[Marxism-Thaxis] Materialism is a form of idealism
Materialism is a form of idealism Chris Doss This is not evidence that ideas are not matter. Indeed, as always and inherently, it is the opposite. Because evidence is an idea. :) Really, people didn't only learn yesterday that the body determines the mind! All idealists know that. Plato was perfectly aware that when you drink alcohol or get a spear through your head, you think differently. But that didn't bother them, because the body and alcohol and spears are ideas. (Plato was actually an idealist in a different sense than that that I discuss below, but bear with me.) ^ CB: Another way to say some of this is that human mind or ideas are an emergent phenomenon of matter. I'd say the Marxist-Leninist philosophical fundamental or definitional statements are for metaphysics or ontology from Engels " There is nothing but matter and its mode of existence is motion", and epistemology from Lenin " Materialism is the belief in the existence of objective reality. " Marxist philosophy categorizes Plato as an objective idealist. Hegel too. Lenin's book is a critique of subjective idealism, Berkeley, Hume, and as Lenin argues, really, Kant, who is a " shamefaced materialist" in Engels phrase. Another term for it is agnostic. Kant is an agnostic i.e. doesn't know, thinks there are un_knowable_ things-in-themselves. (A lot of good belieiving there are things-in-themseleves or objective reality, if we can't know it !). There are deists and agnostics. Hegel's philosophy is actually written as a form of Christianity and belief in God or deism. Plato is a bit far back and different to categorize as a modern deist, I suspect. On the other hand, in another writing, Lenin ( in Russian !) refers to Hegel as arch-brilliant and borderline materialist ! Hegel's Christianity seems suspiciously a cover to deal with reactionary Prussian censors or something Anyway, for Engels there is a significant identity of idealism and deism, and materialism and atheism So another definition of materialism is atheism. All these definitions do not imply that ideas or human mind have no determinitive impact in human affairs , cultures, structures, economies ( see article by Sahlins that initiated this thread). I'd say, with the Bible that "In the beginning " of human society "was the Word". Not the beginning of the universe or earth, but the beginning of the human species was language, the Word, culture, tradition, custom, symbols , systems of ideas, kin systems. ^ The brain is an object of experience. Electrical impulses in the brain are an object of experience. Artificial limbs are objects of experience. No one has ever seen a brain, an electrical impulse, or an artificial limb that is not an object of experience, nor can they, and there is no conceivable evidence that anything corresponds to them outside of experience, because any evidence you gain will, again, be an object of experience. CB: Agree. This is empiricism. Materialism is not synonymous with empiricism, but it doesn''t contradict it. Empiricism equated with materialism becomes positivist error. "Experiences" are had by individuals. This is a necessary step in the scientific or materialist epistemology, individual experience, but it is materialism only when individual experience is combined with social experience in particular, communications from others to the individual of their experiences. This is the aspect of social labor that is communication and combination of the experiences of maney. ^ "Experience" is something that happens to a consciousness, that is, an idea. So, what you have done is correlate objects of experience, that is, ideas, saying, this thing I experience correlates to that thing I experience in such and such a way. To use an old example, you do not refute Berkeley by kicking a rock and saying, "I refute Berkeley thus!" Because you didn't kick a rock, you kicked an idea of a rock, or rather, rocks were ideas all along. CB: Materialism concerns a relationship between consciousness and objective reality, or that which you are referring to as experience. Materialism holds that both consciousness and objective reality are matter ( "There is nothing but matter...) and that there is matter outside of the matter of consciousness ( belief in the existence of objective reality). There is matter outside the matter of consciousness. Consciousness experiences something other than itself. There is matter other than the matter which is ideas. The entire pattern of correlation could be explained, if you wanted to do so, in a purely solipsistic manner. There is no difference to the dreamer between dream and reality. And Occam's razor says, to the dreamer, "your dream is real," because that is indeed the simplest explanation. ^ CB: I agree that dreams are the purest form of individual consciousness or consciousness only experiencing itself, or the s
[Marxism-Thaxis] Materialism is a form of idealism
Materialism is a form of idealism Chris Doss I'm not sure what the point you're trying to make is, but I meant metaphysical materialism, not historical materialism, which is a whole other kettle of piscines. Metaphysical materialism is logically incoherent because "matter" is an idea. Historical materialism, which is merely that human beliefs and cultures are determined by technological development and so forth, is not logically incoherent. ^^ CB, "Metaphysical materialism is logically incoherent because "matter" is an idea. " That's not persuasive to me. You'll have to elaborate. Ideas are material. They are electric impulses in the brain. I just saw a 60 minutes show wherein the latest brain physiology allows paralyzed people to control artificial limbs with hitech stuff. In other words, they have decoded the brain waves or ideas, like "left" or "right", "up" ,"down" such that they can use them to do exactly what they mean (!). No more mind/body problem in philo 101. Anyway, ideas are matter. So, the idea "matter" _is_ matter. It can't be _reduced_ to matter, it's matter and more. A la Aristotle, all ideas are matter , but not all matter is ideas. Sort of like humans are animals and more. Anyway turns out that some matter has a dimension that can be termed "message". Does that help ? I term my "point" on this issue as dialectical materialism, as you may know. You may even be reading _Materialism and Empirio-Criticism_ in the original Russian some time. I admit I get my "point" from Engels and Lenin on that. Lenin defines "materialism" there as belief in the existence of objective reality. This is "realism" in "bourgeois" philo, I think. He and Engels develop their argument as a critique of Kantianism especially. Kantianism is shamefaced materialism or dualism. As to Historical materialism , I would define it somewhat differently than you do: that fundamental_changes__ or revolutions in human beliefs systems and cultures are caused when serious contradictions arise between those belief systems and their accompanying relations of production. The latter include both social relations and means of production. Necessity is the mother of invention. I agree this is logically conherent.. These revolutions are rare, by the way. Most of the time the idea systems are very determinative of people's conduct. Most of the time of history, a form of idealism is true. This is the truth of Sahlins puckish humor in the aritcle, I think. Ideas dictate the activities in the economic system , conventionally. Tradition/culture/symbol systems rules in convention. Necessity is the mother of invention. How's that for thinking outside the box, tvarish ? Or better a theory of how major paradoxes , cause whole new thought boxes I disagree that materialism ( as defined by Lenin) or realism is logically incoherent. Maybe I'll critique Sahlins tomorrow --- On Thu, 9/3/09, c b wrote: > We never knew White was a member of the Socialist Labor > Party in the > ’30s and early ’40s, contributing articles to The > Weekly People under > the name John Steel. Nor could you have guessed from his > so-Americanized version of Marxism: a theory of cultural > evolution > based singularly on technological progress. Progress in the > Neolithic, > he claimed, came from the increase in the amount of energy > harnessed > per capita because of plant and animal domestication. He > was not > amused when I objected that energy “per capita” was the > same as in the > Old Stone Age, since the primary mechanical source remained > the human > body. ___ 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] Materialism and sexuality
Butler Charles Brown charlesb at cncl.ci.detroit.mi.us Thu Jun 5 13:48:15 PDT 2008 Previous message: [lbo-talk] Neocons' last throw? Next message: [lbo-talk] Butler Messages sorted by: [ date ] [ thread ] [ subject ] [ author ] Search LBO-Talk Archives Limit search to: Subject & Body Subject Author Sort by: Date Rank Author Subject Reverse Sort Doug Henwood wrote: > > A thirst >> thought can only be abated by the _material_ impact of water in the >> digestive and circulatory systems. Symbols meaning water won't do the >> trick. > >No kidding. Do you think Judith Butler is a moron or a psychotic? ^^^ Butler seems to be critically and especially a theoretician for the lesbian and gay liberation movement; politics and knowledge in the politics of sexuality. The central use of the claim of no _significant_ determination by heterosexual biological instinct is to establish the principle of anti-essentialism. This gives theoretical underpinning to the rhetorical term "heterosexism" or concept of heter-sexists as an oppressor group. " Significant" is a pun here, in the signifying structuralist tradition. There is no significant determination or biology doesn't affirmatively determine the cultural rules of American ( European ? Culture X ?) sexuality or sexual roles. The precise general structuralist concept is that biological facts only make determination of cultural structures or rules or ideas by limiting them, not by determining them affirmatively ( See _Culture and Practical Reason_ , by Sahlins, for example http://www.press.uchicago.edu/cgi-bin/hfs.cgi/00/2094.ctl ) I'm arguing that biological heterosexuality does make some affirmative determination of the symbolic structure of sexuality in American culture. This would make it an unique exception to the general rule of only negative or limiting determination of culture by nature. As Marx seems to say, sex is a special exception . That would be because sexuality and sexual instinct is a natural sociality, unlike appetite for food , for example. Natural appetite relates a human being and a natural object. Natural sexuality relates two humans, i.e. is a natural sociality. See passage from Marx here http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1844/manuscripts/comm.htm ...In the approach to woman as the spoil and hand-maid of communal lust is expressed the infinite degradation in which man exists for himself, for the secret of this approach has its unambiguous, decisive, plain and undisguised expression in the relation of man to woman and in the manner in which the direct and natural species-relationship is conceived. The direct, natural, and necessary relation of person to person is the relation of man to woman. In this natural species-relationship man’s relation to nature is immediately his relation to man, just as his relation to man is immediately his relation to nature - his own natural destination. In this relationship, therefore, is sensuously manifested, reduced to an observable fact, the extent to which the human essence has become nature to man, or to which nature to him has become the human essence of man. >From this relationship one can therefore judge man’s whole level of development. From the character of this relationship follows how much man as a species-being, as man, has come to be himself and to comprehend himself; the relation of man to woman is the most natural relation of human being to human being. It therefore reveals the extent to which man’s natural behaviour has become human, or the extent to which the human essence in him has become a natural essence - the extent to which his human nature has come to be natural to him. This relationship also reveals the extent to which man’s need has become a human need; the extent to which, therefore, the other person as a person has become for him a need - the extent to which he in his individual existence is at the same time a social being. The first positive annulment of private property - crude communism - is thus merely a manifestation of the vileness of private property, which wants to set itself up as the positive community system. Charles This message has been scanned for malware by SurfControl plc. www.surfcontrol.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] Materialism
Frederick Engels Ludwig Feuerbach and the End of Classical German Philosophy Part 2: Materialism http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1886/ludwig-feuerbach/ch02.htm The great basic question of all philosophy, especially of more recent philosophy, is that concerning the relation of thinking and being. From the very early times when men, still completely ignorant of the structure of their own bodies, under the stimulus of dream apparitions (1) came to believe that their thinking and sensation were not activities of their bodies, but of a distinct soul which inhabits the body and leaves it at death - from this time men have been driven to reflect about the relation between this soul and the outside world. If, upon death, it took leave of the body and lived on, there was no occasion to invent yet another distinct death for it. Thus arose the idea of immortality, which at that stage of development appeared not at all as a consolation but as a fate against which it was no use fighting, and often enough, as among the Greeks, as a positive misfortune. The quandry arising from the common universal ignorance of what to do with this soul, once its existence had been accepted, after the death of the body, and not religious desire for consolation, led in a general way to the tedious notion of personal immortality. In an exactly similar manner, the first gods arose through the personification of natural forces. And these gods in the further development of religions assumed more and more extramundane form, until finally by a process of abstraction, I might almost say of distillation, occurring naturally in the course of man’s intellectual development, out of the many more or less limited and mutually limiting gods there arose in the minds of men the idea of the one exclusive God of the monotheistic religions. Thus the question of the relation of thinking to being, the relation of the spirit to nature - the paramount question of the whole of philosophy - has, no less than all religion, its roots in the narrow-minded and ignorant notions of savagery. This message has been scanned for malware by SurfControl plc. www.surfcontrol.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] Materialism
> With all due respect to auto mechanics, the vast > > majority do not discuss this issue _as_ auto > mechanics. Some auto > > mechanics might have an interest in philosophy as > a hobby, pretty much > > unrelated to their "day job", and then might > discuss it , have an > > opinion on it. At any rate, it would be acting as > an intellectual of > > some sort that the mechanic would discuss > materialism or have an opinion > > on materialism, not as an > "engineer-physicist-mechanic". Questions of > > materialism vs idealism don't arise in dealing > with the problems of > > fixing a car. > > > > Also, the choice of the category "auto-mechanic" > in contrast with > > "intellectual" probably derives from a notion that > > "physicists-engineers-mechanics" are more likely > to hold materialist and > > not idealist positions on the issue. But, lots of > famous physicists have > > been philosophical idealists. Newton was a > believer in God ( Belief in > > God is an idealist position; see Engels's > discussion of this in > > _Socialism: Utopian or Scientific). Mach was an > idealist, a > > neo-Kantian. Heisenberg of uncertainty principle > fame was an > > philosophical idealist, and his uncertainty > principle was put forth as > > an underpinning to that idealist position. > Einstein seems to have been > > a materialist, explicitly disagreeing with Mach > that atoms were just > > thought-structures or some such. > > > > The original review that gave rise to this > thread, seems to be from a > > neo-phyte rightwinger dipping into a time warp for > threadbare anti-left > > material; and the article is pretty much a > mishmash, conflating > > "liberal" with Marxist , and some other things. > But I bet there is > > really very, very little Marxism taught in the US > schools, so this > > article might stir up more interest in Marxism > than is already there. > > > > As to the anthology... might be worth critiquing. > > > > Charles > > > > This message has been scanned for malware by SurfControl plc. www.surfcontrol.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] Materialism, idealism, theory, practice, etc.
...come on guys! give a break! lets be serious about communism! Stop bullshit about maoism and lets get into the real history of the class struggle on an international scale. When was the CC created☺ You see the whole history of the CCP is part of the counterrevolutionary practice of social democracy. In fact, if there is going to be a social revolution in China, we need to plan and organize the communist revolution Charles Brown <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: On Materialism ( speaking of Mao), there are two levels of the relationship between thought and being: "economics" and "physics". While society remains in the Realm of Necessity , ruling classes control masses by conditioning fulfillment of the _material_needs of the exploited classes on the exploited classes ' producing surpluses for the ruling , exploiting classes. The materialism (determinism by the material) at this level derives from the coercive use of conditional provision of material needs. In all societies, including those in the Realm of Freedom ( socialist, communist future and ancient) , all people must , of course, "obey" the laws of physics, chemistry, biology, physiology, objective reality etc. "physics", in the general sense. How do Foucault, Butler, and other Post-moderns differ with these materialist principles ? Charles This message has been scanned for malware by SurfControl plc. www.surfcontrol.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
[Marxism-Thaxis] Materialism, idealism, theory, practice, etc.
On Materialism ( speaking of Mao), there are two levels of the relationship between thought and being: "economics" and "physics". While society remains in the Realm of Necessity , ruling classes control masses by conditioning fulfillment of the _material_needs of the exploited classes on the exploited classes ' producing surpluses for the ruling , exploiting classes. The materialism (determinism by the material) at this level derives from the coercive use of conditional provision of material needs. In all societies, including those in the Realm of Freedom ( socialist, communist future and ancient) , all people must , of course, "obey" the laws of physics, chemistry, biology, physiology, objective reality etc. "physics", in the general sense. How do Foucault, Butler, and other Post-moderns differ with these materialist principles ? Charles This message has been scanned for malware by SurfControl plc. www.surfcontrol.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] materialism and science: gravity anomaly revealed by measuring motion of probes (from Lil Joe)
The philosophers have interpreted the world in various ways; the point is to change it" Marx The article below examines unanticipated challenges to old perceptions, and laws. Expanding knowledge of object's gravity in expanding space-time is changing as human scientific instruments go farther faster, and slower (fast/slow dialectics, where laws are at one confirmed and negated, i.e. altered comprehension matching the new data) changing our perceptions. It wont be easy, and looking back at history in Europe it may even be dangerous (Bruno, Galileo) in that new perspectives challenge institutions whose authority is based on conventional sociopolitical dogma regarding the universe, and man's place in it. "The ideas of the ruling class are in every epoch the ruling ideas, i.e. the class which is the ruling material force of society, is at the same time its ruling intellectual force." www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1845/german-ideology/ch01b.htm#b3 The mechanical materialism of Newton and Descartes -- and even William Paley's "Watch Analogy" -- corresponded to the mechanical world of the manufacturing and industrializing capitalist's world-view, just as Malthus, Spencer and Darwin's competition, invention, "struggle for existence", corresponded to competition, invention and negation of competitors in British market capitalist society. "It is remarkable how Darwin rediscovers, among the beasts and plants, the society of England with its division of labor, competition, opening up of new markets, inventions and Malthusian struggle for existence. It is Hobbes bellum omnium contra omnes and is reminiscent of Hegels Phenomenology, in which civil society figures as an intellectual animal kingdom, whereas, in Darwin, the animal kingdom figures as civil society." http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1862/letters/62_06_18.htm Frances Bacon was right: "Neither the naked hand nor the understanding left to itself can effect much. It is by instruments and helps that the work is done, which are as much wanted for the understanding as for the hand." http://www.constitution.org/bacon/nov_org.txt Contemplation cannot go any further than the object, or objective world being contemplated. This is true even of the imagination -- e.g. the 'beast' in the Book of Revelation having 'seven heads, ten horns and ten crowns' (one on each horn) is a monster imagined by placing together things that already exist, separately but merged into a single monstrous life form, object. -- Similarly Paley's watch analogy presupposed the existence of human technology, the cumulative result of technological developments and innovations of preceding generations, thus the watch. What Bacon suggested, or rather what is implicit in his suggestion, is that the invention and improvements of scientific instruments collecting data, analyzing the data for the formulation of hypothesis, and then other instruments to test the hypothesis, all methods and technologies made available to the scientific community to collect, analyze and test for themselves, has the tendency to maximize detached objectivity, thus minimize if not overcome the subjective prejudices inherent in individual contemplation. I think that the article below shows that Bacon was right. On the other hand, as in the United States progress in the biological sciences is hindered, where institutionalized social prejudices e.g. the power of Churches, threatened by advances in biology and paleoanthropology, use that power to attack these sciences as "only theories" i.e. subjective opinions of Charles Darwin. The more physics advance discovering new things, and insights into the natural workings of the universe, subsequently making god an "unnecessary hypothesis", the religious reactionaries will invade this scientific discipline as well. "The ruling ideas are nothing more than the ideal expression of the dominant material relationships, the dominant material relationships grasped as ideas; hence of the relationships which make the one class the ruling one, therefore, the ideas of its dominance." Thus: "the existence of revolutionary ideas in a particular period presupposes the existence of a revolutionary class" www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1845/german-ideology/ch01b.htm#b3 The advances in science follows the advances in technology, and provides ideational weapons that are only taken up by the philosophical representatives of the revolutionary class, in its polemical conflicts with the ideologists of the powers that be. It was so when Bruno and Galileo represented the materialist advances of philosophy and science in the interests of the then rising bourgeoisie, and today the advances in science are defended by the philosophical materialists representing the interests of the proletariat, as only a revolutionary worker dominated so
Re: [Marxism-Thaxis] Materialism and Social Science
Over on Louis Proyect's Marxmail list, a Melvin P. has written any number of posts expositing the ideas of Nelson Peery. (So Joe may wish to peruse the archives of Marxmail to review Melvin's posts). As Joe correctly points out, Peery's work draws heavily upon the Tofflers' notion of history moving through three waves. The Tofflers as many people here probably know were Marxists in their youth. And out of their youthful Marxism they seem to have retained a technologically determinist interpretation of historical materialism, even if they have long since given up any interest in socialism or class struggle. Their brand of technological determinism seems to have much in common with the some of the technological determinist brands of historical materialism that were popular in the Second International and even the Third International, and which in our time was given an especially sophisticated defense by the Canadian/British philosopher G.A. Cohen in his *Karl Marx's Theory of History: A Defence*. As Joe points out Peery's Marxism deemphasizes the role of the traditional proletariat in making the revolution. Melvin P. in his posts on Marxmail has often written about what he calls the "communist class" which is apparently an emerging class of people who are being displaced from any significant role in production by technological changes under late capitalism. This class seems not unlike the lumpenproletariat that Marx had written about but unlike the latter, Melvin P. sees it as a growing class and one that will become increasingly revolutionary as time goes by. Jim F. On Wed, 4 Feb 2004 15:00:40 -0800 "Lil Joe" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes: > February 4, 2004 > > > > RE: The Institute Resource Paper #1, Science and Doctrine > by Lil Joe > [EMAIL PROTECTED] > > > The best thing to hit the Internet in years - Juno SpeedBand! Surf the Web up to FIVE TIMES FASTER! Only $14.95/ month - visit www.juno.com to sign up today! ___ Marxism-Thaxis mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] To change your options or unsubscribe go to: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/marxism-thaxis
