[Marxism-Thaxis] Plekhanov: materialism vs Neo-Kantianism etc. (2)

[Ralph Dumain]

Plekhanov, Georgi. "Bernstein and Materialism 
" 
(July 1898), in /Selected Philosophical Works/, Vol. II (Moscow: 
Progress Publishers, 1976), pp. 325-339.

I am not versed in the relations among Spinoza, LaMettrie, the 
Encyclopedists, the 19th century German materialists, and Feuerbach. 
This part of the essay at least is not identical with the subsequent 
"Cant Against Kant". It's quite interesting, but a few off-the-cuff remarks:

(1) This has nothing to do with political debates except insofar as 
Plekhanov's antagonists themselves inject this silly stuff into them.

(2) Plekhanov's exposition breaks off at the very point where it starts 
to get interesting.

(3) Neither Plekhanov nor any of the people he discusses have any sense 
of the difference between empirical knowledge and philosophy's attempts 
to fill in the gaps, or how advances in the former alter what should be 
/provisional/ categorial structures of the latter.  And, noting the 
footnotes, where Plekhanov describes a meeting with Engels and Engels' 
confirmation of Plekhanov's view of Spinoza--Plekhanov is content with 
finality rather than further exploration. He merely engages a contest of 
doctrines, but not thinking any new thoughts.

(4) I know little about F.A. Lange, but one thing I know is that he 
wrestled with the mind-body problem and found materialism 
unsatisfactory. This was when biology had barely advanced to the point 
of addressing the question of sensation and apperception. The problem 
remains a problem 150 years later but in a drastically altered 
condition. Philosophy at best is a guidepost to how to interpret, or 
better, to avoid misinterpreting, our knowledge in our general 
categorial framework of world-meaning. (This should be opposed to 
Wittgenstein's retrograde cure, but that's another harangue.)

(5) A key correlative logical fudge of Engels is the ambiguous, and 
implicitly self-contradictory, statement, that he believes only in 
empirical knowledge and disavows metaphysics, only to remain content 
with a formulation of dialectical laws and their universal application 
retrospective to the attainment of adequate empirical knowledge.  But in 
actuality, this dominant strain of Marxist orthodoxy remained stagnant 
at the level of formulaic indoctrination, and once institutionalized, 
proceeded rapidly downhill.

OK, I'll look at the other 4 Plekhanov essays another time. Must get on 
with other things.

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Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] Guy Robinson on Thomas Kuhn

[Ralph Dumain]

It amazes me that this rubbish is considered the cornerstone of 20th 
century philosophy. From formalism to the censorship of thought. 
Ultrasophisticated juvenalia. I can see what Rosa--is Rosa really a she 
or really a Rosa or Lichtenstein?--sees in this. It prevents the 
self-reflection of a Brittrot sectarian.

On 12/30/2010 12:18 PM, Jim Farmelant wrote:
> On Thu, 30 Dec 2010 09:40:33 -0500 c b  writes:
>> Rosa,
>>
>> "Marxist" philosophy without theses ? Without theory ?
> I think that claim has to be understood within the
> context of Wittgensteinian philosophy.  For
> Wittgenstein the only genuine propositions
> are those about the external world since
> those are the only kinds of statements that
> can be confirmed or disconfirmed.  Therefore,
> statements in mathematics and logic did not
> qualify as genuine propositions in Wittgenstein's
> view since they can be analyzed as being either tautologies
> if true, or contradictions if false.  As Wittenstein put it in the
> Tractatus:
>
> -
> 6.1
> The propositions of logic are tautologies.
> 6.2
> Mathematics is a logical method.
> The propositions of mathematics are equations, and therefore
> pseudo-propositions.
>
> 6.3
> Logical research means the investigation of all regularity. And outside
> logic all is accident.
> 6.4
> All propositions are of equal value.
> 6.5
> For an answer which cannot be expressed the question too cannot be
> expressed.
> The riddle does not exist.
>
> If a question can be put at all, then it can also be answered.
>
> Later on, Wittgenstein writes:
>
> The propositions of logic therefore say nothing. (They are the analytical
> propositions.)
> 6.12
> The fact that the propositions of logic are tautologies shows the formal
> -- logical -- properties of language, of the world.
> That its constituent parts connected together in this way give a
> tautology characterizes the logic of its constituent parts.
>
> In order that propositions connected together in a definite way may give
> a tautology they must have definite properties of structure. That they
> give a tautology when so connected shows therefore that they possess
> these properties of structure.
>
> 6.13
> Logic is not a theory but a reflexion of the world.
> Logic is transcendental.
>
>
> Later on also:
>
> 6.113
> It is the characteristic mark of logical propositions that one can
> perceive in the symbol alone that they are true; and this fact contains
> in itself the whole philosophy of logic. And so also it is one of the
> most important facts that the truth or falsehood of non-logical
> propositions can not be recognized from the propositions alone.
>
> And eventually:
>
>
> 6.53
> The right method of philosophy would be this: To say nothing except what
> can be said, i.e. the propositions of natural science, i.e. something
> that has nothing to do with philosophy: and then always, when someone
> else wished to say something metaphysical, to demonstrate to him that he
> had given no meaning to certain signs in his propositions. This method
> would be unsatisfying to the other -- he would not have the feeling that
> we were teaching him philosophy -- but it would be the only strictly
> correct method.
> 6.54
> My propositions are elucidatory in this way: he who understands me
> finally recognizes them as senseless, when he has climbed out through
> them, on them, over them. (He must so to speak throw away the ladder,
> after he has climbed up on it.)
> He must surmount these propositions; then he sees the world rightly.
>
>
> 7
> Whereof one cannot speak, thereof one must be silent.
> --
>
> For Wittgenstein, propositions of philosophy
> are pseudo-propositions.  At worst they
> nonsensical like the propositions of traditional
> metaphysics.  At best, they turn out to be
> propositions of logical analysis which are
> still a species of pseudopropositions.
> Hence, that's why for Wittgenstein there
> cannot be theses or theories in philosophy.
>
>
>> CB
>>
>>
>> http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1845/theses/index.htm
>>
>

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Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] Guy Robinson on Thomas Kuhn

[Jim Farmelant]

On Thu, 30 Dec 2010 09:40:33 -0500 c b  writes:
> Rosa,
> 
> "Marxist" philosophy without theses ? Without theory ?

I think that claim has to be understood within the
context of Wittgensteinian philosophy.  For
Wittgenstein the only genuine propositions
are those about the external world since
those are the only kinds of statements that
can be confirmed or disconfirmed.  Therefore,
statements in mathematics and logic did not
qualify as genuine propositions in Wittgenstein's
view since they can be analyzed as being either tautologies
if true, or contradictions if false.  As Wittenstein put it in the
Tractatus:

-
6.1
The propositions of logic are tautologies.
6.2
Mathematics is a logical method.
The propositions of mathematics are equations, and therefore
pseudo-propositions.

6.3
Logical research means the investigation of all regularity. And outside
logic all is accident.
6.4
All propositions are of equal value.
6.5
For an answer which cannot be expressed the question too cannot be
expressed.
The riddle does not exist.

If a question can be put at all, then it can also be answered.

Later on, Wittgenstein writes:

The propositions of logic therefore say nothing. (They are the analytical
propositions.)
6.12
The fact that the propositions of logic are tautologies shows the formal
-- logical -- properties of language, of the world.
That its constituent parts connected together in this way give a
tautology characterizes the logic of its constituent parts.

In order that propositions connected together in a definite way may give
a tautology they must have definite properties of structure. That they
give a tautology when so connected shows therefore that they possess
these properties of structure.

6.13
Logic is not a theory but a reflexion of the world.
Logic is transcendental.


Later on also:

6.113
It is the characteristic mark of logical propositions that one can
perceive in the symbol alone that they are true; and this fact contains
in itself the whole philosophy of logic. And so also it is one of the
most important facts that the truth or falsehood of non-logical
propositions can not be recognized from the propositions alone.

And eventually:


6.53
The right method of philosophy would be this: To say nothing except what
can be said, i.e. the propositions of natural science, i.e. something
that has nothing to do with philosophy: and then always, when someone
else wished to say something metaphysical, to demonstrate to him that he
had given no meaning to certain signs in his propositions. This method
would be unsatisfying to the other -- he would not have the feeling that
we were teaching him philosophy -- but it would be the only strictly
correct method.
6.54
My propositions are elucidatory in this way: he who understands me
finally recognizes them as senseless, when he has climbed out through
them, on them, over them. (He must so to speak throw away the ladder,
after he has climbed up on it.)
He must surmount these propositions; then he sees the world rightly.


7
Whereof one cannot speak, thereof one must be silent.
--

For Wittgenstein, propositions of philosophy
are pseudo-propositions.  At worst they
nonsensical like the propositions of traditional
metaphysics.  At best, they turn out to be
propositions of logical analysis which are
still a species of pseudopropositions.
Hence, that's why for Wittgenstein there
cannot be theses or theories in philosophy.


> 
> CB
> 
> 
> http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1845/theses/index.htm
> 
>


Jim Farmelant
http://independent.academia.edu/JimFarmelant
www.foxymath.com
Learn or Review Basic Math

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Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] Guy Robinson on Thomas Kuhn

[Ralph Dumain]

What's interesting about Plekhanov's "Cant Against Kant" is that in the 
process of refuting Bernstein's scapegoating of the dialectic, Plekhanov 
falters at the very moment he first cites/Engels/. If there were a 
philosophical root of the confusion, here's where it would be. It begins 
with the merging of the dialectics of nature, society, and thought as 
one and the same, but this ontologolization of dialectics is a mass of 
logical confusion. With Plekhanov this also goes by the name of monism. 
But to lay Plekhanov's error as one of beginning with the wrong 
philosophy would be to duplicate his own mistake, for there's more to it.

Plekhanov makes his first mistake by bypassing Marxism--I mean Marx's 
approach to analyzing society and the ideological phenomena within 
it--in favor of analyzing the putative philosophical preconditions or 
foundation of Marxism--dialectical materialism. This is pure nonsense. 
Is this where the Soviets got this bad habit from?

Another of his blunders is his crude analysis of a probably correct 
assertion of the petty-bourgeois basis of Neo-Kantianism, which however 
asserts nothing meaningful unless one proceeds beyond propaganda to 
explain the connection. Plekhanov combats Bernstein's empirical 
assertions with his own. He combats metaphysics with metaphysics, 
empiricism with empiricism. These two elements interplay in an entirely 
confused fashion.


On 12/30/2010 11:29 AM, Ralph Dumain wrote:
> I tried checking the text at leninist.biz, but I found the Plekhanov
> volume impossible to navigate. I wish someone would make this correction
> for me, because I would like to use this quote.
>
> It looks like I already did some preliminary spadework, viz. . . .
>
> Neo-Kantianism, Its History, Influence, and Relation to Socialism:
> Selected Secondary Bibliography
> 
>
> There I link to 6 articles by Plekhanov on Kantianism. That entire
> period in philosophy, and for decades to come in continental European
> philosophy, was dominated by the Neo-Kantian influence. These debates
> are a small part of the overall picture.
>
> On 12/30/2010 11:14 AM, Ralph Dumain wrote:
>> I was thinking of the philosophical backwardness prevalent in the Second
>> International. I do like this quote from Plekhanov, however:
>>
>>   Strictly speaking, "/partisan science/" is impossible, but,
>>   regrettably enough, the existence is highly possible of
>>   "/scientists" who are imbued with the spirit of parties and with
>>   class selfishness/. When Marxists speak of bourgeois science with
>>   contempt, it is "scientists" of that brand that they have in view.
>>   It is to such "scientists" that the gentlemen Herr Bernstein has
>>   "learnt" so much from belong, /viz./ J. Wolf, Schulze-Gävernitz, and
>>   many others. Even if nine-tenths of scientific socialism has been
>>   taken from the writings of bourgeois economists, it has not been
>>   taken in the way in which Herr Bernstein has borrowed from the
>>   Brentanoists and other apologists of capitalism the material he uses
>>   to "revise" Marxism. Marx and Engels were able to take a /critical/
>>   attitude towards bourgeois scientists, something that Herr Bernstein
>>   has been unable or unwilling to do. When he "learns" from them, he
>>   simply places himself under their influence and, without noticing
>>   the fact, adopts their apologetics.
>>
>>   Georgi Plekhanov, *Cant Against Kant, or Herr Bernstein's Will and
>>   Testament* (August 1901)
>>   http://www.marxists.org/archive/plekhanov/1901/xx/cant.htm
>>
>>
>> There must be a transcription error here: "so much from *belong*":
>> doesn't make sense.
>>
>>
>>
>> On 12/30/2010 10:49 AM, c b wrote:
>>> On Thu, Dec 30, 2010 at 10:22 AM, Ralph Dumain
>>> wrote:
 This is a commonplace analysis of Descartes&critique of the whole
 epistemological tradition that came out of this. However, the disavowal
 of scientific realism is childish. Speaking of childish, It's worth
 contemplating the symbiosis between Rosa's juvenile Wittgensteinianism
 and sectarianism. He differs from Henry Ford in declaring that, not
 history, but all philosophy, is bunk. And if this doesn't show you that
 the British far left--if that's what he is--is not at the end of its
 rope, what does?

 Now I'm reminded that I need to take a look at Plekhanov&see if he's
 as bad as I'm told he is.
>>> ^^^
>>> CB: Well, Plekhanov opposed the 1917 October insurrection. That's
>>> pretty stupid sectarian.
>>>
 On 12/30/2010 10:10 AM, c b wrote:
> That project was exemplified in Descartes' Meditations, and it laid
> two demands on any account of knowledge and the means to knowledge,
> demands that set the standard and defined the adequacy of any account.
> There had been urgent reasons for making those de

Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] Guy Robinson on Thomas Kuhn

[Ralph Dumain]

Hasn't the British SWP been an advocate of Islamism? Furthermore, being 
caught in a struggle between inept arguments pro & con diamat--doesn't 
this drag us back to the 19th century? What progress is there is this?

On 12/30/2010 11:30 AM, Jim Farmelant wrote:
>
> On Thu, 30 Dec 2010 10:22:14 -0500 Ralph Dumain
>   writes:
>
>
>> Itsworth
>>
>> contemplating the symbiosis between Rosa's juvenile
>> Wittgensteinianism
>> and sectarianism. He differs from Henry Ford in declaring that, not
>>
>> history, but all philosophy, is bunk. And if this doesn't show you
>> that
>> the British far left--if that's what he is--is not at the end of its
>>
>> rope, what does?
>
> Well, Rosa is a supporter of the British SWP
> which is still officially committed towards
> dialectical materialism as the philosophical
> basis for Marxism.  However, she is supported
> by Richard Seymour who is very much a rising
> star within that party and the far generally in
> the UK.
>
> Jim Farmelant
> http://independent.academia.edu/JimFarmelant
> www.foxymath.com
> Learn or Review Basic Math

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Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] Guy Robinson on Thomas Kuhn

[Jim Farmelant]

 
On Thu, 30 Dec 2010 10:22:14 -0500 Ralph Dumain
 writes:


> Itsworth 
> 
> contemplating the symbiosis between Rosa's juvenile 
> Wittgensteinianism 
> and sectarianism. He differs from Henry Ford in declaring that, not 
> 
> history, but all philosophy, is bunk. And if this doesn't show you 
> that 
> the British far left--if that's what he is--is not at the end of its 
> 
> rope, what does?


Well, Rosa is a supporter of the British SWP
which is still officially committed towards 
dialectical materialism as the philosophical
basis for Marxism.  However, she is supported
by Richard Seymour who is very much a rising
star within that party and the far generally in
the UK. 
 
Jim Farmelant
http://independent.academia.edu/JimFarmelant
www.foxymath.com
Learn or Review Basic Math

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Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] Guy Robinson on Thomas Kuhn

[Ralph Dumain]

I tried checking the text at leninist.biz, but I found the Plekhanov 
volume impossible to navigate. I wish someone would make this correction 
for me, because I would like to use this quote.

It looks like I already did some preliminary spadework, viz. . . .

Neo-Kantianism, Its History, Influence, and Relation to Socialism: 
Selected Secondary Bibliography 


There I link to 6 articles by Plekhanov on Kantianism. That entire 
period in philosophy, and for decades to come in continental European 
philosophy, was dominated by the Neo-Kantian influence. These debates 
are a small part of the overall picture.

On 12/30/2010 11:14 AM, Ralph Dumain wrote:
> I was thinking of the philosophical backwardness prevalent in the Second
> International. I do like this quote from Plekhanov, however:
>
>  Strictly speaking, "/partisan science/" is impossible, but,
>  regrettably enough, the existence is highly possible of
>  "/scientists" who are imbued with the spirit of parties and with
>  class selfishness/. When Marxists speak of bourgeois science with
>  contempt, it is "scientists" of that brand that they have in view.
>  It is to such "scientists" that the gentlemen Herr Bernstein has
>  "learnt" so much from belong, /viz./ J. Wolf, Schulze-Gävernitz, and
>  many others. Even if nine-tenths of scientific socialism has been
>  taken from the writings of bourgeois economists, it has not been
>  taken in the way in which Herr Bernstein has borrowed from the
>  Brentanoists and other apologists of capitalism the material he uses
>  to "revise" Marxism. Marx and Engels were able to take a /critical/
>  attitude towards bourgeois scientists, something that Herr Bernstein
>  has been unable or unwilling to do. When he "learns" from them, he
>  simply places himself under their influence and, without noticing
>  the fact, adopts their apologetics.
>
>  Georgi Plekhanov, *Cant Against Kant, or Herr Bernstein's Will and
>  Testament* (August 1901)
>  http://www.marxists.org/archive/plekhanov/1901/xx/cant.htm
>
>
> There must be a transcription error here: "so much from *belong*":
> doesn't make sense.
>
>
>
> On 12/30/2010 10:49 AM, c b wrote:
>> On Thu, Dec 30, 2010 at 10:22 AM, Ralph Dumain
>>wrote:
>>> This is a commonplace analysis of Descartes&   critique of the whole
>>> epistemological tradition that came out of this. However, the disavowal
>>> of scientific realism is childish. Speaking of childish, It's worth
>>> contemplating the symbiosis between Rosa's juvenile Wittgensteinianism
>>> and sectarianism. He differs from Henry Ford in declaring that, not
>>> history, but all philosophy, is bunk. And if this doesn't show you that
>>> the British far left--if that's what he is--is not at the end of its
>>> rope, what does?
>>>
>>> Now I'm reminded that I need to take a look at Plekhanov&   see if he's
>>> as bad as I'm told he is.
>> ^^^
>> CB: Well, Plekhanov opposed the 1917 October insurrection. That's
>> pretty stupid sectarian.
>>
>>> On 12/30/2010 10:10 AM, c b wrote:
 That project was exemplified in Descartes' Meditations, and it laid
 two demands on any account of knowledge and the means to knowledge,
 demands that set the standard and defined the adequacy of any account.
 There had been urgent reasons for making those demands but the reasons
 were historical rather than philosophical and came from the
 individualistic model of humanity that played such a pivotal role in
 the era's project of eliminating feudalism's remnants in thought and
 social institutions, and the project of justifying the conceptions and
 arrangements that were replacing them. That story needs to be
 elaborated, and will get some elaboration in the next chapter. What is
 important here is that those demands have been accepted since without
 serious critique or examination of alternatives.



 The first of the demands, describable as a "democratic" or
 "individualistic' one, was that a method be found that was available
 to each separated individual to apply privately and severally in the
 search for knowledge. The second, relating to the knowledge thus
 found, was that the method would lead all who conscientiously applied
 it to the same, objective and timeless true view of things.

 ^^
 CB: This point on "individualistic" method is a good one. This is how
 I define positivism.
>
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Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] Guy Robinson on Thomas Kuhn

[c b]

And here we have to say that Newton was a lot clearer about the status
of what he called "axioms" and "laws" of motion than were later
generations who looked on them as universal, and perhaps providential,
truths about the cosmos. It took Henri Poincaré's hard work and
careful analysis to bring out the fact that what was perhaps the most
promising candidate of the three laws for empirical status and
testable content, the Second Law -- nowadays rendered as "Force equals
mass times acceleration," -- was not in fact a testable, falsifiable
claim about the cosmos or the things in it. Poincaré showed that there
was no way of measuring each of the three components, the force, the
mass and the acceleration independently in any concrete situation and
that therefore no experiment could bring the law to the test. And so
too for the other two of Newton's three "laws" of dynamics.

^^^
CB: This sounds like quantum mechanics .

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Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] Guy Robinson on Thomas Kuhn

[Ralph Dumain]

I was thinking of the philosophical backwardness prevalent in the Second 
International. I do like this quote from Plekhanov, however:

Strictly speaking, "/partisan science/" is impossible, but,
regrettably enough, the existence is highly possible of
"/scientists" who are imbued with the spirit of parties and with
class selfishness/. When Marxists speak of bourgeois science with
contempt, it is "scientists" of that brand that they have in view.
It is to such "scientists" that the gentlemen Herr Bernstein has
"learnt" so much from belong, /viz./ J. Wolf, Schulze-Gävernitz, and
many others. Even if nine-tenths of scientific socialism has been
taken from the writings of bourgeois economists, it has not been
taken in the way in which Herr Bernstein has borrowed from the
Brentanoists and other apologists of capitalism the material he uses
to "revise" Marxism. Marx and Engels were able to take a /critical/
attitude towards bourgeois scientists, something that Herr Bernstein
has been unable or unwilling to do. When he "learns" from them, he
simply places himself under their influence and, without noticing
the fact, adopts their apologetics.

Georgi Plekhanov, *Cant Against Kant, or Herr Bernstein's Will and
Testament* (August 1901)
http://www.marxists.org/archive/plekhanov/1901/xx/cant.htm


There must be a transcription error here: "so much from *belong*": 
doesn't make sense.



On 12/30/2010 10:49 AM, c b wrote:
> On Thu, Dec 30, 2010 at 10:22 AM, Ralph Dumain
>   wrote:
>> This is a commonplace analysis of Descartes&  critique of the whole
>> epistemological tradition that came out of this. However, the disavowal
>> of scientific realism is childish. Speaking of childish, It's worth
>> contemplating the symbiosis between Rosa's juvenile Wittgensteinianism
>> and sectarianism. He differs from Henry Ford in declaring that, not
>> history, but all philosophy, is bunk. And if this doesn't show you that
>> the British far left--if that's what he is--is not at the end of its
>> rope, what does?
>>
>> Now I'm reminded that I need to take a look at Plekhanov&  see if he's
>> as bad as I'm told he is.
> ^^^
> CB: Well, Plekhanov opposed the 1917 October insurrection. That's
> pretty stupid sectarian.
>
>> On 12/30/2010 10:10 AM, c b wrote:
>>> That project was exemplified in Descartes' Meditations, and it laid
>>> two demands on any account of knowledge and the means to knowledge,
>>> demands that set the standard and defined the adequacy of any account.
>>> There had been urgent reasons for making those demands but the reasons
>>> were historical rather than philosophical and came from the
>>> individualistic model of humanity that played such a pivotal role in
>>> the era's project of eliminating feudalism's remnants in thought and
>>> social institutions, and the project of justifying the conceptions and
>>> arrangements that were replacing them. That story needs to be
>>> elaborated, and will get some elaboration in the next chapter. What is
>>> important here is that those demands have been accepted since without
>>> serious critique or examination of alternatives.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> The first of the demands, describable as a "democratic" or
>>> "individualistic' one, was that a method be found that was available
>>> to each separated individual to apply privately and severally in the
>>> search for knowledge. The second, relating to the knowledge thus
>>> found, was that the method would lead all who conscientiously applied
>>> it to the same, objective and timeless true view of things.
>>>
>>> ^^
>>> CB: This point on "individualistic" method is a good one. This is how
>>> I define positivism.
>>>
>>> ___
>>> Marxism-Thaxis mailing list
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>>> http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/marxism-thaxis
>>>
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Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] Guy Robinson on Thomas Kuhn

[c b]

On Thu, Dec 30, 2010 at 10:22 AM, Ralph Dumain
 wrote:
> This is a commonplace analysis of Descartes & critique of the whole
> epistemological tradition that came out of this. However, the disavowal
> of scientific realism is childish. Speaking of childish, It's worth
> contemplating the symbiosis between Rosa's juvenile Wittgensteinianism
> and sectarianism. He differs from Henry Ford in declaring that, not
> history, but all philosophy, is bunk. And if this doesn't show you that
> the British far left--if that's what he is--is not at the end of its
> rope, what does?
>
> Now I'm reminded that I need to take a look at Plekhanov & see if he's
> as bad as I'm told he is.

^^^
CB: Well, Plekhanov opposed the 1917 October insurrection. That's
pretty stupid sectarian.

>
> On 12/30/2010 10:10 AM, c b wrote:
>> That project was exemplified in Descartes' Meditations, and it laid
>> two demands on any account of knowledge and the means to knowledge,
>> demands that set the standard and defined the adequacy of any account.
>> There had been urgent reasons for making those demands but the reasons
>> were historical rather than philosophical and came from the
>> individualistic model of humanity that played such a pivotal role in
>> the era's project of eliminating feudalism's remnants in thought and
>> social institutions, and the project of justifying the conceptions and
>> arrangements that were replacing them. That story needs to be
>> elaborated, and will get some elaboration in the next chapter. What is
>> important here is that those demands have been accepted since without
>> serious critique or examination of alternatives.
>>
>>
>>
>> The first of the demands, describable as a "democratic" or
>> "individualistic' one, was that a method be found that was available
>> to each separated individual to apply privately and severally in the
>> search for knowledge. The second, relating to the knowledge thus
>> found, was that the method would lead all who conscientiously applied
>> it to the same, objective and timeless true view of things.
>>
>> ^^
>> CB: This point on "individualistic" method is a good one. This is how
>> I define positivism.
>>
>> ___
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>> Marxism-Thaxis@lists.econ.utah.edu
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>
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[Marxism-Thaxis] Auto Worker Strikes in China: What Did They Win?

[c b]

Auto Worker Strikes in China: What Did They Win?

Boy Luethje

December 23, 2010

Labor Notes

http://labornotes.org/2010/12/auto-worker-strikes-china-what-did-they-win

Last summer's auto worker strikes in South China
reverberated throughout the country and overseas.

As workers in supplier companies for Honda, Toyota, and
other auto multinationals downed tools, the
international business press expressed fear over the
rising power of workers in China.

At the same time, a tragic series of suicides at
Foxconn--the world's largest contract manufacturer of
computers and iPods--exposed the inhumane nature of
low-wage mass production for global brands such as
Apple, HP, and Nokia.

Both events shook unions and the public in China--and
experts thought they could be a watershed moment for
labor relations in the country.

But the workers' activity disappeared from the media
radar almost as quickly as it arrived. What happened?
Workers vs. Boss--and Government

Last May 2,000 workers at a Honda transmission plant in
the Nanhai district of the city of Foshan went on
strike. The trigger was a rise of the legal local
minimum wage from $123 to $147, announced by the city
government May 1 in response to rapidly rising costs of
living. The workers expected a raise in their monthly
wages equal to this amount. Factory management added $24
to the transmission workers' monthly base wage but
reduced their monthly subsidies (for food, housing, and
regular attendance) from $48 to $29. The net gain was
only $5 per month.
The morning of May 17, two workers in the automatic
transmission department halted the assembly line by
pushing the red stop button, normally used for emergency
shutdowns over quality problems. The Japanese plant
manager met with the workers in the cafeteria and
promised to reply to their demands within a week, and
the night shift returned to work. Negotiations among
management, workers, and the factory union (which
existed unbeknownst to many workers) took place during
the following days, accompanied by further work
stoppages.

The company offered various raises in bonuses and
subsidies for different groups of workers, but the
workers insisted on a general raise in the base wage.
The company fired the two workers who had initially
stopped the line. The harsh reactions of management
galvanized the workers.

On May 24, the strike became indefinite, soon affecting
Honda's main assembly plants in Guangzhou and in Wuhan
in central China. Both factories had to stop production
on May 26 and 27, attracting national and international
media and making the strike a public issue in China. The
local government, along with the union and management,
took a more and more aggressive stance, resulting in the
mobilization of a group of about 100 thugs clad in union
uniforms, who confronted the workers physically.

Workers then wrote an open letter that was widely
published in Chinese media and on websites. This unique
document explained the workers' case for social justice
and their demands. At the core was a raise of $128 for
all, plus raises for seniority and annual 15 percent
increases.

The demand for seniority pay and guaranteed annual
increases would have meant fundamental changes in the
wage system. Base wages in China are generally very low
(usually not more than half of regular monthly incomes),
so workers have to rely on overtime and bonus payments
awarded for "good behavior" and submission to the boss.

Even more important, the Nanhai workers demanded free
and open elections of union representatives in the
factory. Mediation or Collective Bargaining?

The escalation led to the direct involvement of
Guangzhou Automotive, the Chinese mother company of the
core Honda factories. The CEO--a member of China's
legislative assembly- took charge of negotiations. The
Japanese manager of the transmission plant was replaced
by a Chinese one. A prominent labor law professor from
Beijing was brought in to facilitate mediation.

Thirty elected worker representatives took part in
dramatic negotiations June 4, although only five were
allowed to speak. The company had offered to raise total
monthly pay from $240 to $336--but mostly in bonuses and
benefits. Workers insisted on a raise in base wages,
which would also augment overtime pay.

Under the final deal, the base wage hike and various
other increases added up to $80, well below the initial
demand of $128.

Thus bargaining was narrowed to a deal over extra pay to
calm the workers down. Seniority pay was rejected as
"too complicated" and postponed to further
consultations. A big across-the-board wage raise and the
introduction of seniority pay would have challenged the
dominant system of low base wages and high incentive pay
and provided motivation for workers to stay with the
company and develop their skills.

Honda and Guangzhou Automotive effectively prevented a
precedent for car suppliers in China. Jobs would remain
low-paid and the union would continue to side with
management. 

Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] Guy Robinson on Thomas Kuhn

[Ralph Dumain]

This is a commonplace analysis of Descartes & critique of the whole 
epistemological tradition that came out of this. However, the disavowal 
of scientific realism is childish. Speaking of childish, It's worth 
contemplating the symbiosis between Rosa's juvenile Wittgensteinianism 
and sectarianism. He differs from Henry Ford in declaring that, not 
history, but all philosophy, is bunk. And if this doesn't show you that 
the British far left--if that's what he is--is not at the end of its 
rope, what does?

Now I'm reminded that I need to take a look at Plekhanov & see if he's 
as bad as I'm told he is.

On 12/30/2010 10:10 AM, c b wrote:
> That project was exemplified in Descartes' Meditations, and it laid
> two demands on any account of knowledge and the means to knowledge,
> demands that set the standard and defined the adequacy of any account.
> There had been urgent reasons for making those demands but the reasons
> were historical rather than philosophical and came from the
> individualistic model of humanity that played such a pivotal role in
> the era's project of eliminating feudalism's remnants in thought and
> social institutions, and the project of justifying the conceptions and
> arrangements that were replacing them. That story needs to be
> elaborated, and will get some elaboration in the next chapter. What is
> important here is that those demands have been accepted since without
> serious critique or examination of alternatives.
>
>
>
> The first of the demands, describable as a "democratic" or
> "individualistic' one, was that a method be found that was available
> to each separated individual to apply privately and severally in the
> search for knowledge. The second, relating to the knowledge thus
> found, was that the method would lead all who conscientiously applied
> it to the same, objective and timeless true view of things.
>
> ^^
> CB: This point on "individualistic" method is a good one. This is how
> I define positivism.
>
> ___
> 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
>

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Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] Guy Robinson on Thomas Kuhn

[c b]

That project was exemplified in Descartes' Meditations, and it laid
two demands on any account of knowledge and the means to knowledge,
demands that set the standard and defined the adequacy of any account.
There had been urgent reasons for making those demands but the reasons
were historical rather than philosophical and came from the
individualistic model of humanity that played such a pivotal role in
the era's project of eliminating feudalism's remnants in thought and
social institutions, and the project of justifying the conceptions and
arrangements that were replacing them. That story needs to be
elaborated, and will get some elaboration in the next chapter. What is
important here is that those demands have been accepted since without
serious critique or examination of alternatives.



The first of the demands, describable as a "democratic" or
"individualistic' one, was that a method be found that was available
to each separated individual to apply privately and severally in the
search for knowledge. The second, relating to the knowledge thus
found, was that the method would lead all who conscientiously applied
it to the same, objective and timeless true view of things.

^^
CB: This point on "individualistic" method is a good one. This is how
I define positivism.

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Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] Guy Robinson on Thomas Kuhn

[c b]

Rosa,

"Marxist" philosophy without theses ? Without theory ?

CB


http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1845/theses/index.htm


Theses On Feuerbach



The main defect of all hitherto-existing materialism — that of
Feuerbach included — is that the Object [der Gegenstand], actuality,
sensuousness, are conceived only in the form of the object [Objekts],
or of contemplation [Anschauung], but not as human sensuous activity,
practice [Praxis], not subjectively. Hence it happened that the active
side, in opposition to materialism, was developed by idealism — but
only abstractly, since, of course, idealism does not know real,
sensuous activity as such. Feuerbach wants sensuous objects [Objekte],
differentiated from thought-objects, but he does not conceive human
activity itself as objective [gegenständliche] activity. In The
Essence of Christianity [Das Wesen des Christenthums], he therefore
regards the theoretical attitude as the only genuinely human attitude,
while practice is conceived and defined only in its dirty-Jewish form
of appearance [Erscheinungsform][1]. Hence he does not grasp the
significance of ‘revolutionary’, of ‘practical-critical’, activity.
2

The question whether objective truth can be attributed to human
thinking is not a question of theory but is a practical question. Man
must prove the truth, i.e., the reality and power, the this-sidedness
[Diesseitigkeit] of his thinking, in practice. The dispute over the
reality or non-reality of thinking which is isolated from practice is
a purely scholastic question.
3

The materialist doctrine that men are products of circumstances and
upbringing, and that, therefore, changed men are products of changed
circumstances and changed upbringing, forgets that it is men who
change circumstances and that the educator must himself be educated.
Hence this doctrine is bound to divide society into two parts, one of
which is superior to society. The coincidence of the changing of
circumstances and of human activity or self-change [Selbstveränderung]
can be conceived and rationally understood only as revolutionary
practice.
4

Feuerbach starts off from the fact of religious self-estrangement
[Selbstentfremdung], of the duplication of the world into a religious,
imaginary world, and a secular [weltliche] one. His work consists in
resolving the religious world into its secular basis. He overlooks the
fact that after completing this work, the chief thing still remains to
be done. For the fact that the secular basis lifts off from itself and
establishes itself in the clouds as an independent realm can only be
explained by the inner strife and intrinsic contradictoriness of this
secular basis. The latter must itself be understood in its
contradiction and then, by the removal of the contradiction,
revolutionised. Thus, for instance, once the earthly family is
discovered to be the secret of the holy family, the former must itself
be annihilated [vernichtet] theoretically and practically.
5

Feuerbach, not satisfied with abstract thinking, wants sensuous
contemplation [Anschauung]; but he does not conceive sensuousness as
practical, human-sensuous activity.
6

Feuerbach resolves the essence of religion into the essence of man
[menschliche Wesen = ‘human nature’]. But the essence of man is no
abstraction inherent in each single individual. In reality, it is the
ensemble of the social relations. Feuerbach, who does not enter upon a
criticism of this real essence is hence obliged:

1. To abstract from the historical process and to define the religious
sentiment regarded by itself, and to presuppose an abstract — isolated
- human individual.

2. The essence therefore can by him only be regarded as ‘species’, as
an inner ‘dumb’ generality which unites many individuals only in a
natural way.
7

Feuerbach consequently does not see that the ‘religious sentiment’ is
itself a social product, and that the abstract individual that he
analyses belongs in reality to a particular social form.
8

All social life is essentially practical. All mysteries which lead
theory to mysticism find their rational solution in human practice and
in the comprehension of this practice.
9

The highest point reached by contemplative [anschauende] materialism,
that is, materialism which does not comprehend sensuousness as
practical activity, is the contemplation of single individuals and of
civil society [bürgerlichen Gesellschaft].
10

The standpoint of the old materialism is civil society; the standpoint
of the new is human society or social humanity.


11

Philosophers have hitherto only interpreted the world in various ways;
the point is to change it.



1. “Dirty-Jewish” — according to Marhsall Berman, this is an allusion
to the Jewish God of the Old Testament, who had to ‘get his hands
dirty’ making the world, tied up with a symbolic contrast between the
Christian God of the Word, and the God of the Deed, symbolising
practical life. See The Significance of the Creation in Judaism,
Essence of Chr

Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] [Marxism] Guy Robinson on Thomas Kuhn

[c b]

I am going to lay my cards on the table and say that I don't think
there is any room in philosophy for theories and theses. So I get
nervous and suspicious when the 'isms' come marching by. One that
makes me particularly nervous is "Scientific Realism". The reason for
that is that I think that historical facts extraneous to both
philosophy and to the sciences have been a major subterranean
motivation for the belief in what might be called an 'ultimate
reality' as a goal of, or limit on scientific work. If we describe
that 'ultimate reality' as a goal in the sense of something worked
toward, and as a limit in the sense of what it is that gives us
something to measure our theories against and test their adequacy,
then we can see that it is a very appealing notion, one that seems to
solve a lot of problems at once.

^
CB: He gets "nervous" ?  Is that a philosophical response ? (smile)

So, science has theories , but philosophy doesn't  ?

No theories and theses in philosophy ? Wow, that ought to be fun to watch.

Practice is the test of theory, for Marxists. Since Rosa thinks this
guy is such a Marxist, maybe he should have read the Second Thesis on
Feuerbach, which by the way is one of Marx's philosophical _theses_.
Evidently Marx thought theses appropriate to philosophy.

On Thu, Dec 23, 2010 at 7:12 AM, Jim Farmelant  wrote:
>
> On Thu, 23 Dec 2010 06:57:21 -0500 Jim Farmelant 
> writes:
>
>>
>> Rosa Litchenstein has now published on her site the last of
>> the Marxist philosopher Guy Robinson's essays:
>>
>>
> http://anti-dialectics.co.uk/Robinson_Essay_Four_On_Misunderstanding_Scie
>> nce.htm
>
> Try this URL:
>
> http://tinyurl.com/38dfzuw
>
>
>>
>> It's all about Thomas Kuhn.
>>
>>
>> Jim Farmelant
>> http://independent.academia.edu/JimFarmelant
>> www.foxymath.com
>> Learn or Review Basic Math
>>
>
>
> Jim Farmelant
> http://independent.academia.edu/JimFarmelant
> www.foxymath.com
> Learn or Review Basic Math
> 
> New Amex Shopping Tool
> For Cardmembers Only. Try It Today & Let the Offers Come To You!
> http://thirdpartyoffers.juno.com/TGL3141/4d133cf5cf17288e4eest06vuc
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