> Sartesian: > > The central issue for me in the previous round of discussions is those > notions that: somehow "dialectic" means that there is "positive" and > "negative" in everything; > > Reply: > > Correct. Well done. Finally you get it.
Reply to the reply: Obviously, you're an idiot. Oh yes, positive and negative in everything. Why don't you understand there's positive and negative in fascism, there's positive and negative in the bailout of the banks. Why the whole world is just a bunch of pluses and minuses. _________________ > > Reply: > > Actually, it's both. Evolution, as you mention later in your latest > missive, is precisely the adaptation of nature to external factors - e.g. > changes > in climate, the availability of food, etc. > > Those species and categories of flora and fauna which have and do adapt > successfully is obviously due to their inherent potential to do so. > > There is nothing rational or irrational about the process involved. It is > blind, driven by nothing more than a constant process of coming into being > and passing away. The imputation of rationality is subjectivism. There > is, > however, rationality and irrationality in everything of and within human > society, reflective of man's self conscious nature. _____________ Reply to the reply: More of the same from J: rationality and irrationality in everything; good and bad, pluses and minuses, blah, blah, blah, with undying faith in things as they are, or were. > Reply: > > Well, this is the first time I heard it said that survivability - > adaptability - isn't progressiv. I rather think that by an objective > rendering of > the facts that the evolution of homosapiens from apes marks a progressive > development in terms of the ability of the species to survive and master > its > environment. > > It kinda strikes me as the difference between a horse and carriage and a > Range Rover. But, of course, with every positive comes a negative, > especially > as those four wheel drives are a bastard when it comes to carbon > emissions. ____________________ Reply to the reply: Nothing in evolution says the "product," the new DNA is smarter, more clever, more beautiful than the DNA it replaced; only that in the given environment the new DNA, which might make its carrier, like a mouse, less intelligent, less curious, less bold, less beautiful, was more adaptable, gave it, the mouse, the greater chance of transmitting the DNA by making it more timid, less inclined to seek out new territory, etc.. Your ignorance of dialectic is a least equal to your ignorance of evolution. _______ > > Reply: > > Of course there is. What absolute nonsense you write. The ability to build > automobiles, the invention of cement, etc., are progressive developments, > clearly, unless of course you hark back to the days of cottage industries > and spinning wheels. Maybe you do, I don't know. ____________________________ So besides endorsing, without reservation, and requiring all others to endorse the political program of Hamas, does J endorse the FDI by Volkswagen in Brazil, Mexico as progressive? Does this mean that the program of the revolution is "create 2,3, many special enterprise zones"? It is not my argument that in their need to aggrandize surplus value, the bourgeoisie are not forced to augment the productivity of labor, but that their need to augment the productivity of labor does not count as "progress." It may count as "development," and trailing after the great thinkers of the 2nd International, other social democrats, the Cato Institute, and Soviet Union in the 1930s, J may think "development" in and of itself is "positive" or positive and negative, or plus and minus but what is progress is not the construction of the auto factory no more than the overproduction of autos is progressive. What is "progressive" is the negation of the social relation, the expropriation of the expropriators. Without that expropriation "developmentalism" leads to nothing but greater immiseration. Probably too opaque for J, too lacking in pluses and minuses, positives and negatives. ____________________ > Perhaps you should delve into the Communist Manifesto. > > As Marx himself wrote: > > ''The bourgeoisie, historically, has played a most revolutionary part. The > bourgeoisie, wherever it has got the upper hand, has put an end to all > feudal, patriarchal, idyllic relations.' > > Was he lying? ________________________________ Reply to the reply: Have you ever had an original thought J? What was that question Leon asked at the start of Blade Runner. "Do you make these questions up, or do they write them down for you?" The bourgeoisie historically have not played the role of the agent of revolution; I think Soboul's studies of the French Revolution puts the actions of the various classes in the waging of revolution and counterrevolution in perspective. Regarding the "revolutionizing" all feudal patriarchal idyllic relations-- well not quite, and not quite so completely-- I guess the qualifier "where it has got the upper hand" is the key to understanding the development of capitalism as a SOCIAL SYSTEM, as a mode of production that is modified by the pre-existing relations of land and labor it encounters, and adapts those same pre-existing relations to itself. We could if we cared to actually look at the concrete development of capitalism in the Philippines, in Ecuador, Bolivia, Mexico, Cuba find capitalism reinforcing the patriarchal, "idyllic" relations of the haciendas, the plantations, the great houses, the manors. Although I bet Marx was laughing up his sleeve when he wrote "idyllic," in reference to feudalism. Capital certainly did try its best, and in part succeeded in putting an end to the communal relations of land and labor that it encountered in the Philippines, Ecuador, Mexico, Bolivia, but the miserable oppression of agricultural labor by tethering to the land; to attaching it to rural property and less than subsistence; to securing its indenture against the detached free labor that capitalism in the abstract, as described in the Manifesto, and in Capital, required? Hell no, capitalism didn't much about that. And we don't even have to look that far, we can look to the US South and see our progressive bourgeoisie, our revolutionary capitalists trembling before the prospects of actually breaking the slave economy, except for a few of its wild-eyed radicals who were indeed more petty-bourgeois than bourgeois; we can see our revolutionary, progressive capitalists and capitalism re-forming the planter class, the planter economy, and utilizing the return of identured labor, complete with its patriarchal, semi-feudal, actually merantile-feudal veneer. But J. of course never deals with the concrete circumstances of capital's development, preferring instead the abstract -- "as it should be"-- that is described in the Manifesto. A little bit of comprehension of dialectics are required to understand Marx, to grasp the distinction between the "abstraction" of the essential relationship of capital, and the concrete mediated forms capital assume when encounter actual pre-existing relations. > Reply: > > And here we return to the objective behind Sartesian's mish-mash of a > theory - an attempt to erect an argument in support of his desire to > withhold > solidarity from oppressed peoples and nations lying in the crosshairs of > our > respective ruling classes in the West. Why? As far as I can see, because > in > his estimation they fail to pass his checklist of approval - namely, the > fact they do not subscribe to his notion of a pure, secular, socialist, > and > clean resistance. Another name for this condition is 'buckling under the > pressure of our own bourgeoisie'. Yes, Sartesian, I feel your pain. It's > hard > to argue support for those recalcitrant Palestinians of Gaza with our > liberal friends and work colleagues. > _____________________ Reply to the reply. What a pantload of crap J spins here. The only solidarity that qualifies as solidarity with the Palestinians is the uncritical obedience to Hamas, just as I'm sure 30 years ago for J it was the uncritical endorsement of Fatah. History is full of lessons, maybe is nothing but lessons, in how that very "positive" obedience, endorsement, solidarity, quickly becomes the overwhelming negative. So everyone participating in demonstrations against Israel's invasion, everyone who opposed the assault on the West Bank, who objected to the Israel "house arrest" of Arafat, who opposed the destruction of Jenin-- if any of those people failed to endorse without qualification the program-- exactly the program of who back then, J? Of Fatah, which was certainly experiencing a major assault by imperialism? Of Hamas? This is supposed to be a Marxist list. I think Marx said something somewhere about merciless criticism of everything in existence. Was he lying? With all comradely wishes........... ________________________________________________ YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. Send list submissions to: [email protected] Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
