Dialectical Materialism

[Blagsta]

However misguidedly he got there, I do think moon hit on the weak spot in Marxist thought (well most of what I'm familiar with anyway) - the fact that similar to other economic schools of thought there's a tendency to not want to/be able to spot non-economic reasons for social action. Or, if acknowledging that they exist, declare them a priori secondary or epiphenomenal. And then have the temerity to claim that capitalism reduces labour to commodities.

Some interpretations can certainly do that. However, I think Marx's view was that economics is intertwined with everything we do and you can't seperate it out from the other stuff.

 

[TruXta]

Don't get me wrong, B, I'm not talking about Marx, rather about his latter-day interlocutors. FWIW I'd be hard pressed to deny that economics is, as you say, intertwined with everything we do (well, nearly everything), but the question as regards social change and how to do it is what causal status economic incentives and opportunity structures have in a given situation.

Personally I'd be as inclined to look at cultural and psychological factors as much as economics.

 

[belboid]

Sure, there is often a tenedncy to over simplistically reduce everything to simple economics, but those cultural and psychological factors have grown up within class societies that are largely determined by......

It is a dialectical relationship

 

[TruXta]

Well if it's a dialectical relationship belboid (and for the record I think it is) how come economics is always primus inter pares? Again, it's not only Marxists who do this, it's a lot of economists (and social science bods who cling to Rational Choice theory in general).

 

[belboid]

wel, something has to come first to be negated!

 

[TruXta]

Bah, is that the best you can do?

 

[belboid]

There are, of course, other basic human drives that precede any particular economic mode, such as basic survival and the quest for knowledge, and those are always the underlying reasons for any actions, but there specific form are (largely) determined by the sphere they are in - we make history, but not in circumstances of our own choosing n all that.

 

[Athos]

I dont really think so, although I wouldnt really recomend anyone start on Hegel, or even on the Dialectics of Nature. But Engels' three central theses on the dialectic in there are all perfectly comprehensible to the 'average man', because they fit with how the world works. How water turns into steam (quantitative into qualitative changes), the contradictory nature of capitalism, how it both demands higher and lower pay for workers (unity and conflict of opposites), the evolution of stars and the cosmos (negation of the negation). The latter is a tad trickier to explain than the first two, I'll grant you.

I disagree. After all, about 20% of the working class worldwide can't even read! Let's put it this way, if it's so relevant to working people, why haven't they embraced it? It isn't, that's why; instead, the focus on such theories in left wing circles is divisive.

 

[TruXta]

So it's not economics at the bottom after all? Are you feeling OK there belboid?

 

[Sgt Howie]

Mr Gramsci is on the phone, he says he's feeling a bit left out.

 

[belboid]

So it's not economics at the bottom after all? Are you feeling OK there belboid?

certain fundamentals, the degree to which they can be met being determined by economics. Works for me

 

[TremulousTetra]

To be possibly pedantic, they never used the term dialectical materialism. That was Dietzgen. Later Plekhanov stitched together a philosophy of dialectical materialism out of Marx and Engels writings with reference to Hegel.

I don't see Marx and Engels as particularly unique as philosophers. Banality is a good quality for a philosopher and Marx and Engels could be quite banal. The dazzling philosophical obsessions of the leading intellectuals of the day are a distraction and satire is the appropriate response (Holy Family, German Ideology, Anti-Duhring). Good sense and a view to see the world as it is in all its nuance is a fine counterbalance.

Sorry Knotted, but you touched on a little pet hate there. At university, they would say Marx was a, for example, technological determinist because he said "quotes about windmills etc". For me, Marx didn't write Bibles, just to be recited. He gave a methodology of analysis. And in my opinion, to do him fair, we should apply the analysis to his works, and ask what would Marx say of himself if he was here today. We have to capture the essence of what he was talking about. [Dialectics; Essence?]

So yes, he may not have used the phrase dialectical materialism, but he certainly was. That Marx was a young Hegelian, a dialectician [. To coin a phrase] is without doubt. And this is where the point about him being banal comes in. Of course, he wasn't original, that is ONE of the points of dialectics, all we see is synthesis of precedents, synthesis of thesis and anti-thesis. Synthesis of the dialectics of Hegel and the materialism Newton etc, was Marx's achievement. Why an achievement?

That said most of Marx and Engels philosophical commentary is excellent. Marx's preface to The Contribution to the Critique of Political Economy is excellent. The point about the mode of presentation is central. Marx looks at political economy afresh, without making it seem like the unfolding of some law of nature. Capital is thus a very self-conscious and philosophical set of volumes that continually set capital as a product of history. I don't find the more explicitly philosophical language in Grundrisse useful, though. It makes it sound clunkingly mechanical. (Similarly the mathematical manuscripts are bloody awful).

I find it completely strange when people like yourself lord to political economy works etc, but then go on to ridicule Dialectics. What Marx produced, when he produced work such as capital, was like a map so we could navigate the landscape of the political economy. What do you need when you set out to draw a map? A compass. Dialectics was Marx and Engels compass, with which they could venture forth into the unmapped territory of the political economy.

I no longer feel the need for dialectical materialism. I can translate its terms into more precise language if I need to.

Didn't once Marx promise to produce a small pamphlet on the dialectic? Something which he never achieved? I would love to see your pamphlet that can translate the terms of dialectical materialism in a more precise language.

 

[butchersapron]

Fantastic drivel

Unconnected to the thread or OP. No interest in looking at what Marx actually said - just defence of 'marx'

 

[TremulousTetra]

I think it's an irrelevance to most workers' everyday existences. The fact that the ability to engage with the idea depends upon an education in Hegelian thought, means that the vast majority of workers are excluded from doing so. This, coupled with the perceived importance of such theories in some left wing circles leads to the paradox of the isolation of workers from revolutionary movements, and the creation of a self-appointed elite, which is little short of the worst kind of vanguardism. It is wrong in principle, and dangerous in practice. If left wing thinkers had put half as much time and energy into engaging with the working class as they have into discussing dialectical materialism, then perhaps the left would have made some progress in the last 80 years.

The theory of evolution is irrelevant to the everyday experiences of animals, but it is still relevant to an analysis of Evolution. Likewise, revolutionaries should equally be interested in a theory of social evolution. As a guide to how we got from hunter gatherer society to capitalism, and how we can get from capitalism to anarchism/communism. We shouldn't just blindly stumble about as some anarchist like you would have us do.

 

[butchersapron]

Science, like the 1890s!

 

[Fruitloop]

wtf? twilight zone thread.

 

[Athos]

The theory of evolution is irrelevant to the everyday experiences of animals, but it is still relevant to an analysis of Evolution. Likewise, revolutionaries should equally be interested in a theory of social evolution. As a guide to how we got from hunter gatherer society to capitalism, and how we can get from capitalism to anarchism/communism. We shouldn't just blindly stumble about as some anarchist like you would have us do.

People have been applying the analysis of dialectical materialism for over 100 years. To what end? Does your fantastic insight achieve any more than my blind stumblings? Did Marx achieve more by running off to Cologne than Bakunin did by manning the barricades of Dresden, in 1849?

My point is that the desire of some on the left to make a fetish of Marx' pronouncements not only fails to help in the struggle, but actually hinders it. It creates a gap between workers and the self-appointed intellectual leaders of the left. It baffles me why these do-nothing 'thinkers' are so highly prized, but I guess it's only amongst their own kind i.e. effete liberals, that they're considered special, and not by the working class. And that is probably because, deep down, they cherish a bourgeois mentality that esteems thought over action.

 

[TremulousTetra]

Some interpretations can certainly do that. However, I think Marx's view was that economics is intertwined with everything we do and you can't seperate it out from the other stuff.

Bingo! You summed up a response to a lot of comments in this thread with that one post.

I think Moon was right, there is often a tendency, even amongst Marxist, to forget there is no division between, for example, base and superstructure. They are part of the whole. An indivisible whole. There is a reciprocal relationship between the two, not a deterministic one.

Likewise with the economy. Marx was not an economic determinist imo. Though I can understand why people read into him that perception.

The whole.
The contradiction.
The dynamic.
Dialectical materialism.

 

[Knotted]

Sorry Knotted, but you touched on a little pet hate there. At university, they would say Marx was a, for example, technological determinist because he said "quotes about windmills etc". For me, Marx didn't write Bibles, just to be recited. He gave a methodology of analysis. And in my opinion, to do him fair, we should apply the analysis to his works, and ask what would Marx say of himself if he was here today. We have to capture the essence of what he was talking about. [Dialectics; Essence?]

I said nothing about technological determinism. Nor did I say anything about the need to merely recite Marx.

So yes, he may not have used the phrase dialectical materialism, but he certainly was. That Marx was a young Hegelian, a dialectician [. To coin a phrase] is without doubt. And this is where the point about him being banal comes in. Of course, he wasn't original, that is ONE of the points of dialectics, all we see is synthesis of precedents, synthesis of thesis and anti-thesis. Synthesis of the dialectics of Hegel and the materialism Newton etc, was Marx's achievement. Why an achievement?

What is what you would call the dialectical materialism of Marx? There is very little written explicitly describing a philosophy. There's Engels Anti-Duhring and Ludwig Feuerbach...

I didn't say they were unoriginal. I think a lot of there best bits of their philosophy is not very dramatic or dazzling. It's just good sense.

I find it completely strange when people like yourself lord to political economy works etc, but then go on to ridicule Dialectics. What Marx produced, when he produced work such as capital, was like a map so we could navigate the landscape of the political economy. What do you need when you set out to draw a map? A compass. Dialectics was Marx and Engels compass, with which they could venture forth into the unmapped territory of the political economy.

Could they have used a different compass and achieved the same results or even better results? It's not obvious.

I don't think Marx's methodology is seperable from his work. What is interesting is to see how Marx reasoned. We don't need dialectical formulae to do that. In fact I think it is best approached without preconceptions about what dialectics are etc. Now I've no problem with Marx's methodology and I've no problem with you calling it dialectical materialism if you like, but don't see the formulae as a substitute for reading carefully.

Engels materialist dialetics (as he called it) I'm mostly fine with as well. I think it's best seen as rules of thumb and I find it can be helpful. It's only really the laws of dialectics in Dialectics of Nature that I think lead to a lot of nonsense.

Didn't once Marx promise to produce a small pamphlet on the dialectic? Something which he never achieved? I would love to see your pamphlet that can translate the terms of dialectical materialism in a more precise language.

I would have to see Marx's non-existant pamphlet in order to translate it!

 

[Knotted]

Thinking about it, it is any talk of contradictions that I reject in dialectics. It's never really a contradiction, rather a juxtaposition of consistent thoughts which nevertheless appear pyschologically antagonistic.

Is motion contradictory? Is being in one place at one moment and another place at another moment a contradiction? I don't think so. I don't see any value in calling it contradictory.

 

[kyser_soze]

Surely one of the things DM has given is the ability to ask better questions than 'What do you think of dialectical materialism?'

Well, I think it's very nice.

Admittedly, this would have been snappier had it immediately followed the OP...

 

[belboid]

Fantastic drivel

Unconnected to the thread or OP. No interest in looking at what Marx actually said - just defence of 'marx'

Shockingly, Wesistance is 'responding' to criticisms that have not been put! It's almost as if he didn't understand his own question. Which, considering the way he put it, he almost definitely didn't. The dishonest little cunt.

 

[belboid]

I disagree. After all, about 20% of the working class worldwide can't even read! Let's put it this way, if it's so relevant to working people, why haven't they embraced it? It isn't, that's why; instead, the focus on such theories in left wing circles is divisive.

This is all unrelated to anything I actually wrote.

I haven't talked about its 'relevance', because that doesn't mean much. Of course an understanding of its workings is largely unimportant unless you are a philosophy or history of science lecturer, but so are most abstract theories. So what? Should hey never be discussed?

 

[belboid]

Thinking about it, it is any talk of contradictions that I reject in dialectics. It's never really a contradiction, rather a juxtaposition of consistent thoughts which nevertheless appear pyschologically antagonistic.

Is motion contradictory? Is being in one place at one moment and another place at another moment a contradiction? I don't think so. I don't see any value in calling it contradictory.

Motion isnt meant to be contradictory, is it? Rather all motion is caused by other contradictions. Also, dialectical contradictions aren't as rigid as aristotelian logic contradictions, or as strong. The contradiction of 'A' is not simply 'Not A.'

There is a direct contradiction between the needs of the ruling and working clsses, for example, that drives the nature of class society. There is the contradiction between the desire of the capitalist to pay workers less (to maximise profits) and the need to pay them more (so we can buy the shit that is produced).

 

[TruXta]

The contradiction of A is not not-A? Are you saying DM uses non-standard logic?

 

[butchersapron]

Thats the whole fucking point.

 

[TruXta]

So A is not A, is that also a valid statement in DM?

 

[butchersapron]

It's the start point.

 

[belboid]

that is one, very clear, example of a contradiction, but there are other possibilities!

 

[TruXta]

Yea, it's the starting point of ludicrous, self-contradictory lunacy is what it is. Look at me substitute "A" for "butchersapron". "Butchersapron is not butchersapron". Is that true? Are you not yourself?