Charles, Chris and Hugh engage in some metaphysical tomfoolery, viz: Hugh >Yes, but if mental processes are dialectical, are they at the same time >part of the material world and material as well? And doesn't the material >world in that case follow dialectical laws? And where does the boundary >between mental and physical go? Chris: >Marx's marginal notes on Wagner make clear that for Marx, humanity >is an >animal species and there is a continuous development from >animal to man. >Now the anti-dm group would presumably say there are >qualitative changeson >the way. But I would say not in this >fundamental respect: that large >aspects of human social life process >is non-conscious. Similarly I suggest >that Marx's comments on >animals and men, are quote open to the new >understanding that >animals too are sentient beings. So then this argument goes, man is part of matter and since man's engagement with that matter is dialectical, matter itself is dialectical, hence we should all be dialectical materialists and be spending our time seeking out its dialectical laws. This at best repeats the folly of the mechanical materialists and at worst is a recipe for a quest for the holy grail. For, for our dialectical materialists it is not enough that Marx reveals the riddle of history they want him to reveal the riddle of existence. As this riddle unfolds, unfolding in sub-atomic matter as much as in twinklin' galaxies we can all sit back and let it unfold in our tiny corner of matter. Forget action, forget history, forget politics, the old mole Dialectics is grubbing away. Let's forget it all and just party. Apart that is, that in their observations, our dialectical materialists, like Hegel himself, must always arrive post festum... >Seems to me Russ and his mates just don't want to call a spade a spade. Ok, it's a load of bag of spanners. >As I asked before, give us a definition of Marx's actual use of historical >materialism that takes into account all his debts to Hegel, and we'll have >a discussion. Otherwise you might as well spit against the wind. That would be some bloody definition that would! There's one from Jameson I'll dig out where he remarks that when we deal with one aspect of Marx's method, the whole dripping mess of Hegelianism always threatens to spill out. That however differs from attempts to set the old boy back on his feet. As with Elvis Presley, every nut has a rational kernel! All that is rational is real, all that's real is rational, but dialectical materialism is not rational- it's a metaphysical projection onto brute matter of properties it does not own outside of the head of the observer. >And isn't it symptomatically dialectical that Russ uses the words >"engagement with the material world" as an excuse for quietism? Quietism? Strange loogick there Hugh! As if >Lenin, say, didn't engage more with the material world in a day than most >people do in a lifetime. Was that the day he sat in a railway carriage, arriving also, post festum? Russ ______________________________________________________ Get Your Private, Free Email at http://www.hotmail.com --- from list [EMAIL PROTECTED] ---
