File spoon-archives/marxism.archive/marxism_1995/95-01-31.000, message 171


Date: Thu, 26 Jan 95 07:45:07 GMT
From: Ron Press <anclondon-AT-gn.apc.org>
Subject: Foundation/Anti-


1> 
Many years ago 1951 I think, I was walking from university with a friend who was a practicing Catholic. At that time I was just finding my way around the philosophies of Spinoza , Kant, Russel etc.
 
We had a disputation about materialist, or spiritual views of the world. I was not yet a Marxist, nor had chaos theory or foundationalism, post modernism, Postone , even appeared on the scene.
 
We argued for about an hour getting no resolution to the problem. Where upon we agreed that I beleived in materialism, amd he beleived in God.
 
I still beleive that there is no PROOF of either proposition. 
 
I liken the discussion going on between anti-foundationalism and foundationalism is of the same ilk. 
 
There is no resolution between the two. If the arguement is continued trying to find either of them in themselves TRUE, or a combination of them TRUE  there will be no end. Which of course is just what the doctor ordered if you are a philosopher. 
 
In the real world of "Toyota a Maserati" some how the discussion is  briefer. 
 
I personally am a materialist. Language, the beleif in God, Idealist, Fundamentalist, all of them are material. If only as synaptical constructs in the brain. 
 
But I am a materialist because it causes me to seek answers to problems. Problems of how the human body works, how the nucleus is held together, why my father was a trade unionist, why I became a Marxist and used my technical know how as a Chemical Engineer to help MK.
 
Seek ye the kingdom of God in helping others. This is a very materialist slogan. I think there is a lot of anti-foundationalism in foundationalism and vica versa. I think I sense this in some of the discussions.
 
By the way I read Bertrand Russel in my travels to Marxism. At the time I found him very erudite and exellent in the use of the English Language. I never quite understood him. Later I knew why. In stead of clarifying my understanding of the world he was obfuscating it with words. 
 
The value of what we say is reveiled by the clarity of the language. When I find the language hard I ask my self `What is he/she trying to hide.' 
 
Ron Press
 
Merely a child listening to adults talk while I am hungry.
 

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