Date: Tue, 6 Feb 2001 10:17:19 -0500 (EST) From: Ruth Groff <rgroff-AT-yorku.ca> Subject: Re: BHA: Re: Diffraction Post two >Return-Path: owner-bhaskar-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu >X-Authentication-Warning: lists.village.virginia.edu: domo set sender to owner-bhaskar-AT-localhost using -f >Date: Mon, 19 Jul 1999 17:04:34 +1000 >From: Gary MacLennan <g.maclennan-AT-qut.edu.au> >Subject: Re: BHA: Re: Diffraction Post two >X-Sender: maclenna-AT-pop.qut.edu.au >To: bhaskar-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu >References: <3.0.5.32.19990718134700.00e7be20-AT-pop.qut.edu.au> > <l0310280ab3b69639b737-AT-[166.84.196.216]> <000c01bece6a$3f2b2540$342029d8-AT-tbnn> > <3.0.5.32.19990712151505.00e66880-AT-pop.qut.edu.au> > <3.0.5.32.19990713130846.00e88100-AT-pop.qut.edu.au> > <000c01bece6a$3f2b2540$342029d8-AT-tbnn> <l0310280ab3b69639b737-AT-[166.84.196.216]> > <3.0.5.32.19990718134700.00e7be20-AT-pop.qut.edu.au> >Sender: owner-bhaskar-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu >Reply-To: bhaskar-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu > >Tonjimen, > >I am sorry that this has spawned two posts and I am about to give birth to >a third! > >Gary > >Diffracting the Dialectic Post two. > >Part three. > >Having had a fairly hefty swipe at Marx in Part Two, Bhaskar returns to the >critique of Hegel. I have, as indicated in my first post, ending Part >Three on page 96 after the sentence: 'I am proleptically interpreting here >in my terms… and entailing endist closure).' > >This is the place of the 'triple inversions'. There are even 'inversions >of inversions' it seems. Hmmm! Still each to their own, I say. > >Seriously though, mention of subject and predicate simply confused me in >this part. I will take a stab at it, but it is not much more than a guess. > >The Inversions: Hegel and Marx > >I. Hegel: absolute idealist ontology >Marx: universals as properties of particular things > >II. Hegel: speculative rationalist epistemology >Marx: knowledge as irreducibly empirical > >III. Hegel: substantive idealist sociology >Marx: civil society (modes of production) as the foundation of the >state. > >We are now at the top of page 94. Bhaskar rehearses inversions I and II. >For Inversion I turn to Marx's The Holy Family and the "The mystery of >Speculative Construction" (Marx, 1956: 78-83). I will quote at length from >this, because it gives the general thrust of Marx's method and also because >of its wit. > >'If from real apples, pears, strawberries and almonds I form the general >idea "Fruit," if I go further and *imagine* that my abstract idea "Fruit," >derived from real fruit, is an entity existing outside me, is indeed the >*true* essence of the pear, the apple, etc., then, in the language of >speculative philosophy I am declaring that "fruit" is the substance of the >pear, the apple, the almond, etc. I am saying, therefore, that to be a pear >is not essential to the pear, that to be an apple is not essential to the >apple; that what is essential to these things is not their real being, >perceptible to the senses, but the essence that I have extracted from them >and then foisted on them, the essence of my idea --""Fruit". I therefore >declare apples, pears, almonds, etc., to be mere forms of existence, modi, >of "Fruit." My finite understanding supported by my senses does, of course, >distinguish an apple from a pear and a pear from an almond; but my >speculative reason declares these sensuous differences unessential, >indifferent. It sees in the apple the same as in the pear, and in the pear >the same as in the almond, namely "Fruit." Particular real fruits are no >more than semblances whose true essence is 'the Substance" - "Fruit". >(Marx, 1956: 78-9) > >The second inversion has Marx as believing in empirically controlled >investigations instead of the speculative mysticism of Hegel. There is an >interesting aside here about 'preservative dialectical sublation'. I >understand this to refer to the conservatism of Hegel's dialectic, where >nothing is absented, but is rather sublated and preserved. I am currently >studying Benjamin's 'Theses on the philosophy of history', and it is >striking to see the parallels between the Hegelian dialectic and Benjamin's >notion of the 'weak messianic hope' that future generations will redeem the >past through memory. I am thinking especially of the Third Thesis: > >'A chronicler who recites events without distinguishing between major and >minor ones acts in accordance with the following truth: nothing that has >ever happened should be regarded as lost for history. To be sure, only a >redeemed mankind receives the fullness of its past - which is to say, only >for a redeemed mankind has its past become citable in all its moments. Each >moment it has lived becomes a citation a l'ordre du jour - and that day is >Judgement Day.' (Benjamin, 1977: 256) > >The remainder of this part is devoted to a four point development of Marx's >Third Inversion: > >III. Hegel: substantive idealist sociology >Marx: civil society (modes of production) as the foundation of the >state. > >The first of the criticisms has to do with Marxism's practical materialism. >This is fairly uncontroversial. >The second criticism is more complex, at least for me. It is that Hegel >does not distinguish between objectification and alienation. The stakes are >very high here and Bhaskar's reading of Marx's reading of Hegel would >certainly be controversial. It also has to be said that the discussion is >rather 'brisk' to use an expression of Outhwaite's. Presumably in the >forthcoming book on Marx and Hegel the issues will be canvassed at a deeper >level. Again this is where one's sense of the inadequacy of one's personal >grasp of the issues is painfully strong. > >(I had more material on this aspect of the section but there is a danger >of swamping the Bhaskar too much. So I have tried to abbreviate it all.) > > > >The charge against Hegel would appear to be that he universalises a >particular social phenomenon, rendering it as somehow an essential part of >the human condition. Marx's attack is that if we alter the historically >specific mediations of Private property, Exchange, Division of Labour then >we will have a less (non?) alienated society (Meszaros, 1978: 78-9). > >However Richard Schacht in his work on alienation takes a radically >different tack. >He asserts that Hegel did not confuse alienation with objectification >(Schacht, 1971: 54). Schacht's thesis was completed under the supervision >of Walter Kaufmann at Princeton. As such it has a Cold War flavour to its >conclusions which seem to point to the inevitability of alienation. >Nevertheless it is an interesting work and deserves more attention than I >have the time to give it at present. > >Briefly then Schacht acknowledges that Hegel had two concepts of alienation >(entfremdung) - one of alienation as 'separation' and the other of >alienation as surrender (entausserung). As one would expect the discussion >is very complex. According to Schacht alienation as separation has at least >three senses. The principal one refers to alienation from the 'social >substance'. What Schacht means by 'social substance' is not immediately >clear. The examples he gives though of non-separation are taken from the >labour process. Thus he speaks of 'roles' and 'groups'(1971: 38). There is >also the sense in which alienation here is necessary for the development of >individuality. (1971: 38-9). What Schacht translates as 'separation' is >objectification for Bhaskar and externalisation for Mandel (1971; 78), I >think! > > >An additional complication is that alienation as separation has, according >to Schacht, two features. Firstly alienation is a process of becoming. >The individual was at one with the Social Substance then secondly *it* >became alienated from her. > >However there is more to come. The social substance is the objectification >of spirit. But the individual is also the objectification of spirit. Both >the social substance and the individual have spirit has their true selves. >So the individual's true self is really the social substance. The solution >to alienation as separation comes when the individual recognises that >social substance is really its true self objectified and surrenders to it. > >I hope I have done justice to Schacht's discussion (1971: 40-52). The >underlying conservative nature of his conclusions seem obvious to me. More >importantly, even if they constitute a correct reading of Hegel, and I am >in no position to judge, they hardly discredit the Marx/Bhaskar criticism >that alienation as it is presented in Hegel is given an ahistorical >interpretation. As a result of which it can never be overcome. So the >upshot of Kaufmann and Schacht's work for all their undoubted knowledge of >the Hegelian texts is to prove that revolution is both unnecessary and >impossible. QED as the CIA might have said and probably did. > >>From this initial charge of Hegel's identification of alienation with >objectification Bhaskar moves to Lukacs' critique of Hegel. For Lukacs, >Marx always assumed a material substratum. As well the Marxian dialectic >produced change. In other words things could be finite. For Hegel life was >'essentially "infinite" and he spoke of "single lives" as "organs" of the >living whole world (Schacht, 1971: 43). (Interesting touch of the Gaia >hypothesis there.) So the characteristics of the Marxian dialectic are that >it has a base in the objective world. It is finitist in the sense that >things get transformed or absented. Change and novelty are possibilities. >It is also open and does not end in some putative closure such as a return >to the Absolute. > >We are now half way down page 95 and have moved on to the third critique of >the Triple Inversion (III. Hegel: substantive idealist sociology >Marx: civil society (modes of production) as the foundation of the state.) >This accusation is that Hegel has a purely positive account of reality. He >lacks a concept of absence and absenting and so is vulnerable to the charge >of ontological monovalence. On page 200 Bhaskar claims the discovery of >absence as one of the two great discoveries he has made in DPF. So there >can be little doubt as to the importance of this charge. > >I am not quite sure that I understand the next two sentences: > >The very most a Hegelian could say is that he is only constellationally >monovalent. But as Hegel is not concerned with the demi-actual, the >demi-present ( or i.e. the future) etc., this is a very weak response indeed. >III. Hegel: substantive idealist sociology >Marx: civil society (modes of production) as the foundation of the >state. > >The Hegelian system as I understand it is The Absolute - Loss of union with >Absolute - Return to the Absolute. So the Absolute could function >constellationally as overarching all that is i.e. the demi-actual. So in a >sense the Absolute is absented in the world. But the return to the >Absolute always seems to beckon, so the system is at heart positive. > >We have now got to the last criticism of the third inversion. We move back >into controversial territory here. Bhaskar argues that Marx has an element >of the teleological in his work. I think this is a fair criticism, >especially of the polemical Marx of the Manifesto. Communism is presented >there as the goal of humanity and the process of getting there does seem >somewhat automatic. By the time of Capital, according to Bhaskar, Marx >However what is especially interesting for me is that Bhaskar allows a weak >teleology, and it is located within the Fourth Dimension 4D of his >dialectic, that is, the level of agency. On page 169 of DPF he puts this >position thus: > >'Definitionally then, there is a conatus to deconstraint or freedom, in a >depth dialectic… and to the knowledge of the pwer2 relations constraining >the satisfaction of wanted need. Absence will impose the geo-historical >directionality that will usher in a truly humane human global society… >(1993: 169)'. > >There is a more poetic version of this telos on page 98: >'What is certain is that, so long as humanity survives, there will always >be a conatus for freedom to become'. > >I think the latter sentence is why I am a Critical Realist. > >This criticism of the Third Inversion closes with a comparison of Hegelian >thought with the Bhaskarian dialectic. > >Bhaskar: ontological depth, structural change, open totality and >transformative agency >Hegel: necessity, becoming, actuality, infinity. > >Necessity and becoming are it seems close to ontological depth and >structural change, but they revert to actuality (closure) and then the >mystical unity with the absolute or the infinite. > >All this critique of the Hegel - Marx relationship has been filtered >through the Critical realist concepts of the epistemic fallacy, ontological >monovalence and the speculative illusion. > >Some conclusions may be appropriate here. However I feel inadequate to >this task. However from the little I know, it does seem to me that Bhaskar >has a unique spin on Hegel and on Marx (to a less extent perhaps). A >comparison of Bhaskar with Ilyenkov and others from the Russian Academy >would be interesting and I may get the time to pursue it. > > >References > >Bakhtin, M., _Laughter and Freedom_ in Solomon, M. (ed), _Marxism and Art_, >Detroit: Wayne State University, 1979: 295-300 >Benjamin, W., Illuminations, London: Fontana, 1977 >Bhaskar, R., _Dialectic: The Pulse of Freedom_, London: Verso, 1993 >Fiske, J., _Television Culture_, New York: Routledge, 1987 >Ilyenkov, E.V., _Dialectical Logic: Essays on Its History and Theory_, >Moscow: Progress Publishers, 1977 >Mandel, E., The Causes of Alienation, in Mandel, E., & Novack, G., (eds) >The Marxist Theory of Alienation, New York: Pathfinder Press, 1970 >Marx, K., & Engels, F., The Holly Family, Moscow: Progress Publishers, 1956 >Marx, Engels, Lenin, _On dialectical Materialism_, Moscow: Progress >Publishers, 1977 >Meszaros, I., Marx's Theory of Alienation, London: Merlin Press, 1978 >Novack, G., _Polemics in Marxist Philosophy: Essays on: Sartre Plekhanov >Lukacs Engels Kolakowski Trotsky Timpanaro Colletti_ New York: Monad >Press, 1978 >Piaget, J., _A brief tribute to Goldmann_, in Goldmann, L., Cultural >Creation, St. Louis: Telos Press, 1979: 125-7 >Ruben, D-H, _Marxism and Dialectics_, in Mepham, J., & Ruben D-H. (eds) >_Issues in Marxist Philosophy_, London: The Harvester Press, 1979: 37-87 >Schacht, R., _Alienation_, London: Allen & Unwin, 1971 > > > > --- from list bhaskar-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu --- > --- from list bhaskar-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu ---
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