Total?

[Dr.Claw]

I'm not really experienced in philosophy, and I have a question. Can you totally practice anything (ideology, philosophy, etc.)to its full extent? For example if you consider your self a non-conformist, wouldn't you be conforming to the idea of non-conformity or some non-conformist sub culture? Or another example if a nihilist doesn't believe in any ideologies, how can they believe in nihilism:confused:

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

These are called 'pragmatic contradictions', and they tend to afflict those who go in for totalising ideologies, as you note.

There is no way around them, I fear.

[benhur]

I'm not really experienced in philosophy, and I have a question. Can you totally practice anything (ideology, philosophy, etc.)to its full extent? For example if you consider your self a non-conformist, wouldn't you be conforming to the idea of non-conformity or some non-conformist sub culture? Or another example if a nihilist doesn't believe in any ideologies, how can they believe in nihilism:confused:

Everything is one, it just appears differently to different people.

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

BenHur:


Everything is one, it just appears differently to different people.

And how do you know that 'everything is one' as opposed to two, or thirty-seven and five eighths?

[You sound like a Zen Buddhist... :lol:]

[benhur]

BenHur:



And how do you know that 'everything is one' as opposed to two, or thirty-seven and five eighths?



"One" here doesn't refer to the number. It means everything is essentially the same substance appearing in different forms. Consider the objects in your room, they're all made of atoms, so there's no substantial distinction between them; only a difference in forms.

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

BenHur:


It means everything is essentially the same substance appearing in different forms. Consider the objects in your room, they're all made of atoms, so there's no substantial distinction between them; only a difference in forms.

Is that supposed to be a proof that all of reality, for all of time and space is as you say it is?

As I noted in the '@anti-dialectics Made Easy' thread (you have simply imposed this view on reality, based on a superficial 'thought experiment'):


DM: Imposed On Nature

Has dialectics been read from nature, or imposed on it?

It seems the former must be correct, since we regularly encounter these seemingly modest disclaimers in the writings of dialecticians:


"Finally, for me there could be no question of superimposing the laws of dialectics on nature but of discovering them in it and developing them from it." [Engels (1976), p.13. However, the on-line translation uses "building...into" in place of "superimposing".]

Why is this important? As dialecticians themselves admit, the reading of certain doctrines into reality is a hallmark of Idealism and dogmatism. If DM is to live up to its materialist credentials, its theorists must take care to avoid doing this.

As, George Novack points out:


"A consistent materialism cannot proceed from principles which are validated by appeal to abstract reason, intuition, self-evidence or some other subjective or purely theoretical source. Idealisms may do this. But the materialist philosophy has to be based upon evidence taken from objective material sources and verified by demonstration in practice...." [Novack (1965), p.17.]

Here is Communist Party theoretician, Maurice Cornforth:


"Marxism, therefore, seeks to base our ideas of things on nothing but the actual investigation of them, arising from and tested by experience and practice. It does not invent a 'system' as previous philosophers have done, and then try to make everything fit into it…." [Cornforth (1976), p.15.]

However, when we examine what dialecticians actually do, as opposed to what they say they do, we find that the exact opposite is the case. For example, Engels himself went on to claim the following of motion:


"Motion is the mode of existence of matter. Never anywhere has there been matter without motion, nor can there be…. Matter without motion is just as inconceivable as motion without matter. Motion is therefore as uncreatable and indestructible as matter itself; as the older philosophy (Descartes) expressed it, the quantity of motion existing in the world is always the same. Motion therefore cannot be created; it can only be transmitted…." [Engels (1976), p.74. Bold emphasis alone added.]

Had this observation been derived from the facts available in Engels's day (a policy to which he had just sworn allegiance), he would have expressed himself perhaps as follows:


"Evidence so far suggests that motion is what we call "the mode of existence of matter". Never anywhere has matter without motion been observed, but it is too early to say if this must always be the case…. Matter without motion is not inconceivable, nor is motion without matter, we just haven't witnessed either yet…." [Re-vamped version of Engels (1976), p.74.]

[It is also worth noting that matter without motion is not inconceivable; that very idea had been a fundamental precept of Aristotelian Physics.]

As is easy to demonstrate, all dialecticians do the same (the evidence for this can be found here (http://homepage.ntlworld.com/rosa.l/page%2002.htm)). First, they disarm the reader with the 'modest' sorts of claims we saw rehearsed above; then, sometimes on the same page, or even in the very next sentence, they proceed to do the exact opposite, imposing dialectics on nature.

Why they do this (and what significance it has) will be examined below.

Traditional Thought

In the West, since Ancient Greek times, traditional theorists have been imposing their theories on nature (as Cornforth noted, above). This practice is so widespread, and has penetrated into thought so deeply, that no one notices it, even after it has been pointed out to them. Or, rather, they fail to see its significance. [More on that below.]

Now, if you belong to, benefit from or help run a society which is based on gross inequality, oppression and exploitation, you can keep order in several ways.

The first and most obvious way is through violence. This will work for a time, but it is not only fraught with danger, it is costly and it stifles innovation (among other things).

Another way is to persuade the majority (or a significant section of "opinion formers" and administrators, at least) that the present order either works for their benefit, is ordained of the 'gods', or that it is 'natural' and cannot be fought. As is well-known, this tactic has been used for millennia; hence we have Theology and other assorted ruling-class ideologies. All of these were imposed on reality (plainly, since they cannot be read from it).

Indeed, this is how Marx depicted things:


"The ideas of the ruling class are in every epoch the ruling ideas, i.e. the class which is the ruling material force of society, is at the same time its ruling intellectual force. The class which has the means of material production at its disposal, has control at the same time over the means of mental production, so that thereby, generally speaking, the ideas of those who lack the means of mental production are subject to it...."[The German Ideology.]

However, as Marx also noted, members of the ruling-class often rely on other layers in society to concoct the ideas they use to try to con the rest of us into accepting their system.

In Ancient Greece, with the demise of the rule of Kings and Queens, the old Theogonies [i.e., stories about the 'gods'] and myths were no longer relevant. So, in the newly emerging republics and quasi-democracies of the Sixth Century BC, far more abstract, de-personalised ideas were needed.

Enter Philosophy.

From its inception, Philosophers constructed increasingly complex and abstract systems of thought. These were invariably based on arcane terminology, impossible to translate into the material language of everyday life -- which they then happily imposed on nature.

As Marx also noted:


"...The philosophers have only to dissolve their language into the ordinary language, from which it is abstracted, in order to recognise it, as the distorted language of the actual world, and to realise that neither thoughts nor language in themselves form a realm of their own, that they are only manifestations of actual life." [Marx and Engels (1970), p.118.]

Philosophers felt they could do this, since, for them, nature was Mind (or, indeed, the product of Mind). In that case, the human mind could safely project its thoughts onto reality --, of which true thoughts were a reflection, anyway. "As above, so below", went the old Hermetic (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hermeticism) saying. The microcosm reflected the macrocosm. The doctrine of Correspondences thus came to dominate all ancient and modern theories of knowledge -- in which case, all true, 'philosophical' knowledge corresponded with 'essences' that underpinned the world of experience. These 'essences' were impossible to detect in any way whatsoever (meaning that the 'uneducated' could not raise any doubts as to their existence), and were accessible by thought alone.

All this was based on the idea that language was a secret code by means of which each thinker (with the 'right sort of education' and class position, of course) could represent the 'Mind of God', or the underlying 'secrets' of nature, to him/herself. Language was thus viewed as a representational device (which was later interpreted individualistically) -- and not as a means of communication (as Marx and Engels had argued).

Naturally, this view of discourse had profound ideological implications, connected with the legitimation of class power. [More on this below.]

This ancient tradition has changed many times throughout history, as different Modes of Production rose and fell, but its main strategy and core rationale remained basically the same: the dogmatic promulgation of abstract theories that were said to reveal the underlying rational structure of reality, conveniently hidden away from the disconfirming gaze of working people -- which is why they were, and still are, inexpressible in ordinary language --, again, as Marx noted. [More on this below, too.]

So, just like Theology, but in this case in a far more abstract and increasingly secularised form, subsequent philosophies came to reflect the 'essential' structure of reality, one that supposedly underpinned and rationalised alienated class society, mystified now by the use of increasingly baroque terminology and technical jargon.

Unsurprisingly, therefore, modern dialectics was invented by a quintessentially Idealist Philosopher working in this tradition (Hegel), and it was appropriated by Marxist classicists before the working class could provide a materialist counter-weight. DM was thus born out of Idealism, and, as we will see, it has never really escaped from its clutches -- despite the materialist flip dialecticians claim to have inflicted upon it.

And that is why dialecticians happily impose their ideas on nature: becauseit is quite traditional to do so. Moreover, since their theories are based on ancient and idealised abstractions, they plainly cannot be derived from the non-abstract material world, but must be read into it.

But, in doing this dialecticians are (unwittingly) identifying themselves with a tradition that was not built by working people and which does not serve their interests.

Furthermore, since dialectics is not based on material reality it cannot be used to help change it.

Small wonder then that it has failed our movement for so long.

Hence, for all their claim to be radical, DM-theorists are thoroughly conservative when they try to philosophise.

Indeed, despite the fact that DM-theorists appear to be challenging traditional ideas, their practice reveals they are part of a tradition that is quite happy to derive fundamental truths about nature from thought alone, just as ruling-class theorists have always done.


You have derived this thesis from thought alone, too (and not very convincingly, either!).

[Hegemonicretribution]

It definitely seems that you have an outdated notion of absolute. The problems arise because you maintain a certain notion of absolutely or entirely on the one hand, and then try and apply it to different concepts on the other.

For example, when a nihilist denies belief, you cannot then assess them in terms of their beliefs (you can but this is not the point I am making). To do so would be to assume a non-nihilist framework from which you assess the situation.

Or the non-conformity case: You have to build into any reasonable theory of non-conformity a means of not conforming . The claim that non-conformity is conforming to non-conformity is either completely redundant, because it is inherent in the practive of non-conformity. Or else it assumes than any action or process can be said to conform to something if we expand our concept of conformity far enough, i.e. it is in the nature of anything to stand in relation to something else, and we can meaningfully say that it conforms to this relation. This to me seems to either devalue expression in ordinary language, or point to a problem with particular uses of words. I favour the latter.

Basically, our ordinary language is not a formal language designed to be perfect at expressing the sensible and non-sensible concepts thta we may wish to convey during a conversation. It is useful, as long as you keep in mind that its primary function is expression rather than objective meaning.

It is not that you cannot be an absolute non-conformist, it is just that you must construe absolute as a degree of non-conformity, rather than non-conformity as a degree of absoluteness. The degree to which non-conformity can potentially be practised is determined by non-conformity itself, rather than by a pre-existing notion of absolute as a maximum degree.

I started writing this to offer a shorter and less technical reply than Rosa's but I have just realised I can't really go further without delving into even worse stuff...In essence you can explain away this problem in terms of language, and an assumption that the concepts we assume in language are meaningful, when often they have little or no application in the world.

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

Hi there Heg; welcome back! Hope the course is going OK!

Can't agree with this, though:


Basically, our ordinary language is not a formal language designed to be perfect at expressing the sensible and non-sensible concepts thta we may wish to convey during a conversation. It is useful, as long as you keep in mind that its primary function is expression rather than objective meaning.

Not sure what 'objective meaning' is, but I also disagree that the primary function of language is expression.

Once you ask how it is able to convey expression, and what its significance is, the answer comes back: the primary role that language plays is communication.

I'm not sure about this, either:


In essence you can explain away this problem in terms of language, and an assumption that the concepts we assume in language are meaningful, when often they have little or no application in the world.

What exactly do you mean here?

Whether or not the concepts you refer to are meaningful or not (unsure what this means anyway!), every word in ordinary language is, or it would not be there.

[Hegemonicretribution]

Course is going alright, thanks, although nearly over now. You good?

As for my response, I will clarify a few points in a second, and I just realised how wooly some of my wording is so sorry about that, but I was trying to avoid technical talk as much as possible because Dr Claw said they were new to philosophy so probably wouldn't pick up on certain subtleties and distinctions that would have to be thrashed out in a serious essay.


Not sure what 'objective meaning' is, but I also disagree that the primary function of language is expression.Oops, I meant to use communication here, I guess I was treating them as synonymous, which I know I shouldn't really do. All I meant by denying objective meaning is that a word does not have a definite meaning regardless of speaker, audience, context etc.


Whether or not the concepts you refer to are meaningful or not (unsure what this means anyway!), every word in ordinary language is, or it would not be there.Every word in our language has an application, but this can lead to problems, especially when they are understood as meaningful independently of the situation in which they are used.

In talking about 'total practice' Dr Claw suggests that there is a maximal state of x which could be realised (eg total anti-conformity).

Dr Claw assumes that the degrees by which it (anti-conformity) could be realised are determined by a relation to a pre existing concept of totality.

Once the concept that totality is supposed to relate to is specified (in this case anti-conformity), then the operation of 'totality' changes too. When we use 'totality' in the unspecified sense we understand it to present us with a logical limit. When it is specified, then the limit that we are presented with is that specific to the practice this applies to.

So the concept of total practice is constrained by the relation (in this case) to anti-conformity. It still functions as a logical limit, but this limit is now specific to a particular practice rather than an abstract notion. It ceases to function as something metaphysical and free-floating, and instead relates to something specific. Containted within any sensible use of the term anti-conformity is the idea that anti-conformity is not itself a form of conformity.

...............I have just realised how long this will take me to express, so I think maybe I will defer to one of your comments which i missed at the time Rosa.


you have simply imposed this view on reality, based on a superficial 'thought experiment

I was trying to express a similar idea from another perspective, with a focus on language, but it is certainly proving more complicated than I anticipated.

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

Fair enough, there is not much in what you say with which I would want to take exception.

[By the way, I am fine.:) Glad your course is going OK.]

[Dr.Claw]

It definitely seems that you have an outdated notion of absolute. The problems arise because you maintain a certain notion of absolutely or entirely on the one hand, and then try and apply it to different concepts on the other.

For example, when a nihilist denies belief, you cannot then assess them in terms of their beliefs (you can but this is not the point I am making). To do so would be to assume a non-nihilist framework from which you assess the situation.

Or the non-conformity case: You have to build into any reasonable theory of non-conformity a means of not conforming . The claim that non-conformity is conforming to non-conformity is either completely redundant, because it is inherent in the practive of non-conformity. Or else it assumes than any action or process can be said to conform to something if we expand our concept of conformity far enough, i.e. it is in the nature of anything to stand in relation to something else, and we can meaningfully say that it conforms to this relation. This to me seems to either devalue expression in ordinary language, or point to a problem with particular uses of words. I favour the latter.

Basically, our ordinary language is not a formal language designed to be perfect at expressing the sensible and non-sensible concepts thta we may wish to convey during a conversation. It is useful, as long as you keep in mind that its primary function is expression rather than objective meaning.

It is not that you cannot be an absolute non-conformist, it is just that you must construe absolute as a degree of non-conformity, rather than non-conformity as a degree of absoluteness. The degree to which non-conformity can potentially be practised is determined by non-conformity itself, rather than by a pre-existing notion of absolute as a maximum degree.

I started writing this to offer a shorter and less technical reply than Rosa's but I have just realised I can't really go further without delving into even worse stuff...In essence you can explain away this problem in terms of language, and an assumption that the concepts we assume in language are meaningful, when often they have little or no application in the world.
Thanks this helped :thumbup1: