Date: Mon, 10 Apr 1995 11:03:35 -0600 From: Lisa Rogers <EQDOMAIN.EQWQ.LROGERS-AT-email.state.ut.us> Subject: DIALECTICS: THE VIOLENCE OF ABSTRACTION 2 -Reply This is great. I probably don't see all the implications because I have little exposure to the "mind-wringing" Dumain mentions- just enough to know that I'd rather avoid it. Now, I've found another place where I enjoy and agree with Marx' insight (even if I do take off from there in an unusual direction for a Marxist) - one cannot separate spirit from matter. Yes! I include in this the idea that one cannot "transcend" one's physical nature and that "culture" did not magically "raise us above the beasts". Lisa Rogers >>> Ralph Dumain <rdumain-AT-igc.apc.org> 4/8/95, 01:38am >>> SUMMARY & COMMENTARY BY R. DUMAIN -- PART 2 Sayer, Derek. THE VIOLENCE OF ABSTRACTION: THE ANALYTIC FOUNDATIONS OF HISTORICAL MATERIALISM. Oxford; Cambridge, MA: Basil Blackwell, 1989. (Ideas) Chapter 4 ('Ideal superstructures') is a real eye-opener. Let's cut to the chase: "In my view, Marx's critique of idealism involves something quite different from, and very much more radical than, this straight-forward inversion of idealism's supposed order of priorities, and the inversion metaphor is in important ways misleading. What Marx does, in criticizing Hegel and his 'left' followers .... is first and foremost to deny the very existence of the 'ideal' as a separable entity. The 'cunning of reason', the 'spirit of the age', Hegel's _Weltgeist_, the Young Hegelians' 'self-consciousness', and so on, cannot for Marx be the subjects of history for the simple reason that they do not exist. They are reifications: philosophers' fictions, abstractions made flesh, speculative constructions .... Marx's central criticism of idealist history is that it is 'an imagined activity of imagined subjects'". [p. 85] The whole point is that the products of consciousness are denied an independent existence, and consciousness is the consciousness of real subjects [p. 86]. But now: "But it is equally important to realize that the other term in the equation -- the 'material' -- is also and _ipso facto_ transformed. If consciousness ceases to be regarded as 'a living individual', but instead is recognized as an attribute or predicate of 'real living individuals' themselves, then the material existence of these individuals can no longer be conceptualized in ways which exclude their consciousness. The material premise from which historical materialism starts is not, abstractly, 'matter', as opposed to 'spirit' .... It is 'real individuals. their activity and the material conditions under which they live' ... -- real individuals who are amongst other things conscious, and act on the basis of their conceptions." [p. 87] Can I stress this argument enough? Please read it over and over until you see its implications. All the wasted mental hand-wringing (mind-wringing) over Marx's initial conceptualization of ideology, being, and consciousness -- it is to weep. Sayer goes on to marshal Marx's comments on Feuerbach and his work 18TH BRUMAIRE to drive home his argument. "Marx is precisely unlike his materialist precursors, in his inclusion, within what he understood as the realm of material life, of those attributes of human beings -- the 'active side' -- which were previously separated off under the illusory guise of the ideal. Indeed, what he retained from the idealist tradition, whilst resituating it in terms of the natural history of humanity rather than the biography, was a conception of the internality of the relation between what Spinoza called thought and extension. The reason inversion is so inadequate a metaphor for this critique should by now be evident. The metaphor suggests a simple reversal of terms -- 'material' and 'ideal' -- which leaves their referents intact." [p. 87-88] Has the matter ever been stated more plainly? Think of how much ink has been spilled over the question of Marx's materialism, citing Marx's 'naturalism' that unites the truth of both materialism and idealism. Further: "Now it is notable (and usually goes totally unremarked in commentary) that the structure of Marx's argument against the historical primacy of (ostensibly) other elements of what is normally taken to be the superstructure -- in particular, law and state -- is identical with that of his critique of idealism. His denial of superstructural primacy, just as with that of the primacy of 'the ideal' more generally, rests on a prior denial of superstructural _independence_ -- 'relative' or otherwise." [p. 88-89] And: If, with Cohen and 'traditional historical materialism', and with 'relative autonomy' theorists, we see the 'economic structure of society' as exclusive of morality, law, religion, science, art, politics, and the rest, then we have to conclude from these curt propositions that Marx was indeed an economic determinist, and a pretty vulgar one at that. This is implausible, given the oft-remarked undeterministic character of any of his substantive historical analyses .... His concern is to deny that law, religion, politics and so on have a history in themselves, which is independent of that of production and its social relations, He does not say these are epiphenomenal, secondary, subordinate, or otherwise marginal factors in history as such. The two claims are very different." [p. 89] Sayer further sees this very reification of concepts as a consequence of social relations, particularly of the division of labor [p. 92]. Note that _The German Ideology_ is heavily cited in this chapter. Also important for understanding the Hegel connection is understanding (for which Sayer credits Patrick Murray) Marx's reliance on Hegel's logic of essence [p. 93] There is much more detail to this chapter, but what a fresh breeze. Your Bhaskar can bite me and your anal-ytical philosophers can kiss my anus, 'cause today Sayer is my only sunshine. [end of part 2. I may write a part 3 on chapter 6.] --- from list marxism-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu --- --- from list marxism-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu --- ------------------
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