Date: Sat, 24 Jun 1995 02:22:08 -0400 (EDT)
From: Jim Jaszewski <ab975-AT-main.freenet.hamilton.on.ca>
Subject: Re: "marxism", "dialectics" and "science"



On Fri, 23 Jun 1995, Justin Schwartz wrote:

> I think that if Jim wants to argue with true believers who won't raise
> questions about his core beliefs, he will be unhappy on this list.

	Using this line of argument is rather petty... 'True Believer' is
meant to paint one's opponent as obtuse and closed to reason. My
incredulity at finding 'anti-marxist' marxists here (as Louis puts it)
does NOT imply being closed to what they, or anyone else, have to say; I'm
only asking DIRECTLY (and uncomfortably, obviously) just WHY they ARE
here; I mean, why aren't they working for the Rand Corporation or
something..?? 


 I still
> find debates about who's a real Marxist a bore:

	(Gee -- maybe it's because he doesn't want such debates to come to
any conclusions...)

	And I am negative about attempts to 'prove' 'scientifically' that
Marx and thus marxism are illogical at the core ("Give up fighting, you
will never win..."). It doesn't mean that I don't want to find out that I
_might_ be wasting my life on a chimera, but I'm willing to bet my *LIFE*
that that won't be happening any time soon... 


 isn't the issue what's
> true, what promotes socialism and proletarian liberation, etc.?

	Sraffan, etc. dissembling does not, in my estimation (far as I can
tell), promote socialism and 'proletarian' liberation. 


 So if Jim
> and Lewis want to peg me as an anti-Marxist Marxist, that's OK. Je suis ne
> pas un marxiste, as someone once said.

	Ya right. Flatter yourself... Moi, je dis: Je ne suis pas une 
'Sraffaniste' moi-meme...


 What I'd like to get from them, and
> sometimes do from Louis, is interesting substantive discussion. 

	Don't worry; I'll have your back against the wall yet (or maybe
I'll just have you put against the wall, hnyuck, nyuck...  :)


> I'd alsp remark, with Rahul, that some of us who hold some subset of the
> views Louis lists below--in my case, analytical Marxism, market
socialism, > doubts about dialectics, anti-Leninism (though this less than
> anti-Stalinism), fan of Hayek,--held them long before the collapse of
the > USSR.

	_Obviously_. Whatzyer point??


 Of course in my case holding them at all reflected a certain >
evaluation of the Soviet experience. It seemed to me as to others that the
> USSR had failed long before it collapsed, and even before it was widely
> predicted that it would collapse.

	It was obviously struggling, but the death was far from
inevitable... 


 I'd also say that by and large >
analytical Marxists are scientifically minded types who have no patience >
for postmodern doubletalk--well, anyway, the views listed below shouldn't
> be lumped all together.

	What I've been responding to is just that -- doubletalk.




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   Jim Jaszewski   <jazz-AT-freenet.hamilton.on.ca>	[DOWN TEMPORARILY]
								|
   WWW homepage:   <http://www.freenet.hamilton.on.ca/~ab975/Profile.html>

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