's paradox for displacement, I believe. It is the paradox inherent in conceiving of motion in this way. But what other way is there to conceive of motion ? It's a trivial paradox in a way. There is no other way to conceive motion. But it is highly significant to determine wherein consists dialectical thinking. That is, if the freezing of a world in motion is necessary in order to analyze it, and this involves the necessary generation of contradictory expressions, then this says something profound about what makes the world or thought dialectical. (Lenin expressed this much better than many others.) It may seem like a trivial point, but I think it kicks up the discussion several notches to begin with this point of departure. ___ Marxism-Thaxis mailing list Marxism-Thaxis@lists.econ.utah.edu To change your options or unsubscribe go to: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/marxism-thaxis
Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] [marxistphilosophy] Graham Priest vs Erwin Marquit (2)
On Sat, 17 Sep 2005 18:54:33 -0400 Ralph Dumain [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: The upshot, I think, is that even if Priest can prove Marquite wrong in arguing for contradictions in 'the same respect', that one point does not render his analysis of the issues involved any subtler, nor does it lead to interesting arguments and conclusions. The argument is to one point only--the admission of contradictions into formal logic. And so? That's pretty much my take on Priest. At most what he does is show that you can have viable systems of formal logic that admit contradictions. He attempts to show that Hegel and Marx can be understood as having been dialetheists but he leaves unclear what would follow if we accept his conclusions. Is our understanding of Marxist dialectics in any fundamental way changed if we choose to agree with Marquit or opt for Priest? Certainly other philosophers before him have attempted to understand or model dialectical reasoning in terms of formal logic. Even A.J. Ayer in his *The Central Questions of Philosophy* briefly made the argument that perhaps Hegel's dialectical logic could be understood in terms of a multivalue logic. Lofti Zadeh is noted for his fuzzy logic and fuzzy set theory (which Priest regards as dialetheic) which likewise admits contradictions. And some Soviet philosophers like Gorskii were interested in fuzzy logic for that very reason. But in the end what follows from this does not seem very clear. Concerning the interpretation of QM which both Marquit and Priest are concerned with, it should be noted that the founding fathers of the Copenhagen Interpretation, Nils Bohr and Werner Heisenberg, while insistent upon the dialectical character of their interpretation were equally insistent that this did not entail formal logical contradictions. In fact Bohr maintained that his principle of complementarity showed how it was possible to embrace dialectically contradictory interpretations of subatomic phenomena (waves v. particles) without leading to logical contradictions. That seems to be Marquit's position too whereas Priest seems to think, that contrary to Bohr, the Copenhagen Interpretation does not eliminate logical contradictions from its portrayal of quantum mechanics. Interestingly enough, some of the critics of the Copenhagen Interpretation have said much the same thing, using that as a basis for rejecting it. Priest on the other hand takes this as showing that it is possible to have a physical theory that admits logical contradictions without being invalidated for that reason. Jim F. ___ Marxism-Thaxis mailing list Marxism-Thaxis@lists.econ.utah.edu To change your options or unsubscribe go to: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/marxism-thaxis ___ Marxism-Thaxis mailing list Marxism-Thaxis@lists.econ.utah.edu To change your options or unsubscribe go to: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/marxism-thaxis
[Marxism-Thaxis] Contradiction inherent in symbolling
There is an inherent contradiction in all efforts to represent, as the process is fundamentally establishing an identity between two different things - the thing represented and the thing being used to represent. I think this is the contradiction that always pops up in math , logic , dialectics because they all involve symboling or representing. This convention is what allows messages across generations of dead and living, yet it carries with it inherent paradox. Will elaborate. CB ___ Marxism-Thaxis mailing list Marxism-Thaxis@lists.econ.utah.edu To change your options or unsubscribe go to: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/marxism-thaxis
Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] the theory of the Communists may be summed up in the sin...
CB: If Marx had thought changing the technological regime were the focus for revolutionary activity , _Capital_ would have been a book of engineering-physics, not political economy. The following demonstrates that followers of Marx and Engels would focus on changing property relations, ownership relations, not on impacting the human productive forces who invent, inventors,scientists and engineers who make the scientific and technolgoical revolutions. _Discovery_ of the use of things, technological invention is not the process that Marx claimed to have mastered such that Marxists would lead technological innovation, and somehow shape technological disccovery and invention to cause a revolution in property relations. Discovery , by definition is unforeseeable. Comment WL: Why invent straw men to fight? The topic of this new the theory of communists is a somewhat different subject than the practical activity of the communists as the more class conscious members of the working class. Communist and Marxists have always understood that the political struggle takes place in the superstructure relations of society rather than - in contradistinction, to the economy base of society and most certainly not as a quest for scientific discovery. This is not to say that Marxists and communist are indifferent to the scientific question and application. Communist and Marxists come from all walks of life. The issue in discussing Marx meaning of the productive forces in conflict with the relations of production, and what it means for us at our moment of history, has never been the form, content, or substance of ones revolutionary activity as communist or Marxists. On the issue of the content of ones activity I have a several decades of experience worth sharing from time to time. As you are aware this includes being an elected union official, a member of the Executive Board of the American Writers Congress, a founding member and Executive Board member of the Detroit Metropolitan Chapter of the Coalition of Black Trade Unionists; former editor of the Southern Advocate as well as the Equal Rights Congress; Communist League, Communist Labor Party and of course the League of Revolutionary Black Workers, to name a few. The focus of communist activity is contained in our banner that simply states victory to the workers in their current struggle. How the communist have fought various battles in America between the post W.W.II period and up to the present is an important subject, and gives definition to most of my life. Perhaps, in the future some of this information can be shared. Contained within this very real process is how various presentations, expositions and currents within Marxism regrouped themselves, after the dissolution of the Third International and the further decay of the Communist Party USA (CPUSA), which carried forth much of our revolutionary history. To speak directly to the passage quoted above: Social revolution comes about as the result of spontaneous changes in the means of production. Discovery as you state above, of the use of things is not what constitutes the spontaneous change in the means of production, but sets the basis of such change with application. The theory of communism as elaborated by Marx is not the meaning of the practical activity or doctrine of combat characterizes of communist. For instance, we cannot concretely fight to abolish the state as product of the irreconcilability of class antagonism or cause it to wither away simply because we desire such and this vision is part of our theoretical underpinning. You quote Marx as stating: In this sense, the theory of the Communists may be summed up in the single sentence: Abolition of private property. Marx calls the desire to abolition private property as - in a sense, the theory of communists rather than the immideate fight of the workers and there immediate goals. To my knowledge the immediate goals go our working class - as a class stratified, has never been to discover scientific discovery, nor has this been the platform, program of any communist grouping I am familiar with. Perhaps you can cite the source and material of those whose advocate communist do not fight for the victory of the workers in their immediate struggle. Waistline ___ Marxism-Thaxis mailing list Marxism-Thaxis@lists.econ.utah.edu To change your options or unsubscribe go to: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/marxism-thaxis
Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] the theory of the Communists may be summed up in the sin...
Correction The issue in discussing Marx meaning of the productive forces in conflict with the relations of production, and what it means for us at our moment of history, has never been the form, content, or substance of ones revolutionary activity as communist or Marxists. Should read The issue in discussing Marx meaning of the productive forces in conflict with the relations of production, and what it means for us at our moment of history, has never been the form, content, or substance of ones revolutionary activity as communist or Marxists at this point in the dialogue. ___ Marxism-Thaxis mailing list Marxism-Thaxis@lists.econ.utah.edu To change your options or unsubscribe go to: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/marxism-thaxis
