[Marxism-Thaxis] How many souls do Black Folk have ?
Jim Farmelant : I remember the case of economist, Glenn Loury (http://www.bu.edu/irsd/loury/lourybio.htm) (http://www.pkarchive.org/economy/loury.html). Almost twenty years ago, he was one of the Republican right's favorite black economists. He became famous for his denunciations of affirmative action, welfare and all the other stuff that black neocons are supposed to denounce. In fact, the Reagan Administration was about to appoint him to a government post, them he got busted for cocaine possession and that brought his career on the Republican right to a screeching halt. After that he discovered that the rightwing really is racist, he denounced some of his old rightwing friends for their embracing of Charles Murray Richard Herrnsteins' book, *The Bell Curve* which he regarded as a racist tract. Them he changed his mind concerning affirmative action and a few other issues, and so he became a born again liberal Democrat. Not that being a contributing editor to The New Republic is all that much of an improvement over being a neocon, but I guess you take your friends where you can find them. CB: I didn't know about that latest turn in Loury. By the way, on affirmative action, Michigan is under attack from another Black conartist, Ward Connerly. There is ballot initiative started by Connerly ( from California; here on rightwing money) to make affirmative action unconstitutional. ___ 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] Dialectical materialism
I thought similarly. What about Bhakar , before he became idealist ? Is that the way to spell it ? I was on a list. It sounded like sort of dialectical materialism to me, but the people interested in it didn't cop to that. There were a whole lot of people interested in it. CB Ralph Dumain Encyclopedia entries like these can always be improved upon. There is one paragraph in this one which puzzles me. See below. Examples would have helped. Of course there have been philosophers interested in dialectical materialism as an ontology independent of its political marxist ramifications. Some of these were not explicit marxists; others were sympathetic; some were Marxists; some were dialectical materialists, some not. I can't think of anyone offhand who declared himself a dialectical materialist without being a Marxist. But you never know. The reader, though, can't get much sense out of this paragraph without further explanation. At 06:06 PM 1/17/2006 -0500, Charles Brown wrote: Dialectical materialism Jump to: navigation http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dialectical_materialism#column-one While dialectical materialism has been traditionally associated almost exclusively with Marxism, some claim that the philosophy is applicable to a non-Marxist worldview http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Worldview as well. There is nothing in either the concept of dialectic as elaborated by Hegel or in materialism itself which requires Marxism. However, because Marxism is essentially free of traditional theological influences, it is particularly well-suited to dialectical materialism, and a comparable political system based on the philosophy has not yet emerged. ___ 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] Dialectical materialism (materialist dialectic)
Jim Farmelant : As far as I can tell the term dialectical materialism was first coined by the German worker Josef Dietzgen, who had independently arrived at political and philosophical views that were akin to those of Marx and Engels. Plekhanov is usually credited as having been responsible for popularizing the term around 1890 as a designation for the philosophical outlook that was attributed to Marx and Engels. So I think the part of the article that ascribes the term to Plekhanov ought to be cleaned up, although that seems to be a mistake that one can find in lots of respectable books. CB: I believe Engels does use materialist dialectics. I can look it up easily enough. It's in _Ludwig Feuerbach_. Here it is. And this _materialist dialectic_ (emphasis added -CB), which for years has been our best working tool and our sharpest weapon, was, remarkably enough, discovered not only by us but also, independently of us and even of Hegel, by a German worker, Joseph Dietzgen. (2) ^^^ CB: I believe materialist dialectic is Engels' formulation. The above is in the larger paragraph copied below. Hegel was not simply put aside. On the contrary, a start was made from his revolutionary side, described above, from the dialectical method. But in its Hegelian form, this method was unusable. According to Hegel, dialectics is the self-development of the concept. The absolute concept does not only exist - unknown where - from eternity, it is also the actual living soul of the whole existing world. It develops into itself through all the preliminary stages which are treated at length in the Logic and which are all included in it. Then it alienates itself by changing into nature, where, unconscious of itself, disguised as a natural necessity, it goes through a new development and finally returns as man's consciousness of himself. This self-consciousness then elaborates itself again in history in the crude form until finally the absolute concept again comes to itself completely in the Hegelian philosophy. According to Hegel, therefore, the dialectical development apparent in nature and history - that is, the causal interconnection of the progressive movement from the lower to the higher, which asserts itself through all zigzag movements and temporary retrogression - is only a copy [Abklatsch] of the self-movement of the concept going on from eternity, no one knows where, but at all events independently of any thinking human brain. This ideological perversion had to be done away with. We again took a materialistic view of the thoughts in our heads, regarding them as images [Abbilder] of real things instead of regarding real things as images of this or that stage of the absolute concept. Thus dialectics reduced itself to the science of the general laws of motion, both of the external world and of human thought - two sets of laws which are identical in substance, but differ in their expression in so far as the human mind can apply them consciously, while in nature and also up to now for the most part in human history, these laws assert themselves unconsciously, in the form of external necessity, in the midst of an endless series of seeming accidents. Thereby the dialectic of concepts itself became merely the conscious reflex of the dialectical motion of the real world and thus the dialectic of Hegel was turned over; or rather, turned off its head, on which it was standing, and placed upon its feet. And this materialist dialectic, which for years has been our best working tool and our sharpest weapon, was, remarkably enough, discovered not only by us but also, independently of us and even of Hegel, by a German worker, Joseph Dietzgen. (2) Dietzgen lived in St. Petersburg for a while. Bertell Ollman essays Dietzgen in _Alienation_ and Dietzgen lived in the U.S. ! In New York and Chicago ! He lived in Chicago in the May Day era. Dietzgen is: 2) See Das Wesen der menschlichen Kopfarbeit, dargestellt von einem Handarbeiter [The Nature of Human Brainwork, Described by a Manual Worker]. Hamburg, Meissner. Joseph Dietzgen From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. Jump to: navigation, search Joseph DietzgenJoseph Dietzgen (December 1828 - 1888) was a socialist and marxist philosopher. He was born in Blankenberg near Siegburg, Germany. He was, like his father, a tanner by profession. Entirely self-educated, he developed the notion of dialectical materialism independently from Marx and Engels. Ludwig Feuerbach's works had a great influence on his early theories. He spent some time in the U.S. from 1849 to 1851 and again from 1859 to 1861. From 1864 to 1868, he lived in St. Petersburg, where he was headmaster in the state tannery. Back in Germany, he met Marx in 1869. In 1881, he ran for the elections of the German Reichstag (the parliament), but emigrated in 1884 to New York City. He moved to Chicago two years later, where he
Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] Historical materialism
This Wikipedia article is quite remarkable, I think at first glance. It's the sort of material suitable for Marx Myths and Legends, to which it links. Especially noteworthy are the sections Disclaimers and Historical materialism as doctrine. I'm sure there are many more marxist and quasi-marxist approaches to the history of marxism itself that could be cited. One could begin with Gouldner. But I would think any marxist who ever wrote a good marxist analysis about where 'marxism went wrong' could be included here. Indeed, the Poznan Achool (Nowak et al) eventually developed a non-marxian historical materialism. That Esotonian fellow whose name I can't remember also wrote a book on what remains of historical materialism after a thorough analytical going-over. At 06:03 PM 1/17/2006 -0500, Charles Brown wrote: Historical materialism ___ 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] Historical materialism
That Esotonian fellow whose name I can't remember also wrote a book on what remains of historical materialism after a thorough analytical going-over. Yewah, I have that book, forget the author's name. So did Erik Wright, Andrew Levine, and Elliot Sobor, Reconstructing Marxism, very similar results in a shortter space. __ Do You Yahoo!? Tired of spam? Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around http://mail.yahoo.com ___ 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] Historical materialism
Eero Loone. On Jan 18, 2006, at 6:35 PM, andie nachgeborenen wrote: That Esotonian fellow whose name I can't remember also wrote a book on what remains of historical materialism after a thorough analytical going-over. Yewah, I have that book, forget the author's name. So did Erik Wright, Andrew Levine, and Elliot Sobor, Reconstructing Marxism, very similar results in a shortter space. __ Do You Yahoo!? Tired of spam? Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around http://mail.yahoo.com ___ 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
Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] How many souls do Black Folk have ?
Taylor Branch, the civil rights historian, is a white man. I have no idea what his politics are, but his rap on Meet the Press was weird: he linked the civil rights movement which he characterized as a struggle for responsible citizenship to the struggle for democracy in Iraq. What on earth is this all about? He gave me the creeps. Not as creepy as that slick black neocon John McWhorter, but creepy nonetheless. What is the Manhattan Institute, anyway? At 06:40 PM 1/17/2006 -0500, Jim Farmelant wrote: On Mon, 16 Jan 2006 11:21:31 -0500 Ralph Dumain [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: I immediately thought of the Du Bois double consciousness connection BTW, I'm extremely distressed at the exploitation of King's birthday by black neocons. I had a shit fit last night watching Meet the Press and America's Black Forum. And this historian of King and the civil rights movement Taylor Branch--I don't know much about him--but he seems to be a weasel in terms of his current political perspective. I remember the case of economist, Glenn Loury (http://www.bu.edu/irsd/loury/lourybio.htm) (http://www.pkarchive.org/economy/loury.html). . ___ 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] Roy Bhaskar
One important idea of Bhaskar's was about what he called the intransitive and transitive dimensions of reality. This was akin to Althusser's idea of the real object and the thought object, but Bhaskar's version is better in my view because it is more accurate. Althusser's version still gives too much weight to social construction rather than to nature. For Marxists, the importance of Bhaskar's distinction above is that it foregrounds the importance of ontology. In my view Marxism had got into a near-terminal crisis because the Trotskyist groups were focussing almost exclusively on trying to realise their beyond-question theory (i.e. working at the level of epistemology as an identity-theory) whereas what they needed to be doing was trying to cognize changes in the nature of world capitalism (i.e. working at the level of ontology). The groups were thus committing an example of what Bhaskar calls the epistemic fallacy. Phil Sharpe and I (in Britain) took some of Bhaskar's ideas into the Trotskyist milieu starting from about 1992 and got an uncomprehending response but it now appears that some of the Bhaskar did get taken up. Bhaskar rejects the appellation materialist because he sees the materialism of Lenin (M+EC) and Engels as being positivist in a reductive way, and as being distantly related to what he regards as the false ontology of Hume's regularity determinism (i.e. it is not sufficiently stratified). Later dialectical materialism (post-1930) is referred to by Bhaskar as objectivist processual empiricism (see Dialectic: The Pulse of Freedom, Verso 1993, or Plato Etc., Verso 1994). Those two books are very demanding (but rewarding!), but Bhaskar's more recent books are much more accessible. Bhaskar has gone through a transcendental (and even mystical) phase but I am told that his latest work which he is starting to propagate is much more grounded in empirical research. For some years now Bhaskar has been working in Sweden at the same university where Goran Therborn, the noted social thinker and researcher, is based. Phil Walden ___ 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] Roy Bhaskar
At 05:52 PM 1/18/2006 +, Phil Walden wrote: One important idea of Bhaskar's was about what he called the intransitive and transitive dimensions of reality. This was akin to Althusser's idea of the real object and the thought object, but Bhaskar's version is better in my view because it is more accurate. Althusser's version still gives too much weight to social construction rather than to nature. Maybe. Transitive' and 'intransitive' are not bad as far as neologisms go, but I have my doubts as to whether most of his terminology is necessary, not to mention that it facilitates Bhaskar-cultism. I've found the term 'epistemic fallacy' to be very useful, though, but maybe there's some other term for it I don't know. For Marxists, the importance of Bhaskar's distinction above is that it foregrounds the importance of ontology. In my view Marxism had got into a near-terminal crisis because the Trotskyist groups were focussing almost exclusively on trying to realise their beyond-question theory (i.e. working at the level of epistemology as an identity-theory) whereas what they needed to be doing was trying to cognize changes in the nature of world capitalism (i.e. working at the level of ontology). The groups were thus committing an example of what Bhaskar calls the epistemic fallacy. Phil Sharpe and I (in Britain) took some of Bhaskar's ideas into the Trotskyist milieu starting from about 1992 and got an uncomprehending response but it now appears that some of the Bhaskar did get taken up. I haven't the foggiest notion of what you're talking about, but I would be interested in learning more. Bhaskar rejects the appellation materialist because he sees the materialism of Lenin (M+EC) and Engels as being positivist in a reductive way, and as being distantly related to what he regards as the false ontology of Hume's regularity determinism (i.e. it is not sufficiently stratified). This, I think. is horseshit. Later dialectical materialism (post-1930) is referred to by Bhaskar as objectivist processual empiricism (see Dialectic: The Pulse of Freedom, Verso 1993, or Plato Etc., Verso 1994). I don't know what this means, though I suppose I could translate this gobbledegook into more familiar conceptual terms. Those two books are very demanding (but rewarding!), but Bhaskar's more recent books are much more accessible. The books mark Bhaskar's dive into obscurantism. This business about dialectic as absence makes no sense to me except as a transition to mysticism. But I made a careful study of the unreadable PLATO ETC.: some of it is insightful and some pure BS. This type of writing, though, is inexcusable, and is good only for cult-building. Bhaskar has gone through a transcendental (and even mystical) phase but I am told that his latest work which he is starting to propagate is much more grounded in empirical research. For some years now Bhaskar has been working in Sweden at the same university where Goran Therborn, the noted social thinker and researcher, is based. I've lost track of these developments, but I was really disgusted to see how far Bhaskar-cultists would go to ingest the steaming turds Bhaskar laid on their plates as TDCR. ___ 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] Roy Bhaskar
Phil Walden * For Marxists, the importance of Bhaskar's distinction above is that it foregrounds the importance of ontology. In my view Marxism had got into a near-terminal crisis because the Trotskyist groups were focussing almost exclusively on trying to realise their beyond-question theory (i.e. working at the level of epistemology as an identity-theory) whereas what they needed to be doing was trying to cognize changes in the nature of world capitalism (i.e. working at the level of ontology).The groups were thus committing an example of what Bhaskar calls the epistemic fallacy. ^ CB: Do you mind elaborating on this ? Now that you mention it, I recall the epistemic fallacy idea. Is Bhaskar for ending capitalism and building socialism ? ___ 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] Roy Bhaskar
Reply to CB below at the end: For Marxists, the importance of Bhaskar's distinction above is that it foregrounds the importance of ontology. In my view Marxism had got into a near-terminal crisis because the Trotskyist groups were focussing almost exclusively on trying to realise their beyond-question theory (i.e. working at the level of epistemology as an identity-theory) whereas what they needed to be doing was trying to cognize changes in the nature of world capitalism (i.e. working at the level of ontology).The groups were thus committing an example of what Bhaskar calls the epistemic fallacy. ^ CB: Do you mind elaborating on this ? Now that you mention it, I recall the epistemic fallacy idea. Is Bhaskar for ending capitalism and building socialism ? PW: Bhaskar defines the epistemic fallacy as the analysis or definition of statements about being in terms of statements about our knowledge (of being). For example, if somebody says that capitalism must give way to socialism because Hegelian-Marxism proves that it must, this would be committing the epistemic fallacy because that body of work is overarched by a greater reality which does not have to conform to the laws of Hegelian-Marxism. Of course Marx agreed with this point that Bhaskar is more explicitly making, as shown by Marx's comment (recently cited on this list by Ralph I think) that I am not a Marxist when Marx wanted to dissociate himself from people who were using his work like a universal key to history. Bhaskar has not demurred from the characterization of himself as a Marxist, and has even referred to himself as a Marxist. However, when he states his goal he does not say socialism, which he regards as hopelessly tainted by what he refers to as actually existing socialism. That is, Bhaskar thinks that the idea of socialism has been irredeemably ruined by the horrific experience of Stalin's Russia, Mao's China, etc. When Bhaskar does state his goal the term he uses is eudaimonia which in the philosophy of Aristotle means universal human flourishing. ___ 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
RE: [Marxism-Thaxis] Roy Bhaskar
At 11:12 PM 1/18/2006 +, Phil Walden wrote: PW: Bhaskar defines the epistemic fallacy as the analysis or definition of statements about being in terms of statements about our knowledge (of being). For example, if somebody says that capitalism must give way to socialism because Hegelian-Marxism proves that it must, this would be committing the epistemic fallacy because that body of work is overarched by a greater reality which does not have to conform to the laws of Hegelian-Marxism. Of course Marx agreed with this point that Bhaskar is more explicitly making, as shown by Marx's comment (recently cited on this list by Ralph I think) that I am not a Marxist when Marx wanted to dissociate himself from people who were using his work like a universal key to history. This is the silliest 'example' of the epistemic fallacy I can think of, and I don't even think it's a correct example. The epistemic fallacy is exemplified by David Hume. It's basically the skeptical, relativist, subjective idealist position. Bhaskar has not demurred from the characterization of himself as a Marxist, and has even referred to himself as a Marxist. However, when he states his goal he does not say socialism, which he regards as hopelessly tainted by what he refers to as actually existing socialism. That is, Bhaskar thinks that the idea of socialism has been irredeemably ruined by the horrific experience of Stalin's Russia, Mao's China, etc. When Bhaskar does state his goal the term he uses is eudaimonia which in the philosophy of Aristotle means universal human flourishing. OK, fine, actually existing socialism sounds bad, though, oddly, not as bad as communism for those of us who grew up in the Cold War. 'Eudaimonia' seems to indicate an existential state, but it can hardly be used to describe a social order. I think Bhaskar is a pretentious jackass. ___ 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
