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By Vera Politica
#14446632
This is my first post in quite some time, so I apologize if I am not coherent.

This post isn't, specifically, about the historical conflict between what is often called 'German Idealism' and 'Historical Materialism'. The point is to try and get even a superficial understanding of what this tension might actually consist in. From my experience, many Marxists seem to present both idealism and materialism in a simplistic way. This isn't, itself, a bad thing. As I said, I really just want to see whether we can get a simplistic understanding of this tension. But what I meant to say is that this simplistic way of framing the debate, I think, does severe injustice to both camps. Marxists (and I mean amateur Marxists here, like you and me. Well maybe not you, but certainly me) tend to present idealism in such a way that accepting the view seems childish or insane. As a result, what we mean by 'materialism' becomes a jumbled mess.

Because of many other things going on in my life, I am not in a position to seriously address this question; this will be something like a priori historical exegesis and is, consequently, false. I want to engage in a little philosophy. The tension is, indeed, a philosophical one.

Here is in a crude sense how we could dissociate realism and idealism. Suppose we are talking about some object X. A realist about object X is one who thinks that object X exists independent of anything about minds: that is, independent of human conventions, language, etc. An idealist about that object will say that part of what is means to be the object X is to be conceptualized, or named, or..etc. That is, object X is, in some sense, not independent of human beings.

Now consider how crazy idealism might look when we speak of every day objects. Consider the cup of coffee sitting next to my laptop. If I am an idealist about this cup, I am saying that this cup would cease to exist if there were no minds. The cup is not independent of the way it is conceived by minds. Let's be a little clearer: it is not independent of the way in which it could be conceived, perceived, named, etc., by rational creatures with a mind. "Whoah," you may protest, "that's just fucking bonkers!" Sure sounds so. But let me try to make the thesis more palatable. Consider just the portion of the cup that is 2.489 cm, or less, away from any portion of the table it is resting on. What about that object? Surely, one may say, that that object is, in an important sense, dependent on human conceptualization, thought, language, etc. Is there really such a thing as the portion of the cup of coffee that is 2.489cm away from any point of the table independently of any way in which such a thing is even conceived? What about that portion of the cup along with the portion of the table that is less than pi metres from the window? The more we do this, the more we see that we can arbitrarily conceive of and/or name certain portions of matter. Maybe the idealist is one who thinks that, in the end, the cup is just an arbitrarily named or perceived portion of matter -- even matter itself is just an arbitrarily perceived or named or conceptualized portion of... you get the idea.

What privileges my cup from arbitrarily conceived objects? My (very tentative) answer to this question would be that certain objects that we conceive, perceive, or name, play either distinct roles in our perceptive/cognitive/sensory apparatus or in our scientific theorizing. For example, perceiving a lion as a distinct object has a distinct evolutionary advantage: it signals certain other cognitive functions, or whatever, and induces us to fight or flight. The fact that this plays a distinct role in our survival is best explained by our taking these objects to be independent of ourselves: we are observing something true of (and independently true of) our capacity to perceive or conceptualize that object. Now take some other entities, like theoretical entities in science. In so far as they play the right sort of predictive role in our scientific theories (i.e. that we can accurately predict and/or explain phenomenon) is good reason to think that these entities exist independently of the way in which we actually conceive and theorize about them. In short, we provide an "inference to the best explanation". The utility of privileging certain objects is best explained by the fact that some of these objects are actually independent of human beings.


Ok I'm tired of writing, but I am trying to move from this to consider what Marxists are trying to say when they claim that they have a realist (and materialist) conception of history. My sense is that this thesis is informed by the fact that Marx thought that there could be such a thing as social science and that there could be certain entities, objects, whatever, that play the right sort of theoretical roles in that science. One negative side of this thesis is that there are many things, like concepts of "justice", "geist", whatever, that do not play the right sorts of theoretical roles in this science.

Alright, I will write some more after I hear what other people have to say. Please don't be shy to just call out my foolishness (not that this is really something I need to mention on PoFo).
#14446637
Good to hear from you, Vera.

First, you're right in saying that I, at least, paint a crude depiction of idealism and materialism in many of my posts. This is by design. For the most part, it's usually as a means to explain Marxism to someone that doesn't understand it. In doing so, one tends to use very basic primary colors as a way to demonstrate the differences in one thing or another.

A second reason to be crude about these things is to try and contain the conversation from going off into philosophy and leave it as an example for why, say, a Marxist thinks that history has a pattern or whatever the discussion was about.

Finally, a little bit of smug assholishness probably helps move it along a little bit.

So far as your final component, Marx—like most 19th century thinkers—thought he did come up with a complete philosophy of the universe. One may counter the, "negative side of this thesis," by pointing out that concepts like, "justice," "geist," and other things are abstractions that stem from the material world.

To put it very basically, our notion of justice is determined by our capitalistic mode of production. Even the way we talk about a prisoner, "paying his debt to society," or something is steeped in capitalist rhetoric. Justice, one might say as another crude example, becomes an exchange of goods. Based upon property rights ultimately, one is expected to have made a reasonable and enlightened choice to commit the crime and so society interrupts the exchange and merits out a punishment. A punishment often itself dependent upon the capitalist mode of production. The way we interact with the world, in otherwise, is dictated by how we interact with physical things on a big and small level. In our current case, via capitalism.

Someone in feudalism may have lost his title because his son stole something. The family unit itself had a relationship to the land. Removing the title of the land and punishing the family as a whole was a reasonable conception of justice then.

In ancient times, an entire city-state might go to war with another one for the crime of one.

Abstract notions like, "justice," in other words, is based upon material relations.
#14446656
Thank you for your reply, TIG.

TIG wrote:First, you're right in saying that I, at least, paint a crude depiction of idealism and materialism in many of my posts. This is by design. For the most part, it's usually as a means to explain Marxism to someone that doesn't understand it. In doing so, one tends to use very basic primary colors as a way to demonstrate the differences in one thing or another


Good. I certainly did not mean for my remarks to be read as a criticism of us Marxists in any strong sense. I was worried, instead, that these kinds of simplifications get thrown around within the Marxist camp itself and that we may be doing a disservice to ourselves as we simplify inherently complex topics and even forget how complex they truly are.

TIG wrote:A second reason to be crude about these things is to try and contain the conversation from going off into philosophy and leave it as an example for why, say, a Marxist thinks that history has a pattern or whatever the discussion was about.


Yes indeed. Though, it seems to me that any serious engagement with this particular topic will involve a philosophical discussion. I think this is because the debate between idealism and realistic materialism is a philosophical one. But maybe I am wrong about the philosophical import of such things. Indeed, my post meant to head toward the way Marx and Marxists conceive of studying human societies as a scientific practice. I think that, in all likelihood, the philosophical tension is one that is informed by this scientific view of history and social studies.

TIG wrote:Finally, a little bit of smug assholishness probably helps move it along a little bit.


Hehe, well there is enough of this coming from every camp. But I don't think that Marxists, amongst themselves, should stop from coming to a sophisticated understanding of the historical origins of their political and economic views.

TIG wrote:So far as your final component, Marx—like most 19th century thinkers—thought he did come up with a complete philosophy of the universe. One may counter the, "negative side of this thesis," by pointing out that concepts like, "justice," "geist," and other things are abstractions that stem from the material world.


Good. Now what exactly is an `abstraction'? What exactly does it mean to 'stem' from the material world? I have vague ideas about how to answer these questions, but is there a more precise way to speak of these things?

TIG wrote:To put it very basically, our notion of justice is determined by our capitalistic mode of production. Even the way we talk about a prisoner, "paying his debt to society," or something is steeped in capitalist rhetoric. Justice, one might say as another crude example, becomes an exchange of goods. Based upon property rights ultimately, one is expected to have made a reasonable and enlightened choice to commit the crime and so society interrupts the exchange and merits out a punishment. A punishment often itself dependent upon the capitalist mode of production. The way we interact with the world, in otherwise, is dictated by how we interact with physical things on a big and small level. In our current case, via capitalism.


Good. Another notion that needs to be specified, though: "determined". Do you mean this in the same sense that you used the term "stem" up there? A stems from B just in case B determines A? If so, now what exactly would it be to determine something?


My understanding, too, of the inadequacy of a certain concept like "justice" is in the fact that what turns out to be just is invariably restricted by contingent social and material circumstances. The concept itself often involves some kind of 'false universalization' by which I mean to say that we mistakenly take certain behaviors or circumstances that are in fact contingent to be, instead, true universally. For example, we may think that the competitive behavior that are exhibited by individuals in a capitalist arrangement to be an expression not of their behavior in that circumstance, but rather of their "human nature" and, so, an expression of a trait that would be invariant in any social and economic circumstance.We falsely "universalize" what is only a contingent fact.

TIG wrote:Someone in feudalism may have lost his title because his son stole something. The family unit itself had a relationship to the land. Removing the title of the land and punishing the family as a whole was a reasonable conception of justice then.


Right, but many would simply retort that these people were wrong. A Marxist needs to be able to respond coherently to this charge without digressing into a naive kind of relativism. Or, at least, it seems to be that the Marxist should be able to do so. Maybe I'm wrong.

TIG wrote:Abstract notions like, "justice," in other words, is based upon material relations.


Yup, though again the use of "based". I suppose you mean this to mean, roughly, the same as "determined" or "stem". I do still think that this needs to be made much more precise if it is not going to be open to some charge of relativism or the charge that "might makes right". I don't think that the Marxist countenances this view. But maybe I'm wrong.
#14446665
The Immortal Goon wrote:Abstract notions like, "justice," in other words, is based upon material relations.

Is it not the case that abstract notions like justice are just somewhat difficult to communicate without resorting to metaphors? Thus phrases like "pay your debt to society" is merely a metaphorical way of describing the restoration of properness in tangible everyday terms with which any people familiar with the uses of money, and other temporary transfers of property on the understanding of its return, will understand. Also I believe the concept of debt long predates that period Marxists assert as the beginning of the "capitalist mode of production" which is the English Industrial Revolution (Marx presumably did not know anything of the capitalism of the Islamic Golden Age).
#14446670
This is an interesting topic. Obviously, not being a Marxist, I can't address the specific issues you raised for Marx groupies, but without making a separate topic, the foundation of Marxism on materialism raises some related issues for me.

I've never really understood the suppose essentiality of idealism to liberalism to which Marxism contrasts itself; it seems to me that you can easily be a materialist and a liberal at the same time.

Also, materialism in philosophy is simply the view that the world gives rise to thought, rather than the other way around, so it would seem that Marxism employs a sub-set of materialism, and not materialism broadly, when it sees human thought as driven by class distinction.

I mean, I've never seen Marxists discuss genetic tendencies of humans which may act to hold certain trends in class movement, or discuss hysteresis effects whereby a system depends on its past history of inputs and not just its current input; in this way we can see the material world giving rise to thought which then shapes the material world to fit the thought. For example, an analysis of religious struggle in the Islamic world purely based on changes in class structure would miss the mark, because even if the religious tendencies at their formation arose out of economic conditions, once they exist they exist they have a life of their own. Saying that ISIS is doing what it is doing because "bourgeoisie" isn't properly untrue, but it's reductionist in the extreme.

As soon as it is extant, the fact that people believe in idealist philosophies itself manifests as a material force of history. Marxists seem to get stuck at "false consciousness" as if it is a temporary brake on a current mode of production, and not a huge historical force of its own.
#14447543
Vera, thank you for your reply. And do excuse my tardiness in getting back to you.

Vera wrote:Now what exactly is an `abstraction'? What exactly does it mean to 'stem' from the material world? I have vague ideas about how to answer these questions, but is there a more precise way to speak of these things?


In my own understanding, the "abstraction," would be a word that is pretty much not as precise as I should have used when I wrote it. Perhaps, "concept," would be better. When I use the word, "stem," I mean to grow from.

So, to go back to justice for example, our concept of justice comes from our interaction with the material world. So, for example, in one time and place you are just to stone your daughter to death because she had sex. In another, this is a monstrous injustice.

An idealist might reconcile this in many different ways, perhaps saying that stoning one's daughter was never justice, but an attempt by one gender to dominate another for self-interested reasons.

I would argue that the difference is because of how the people understand the physical world. In examples where one may stone one's daughter to death, and the Biblical Middle East comes to mind for this, women were property prized because they were used as transactions for acquiring and maintaining land. The morality question I hope to address later, but putting that aside (and we should, as morals also come from these physical interactions), this has its own logic within the system in which they live. They are dependent upon their interaction with the land. It's the same reason the Pharaohs and other early monarchies married brothers and sisters together: it kept the land they owned completely under their control. The notion of justice, was maintaining this power. Had the daughter had sex before marriage, she negated the land system for her family.

Vera wrote:Another notion that needs to be specified, though: "determined". Do you mean this in the same sense that you used the term "stem" up there? A stems from B just in case B determines A? If so, now what exactly would it be to determine something?


In this case, I suppose it was the same. In general, however, there is a difference in determining (which tends to take some amount of reason, at least in colloquial usage) and stemming, which tends to be a way to mention, "A stems from B just in [the] case B determines A."

So, more exactly I suppose, the notion that the girl should be stoned to death stems from her society's relationship with the land. It was determined that it was just to stone the girl had destroyed her family and her father's duty was to maintain the family.

Does that seem right? Seems okay while I'm writing this, but this is the kind of thing that needs a check, I suppose.

Vera wrote:My understanding, too, of the inadequacy of a certain concept like "justice" is in the fact that what turns out to be just is invariably restricted by contingent social and material circumstances. The concept itself often involves some kind of 'false universalization' by which I mean to say that we mistakenly take certain behaviors or circumstances that are in fact contingent to be, instead, true universally. For example, we may think that the competitive behavior that are exhibited by individuals in a capitalist arrangement to be an expression not of their behavior in that circumstance, but rather of their "human nature" and, so, an expression of a trait that would be invariant in any social and economic circumstance.We falsely "universalize" what is only a contingent fact.


Completely agreed.

Vera wrote:Right, but many would simply retort that these people were wrong. A Marxist needs to be able to respond coherently to this charge without digressing into a naive kind of relativism. Or, at least, it seems to be that the Marxist should be able to do so. Maybe I'm wrong.


They would, and do say that. Women have been politically emancipated for all of 100 years (at the very most in some places), which means for the past 6,000 years society has been completely out of balance and wrong, and we just very recently corrected it. In my own mind, this premise is self-evidently absurd.

I tend to ignore the mortality of these things too, as that's easy to get bogged down into. I don't actually think women should be the property of men. However, one cannot deny that this has been the case for the vast majority of human civilization (as we recognize it in the west). So either something materially changed, or morality itself is completely random and arbitrary—which doesn't speak well for the argument that people are just wrong.

I always think slavery is a good example, where it was fine for the majority of human civilization. In the last few 100 years, however, we've watched it change. We have extensive documents about it. First people didn't really want to see it, so it was banned at home and kept in far off colonies, and then in these colonies a social revolution had to occur to get rid of it. But what really connects that with today, more than anything, is child labour. Which now we have banned at home because it's distasteful to see and put it into far off colonies to deal with.

Hardly anybody in a first world country is going to say that slavery was right. An idealist might say that it was always wrong, and we corrected it. Even going so far as to say that the vast majority of human society for all time was just simply wrong for idealist and moral reasons, and we just recently were able to do that.

But in doing so, the person is silently living and accepting child labour. Yes, he may say, child labour is wrong. But the computers we use, the clothing we wear, the shoes we covet, are assembled by children. What can the individual in question do about this? It is a systematic problem based on how physical material moves, is valued, and interacted with. The idealist can speak until he's blue in the face about morally opposing child labour, but it's clear that his usage and tacit acceptance of child labour stems from material conditions beyond his control.

Now, granted this is not in any way a, "precise," or simple way to explain the concept.

But it, in my mind, dodges the, "might makes right," argument and isn't part of a kind of relativism. I oppose child labour, and I oppose the capitalist system that makes such things possible and so hard to fight. But I accept that as reality.

Maybe I'm not typing that well or there is a much better kind of example though.

What are your thoughts on the subject?
#14450507
Oh jeez, no worries. Clearly, I am not exactly punctual with my replies either.

TIG wrote:An idealist might reconcile this in many different ways, perhaps saying that stoning one's daughter was never justice, but an attempt by one gender to dominate another for self-interested reasons.


Ok. I guess now my question is whether or not this reconciliation is a demand that must be met only by idealists and, if so, why.

TIG wrote:I would argue that the difference is because of how the people understand the physical world. In examples where one may stone one's daughter to death, and the Biblical Middle East comes to mind for this, women were property prized because they were used as transactions for acquiring and maintaining land. The morality question I hope to address later, but putting that aside (and we should, as morals also come from these physical interactions), this has its own logic within the system in which they live. They are dependent upon their interaction with the land. It's the same reason the Pharaohs and other early monarchies married brothers and sisters together: it kept the land they owned completely under their control. The notion of justice, was maintaining this power. Had the daughter had sex before marriage, she negated the land system for her family.


So, of course, I think this strategy is entirely correct. Though, it is limited in the following sense: it offers only a description of moral and ideological systems. The step I am interested in is to what extent this descriptive enterprise bears on the normative debate. That is, does the normative debate simply disappear or do Marxists have something more substantive to contribute here?

TIG wrote:Does that seem right? Seems okay while I'm writing this, but this is the kind of thing that needs a check, I suppose.


Yes. It allows us to study moral/ideological systems as a socio-natural phenomenon: one that is amendable to social scientific/sociological analysis. I think this is the central contribution of Marxist analysis. I mean, whatever the details of the explanation for the particular example, the general strategy here is what is important.

TIG wrote:What are your thoughts on the subject?


I think this all seems right and we seem to be concerned with the same sort of "gap": how does the descriptive enterprise of Marxist analysis bear on the normative one? How do we get to be normatively opposed to child labor while subjecting child labor to the kind of materialist, Marxist analysis we're so familiar with?

Now I do have some tentative thoughts on the subject and I think that our ideas may track on this. I do want to hear your thoughts. Here is how I think we can criticize certain ideological and moral systems. In any system of production we can always look at a particular objective, material fact: the productivity, per capita, of goods and services and their 'effective' distribution (i.e. the effectiveness of the goods produces to satisfy human actual human needs). Ideological systems, while they ultimately 'stem from' the mode of production and distribution also have a reciprocal effect on that system. In so far as that ideological system gives way to progress in those material relations, i.e. sustaining and or increasing productivity and the effectiveness of distribution, then we could say that it is rational to subscribe to that ideological system. In so far as that ideological system is a fetter on these productive processes and inhibit both the increase in the productive capacity of a society and the ability of that society to satisfy social and material needs, then we can say that subscribing to that ideological system is irrational. In this way, certain practices like child labor or stoning women can be discredited by a Marxist because they are practices that no longer have an efficient effect on the productive relations of that society. They become a fetter on our ability, as human beings, to produce and satisfy our needs. It would be irrational to subscribe to such practices given the state of development in Western societies. Similarly, many Bourgeois conceptions of justice and law receive a similar fate.
#14451071
Sorry...I'm jumping in somewhat late--Good to hear from you Vera and thanks for the good post and good follow ups TIG!

One thing to consider that I would point out: In reading through the OP I noticed that, Vera, you seemed to take the materialism/idealism debate solely in terms of pure philosophy: e.g. do things exist independent of minds? However, I always understood the materialism/idealism issue that Marx raised had primarily to do with historical development. This is not to say that the epistemological question is completely divorced from the historical one, but I always thought Marx was giving more priority to the philosophy of history. So whereas Hegel suggested that history is moved forward through Spirit (ideas) transcending itself, Marx, in contrast argued that ideas are a product of material production. The crux of the matter really seems to be a philosophy of history, or, one of a more socio-historical bent as opposed to a pure philosophical question.

On the question of Materialism/Idealism, I think there is much room for nuance. One need not adopt one or the other. To me, what Marx really opened the door for considering in a very sophisticated way, which actually paved the way for much modern social science, is that the way we think and act is very much dependent upon our socio-economic conditions. For Marx, material and economic relations has the priority. But I could easily see our ideas as conditioned upon other ideas, which are often linked to material and economic conditions, but not always. I think the idea of cultural capital, particularly as developed by Pierre Bourdieu, can be just as important a question as economic capital in understanding the economy of ideas and their production.

This, I think, ties into the very important question that you and TIG have raised in relation to relativism: How can we credibly make value judgments if ideas are fundamentally conditioned?

TIG wrote:Ideological systems, while they ultimately 'stem from' the mode of production and distribution also have a reciprocal effect on that system. In so far as that ideological system gives way to progress in those material relations, i.e. sustaining and or increasing productivity and the effectiveness of distribution, then we could say that it is rational to subscribe to that ideological system. In so far as that ideological system is a fetter on these productive processes and inhibit both the increase in the productive capacity of a society and the ability of that society to satisfy social and material needs, then we can say that subscribing to that ideological system is irrational. In this way, certain practices like child labor or stoning women can be discredited by a Marxist because they are practices that no longer have an efficient effect on the productive relations of that society. They become a fetter on our ability, as human beings, to produce and satisfy our needs. It would be irrational to subscribe to such practices given the state of development in Western societies. Similarly, many Bourgeois conceptions of justice and law receive a similar fate.

The one possible problem I see here, TIG, is that what constitutes "progress" is an idea, which from a materialist standpoint would be determined by the economic conditions. So naturally, what counts as "effectiveness of distribution" and the like would also depend on the economic conditions. Thus, in capitalist production, for instance "effectiveness of distribution" depends on its concept of individual rights (including the right to property) and the free use of labor. So long as property is protected and individuals are free to buy and sell property and labor, distribution could be considered effective. I think that there has to be a way in which a Marxist can make a value judgment in order to credibly say what something like "effective distribution" or fair and just distribution is, because by themselves they are not absolute terms. I don't think these terms, "fairness" and "justice," are necessarily ideas that Marxists should be afraid to employ and incorporate.

One could, perhaps, admit that "justice" and "fairness" and are products of historical relations, and as such what is intrinsic to these concepts--as well as any--is that human beings themselves are integral in forming them. So Marxists could simply do what they do so well: expose the very contradictions that the capitalist system produces in relation to these concepts. What is "just" and "fair" ends up being decided by certain groups, those who control capital, more often than not. While we cannot say, in any absolute way, what constitutes "justice" and "fairness" as these are produced in history; we can, however, argue that capitalist conditions of existence do not provide the social means for all to participate in forming these ideas and thus the legal and economic relations that follow.
#14451114
Vera wrote:Ok. I guess now my question is whether or not this reconciliation is a demand that must be met only by idealists and, if so, why.


In my interpretation, a materialist isn't as beholden to the concept of justice as a concept unto itself because justice—as we perceive it—is the result of something material. I, at least, feel perfectly justified (perhaps I should find a word with a different root, but good enough for now) in stating that justice itself is not a single static concept and is something that does not exist upon its own. Justice is, in short, an abbreviation for a society's understanding of its place in a material world—a material world that is ever shifting.

Vera wrote:Though, it is limited in the following sense: it offers only a description of moral and ideological systems. The step I am interested in is to what extent this descriptive enterprise bears on the normative debate. That is, does the normative debate simply disappear or do Marxists have something more substantive to contribute here?


Reconciling the justice in stoning one's daughter is not the job of the materialist, in my view. But, I see where you head with this in questioning a certain type of morality. I certainly would never justify the stoning of a daughter, even if a good excuse could come about. In this sense, morality can be inverted into a kind of propaganda as anticlimus suggests—is it moral to allow children to do our labour because the market makes more money that way?—but ultimately, I understand my own sense of morality comes because of the time and place in which I was raised. Would I object if I saw a girl being stoned? Hell yes, even if I was in a culture that allowed such a thing as routine. This would, of course, be a moral reaction that was probably only hung up on the pretext of materialism were I confronted directly with it. But that's part of being a human being. I have wanted to punch people for strictly selfish reasons, but I have retrained myself because I understand things on a broader level. I can understand that knee-jerk feeling of morality but saving one girl from a stoning—as noble as such a thing may be—would ultimately not do a thing to end stoning. For that to happen, the material consequences would need to be altered.

And that may be the extra Marxists can offer, is a way to stop the root of the problem instead of the symptoms of the problem.

Vera wrote:In any system of production we can always look at a particular objective, material fact: the productivity, per capita, of goods and services and their 'effective' distribution (i.e. the effectiveness of the goods produces to satisfy human actual human needs). Ideological systems, while they ultimately 'stem from' the mode of production and distribution also have a reciprocal effect on that system. In so far as that ideological system gives way to progress in those material relations, i.e. sustaining and or increasing productivity and the effectiveness of distribution, then we could say that it is rational to subscribe to that ideological system. In so far as that ideological system is a fetter on these productive processes and inhibit both the increase in the productive capacity of a society and the ability of that society to satisfy social and material needs, then we can say that subscribing to that ideological system is irrational. In this way, certain practices like child labor or stoning women can be discredited by a Marxist because they are practices that no longer have an efficient effect on the productive relations of that society. They become a fetter on our ability, as human beings, to produce and satisfy our needs. It would be irrational to subscribe to such practices given the state of development in Western societies. Similarly, many Bourgeois conceptions of justice and law receive a similar fate.


I would very much agree with this. I might even go further and point out that so far as most historians and archaeologists theorize, child labour and injustice to women and whatnot are relatively recent, stemming from the neolithic on. These are material issues. A Marxist may well say that the transition from paleolithic to neolithic was that of leaning "primitive communism," and the goal is to achieve, "communism," again. That is to say, to end the artificial subjugation of women that developed as the conception of individual property came into vogue. In this sense, we are not only doing what is rational for us today (as you suggest), but returning to our roots as a species.

anticlimacus wrote:I think that there has to be a way in which a Marxist can make a value judgment in order to credibly say what something like "effective distribution" or fair and just distribution is, because by themselves they are not absolute terms. I don't think these terms, "fairness" and "justice," are necessarily ideas that Marxists should be afraid to employ and incorporate.

One could, perhaps, admit that "justice" and "fairness" and are products of historical relations, and as such what is intrinsic to these concepts--as well as any--is that human beings themselves are integral in forming them. So Marxists could simply do what they do so well: expose the very contradictions that the capitalist system produces in relation to these concepts. What is "just" and "fair" ends up being decided by certain groups, those who control capital, more often than not. While we cannot say, in any absolute way, what constitutes "justice" and "fairness" as these are produced in history; we can, however, argue that capitalist conditions of existence do not provide the social means for all to participate in forming these ideas and thus the legal and economic relations that follow.


As a propaganda tool, I think that's about right. It touches on what Vera was saying, and I tend to agree with it more or less.
#14454553
I apologize for the amount of time it takes me to respond. I will, for now, respond to anticlimacus and then make my way to respond to TIG. My apologies.

anticlimacus wrote:One thing to consider that I would point out: In reading through the OP I noticed that, Vera, you seemed to take the materialism/idealism debate solely in terms of pure philosophy: e.g. do things exist independent of minds? However, I always understood the materialism/idealism issue that Marx raised had primarily to do with historical development. This is not to say that the epistemological question is completely divorced from the historical one, but I always thought Marx was giving more priority to the philosophy of history. So whereas Hegel suggested that history is moved forward through Spirit (ideas) transcending itself, Marx, in contrast argued that ideas are a product of material production. The crux of the matter really seems to be a philosophy of history, or, one of a more socio-historical bent as opposed to a pure philosophical question.


Nice to hear from you as well. As to this point, well, I think it is a mistake to think that it is not a philosophical question because it bears, in the end, on a question concerning historical methodology (which, I take it, is the point you are making, though I may not have understood and I apologize if that is the case). The distinction between the materialist and idealist position is, indeed, a philosophical distinction and it bears on how it is that we should do history. Crucially, of course, the way Marx understood it, materialism with respect to historical methodology turns history into a social science. The shift, in general, makes the study of society as a science possible. The central question I am concerned with is first getting clear on what the distinction between idealism and materialism is and this, I think, is the only way to really understand how it is that we distinguish between historical materialism v.s. historical idealism. Historical materialism, rather than naturalism, is of course the view that Marx defended.


anticlimacus wrote:On the question of Materialism/Idealism, I think there is much room for nuance. One need not adopt one or the other. To me, what Marx really opened the door for considering in a very sophisticated way, which actually paved the way for much modern social science, is that the way we think and act is very much dependent upon our socio-economic conditions. For Marx, material and economic relations has the priority. But I could easily see our ideas as conditioned upon other ideas, which are often linked to material and economic conditions, but not always. I think the idea of cultural capital, particularly as developed by Pierre Bourdieu, can be just as important a question as economic capital in understanding the economy of ideas and their production.


All this is true, though I would say that even Bourdieu's analysis could easily be interpreted within Marx' historical materialism. Althusser, for example, argued quite convincingly that the ideological superstructure has an important reciprocal effect on the mode and relations of production. Most importantly, they ensure their reproduction. Cultural and social capital highlight important components of social class and, to be Althusserian, denote the kind of stratified (ideological) capital that ensures the reproduction of our material relations. It isn't just that we need to reproduce economic class relations in general, but we also must reproduce the distinct positions within those economic class systems (i.e. the kind of division of labor that is required for our current mode of production). So it is important that we have so many (bot not too many) blue-collar workers, etc. Even though a miner makes about 80-90k a year in West Virginia, it is important that not everyone becomes a miner. Similarly, it is important that not everyone wants to become a professor. The latter is of a higher social (though not economic) class: it commands higher social prestige (even though most make less than a miner) and is more easily attained by those endowed with the right sorts of cultural and economic capital. Capital, in other words, that the sons and daughters of miners from a small town are systematically deprived of.

That being said, I am still not satisfied with how precise we've characterized Marx's thesis, i.e., his historical materialism.
#14456154
Vera wrote:I apologize for the amount of time it takes me to respond. I will, for now, respond to anticlimacus and then make my way to respond to TIG. My apologies.

No worries. Between kids, work, and wife it's difficult for me to keep up with posts too.

Vera wrote:That being said, I am still not satisfied with how precise we've characterized Marx's thesis, i.e., his historical materialism.


Maybe this is a good place to begin. As far as I understand, the only time Marx entertained the idea of metaphysical materialism explicitly was when he wrote his doctoral thesis. His later writings focus more on historical materialism or dialectical materialism, which I think The German Ideology, The 18th Brumaire, and The Communist Manifesto are of the most important works in this regard.
Marx, The German Ideology wrote:History is nothing but the succession of the separate generations, each of which uses the materials, the capital funds, the productive forces handed down to it by all preceding generations, and thus, on the one hand, continues the traditional activity in completely changed circumstances and, on the other, modifies the old circumstances with a completely changed activity...

[The Materialist conception of history] thus relies on expounding the real process of production—starting from the material production of life itself—and comprehending the form of intercourse connected with and created by this mode of production, i.e., civil society in its various stages, as the basis of all history; describing it in its action as the state, and also explaining how all the different theoretical prducts and forms of consciousness, religion, philosophy, morality, etc. arise from it…It is not like the idealist view of history, to look for a category in every period, but remains constantly on the real ground of history; it does not explain practice from the idea but explains the formation of ideas from material practice, and accordingly it comes to the conclusion that all forms and products of consciousness cannot be dissolved by mental criticism…that not criticism but revolution is the driving force of history, also of religion, of philosophy and all other kinds of history…This sum of productive forces, capital funds and social forms of intercourse, which every individual and every generation finds in existence as something given, is the real basis of what philosophers have conceived as ‘substance’ and ‘essence of man’


So here from the German Ideology Marx spells out some of the basics of historical materialism, where history is the product of human activity, and activity that is specifically grounded in production and its means, which forms particular social epochs. Activity, as opposed to ideas, is the engine of historical development, and as the activities are centered in a mode of production (as human beings are essentially producers for Marx), historical activity is essentially reduced to class activity within a particular economic condition. He spells this out rather crudely also in the Communist Manifesto. But the 18th Brumaire is also instructive. Here is Engles’ summary:

Engles, intro to 18th Brumaire wrote:The great law of motion of history, the law according to which all historical struggles, whether they proceed in the political, religious, philosophical or some other ideological domain, are in fact only the more or less clear expression of struggles of social classes, and that the existence and thereby the collisions, too, between these classes are in turn conditioned by the degree of development of their economic position, by the mode of their production and of their exchange determined by it.


And now Marx:

Marx, 18th Brumaire wrote:Men make their own history, but they do not make it just as they please; they do not make it under circumstances chosen by themselves, but under circumstances directly encountered, given and transmitted from the past

Under the Bourbons, big landed property had governed, with its priests and lackeys; under the Orleans, high finance, large scale industry…that is capital…what kept the two factions apart, therefore, was not any so-called principles, it was their material conditions of existence, two different kinds of property…Upon the different forms of property, upon the social conditions of existence, rises an entire superstructure of distinct and peculiarly formed sentiments, illusions, modes of thought and views of life. The entire class creates and forms them out of its material foundations and out of the corresponding social relations


Like in the German Ideology, human activity is the engine of historical production. However, here Marx even more explicitly states that ideas are mere products of the mode of production and the property relations that follow. I put in bold Marx's use of "superstructure". So I think, for Marx materialism is essentially dialectical materialism, an aspect of studying history scientifically. This does seem to commit him to a form of realism, as ideas are relegated to products of material conditions of existence. More importantly it commits Marx to a sort of realism of the structure, where the social structure serves as a systematic condition for human action, in fact putting human beings into action. Thus, perhaps more important than even idealism VS materialism is the issue of humanism VS anti-humanism--how much power do agents actually have to affect history?

Althusser tried to give history to the social structure by showing how it reproduces itself, by playing back on itself (And TIG seems to give an Althusserian interpretation). But Althusser too gave the structure of the mode of production the deciding factor for determining history, and ideas. Agents are still passive to the social structure. This is where sociologists like Bourdieu, who did have Marxist leanings, and Anthony Giddens (less impacted by Marx) criticized this perspective--although Bourdieu, too was a staunch anti-humanist. At any rate, the structure is not taken as an abstract entity pushing forward human actions. Rather agents themselves produce and reproduce structure. The difference seems subtle, but it actually impacts how one really considers historical production and social relations: do we first look at a certain social structure and the relations it produces? Or do we look at what agents do and how they do things, and what positions of power and interest their actions place them into in relation to other actors? The latter perspective also allows for the importance of culture and the way individual actors think in deciding social transformation--although culture is fundamentally related to power and social interests.
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By KurtFF8
#14470616
Technology wrote:This is an interesting topic. Obviously, not being a Marxist, I can't address the specific issues you raised for Marx groupies, but without making a separate topic, the foundation of Marxism on materialism raises some related issues for me.

I've never really understood the suppose essentiality of idealism to liberalism to which Marxism contrasts itself; it seems to me that you can easily be a materialist and a liberal at the same time.


It seems no one answered you here so I'll give it an opening shot. The liberal conception of the economic system from what I understand of it is not based on a scientific analysis of society but rather an ideological one. The liberal arguments tends to rely on conceptions of freedom abstract praise of the intrinsic value of markets (they are good because they are free), etc. The results, historical progress, etc. aren't measured and understood by the social components (class, race, methods of production, etc.) but rather on conceptions of how much freedom has expanded, how many rights have been won, etc. Marxism distinguishes itself by pointing to the social and historical roots of these freedoms, rights, and how they are completely connected to the modes of production that dominate societies. This is something liberals reject.

Also, materialism in philosophy is simply the view that the world gives rise to thought, rather than the other way around, so it would seem that Marxism employs a sub-set of materialism, and not materialism broadly, when it sees human thought as driven by class distinction.


Well as others have pointed out, the relationship between ontological materialism and historical materialism isn't that obvious, and has never really been something that Marxists have emphasized too much.

I mean, I've never seen Marxists discuss genetic tendencies of humans which may act to hold certain trends in class movement, or discuss hysteresis effects whereby a system depends on its past history of inputs and not just its current input; in this way we can see the material world giving rise to thought which then shapes the material world to fit the thought. For example, an analysis of religious struggle in the Islamic world purely based on changes in class structure would miss the mark, because even if the religious tendencies at their formation arose out of economic conditions, once they exist they exist they have a life of their own. Saying that ISIS is doing what it is doing because "bourgeoisie" isn't properly untrue, but it's reductionist in the extreme.


Well it's a bit of a straw man to say that Marxists only examine class in understanding events. There are super structural maters (like religion, politics with a capital P, cultural) that do indeed play an important role in history. Even in Marx we can see a sort of tension about this: in his main works like Capital you would think he's interested solely in economics to understand how history moves. But in his writings on the American Civil War, French history, etc. he also focuses on historical personalities, outside matters, etc. The two are quite related, but to say that we can't just understand ISIS based on a class analysis, Marxists would say: well yeah!

This also assumes a sort of crude understanding of the Marxist class analysis, which has developed since Marx. If we look at Lenin's (and subsequent thinkers) take on imperialism and how the more advanced industrial countries exploit what we now call the Global South: this is a key factor in understanding movements like ISIS.

As soon as it is extant, the fact that people believe in idealist philosophies itself manifests as a material force of history. Marxists seem to get stuck at "false consciousness" as if it is a temporary brake on a current mode of production, and not a huge historical force of its own.


Well false consciousness is a tough one even within the Marxist literature. You have some Marxists who feel the concept needs to be dropped altogether because it was never developed, to those who believe it explains quite a lot.
#14553600
Please excuse this long delay, but here goes (as much as I can muster):

The Immortal Goon wrote:
In my interpretation, a materialist isn't as beholden to the concept of justice as a concept unto itself because justice—as we perceive it—is the result of something material. I, at least, feel perfectly justified (perhaps I should find a word with a different root, but good enough for now) in stating that justice itself is not a single static concept and is something that does not exist upon its own. Justice is, in short, an abbreviation for a society's understanding of its place in a material world—a material world that is ever shifting.


It seems right to say that the concept 'justice' has to be, in some sense, understood as a social phenomenon. I take it that you would agree with the following: a component of Marx's historical materialism is to say that the domain of moral philosophy and legal philosophy are, themselves, subject to a social scientific analysis. In what ways does our moral and legal reasoning relate to the social and material conditions in which we find ourselves? The Marxists hopes that this would make better sense of why it is that human beings, at various times in their social history, held the moral beliefs and systems that they did.

This is open to a prima facie objection: this method is (1) overly-anthropological or (2) incomplete. On (1), the criticism goes, the Marxist denies that there is anything we could call an objective moral assertion; all morality is simply what a particular social group prefers or takes to be preferred. This is subject to the standard criticisms against cultural relativism. Moreover, I see no reason to think that Marxism embraces cultural relativism. I forget the passage, but Engels, for one, thought that we could not achieve an appropriate moral discourse in a predicament where we find ourselves stratified along class lines. It seems that the suggestion is that we could achieve an appropriate discourse where moral reasoning is no longer hostage to class morality. There is, then, a sense in which the Marxist advocates for a universal morality. On (2) the moral philosopher may say the following: the Marxist may only claim to be making a methodological point, and not a substantive, moral one. Fine. But then the Marxist has nothing to day about morality, and t is perfectly appropriate for the moral philosopher to continue on with their research programs. I take this also to be a conclusion Marxists resist since Marxists believe that their methodology is a criticism of the research programs of contemporary moral philosophers.

I submit, then, the following challenge: an appropriate understanding of historical materialism, with respect to the analysis of moral and legal concepts, is complete only when we finally make the methodological point cohere with an appropriate resistance against the charge of moral relativism.


The Immortal Goon wrote:Reconciling the justice in stoning one's daughter is not the job of the materialist, in my view. But, I see where you head with this in questioning a certain type of morality. I certainly would never justify the stoning of a daughter, even if a good excuse could come about. In this sense, morality can be inverted into a kind of propaganda as anticlimus suggests—is it moral to allow children to do our labour because the market makes more money that way?—but ultimately, I understand my own sense of morality comes because of the time and place in which I was raised. Would I object if I saw a girl being stoned? Hell yes, even if I was in a culture that allowed such a thing as routine. This would, of course, be a moral reaction that was probably only hung up on the pretext of materialism were I confronted directly with it. But that's part of being a human being. I have wanted to punch people for strictly selfish reasons, but I have retrained myself because I understand things on a broader level. I can understand that knee-jerk feeling of morality but saving one girl from a stoning—as noble as such a thing may be—would ultimately not do a thing to end stoning. For that to happen, the material consequences would need to be altered.

And that may be the extra Marxists can offer, is a way to stop the root of the problem instead of the symptoms of the problem.


I have at times proposed the following: a Marxist can condemn, morally, those practices which are antithetical to progress, where progress is defined, roughly, as the increased productive capacity, per capita, and distributive capacity of a given society. A socialist morality will be that moral and legalistic framework in which a society functions without class divisions. Whatever moral and legalistic norms allow for the reproduction of such conditions just are the correct moral and legalistic norms (objectively speaking). Why? The socialist productive relations are progress productive/distributive relations.



I apologize to those I have yet to respond to.
#14554968
anticlimacus wrote:Maybe this is a good place to begin. As far as I understand, the only time Marx entertained the idea of metaphysical materialism explicitly was when he wrote his doctoral thesis. His later writings focus more on historical materialism or dialectical materialism, which I think The German Ideology, The 18th Brumaire, and The Communist Manifesto are of the most important works in this regard.


I thought that the following passage you quoted from Marx was most instructive:

Marx wrote:it does not explain practice from the idea but explains the formation of ideas from material practice, and accordingly it comes to the conclusion that all forms and products of consciousness cannot be dissolved by mental criticism…that not criticism but revolution is the driving force of history, also of religion, of philosophy and all other kinds of history…


It seems that Marx's materialism is two fold: (1) it is a methodological point about how we should understand the relationship between our theories, language, etc.; (2) it is a prescriptive point in light of (1). That is, a criticism of capitalism, on the basis of (1), is appropriate if and only if such a criticism does not preclude or come into conflict with the real struggles against capitalism. In a word: it is not progress in reasons that explain historical change (even change in ideologies), it is, rather, progress in social and economic relationships that explain historical changes (methodological point). Therefore (prescriptive point), the struggle against capitalism (or any economic or ideological system for that matter) cannot be merely a struggle of ideas (i.e. criticism), it must be revolutionary (or at the very least that which actually affects the underlying social and economic conditions).

I also wanted to get peoples's thoughts on the following thesis:

Marxist Supervenience Claim: The superstructure supervenes on the infrastructure. That is, there can be no change in the superstructure without a corresponding change in the infrastructure. A supervenience thesis is not a thesis about causal relationships so it does not claim that the superstructure is determined by the infrastructure.



anticlimacus wrote:Althusser tried to give history to the social structure by showing how it reproduces itself, by playing back on itself (And TIG seems to give an Althusserian interpretation). But Althusser too gave the structure of the mode of production the deciding factor for determining history, and ideas. Agents are still passive to the social structure. This is where sociologists like Bourdieu, who did have Marxist leanings, and Anthony Giddens (less impacted by Marx) criticized this perspective--although Bourdieu, too was a staunch anti-humanist. At any rate, the structure is not taken as an abstract entity pushing forward human actions. Rather agents themselves produce and reproduce structure. The difference seems subtle, but it actually impacts how one really considers historical production and social relations: do we first look at a certain social structure and the relations it produces? Or do we look at what agents do and how they do things, and what positions of power and interest their actions place them into in relation to other actors? The latter perspective also allows for the importance of culture and the way individual actors think in deciding social transformation--although culture is fundamentally related to power and social interests.


This might be above my pay-grade. I only have a passing familiarity with Bourdieu (mostly from an introduction to one of his works, I find the actual activity of reading Bourdieu completely gut-wrenching. He is just an awful writer). I see no reason, though, to think that Althusser would not be comfortable in saying that agents themselves produce and reproduce structure. All he would have to say is that this agent-led activity has a reciprocal affect on the infrastructure, no?
#14555481
Kurt wrote:Well it's a bit of a straw man to say that Marxists only examine class in understanding events. There are super structural maters (like religion, politics with a capital P, cultural) that do indeed play an important role in history. Even in Marx we can see a sort of tension about this: in his main works like Capital you would think he's interested solely in economics to understand how history moves. But in his writings on the American Civil War, French history, etc. he also focuses on historical personalities, outside matters, etc. The two are quite related, but to say that we can't just understand ISIS based on a class analysis, Marxists would say: well yeah!

This also assumes a sort of crude understanding of the Marxist class analysis, which has developed since Marx. If we look at Lenin's (and subsequent thinkers) take on imperialism and how the more advanced industrial countries exploit what we now call the Global South: this is a key factor in understanding movements like ISIS.


I take it that the Marxist position on these matters is that one cannot properly understand gender issues, racial issues, religious and ethnic issues, etc., without a proper class analysis. Speaking about race and gender exclusively, as is often done among the middle classes of the Unites States (at least in my experience), distorts real differences and exaggerates superficial similarities. We might speak of, say, the "black experience" in white-male dominated universities. But then there are reports that show that working class whites, especially ethnic whites (who are far more likely to be working class), report similar rates of imposter syndrome, cultural exclusion, etc., and their stories are eerily similar to that of blacks. The problem is that what is attributable, in large part, to a phenomena involving, crucially, social class becomes a racial, or gender, or sexual orientation issue and glosses over the fact that the experience of middle class professional blacks is worlds apart from that of a working class first generation black student and that the latter's experience is shared much more by a first generation working class white student. In any case, this is just an example.

The general point is this: I believe that we should have a quasi-reductive account of superstructural analysis (gender, race, ethnicity, etc.). For example, in the sciences we often think there is a reduction from higher-level sciences, like psychology, to mid-level sciences like neuroscience, to low-level sciences like physics. I want to say that a quasi-reduction is one that does not imply that our psychological theories can be re-styled in physics-talk. We cannot, in other words, do away with psychology and simply do more complex physics. The point is that physics is fundamental, psychology is not. Similarly, superstructural analysis is not fundamental, class analysis, on the other hand, is. It is the bedrock and there can be no shift in the superstructural facts without a corresponding change in the infrastructural facts.
#14556160
noemon wrote:The idealist(marxist and communist newspeak) also seem to believe that by imagining and declaring objects it(fairy-dust) can also create objects(jobs, wealth) taking the theory to its rational conclusion just like many communists in power wonder why just by exorcising austerity isn't working.

I apologise if my brief comment is out of place but that's all it is.


Noemon,

I am not sure I entirely understood your comment. So the idealist thinks that certain objects are constructed (well, presumably, so do Marxists I think. Radical thinkers tend to be social constructivists about many things like knowledge, laws, etc.). Are you saying that the problem is the extent to which idealists push this claim? Once it concerns empirical objects, then idealism has lost its mind? Well, if that's what you said, then I agree.
#14557534
Vera wrote:It seems right to say that the concept 'justice' has to be, in some sense, understood as a social phenomenon. I take it that you would agree with the following: a component of Marx's historical materialism is to say that the domain of moral philosophy and legal philosophy are, themselves, subject to a social scientific analysis.


This is how I understand it.

Vera wrote:all morality is simply what a particular social group prefers or takes to be preferred. This is subject to the standard criticisms against cultural relativism. Moreover, I see no reason to think that Marxism embraces cultural relativism. I forget the passage, but Engels, for one, thought that we could not achieve an appropriate moral discourse in a predicament where we find ourselves stratified along class lines. It seems that the suggestion is that we could achieve an appropriate discourse where moral reasoning is no longer hostage to class morality. There is, then, a sense in which the Marxist advocates for a universal morality.


I guess I hadn't followed this reasoning to its conclusion in this way, but you're right. I think something can be added to this in that Marx doesn't advocate for the kind of emancipation that Bauer and the other Young Hegalians had advocated, that is to say, an emancipation from other human beings. On the contrary, freedom is found by having your relations with other people uncorrupted and less alienated from one's self.

Marx wrote:But, the right of man to liberty is based not on the association of man with man, but on the separation of man from man. It is the right of this separation, the right of the restricted individual, withdrawn into himself.

The practical application of man’s right to liberty is man’s right to private property.

What constitutes man’s right to private property?

Article 16. (Constitution of 1793): “The right of property is that which every citizen has of enjoying and of disposing at his discretion of his goods and income, of the fruits of his labor and industry.”

The right of man to private property is, therefore, the right to enjoy one’s property and to dispose of it at one’s discretion (à son gré), without regard to other men, independently of society, the right of self-interest. This individual liberty and its application form the basis of civil society. It makes every man see in other men not the realization of his own freedom, but the barrier to it...None of the so-called rights of man, therefore, go beyond egoistic man, beyond man as a member of civil society – that is, an individual withdrawn into himself, into the confines of his private interests and private caprice, and separated from the community. In the rights of man, he is far from being conceived as a species-being; on the contrary, species-life itself, society, appears as a framework external to the individuals, as a restriction of their original independence. The sole bond holding them together is natural necessity, need and private interest, the preservation of their property and their egoistic selves.

...This man, the member of civil society, is thus the basis, the precondition, of the political state. He is recognized as such by this state in the rights of man.

The liberty of egoistic man and the recognition of this liberty, however, is rather the recognition of the unrestrained movement of the spiritual and material elements which form the content of his life.

Hence, man was not freed from religion, he received religious freedom. He was not freed from property, he received freedom to own property. He was not freed from the egoism of business, he received freedom to engage in business.

The establishment of the political state and the dissolution of civil society into independent individuals – whose relation with one another on law, just as the relations of men in the system of estates and guilds depended on privilege – is accomplished by one and the same act. Man as a member of civil society, unpolitical man, inevitably appears, however, as the natural man. The “rights of man” appears as “natural rights,” because conscious activity is concentrated on the political act. Egoistic man is the passive result of the dissolved society, a result that is simply found in existence, an object of immediate certainty, therefore a natural object. The political revolution resolves civil life into its component parts, without revolutionizing these components themselves or subjecting them to criticism. It regards civil society, the world of needs, labor, private interests, civil law, as the basis of its existence, as a precondition not requiring further substantiation and therefore as its natural basis. Finally, man as a member of civil society is held to be man in his sensuous, individual, immediate existence, whereas political man is only abstract, artificial man, man as an allegorical, juridical person. The real man is recognized only in the shape of the egoistic individual, the true man is recognized only in the shape of the abstract citizen.


Marx goes on to explain how to resolve that, to find the "universal morality" as you call it:

ibid wrote:Only when the real, individual man re-absorbs in himself the abstract citizen, and as an individual human being has become a species-being in his everyday life, in his particular work, and in his particular situation, only when man has recognized and organized his “own powers” as social powers, and, consequently, no longer separates social power from himself in the shape of political power, only then will human emancipation have been accomplished.


Your second point that:

Vera wrote:the moral philosopher may say the following: the Marxist may only claim to be making a methodological point, and not a substantive, moral one. Fine. But then the Marxist has nothing to day about morality, and t is perfectly appropriate for the moral philosopher to continue on with their research programs.


Is also valid.

Vera wrote:I submit, then, the following challenge: an appropriate understanding of historical materialism, with respect to the analysis of moral and legal concepts, is complete only when we finally make the methodological point cohere with an appropriate resistance against the charge of moral relativism.


I'm going back on forth about the, "charge of moral relativism." It's never really bothered me that much, so I'd be lying if I said I put too much thought into it either way.

I more or less always took your idea, that socialist morality can only work without class divisions as more or less apt. But I don't know that we'll know what those conditions are until we are in them. In the early Soviet state, there was some concern about how the youth were having relationships. But nobody knew what a socialist relationship, morally, would look like.

Having gone through what you, thoughtfully, but together above though, I'm increasingly thinking more about private property than anything else.

I didn't want to make you longer, and this is probably a bit of a disappointing post as I don't have that much to say about it...but I'm mulling everything you said around and thinking on it. I just wanted to let you know, if nothing else.
#14560828
This was a very helpful post. Here are a few of my thoughts on your concluding remarks:

TIG wrote:I'm going back on forth about the, "charge of moral relativism." It's never really bothered me that much, so I'd be lying if I said I put too much thought into it either way.


I have always thought that this charge should bother Marxists. This is mostly because it seems crude and naive. Moreover, I do not think it is endorsed by Marx or Engels. I am reminded of Kuhn's "Structure of Scientific Revolutions". The challenge there is to have a historical and social scientific understanding of scientific change without abandoning normativity and progress. It is similar, I think, with morality. The error made by philosophers, in general, is to treat morality idealistically: implicitly, it is static, non-constructive, and platonic. To put it metaphorically: the Marxist needs to say that moral systems are built but are no less objective because of it. They are sustained by real social activity, but it doesn't follow from this that any kind of practice is legitimate. The latter would be the relativists's stance.

You are right, though, that this Marxist view (whatever it might be) does avoid speculative ethics: if there is a socialist morality, sustained by the relationships of people in the relevant conditions, it is not possible to know it a priori. Ipso facto, it could never present us with reasons to abandon capitalism. Whatever reasons we have, they must be of a different kind.

Presumably, a Marxist believes that a socialist society is a progressive one. We do not want to say that it is in virtue of its moral superiority that we thereby should fight for a socialist society, nor that it is progressive because it is morally superior. More and more I am troubled by this. I believe it shows a sophistication on Marx's part that many of us never try to appreciate. There is a normativity in Marx (it is implicit and informs political action), but it is not moral; it is something else. It needs to be consistent with, informed by, and closely related to historical materialism. But how, exactly, does this work? What is the relationship between historical materialism and the normative dimension of revolutionary activism?
User avatar
By Le Rouge
#14570561
Vera Politica wrote:Here is in a crude sense how we could dissociate realism and idealism. Suppose we are talking about some object X. A realist about object X is one who thinks that object X exists independent of anything about minds: that is, independent of human conventions, language, etc. An idealist about that object will say that part of what is means to be the object X is to be conceptualized, or named, or..etc. That is, object X is, in some sense, not independent of human beings.

Sorry for not responding more but this seemed most urgently relative. Lenin insists that the error of the realist position is that while object X exists independent of anything about minds this reflexive thought-form is not a 'dead mirroring' but an 'active process' of human understanding. So while object X exist independently of the human mind its relationship to the human mind is active process and this relational consciousness is highly important.

So let us say object X is materially real for itself. This is the materialist position.
But Marx and Lenin raise the materialist position to this:
object X is materially real for itself and real for the Other, human consciousness.
Being real for human conscious is a process of reflexive understanding which permits the growth of knowledge.

I'd write more but I've lost my train of thought. Mainly I'm trying to raise three issues: material object x, material object x for human consciousness, and material object for human consciousness as a process (and moreover, as a process of practical understanding).
This link could be helpful:
https://www.marxists.org/reference/subj ... /cliff.htm

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