Inherent Nature of man - Does one exist?

[Potyondi]

Is there an inherent nature of man? Is he born "good" or "evil"? Greedy and selfish or altruistic and selfless? Or is he neither, a tabula rasa (blank slate) as Locke described.

I believe that men are born with no inherent nature whatsoever. To some extent their personalities are determined by their genetics, but their attitudes are completely independent of that. Instead, they are products of their environments. If I separate two identical twins at birth and raise them in completely different conditions, they will be completely different people.

In the words of Marx, "It is not man's consciousness which determines his existence, but on the contrary, it is his social existence which determines his consciousness."

Thoughts?

[peaccenicked]

I find 'nature' such a bland word, if you think of how many adjectives can be put in front biological, species,
poetic ....
Aristotle says man is essentially social.

[Valkyrie]

I think human beings on the average tend to be a docile species. much more naturally inclined to follow the herd, than to stray from the pack.

I think people are genetically predisposed of having aggressiveness or passivity in their genes; (and not one or the other being "good" or "bad.") which would either develop or lie latent dependent on environmental factors.






(Edited by Paris at 4:29 pm on Feb. 28, 2002)

[vox]

Beware, friend Potyondi, of placing too much emphasis on your quote from Marx, for, in a hundred other places, he decried what he wrote there.

vox

[Moskitto]

No I don't think there is such thing as the basic human nature that everyone is.

Although down to their roots humans do think a bit more about themselves than others, the level greatly varies.

In primative societies, no one can survive on their own so people live communally, (see Indian proverb about the beggers making the curry.) In societies such as South Africa there are people who have grown up with racism drilled into them people often don't know much else. In Fuedel societies people live by obligations. In societies where governments have collapsed, it's knowing who's side to be on and how to avoid the death squads which is what people do to survive.

[Supermodel]

OK you have to look at this from a male and a female perspective.

Men's nature is to eat, fart and have sex.

Women's nature is to be very selective about just which fart is going to impregnate them as they will be left to raise the little fart.

Human kids take nine or ten years to mature to the point where they can survive alone, hence the growth of the nuclear family and the importance of the extended family in raising new little humans

What women want (the biggest, handsomest, most powerful, richest male who stays around to help with the little farts) is directly in opposition to how men want to live.

What men want (complete freedom to screw and walk away) is in opposition to how women want to live.

Hence the rise of communism (come over here and do your part, you lazy bum!!!!) and capitalism (my, what a big Rolex you have......)

[MJM]

Human nature is inherently good IMO.
If there's a car crash and someone is trapped in their car everyone will try to help them out. Now the car bursts into flames and the person is screaming for help. I guarantee you most people will have blistered hands and burnt hair trying to save the person trapped.
The ones who don't, far from being not good, show a compassion for their fellow man that made them too shocked to do anything.

Now I wonder, will any of them expect to be paid?

[Field Marshal]

I think I am going to have to side with Mr. Kurtz and Col. Kurtz on this issue. Human nature is inherenty evil.

[vox]

Supermodel's superficial analysis of gender relations needs some correction. After all, in a question about "human" nature, she separates genders, leading one to believe that both men and women are not, by her definition, human. Further, she uses right-wing evolutionary psychology (tinged with Victorian prejudice) to make her point.

Supermodel wishes to reduce humanity to the level of our genitalia, and base all further social organization (as her absurd examples of communism and capitalism show) on this reductionist and essentialist thinking. She fails, however, for her presupposition relies on gender inequality in a communist state, and that is, of course, a false premise.

Supermodel would like us to believe that existing gender relations and class relations (how can one be a "bum" in a communist society?) would exist in a communist society, but the implementation of Marxist communism would by definition destroy such relations. Which leaves Supermodel's cute theory ultimately meaningless.

vox

[El Che]

[email protected] SuperModel`s "theory" might be meaningless but then again i think its just a joke (and a good job at that).

As for the topic of this thread i would say yes i think there is some sort of human nature and i also think its not a prety one. It is true that man is a product of his enviorment, but you see that has nothing to do with human nature. The nature of something is the caracteristics inherent to that same something. Therefor to say that man is a product of his enviorment is to say that his enviorment, social, economic, political etc changes him. It changes him... hmm yes, but u cant change nature can you? Man`s nature to my mind is that of every other animal. That is after all what we are dispite all our reasoning, civilisation and achivements. Man`s nature is that of every other animal, instinctive, selfish and self preservative. Altruism is not "natural" nore is giving your life up for something... None the less we humans do this, we do with our lifes up for causes or to save others... We are altruistic... How can these things be in our nature then? do we go against nature? I think so, i think we can go against our nature because of our beliefs and our reasoning ability. We rationalise the world and everything in it, there lies our ability to go against what is natural in animals. But we are none the less animals. So is it our ability to go against our nature that leads some to believe that we infact have not inherent nature? once again i think the answer is afirmative.

[Supermodel]

Vox, were you aware that the average male thinks about sex every 15 seconds?

[MJM]

I think it's every 7 minutes isn't it? Or was it 12.
How often do women think about sex anyway?
I suspect it would be quite close if not the exact same figure.

[Supermodel]

You're backin' me up, MJM!!

Sex rules the world, not money, ideals, armies, or politicians.

I'm thinking about sex right now but I suppose I should go to another website if I want to talk about it. Besides, I'm at work.

OOOOOps there I go again, how long was that, 12 seconds???

[Fires of History]

Man has no inherent nature.

Man is a clean slate when arriving here; impressed upon from birth with ideas and beliefs.

Good and evil are too subjective to even mention.

I think humans will do and be 'good' if their needs are met; and vice versa.

Power to the People,
Trance

[honest intellectual]

Stalin- Consider yourselves as architects, engaged in the reconstruction of the human soul

I think people are animals like any other (although, of course, we have superior powers of reasoning and thought). We have instincts; fear, lust, desire, hunger, whatever. These instincts are cnstantly being refined and changed. History has shown that complete reversal of these instincts is possible, but not with all members of a society (for example, puritans who live chaste lives because "sex is evil"). Similarly, in a communst society, people can be persuaded by the culture in which they are raised to be "good" , to work for society.

[vox]

SM,

I'm aware of the statisitics. However, to say that humankind is somehow determined by nothing but sexual desire is to, as I said, reduce humankind to its genialia.

It is possible that you see no farther than your crotch, but it is also possible that I see not only beyond yours, but mine as well.

Your reductionist philosophy is well established, to be sure, but it stands against Marxism.

vox (not thinking about sex, but political economy)

[munkey soup]

Humans are complex characters that will never be fully understood, there are just too many questions with too many answers. Are we born with a lust for spirituality or are we just taught this?(consiously and unconsiously). Are we just big balls of instincts? Why are so many people arseholes? and so on.

[munkey soup]

c'mon vox, you're telling me you can actually see past your fundamental human urges. While I agree that sex does not run the world(I'm sure supermodel wasn't too serious) and that to a point, people can contain themselves, the reason people do the things they do is too bag that ultimate mate. But I do also believe that one can give one's self to a cause and rise above basic human desire, but that those are few and far between.

[TheDerminator]

Marx made more than a few theoretical errors "it is not man's consciousness which determines his existence, but on the contrary, it is his social existence, which determines his consciousness" was the major error which underpinned his historical analysis. It even contradicts something in his Theses on Feurbach and that is the crude materialism of Feurbach, "forgets that people can change their own circumstances". Sounds like political consciousness to me.
Likewise, Lenin changed the goal posts somewhat when we wrote that "the political having primacy over the economic is the ABC" of Marxism" It was Lenin's major contribution to the development of Marxism, and actually is not inconsistent Marxism, because the essence or economic base creates the cause within the superstructure, and the cause "political consciousness" is the primary determination for bringing about change.
Unfortunately, even though it does possess some self-consistency, it is still a huge contradiction, because it is asking an extremely important question about the role of consciousness within human historical development.
For non-Marxists, the most famous quote within philosophy is "I think, therefore I am" and in the idealistic context of the arguments of Descartes, this is the only interpretation you should put on the translation of "Ergo sum cognito" With the first quote from Marx above, Marx is positing himself in contrast to Descartes, with "I am, therefore I think" It is the only interpretation. Consciousness determining against existence determining consciousness. Ofcourse, one is complete idealism, but the other is reductionism. In fact both are equally wrong and equally right. Yep, weird.
There is answer to this veritable conundrum. Got it?
Nope. Well, it is simply that human existence is conscious existence. You cannot seperate consciousness and the human species. When our ancestors gained human consciousness, that moment defined us as a species. Our species cannot exist without consciousness! If you take Descartes out of his idealist method, you get the first empirical proof: I think, therefore, I am. Yep, you are thinking right now and it proves you exist. A strange phenomenon for anyone in the orthodox Marxist tradition!
Yep, Marx got his historical analysis wrong. Big style. Nope, the early barter system did not come out of nowhere, like God going zap from the Heavens, it was created in consciousness, so was slavery, so was serfdom, so was ... capitalism. Yep, as weird as this is going to sound the fledgling bourgeoisie within the merchant class in England created capitalism, and they were given a helping hand by Henry VII who reformed the taxation system, with the effect of allowing the merchant class to unite. Yep, unity is strength and these bastards knew it, a long time before primitive socialists.
Yep, the bourgeoisie did the most to create capitalism, and it is the Bourgeois epoch, not faceless capitalism, Marx unwittingly let the bastards off the hook. Yep, consciousness creates not social existence as such, but our form of social existence.
All this innate evil is the biggest lot crap! The "evil" gene is a brutal mythology, and again it lets the bastards who created the Frankenstein off the hook. As Marx correctly noted "people can change their own circumstances" We can get rid of the fucking evil.
If you think that people like Hitler, Stalin, Torquemada, Ted Bundy, and Jack the Ripper were born evil, perhaps, just perhaps, you are pointing three fingers back at yourself, and you are part of the brutality that creates the monsters, and perhaps, there is no perhaps, and that even ethical judgements can be objectified. There is a greater elucidation of this analysis in my treatise, Heresies on God and Freedom, which defintively proves that the concept of is only a human invention. Derminated.

[honest intellectual]

[qoute]this is the only interpretation you should put on the translation of "Ergo sum cognito" [/quote]

Do you mean "cognito ergo sum"? ;)

What does everyone mean by "evil" and "good"? I believe that, while we cannot act in a truly altruistic way, we can still be "good" and do good things. By "evil", I would take you to mean 'selfish'. IIs this right?

[peaccenicked]

"This translates as I am the sum total of my knowledge
Not 'I think therefore I am' which is a paraphrase, of less susbtantial meaning.
here is Marx on idealism in consciousness.
[...] We shall, of course, not take the trouble to enlighten our wise philosophers by explaining to them that the "liberation" of man is not advanced a single step by reducing philosophy, theology, substance and all the trash to "self-consciousness" and by liberating man from the domination of these phrases, which have never held him in thrall. Nor will we explain to them that it is only possible to achieve real liberation in the real world and by employing real means, that slavery cannot be abolished without the steam-engine and the mule and spinning-jenny, serfdom cannot be abolished without improved agriculture, and that, in general, people cannot be liberated as long as they are unable to obtain food and drink, housing and clothing in adequate quality and quantity. "Liberation" is an historical and not a mental act, and it is brought about by historical conditions, the development of industry, commerce, agriculture, the conditions of intercourse... "

[TheDerminator]

(Edited by TheDerminator at 8:12 pm on Feb. 10, 2002)

[TheDerminator]

Evil does not just mean selfish. The word evil can be derived from the concepts of good and bad. Good is obviously a moral value jugdgement upon what we consider as ethical, if it is not just to mean a good breakfast or a good cup of tea, which is referring to quality rather than to ethos. Likewise bad can relate to a bad case of the mumps, which again is a qualtive rather than an ethical judgement.
Sorry if this is turning into another thesis, but you are asking a very philosophical question. As regards, evil, think of a single murder and then think of mass genocide. The relativism of "lesser evils" probably pops into the head, but the latter misses the point. Racism, is still an intrinsic evil. The evil it possesses is an absolute, just like genocide, just like murder, just like capital punishment, just like paedophilia, just like rape and so on. These are all intrinsic evils, and relativism is only a mitigator, which lets us see that indeed you cannot compare a single murder to genocide, because as evil as the act of murder is the murder is not yet a mass murderer, and the judge should rightly take this into consideration as a mitigating fact. The smaller the evil, the greater, the mitigation, but you cannot change the smallest of evils into a good act. When there is no choice, but to take the lesser of evils as the only alternative, the lesser of the evils, becomes the good ethical response. Derminated

[munkey soup]

Munkey soup stares blankly at wall, wipes drool from mouth, and quietly mumbles, "peaccenicked and dermy guy smart, head hurt, go take nap now."
(sorry)

[TheDerminator]

Monkey Soup Sorry thinking about my stuff is hurting your head, but I am not going to patronise you. Thinking about the important shit in life is hard fucking work for anyone who bothers trying, and a lot people don't give a shit. It is hard work for me too, but as I mumble away to myself, and stare at the walls, I try not to stare too blankly, because the sore fucking head is a sign that I am making a fucking attempt.
derminated.

[Supermodel]

Munkey, my head hurts and I wasn't even trying to think. I think I'll go brush my blonde hair now.....and think about sex instead....

[munkey soup]

Here's an idea...
Mankind/womankind runs on instinct, our pure emotions. These are the laws before laws. While we can try to run from these by filling our heads with insane amounts of big words and theories that can never be proven, everything we do and say ultimately boils down to the basic emotion we are feeling at that particular point in time. A human who is 100% rational and feels no emotion is not a human, he is a computer.
I'm not saying we shouldn't fill our heads with as much knowledge as possible, but maybe there is a point where it becomes counter-productive? I'm am also not advocating letting your emotions run wild, we should try to control them to a certain extent, but look back at decisions you have made in your life and see if all of them are rational, logical, and emotionless.

[munkey soup]

Messed up on the "I'm am," sorry.
sex....huh? what? oh sorry, lost my train of thought.
hmmm.....sex.....damnit!?!

[vox]

Good idea, sm. Play to your strengths, I say.

vox

[peaccenicked]

man under capitalism is a wage slave.
man under socialism is a free creator
what is inherent to all human nature is conscious labor.
Capitalism goes against our nature.

[vox]

"man under capitalism is a wage slave."

This is, of course, a fallacy, for "man" can be a laborer or a capitalist, and a capitalist, by definition, is not a wage slave. Indeed, he is just the opposite.

When one begins from such a terribly flawed premise, it's not surprising that the conclusion is terribly flawed, as well.

Our friend would have us believe that Socialism is somehow inherent in an undefinded "human nature," but humankind has lived for a very long time without it, and so we are, somehow, to believe that "human nature" has been constantly thwarted! It is, of course, a ridiculous notion.

Too, it's anti-Marxist, for Marx held that it is only through the CONSCIOUS effort of the proetariat that socialism can be brought about. Peacenicked and other Leninists would have us believe that we are simple automatons, robotically acting out our historical role, when he submits such notions to us.

We are not, however, economically determined, nor are we determined above and beyond our existence, which is something that many do not wish to face, for it implies a dreadful responsibility. One can no longer say that "the Devil made me do it," for we are all responsible for our own actions, and our own thoughts.

Peacenicked provides a very pretty picture, of course, and one that absolves us of this responsibility, but it's not one that is reflected in the actuality of the world.

It would be far easier, of course, to relegate this responsibility to another, but that, alas, cannot be done. We are our own keepers, and we need to acknowledge that, constantly.

vox

[peaccenicked]

I don't think anyone is a simple autonoman.
only that the picture i paint is a simplification.
I did not incude the minority capitalists as they are so few of them, their humanity is alienated even more so than that of a wage slave. Relatively free
creative labour is a part of capitalism but it tends to be a pastime and under financial burdens. I reduce no one to the mere inhumane category of their existence. It is an insult from vain left communists and anarchists who
have an elitist blindness to anything that signals that the proletariat as a whole has to gain its own authority
as class.

[vox]

Peacenicked,

Just how fast can you backpedal?

Damn, man, take a STAND!

You come onto Hegel, then back off. You determine man's nature, then say, no, that's not what I meant. You try to, in this thread, distract us into thinking about "free" artistic ventures, completely avoiding the question of capitalist social relations in post-industrial societies.

Are your just a troll or a capitalist sympathizer in disguise? Or, perhaps, and most likely, you're a misguided Leninst.

Whatever the case may be, I hope that I'm not alone in thinking that your constant backpedaling is endearing.

But, of course, it gets worse, for you say, "It is an insult from vain left communists and anarchists who
have an elitist blindness to anything that signals that the proletariat as a whole has to gain its own authority as class."

Here, of course, you completely and utterly discount what I said, as if I hadn't said it at all! It's a trick worthy of any good capitalist. What I said was, "...Marx held that it is only through the CONSCIOUS effort of the proetariat that socialism can be brought about."

You wish, apparently, to deny that I've already said this and claim it for your own. I've been tolerant of your attacks in the past, but this kind of charlatanism is unacceptable.

I stand by what I wrote. You might be wise to do the same.

vox

[peaccenicked]

I merely expanded my reply.
I can not see your point.
how does the question of revolution negate labour
as the decisive inherent nature of mankind.
Do you rule it out as such fine but what is that got
do with the transition between capitalism and socialism.
You are beginning to sound more and more like my popperian friends who jump about atomistically everywhere missing the real argument.

(Edited by peaccenicked at 10:05 pm on Feb. 13, 2002)

[vox]

I've tried to be very clear, yet peacenicked still wrote:

"I can not see your point.
how does the question of revolution negate labour
as the decisive inherent nature of mankind."

Where did I say anything of the sort? And please, write in complete sentences.

Thank you,

vox

:)

[peaccenicked]

What I said was, "...Marx held that it is only through the CONSCIOUS effort of the proetariat that socialism can be brought about."
You are saying what then.

[Rosa]

c'mon vox:"We are not, however, economically determined, nor are we determined above and beyond our existence"?
do you really think that a child living in slum has an acces to a greek mythology,or Plato? or has a time to deal with it, when has to start working in age of 15? And where the hell could he hear about the author?And should read it in a crowdy room?and that associating with people of the same ignorance wouldn't disable him to value the knowledge? Bcs they are admiring the Oprah?
"A dreadful responsibility being here",
yes - but only when you know what you can gain for being a human being, and that's something that culture is giving to you
...or do you think that during one life in natural environment (wood, or a desert)
the one is able to gain all that you're gaining using the knowledge gained through culture?
and grow more?

[TheDerminator]

I agree with Rosa economic determinism, is crude reductionism.

It is a misrepresentation of Marx, since the The Commumist Manifesto emobodied the spirit of socialism given in the statement by Marx himself, that people can change their own circumstances.

The only way to go beyond the "common sense" culture which underpins poverty throughout the world is to create an alternative common sense which changes the social conditions which create the poverty.

The philosophers, including Plato, left us with a little ground upon which to build that new common sense, but we have to leave their idealism behind and create a practical socialist philosophy, that is accessible to as many people as possible.

Accessibility, is the key, the more accessible our alternative common sense, the greater our chance of supplanting traditional "common sense" which Gramsci, rightly said is crudely neophobic.

May the Force be with U!

derminated

[vox]

First to Rosa:

I have absolutely no idea what you are talking about. I don't mean that to be cruel, it's just the truth. I've no idea of your objection, nor of what you mean to imply by sampling the poor.

TheDerminator:

Then you agree with me, for it's a point I've made repeatedly. Indeed, in this thread I wrote, "We are not, however, economically determined...."

Peacenicked:

I agree with conscious, and unceasing, effort. I disagree with Democratic Centralism, which, by its very existence, needs to have a structure of command which then alienates further the worker. Indeed, someone called me a "workerist!" Hee!

I am not at all against, and you won't find a quote contrary to this, conscious effort. I AM against a political structure that alienates the working class.

I've been VERY clear on this, and I've not changed my position, which is, I suppose, why I'm wondering why so many seem so confused about just what I mean.

vox

[peaccenicked]

Democratic centralism as a command structure
the majority decides.
Are you saying you are not a democrat, if you disagree with what the majority decides so much then why not leave the party. It is as simple as that.

[vox]

peacenicked wrote:

"Democratic centralism as a command structure
the majority decides.
Are you saying you are not a democrat, if you disagree with what the majority decides so much then why not leave the party. It is as simple as that."

SIC

That is, I didn't edit that, it's what he wrote. I'm not quite sure what he meant. It sounds, however, like pure Leninism: IF YOU DO NOT AGREE, YOU ARE NOT A MARXIST. LEAVE!!!.

It's really unfortunate that things have degenerated to this level. However, whenever and wherever I've encountered Leninists, this has always been the case.

Now, once more, peacenicked, please write in full and coherent sentences if you can. If you cannot, then please try to write LONG, so it won't take ten posts for you to say something and then reverse it, okay?

Thanks,

vox

[peaccenicked]

You always seem to have no inkling of practical life and then confuse that with theory, If you disagree with the party that much it might be because you are a better Marxist than the party you want to leave.

[vox]

"You always seem to have no inkling of practical life and then confuse that with theory, (sic)"

Please explain to me, in precise terms, just how I do that, okay? I'm not sure what you're on about, but if you could quote me doing this, or something, rather than just bold accusations, I'd really appreciate it.

If you didn't understand something I wrote, I'm happy to explain it to you. Perhaps you could explain what you wrote to me?


"If you disagree with the party that much it might be because you are a better Marxist than the party you want to leave."

Umm, peacenicked? I don't belong to a party. Are you saying that this, like, umm, this forum, is your personal party, and if I disagree I should just leave?

Sorry, pn, that's just not going to happen.

Is this the kind of elitist attitude that Democrat Centralism invokes? It seems to me that you're telling me to leave, yes? (Perhaps I'm a bit paranoid. If any thinks peacenicked is asking me to stay, please say so now.)

I'm all about the practical, peacenicked. I still don't see how your Leninism is practical. Explain it to me?

vox

[peaccenicked]

I am not reffering to you at all but a hypothetical example. I have been the founding member of two political parties because precisely I felt that all previous parties lacked essential understanding of both Marx and
Lenin. You (hypothetical individual) have only the choices
put in front of you.

[vox]

Okay,

First, peacenicked says that he's not referring to me at all. Then he says I (hypothetical individual) have only the choices I'm given, because, of course, as a FREE WORKER I am too dumb to understand anything else, right?

This is the height, and the depth, that the arrogant Leninist garbage would go to so as to persuade people that they are not human.

People like me.

But you know what?

I STILL haven't heard that great argument against me. I've only heard that, somehow, I'm wrong. The establishment, Leninist left is as mediocre and foul as the right-wingers in this regard.

So, I'll be here, waiting.

Say something,

vox

[peaccenicked]

Sheer hulaboloo.
A command structure is at the essence of democracy.
If the majority decide to go on strike then as a rule you go on strike.
You are avoiding reality to perform your usual intelectual bullying childishness.
Here is what Lenin wrote,
"8. METHODS AND RESULTS OF COMBATING BUREAUCRATIC
PRACTICES AND RED TAPE

At first, most answers to this question will probably be very simple: methods -- nil; results -- nil. The decisions of the Eighth All-Russia Congress of Soviets have been read and forgotten.

But although the situation in this field is deplorable, we shall certainly not imitate those who give way to despair. We know that in Russia bureaucratic routine and red tape are mostly due to the low standard of culture and the consequences of the extreme ruin and impoverishment resulting from the war. This evil can be overcome only by strenuous and persistent effort over a long period of years. Therefore, we must not give way to despair, but make a new start every time, pick it up where it was abandoned, and try diverse ways of achieving our goal.

The reorganisation of the Workers' and Peasants' Inspection; enlistment of the services of non-Party people with and without this inspection; legal proceedings; reduction and careful selection of staffs; verification and co-ordination of the work of the various departments, and so on and so forth -- all these measures, everything indicated in the decisions of the Eighth Congress of Soviets, all the measures and methods mentioned in the press must be systematically, steadily and repeatedly tried out, compared and studied. "
Here is Lenin 'commanding' a struggle against bureaucracy.
Do I have to reply to more or of your ignorant drivel or will actually do some work and actually study what you just seem to know enough about to distort it
at its most basic level


(Edited by peaccenicked at 6:50 pm on Feb. 28, 2002)

[Rosa]

.to vox: you said that my example wasn't a good link to my point, ok, I'll try to explain: do you really want just for the strongest to survive,..and prosper? The weak but talented ones could give a lot to the rest of us: that's why you haven't convinced me that existensialism ideals are the ones we should integrate in socialist theory: I want to fight for the others,too - if they are not fighters themselves.
Belive that we should follow the ideals of making conditions that alow everybody to FIND, work on, and express their talents.(suppose that you haven't understood that part). And to contribute to the society the best they can. And not like someone with money and power would want to. Bcs his son, even if stupid, "should become university professor".And a boy from slum should work in Mc-something, so why should he read greek mythology (per example).
I'll repeat: dissagree with you in that "everybody should fight for himself", bcs the 1)CAP SYSTEM UNABLES PEOPLE TO FIND THEMSELVES,2)NOT EVERYONE IS A FIGHTER ( as I see - you like Plato, so this should be familiar to you)...and think that fighters should fight in purpose of general good, ...AND FOR THE OTHERS. sorry if my writings are confused, hope you'll manage...

[ZaPaTiStA SoCiAlIsTa]

This is interesting, i though humans are born inherently greedy and il-spirited, but know i firmly Believe that all humans are born with a blank slate, like you said, but they are molded by their society and what society dictates. I think if you could get people who arnt programed by the system yet and allow them to join a community where Individualism didnt exist and they worked for the benifit for thier community, then they will learn that they all live better in a society which is based on mutual aid and the best standard of living for all of them.

[peaccenicked]

This moulding is known as the social reproduction
of the working class.This a process by which individuals are shaped into units of capitalist labour. What disrupts
it is cultural traditions and trade union and socialist practice. Labour is shown to be the decisive inherent quality of man and the essential feature that defines his development. We even go through 'labour' to get born.

[vox]

Rosa,

I went back and read what was written previously and I think that I understand the problem.

When I said that "WE" are not determined, I was refering to humankind in general, not to specific individuals, though I was still say, in no uncertain terms, that even individuals are not economically determined. What are determined are people's alternatives.

Harrington called this the "all pervasive light," in that, while it doesn't determine us as human beings, our economic class certainly determines, to a large extent, the avenues of our humanity that we are able to explore. Indeed, I agree with you completely on many points.

However, if we, as human beings, were to be completely economically determined in all aspects of our being, then why would any poor child even want to know about Greek mythology? See what I mean? That would be economics determining our very humanity, and you and I agree that doesn't happen.

To state it another way, I do not believe that class determines each individual person at all, but it can very well restrict the way in which a person is treated, and the way in which a person is conditioned to respond. This is one of the foulest aspects of the class structure, to me.

vox

[peaccenicked]

Vox renders himself more 'pround' than Marx
Karl Marx
Economic and Philosophical Manuscripts of 1844


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The Power of Money
[40] If man’s feelings, passions, etc., are not merely anthropological phenomena in the (narrower) sense, but truly ontological [41] affirmation of being (of nature), and if they are only really affirmed because their object exists for them as a sensual object, then it is clear that:

1. They have by no means merely one mode of affirmation, but rather that the distinct character of their existence, of their life, is constituted by the distinct mode of their affirmation. In what manner the object exists for them, is the characteristic mode of their gratification.

2. Wherever the sensuous affirmation is the direct annulment of the object in its independent form (as in eating, drinking, working up of the object, etc.), this is the affirmation of the object.

3. Insofar as man, and hence also his feeling, etc., is human, the affirmation of the object by another is likewise his own gratification.

4. Only through developed industry — i.e., through the medium of private property — does the ontological essence of human passion come into being, in its totality as well as in its humanity; the science of man is therefore itself a product of man’s own practical activity.

5. The meaning of private property — apart from its estrangement — is the existence of essential objects for man, both as objects of enjoyment and as objects of activity.

By possessing the property of buying everything, by possessing the property of appropriating all objects, money is thus the object of eminent possession. The universality of its property is the omnipotence of its being. It is therefore regarded as omnipotent. . . . Money is the procurer between man’s need and the object, between his life and his means of life. But that which mediates my life for me, also mediates the existence of other people for me. For me it is the other person.

“What, man! confound it, hands and feet
And head and backside, all are yours!
And what we take while life is sweet,
Is that to be declared not ours?

Six stallions, say, I can afford,
Is not their strength my property?
I tear along, a sporting lord,
As if their legs belonged to me.”

Goethe: Faust (Mephistopheles)

Shakespeare in Timon of Athens:

“Gold? Yellow, glittering, precious gold?
No, Gods, I am no idle votarist! ...
Thus much of this will make black white, foul fair,
Wrong right, base noble, old young, coward valiant.
... Why, this
Will lug your priests and servants from your sides,
Pluck stout men’s pillows from below their heads:
This yellow slave
Will knit and break religions, bless the accursed;

Make the hoar leprosy adored, place thieves
And give them title, knee and approbation
With senators on the bench: This is it
That makes the wappen’d widow wed again;

She, whom the spital-house and ulcerous sores
Would cast the gorge at, this embalms and spices
To the April day again. Come, damned earth,
Thou common whore of mankind, that put’st odds
Among the rout of nations.”

And also later:

“O thou sweet king-killer, and dear divorce
‘Twixt natural son and sire! thou bright defiler
Of Hymen’s purest bed! thou valiant Mars!
Thou ever young, fresh, loved and delicate wooer,

Whose blush doth thaw the consecrated snow
That lies on Dian’s lap! Thou visible God!
That solder’st close impossibilities,
And makest them kiss! That speak’st with every tongue,

To every purpose! O thou touch of hearts!
Think, thy slave man rebels, and by thy virtue
Set them into confounding odds, that beasts
May have the world in empire!”

Shakespeare excellently depicts the real nature of money. To understand him, let us begin, first of all, by expounding the passage from Goethe.

That which is for me through the medium of money — that for which I can pay (i.e., which money can buy) — that am I myself, the possessor of the money. The extent of the power of money is the extent of my power. Money’s properties are my — the possessor’s — properties and essential powers. Thus, what I am and am capable of is by no means determined by my individuality. I am ugly, but I can buy for myself the most beautiful of women. Therefore I am not ugly, for the effect of ugliness — its deterrent power — is nullified by money. I, according to my individual characteristics, am lame, but money furnishes me with twenty-four feet. Therefore I am not lame. I am bad, dishonest, unscrupulous, stupid; but money is honoured, and hence its possessor. Money is the supreme good, therefore its possessor is good. Money, besides, saves me the trouble of being dishonest: I am therefore presumed honest. I am brainless, but money is the real brain of all things and how then should its possessor be brainless? Besides, he can buy clever people for himself, and is he who has a power over the clever not more clever than the clever? Do not I, who thanks to money am capable of all that the human heart longs for, possess all human capacities? Does not my money, therefore, transform all my incapacities into their contrary?

If money is the bond binding me to human life, binding society to me, connecting me with nature and man, is not money the bond of all bonds? Can it not dissolve and bind all ties? Is it not, therefore, also the universal agent of separation? It is the coin that really separates as well as the real binding agent — the [. . .] chemical power of society.

Shakespeare stresses especially two properties of money:

1. It is the visible divinity — the transformation of all human and natural properties into their contraries, the universal confounding and distorting of things: impossibilities are soldered together by it.

2. It is the common whore, the common procurer of people and nations.

The distorting and confounding of all human and natural qualities, the fraternisation of impossibilities — the divine power of money — lies in its character as men’s estranged, alienating and self-disposing species-nature. Money is the alienated ability of mankind.

That which I am unable to do as a man, and of which therefore all my individual essential powers are incapable, I am able to do by means of money. Money thus turns each of these powers into something which in itself it is not — turns it, that is, into its contrary.

If I long for a particular dish or want to take the mail-coach because I am not strong enough to go by foot, money fetches me the dish and the mail-coach: that is, it converts my wishes from something in the realm of imagination, translates them from their meditated, imagined or desired existence into their sensuous, actual existence — from imagination to life, from imagined being into real being. In effecting this mediation, [money] is the truly creative power.

No doubt the demand also exists for him who has no money, but his demand is a mere thing of the imagination without effect or existence for me, for a third party, for the [others], and which therefore remains even for me unreal and objectless. The difference between effective demand based on money and ineffective demand based on my need, my passion, my wish, etc., is the difference between being and thinking, between the idea which merely exists within me and the idea which exists as a real object outside of me.

If I have no money for travel, I have no need — that is, no real and realisable need — to travel. If I have the vocation for study but no money for it, I have no vocation for study — that is, no effective, no true vocation. On the other hand, if I have really no vocation for study but have the will and the money for it, I have an effective vocation for it. Money as the external, universal medium and faculty (not springing from man as man or from human society as society) for turning an image into reality and reality into a mere image, transforms the real essential powers of man and nature into what are merely abstract notions and therefore imperfections and tormenting chimeras, just as it transforms real imperfections and chimeras — essential powers which are really impotent, which exist only in the imagination of the individual — into real essential powers and faculties. In the light of this characteristic alone, money is thus the general distorting of individualities which turns them into their opposite and confers contradictory attributes upon their attributes.

Money, then, appears as this distorting power both against the individual and against the bonds of society, etc., which claim to be entities in themselves. It transforms fidelity into infidelity, love into hate, hate into love, virtue into vice, vice into virtue, servant into master, master into servant, idiocy into intelligence, and intelligence into idiocy.

Since money, as the existing and active concept of value, confounds and confuses all things, it is the general confounding and confusing of all things — the world upside-down — the confounding and confusing of all natural and human qualities.

He who can buy bravery is brave, though he be a coward. As money is not exchanged for any one specific quality, for any one specific thing, or for any particular human essential power, but for the entire objective world of man and nature, from the standpoint of its possessor it therefore serves to exchange every quality for every other, even contradictory, quality and object: it is the fraternisation of impossibilities. It makes contradictions embrace.

Assume man to be man and his relationship to the world to be a human one: then you can exchange love only for love, trust for trust, etc. If you want to enjoy art, you must be an artistically cultivated person; if you want to exercise influence over other people, you must be a person with a stimulating and encouraging effect on other people. Every one of your relations to man and to nature must be a specific expression, corresponding to the object of your will, of your real individual life. If you love without evoking love in return — that is, if your loving as loving does not produce reciprocal love; if through a living expression of yourself as a loving person you do not make yourself a beloved one, then your love is impotent — a misfortune.




--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

[vox]

I'd reply, peacenicked, but I'm not sure what "pround" means, and I not sure to what you were responding. Indeed, I'm not sure that you responsed at all.

vox

[peaccenicked]

yeah my mistake. It should read
profound.

[vox]

Okay, fair enough. That was question one.

What about question two? What, exactly, is this copy-and-paste display supposed to prove?

vox

[peaccenicked]

"It is therefore regarded as omnipotent. . . . Money is the procurer between man’s need and the object, between his life and his means of life. But that which mediates my life for me, also mediates the existence of other people for me"
Here we have Marx, making a statement which roots
social life in the economic base. You seem treat economic determinism of any sort as a philistine crime.



(Edited by peaccenicked at 11:27 am on Mar. 7, 2002)

[vox]

peacenicked, you sorry and deluded fool,

Marx spoke there only of life in a capitalist society. Surely you don't think that Marx, a truly brilliant man, was so stupid as to think that in a Feudal existence money was the only consideration? If you do, I believe you really need to study Marx more closely.

Only in a CAPITALIST society, peacenicked, are such things true.

This is the exact point that Harrington made.

Some, like you, wish to reduce Marx to an equation wherein money is the only player, but you misunderstand Marx in that you seek to destroy any other thread in the social fabric using the rules of our currect society! How daft and arrogant can you be?

Fact is, the pre-industrial Feudalism has very little to do with the Marx you showed us. Do better next time.

vox

[peaccenicked]

Marx is writing about the power of money, anytime.

[vox]

"Marx is writing about the power of money, anytime."

Anytime? Okay, then you disagree with Marx, right? For Marx based his finding on materialist thought, yes? And now you're saying that money has always played the same role throughout human history, without regard to the social relations of production.

Okay, peacenicked. Whatever, as they say. You ignore the method of Marx, as you've just made very apparent, but you embrace the ideology of Marxism?

I've said you're a vlugar, deterministic Marxist before, and you prove me right every time you post.

vox

[peaccenicked]

He is writing about the power of money at any point in its life time.

[vox]

"He is writing about the power of money at any point in its life time."

HEE! Hee hee hee!!!!!!!

You're a funny guy, peacenicked, for now you're essentializing money, something Marx certainly never did, and saying that it's Marx doing it!!!!

The lifetime of money, peacenicked? Please elucideate.

We could all use a good laugh.

vox

[peaccenicked]

Lets have a good laugh.
You are implying money is not an historical entity.

[vox]

Yes, let's have a good laugh.

Fact is, money as it exists today cannot, in any way, shape or form be compared to the "money" of the past. Peacenicked wishes all of us to forget the changes in the social relations of production between ancient Athens and modern Calcutta, and there are many changes that have taken place.

Money is not an "historical entity" in the sense that it has an "essence," but we've already seen that peacenicked is a vulgar essentialist. If money were to have the same "essence" all this time, then how could money change along with the social relations of production? It's a question a cowardly fool will never answer, which makes me suspect that peacenicked will never answer it.

Being an "historical entity" and demanding a certain nature of production and exchange are VERY different things. Peacenicked wants us all to forget that money can exhange hands without capitalism.

Again, peacenicked, you're just not quite there.

vox

[RedRevolutionary1234]

I agree. I have always liked to see what a person would become if they were raised without knowing what really goes on in this cruel world. If all they knew was love, thats all they could give

[peaccenicked]

"If I have no money for travel, I have no need — that is, no real and realisable need — to travel. If I have the vocation for study but no money for it, I have no vocation for study — that is, no effective, no true vocation. On the other hand, if I have really no vocation for study but have the will and the money for it, I have an effective vocation for it. Money as the external, universal medium and faculty (not springing from man as man or from human society as society) for turning an image into reality and reality into a mere image, transforms the real essential powers of man and nature into what are merely abstract notions and therefore imperfections and tormenting chimeras, just as it transforms real imperfections and chimeras — essential powers which are really impotent, which exist only in the imagination of the individual — into real essential powers and faculties. In the light of this characteristic alone, money is thus the general distorting of individualities which turns them into their opposite and confers contradictory attributes upon their attributes. "
So when in the history of money does this change?

[vox]

Is Marx dicussing Feudal society in your passage, uncredited as always, from the 1844 mss.?

Is he discussing Athens? Is he talking about Sparta? If he is, let me know, for I thought he was talking about capitalism, which is what I previously said.

Now, try again.

vox

[peaccenicked]

This is from the above passage were he is clearly talking about money in general.
As you would say to Che......about vanguardism
FUCK OFF.

[vox]

Ah, the old "fuck off" approach.

Sorry, but that doesn't wash.

If we agree that Marx isn't a Bible but that Marxism is a method, then one must look at the history and apply the method to that history. This, peacenicked, is the dialectic, right?

However, you wish to tell me to "fuck off" rather than go into any detail about the history of money. Perhaps, peacenicked, it's because you can't. Perhaps it's because you're iimpotent in this regard. Perhaps you couldn't find a quote to copy and paste.

Fact is, there is NO SUCH THING AS MONEY IN GENERAL but only MONEY AS IT EXISTS IN A SPECIFIC SET OF SOCIAL RELATIONS.

You may know Lenin better than me, but I know Marx better than you, peacenicked, and if you essentialize Marx, then you destroy Marx, for Marx was always clear that the social relations of production in a capitalist society are key, and this includes alienation and commodity fetishism.

At this point, your best argument is an insult and a Fuck Off.

You're too pathetic to believe. If someone as truly stupid as you could feel shame, I would say you should hide your vulgar face, but you can't even feel shame, I think.

So continue to believe that you're right. Continue to ignore context, ignore historicism, and believe that you're right.

You provide a jousting stick where others hold a lance.

vox

[peaccenicked]

It is impossible to teach an incurably blind person
how to see. Vox you seem to have blinkers on,
all you see is your own mis educated ideological
baggage.
I cannot talk about money in general.
Are you an ideological fascist.
I think that Fuck off is fast becoming my answer to
your intellectual bullying and fantastic claims.
I think it is becoming a waste of time to deal with
your ill conceived tangents, that lead nowhere.
The only purpose you seem to serve is buttering your own intellectual vanity. It is probably better for me to stay clear from what you call "masturbation"

Of course I can, there is no need to specific to any period.
What on earth is Marx doing.
It is not The power of...........x.......Money...
in ............z......... place. How did you conclude that.

[vox]

"It is impossible to teach an incurably blind person
how to see. Vox you seem to have blinkers on,
all you see is your own mis educated ideological
baggage.
I cannot talk about money in general.
Are you an ideological fascist.
I think that Fuck off is fast becoming my answer to
your intellectual bullying and fantastic claims.
I think it is becoming a waste of time to deal with
your ill conceived tangents, that lead nowhere.
The only purpose you seem to serve is buttering your own intellectual vanity. It is probably better for me to stay clear from what you call 'masturbation'"

Is that it? You can't answer so you accuse me of masturbation? You did not, for the record, answer, right? If you did, point out where. Quote yourself, peacenicked.

I'm sorry that you can't answer.

I'll give you another chance and I'll state my claim again:

"If we agree that Marx isn't a Bible but that Marxism is a method, then one must look at the history and apply the method to that history. This, peacenicked, is the dialectic, right?"

Do you agree that's right, peacenicked?

Do you agree that there is no "essence" of money but it only exists according to the Social Relations of any given society?

These were the questions. Perhaps you didn't notice them? Perhaps it was easier to attack me than to answer?

I don't know your reasoning, or even that any reasoning took place.

All I know is that I pointed out desperate flaws in your argument you chose to attack me rather than even make a pretense of answering.

peacenicked, you've obviously studied the capitalist approach when encountering a vox in the wilderness. Which is too bad, really.

Of course, now you can invoke your very convenient, but not too clever (it's been done) vox resolution and claim you don't have to answer.

However, the points I've made about money and historicism and social relations still stand. The only thing that there won't be is your reply.

vox

[peaccenicked]

It is better when you stick to the point and quit personal harassment. All this pissing about as you call it is putrid.
"Do you agree that there is no "essence" of money but it only exists according to the Social Relations of any given society?"
Firstly, there is essence in social relations.
ie Teacher/Student. The essence of that social relation is education or one would hope so.
Money is in essence the universal equivalent.
It has a history a beginning, a climatic middle, a decline and hopefully and end. The power of money as an omnipotent alienating condition of life is in movement also. However that movement does not leave in the Fuedal age, Money still distorts every single human relationship. Even our Leninist/'democratic Marxism" can be traced to the Bourgeois misrepresentation of the Russian Revolution and the anarchist champions of that misrepresentation.
If you actually looked at most of the documents available on the Russian Revolution, you might realise the eclectic nature of the anarchist approach and its
self serving purpose.

[peaccenicked]

Chomsky takes a one sided truth of the Russian Revolution and turns it into the whole truth of Lenin's role in the revolution. In doing so the civil war and the American and allied intervention, to use a phrase Chomsky is fond of using, 'disappears down the memory plug hole'. If I go home drunk to my wife and you spot
me, then tell the world I always go home drunk to my wife, that might not be the whole truth. Hence Chomsky's approach to Lenin is not Marxist by any means, and anyone falling Chomsky's steps falls down not only marxism but on basic truth telling. Nowhere do
I see Chomsky go beyond this old anarchist chestnut.
After the civil war, Lenin argued against, Trotskys 'militarisation of labour' and accused him of bureaucratically trying to harrass the trade union movement. Indeed argued for the independence of
Trade unions.

[vox]

"The power of money as an omnipotent alienating condition of life is in movement also. However that movement does not leave in the Fuedal age, Money still distorts every single human relationship."

This is the crux of our disagreement. I, being a Marxist, do not see any inherent power of money, even in the soft and fuzzy aspect of "movement" that you've put forth.

Rather, I see money as a manifestation of social relations which, in Feudal times, did not hold the same role at all as it does in any current capitalist society.

Where you see money as a transcendent thing, I see it as a relationship, completely and utterly dependent upon the social relations in any given society. You stand with essentialism and I do not.

Hasn't this always been our argument?

vox