Month: January 2020

entry 17

In this entry I return to a my main projects: criticism of rationalism and rationality. Reading this note now, it seems rather speculative and maybe unfair. It was written several months before I planned on starting this blog, and I didn’t even write down which book the quote was from. But whether the quote is precise or correctly attributed isn’t really relevant to the main points here. And expansive speculation and mental gymnastics are productive and healthy. Also, the more dominant and historically causal/operative a tradition, the stronger society’s attempted criticism must be – as it is correspondingly more important to make sure that the tradition isn’t fundamentally flawed and imbalanced and to test/explore ways in which it might be…

How my anti-rationalism may connect to [analysis of the meaning behind] seemingly anodyne rationalist maxims, for example what Karl Popper states as a credo¹ of his:

1: ”I accept that I may be wrong” 

Consider the quote not simply at face value but in the context of Popper communicating/laying out his philosophy and calling it a credo. It seems clear that it must mean something other than the literal², particular meaning – a personal statement – as this would be trivial and irrelevant to his project. I think he means to imply a general methodological rule and that what we see here is a prescriptive/normative statement formulated as acceptance/seeing of reality – I propose that rationalists’ actual meaning of such credos/maxims is something like these paraphrases:

1p₁: I should/must admit that I am wrong in cases where [rational] reason(s) dictate so.

1p₂: If I am faced by a logically sound [counter-]argument & I am [in the moment] unable to come up with rational/explicit/clear reasons for a premise of the counter-argument being incorrect³, i.e. reasons with which to defend my position – and if I proceed based simply on a *reasonless* un-convincedness, i.e. a feeling/intuition that I am nevertheless right, then this is irrational, unreasonable of me! (and this even in the moral sense!) 

When thus interpreted, many problems arise [in a world in which we follow the credo]:

    • Conformity to standard established/accepted language – & thus to currently dominant conceptual paradigm – becomes prerequisite to inclusion in discourse! (One is excluded as soon as one sticks to a position in the face of rational reasons – despite only having a reason that doesn’t conform to the criteria of dominant rationality.)
    • Only those concepts are permitted for which there are/is currently available language/terminology.³ (If, to defend oneself, one uses a word that is meaningless to a rationalist, then they will say that you must accept you are wrong.)
    • …Non-rationalism is confused with infallibilism!

also connected:

    • debating: Adeptness in established/dominant linguo-conceptual paradigm and in ability to connect ideas/positions to the terminology of the paradigm/tradition gives a prohibitive advantage which can be utilized and presided over in a lawyerly fashion…This is a technical, non-philosophical mastery in contrast to what should really count and be made visible in debate – the brilliance of the actual idea/position.
    • conservatism: It is too easy to rationally defend established ideas and ways of speaking against new ideas that have not yet had time and space to fully take form and be institutionalized in systems of abstractions and in terminology/language/culture…

¹ It is ironic and fitting that, whilst religions state their credos openly and sincerely, rationalists state their credos with ostensible irony.

² – This would also be ironic given rationalism’s general linguistic methodology of clarity, precision and literalism.

³ see Paul Feyerabend: Erkenntnis für Freie Menschen p.47 footnote

 

entry 16

Here I develop and explicate both my critique of marxist Dialectic Materialism and aspects of my own philosophy through interpreting & commenting on a passage by David Harvey, a respected contemporary author on the left.

”Marx […] insists that only by transforming the world can we transform ourselves; that it is impossible to understand the world without simultaneously changing it as well as ourselves.” (David Harvey: Justice, Nature and the Geography of Difference (1996), p.56)
 
 

Now, I agree prima-facie with the passage and find it basically fine, at least on a technical/extensional level.* But I’m going to contrast two possible interpretations of the passage that have significantly different implications – my view of the dialectic of transforming our world [from capitalism to something better], and a second interpretation that is partly different and that may reflect marxist thinking.**

I see a process consisting, basically, of complementary and synchronized halves:

Half (h1) is the stepwise building of a post-capitalist world – in our individual and collective minds and in society and economy*** – with each step requiring that both a) the previous step is in place as a basis to build on, and b) material and ideological space for the new step to be built into is free.

Half (h2) is the process that makes space available in the current world for (h1), i.e. to grow and build a post-capitalist world into: It is a commensurate stepwise/layerwise process of capitalist reality receding, synchronized with availability of a next step of (h1) to replace the part of capitalism that is removed.

The marxist version is identical except for the process half (h2) not being required to be gradual and commensurate – it may be an abrupt, violent process [and is seen as such as the default].

So, why these two variations and how do they relate to the quoted passage? This may become clearer as I elaborate the side of each half**** that concerns understanding or ideology, i.e. the mental side:

regarding (h1):  Each step of this positive transformation consists of material and ideological changes that reciprocally cause and require each other, much as described in entry 11. The ideological side of this includes building an understanding of how a post-capitalist world works and of ourselves as minds/subjects within post-capitalist society – with this gradually forming an ideology that is both institutionalized in society and manifested in post-capitalist economy[ ,replacing the institutions of capitalist realism and economy]. And of course each ideological step of change requires the material and ideological changes of the previous step to be in place, i.e. it requires the previous step of transformation of the world.

regarding (h2): The process of capitalism shrinking and diminishing materially and ideologically has to be stepwise – or layerwise – and commensurate with the organic growth of post-capitalism because: Capitalist reality is an ideological and material reality structure of the same quality and requiring the same approach as any other: Its foundations/principles produce and re-produce capitalist reality, blocking alternative manifestations, as long as that institutionalized ideological structure is in place. And it remains in place – in individual and collective institutions/structures of culture and tradition – until it is made conscious, understood and can then be negated with precision – and one must build an understanding[/consciousness] of [unconscious] capitalist ideology just like building any other theory or understanding of some complex process/structure that one does not understand. This gradual building of a complete understanding of capitalist reality is a gradual disruption and erosion of capitalist ideology and reality, and it is the only way to truly free up space for an alternative reality to grow.

now to re-simplify and contrast the two interpretations and two versions of the transformation process:

Marxist version: We gradually/dialectically democratize/positively transform the world and our individual and collective minds, made possible by a non-gradual and non-dialectic, material-revolutionary disruption of material capitalist relations.

My version: two complementary and synchronized processes: We gradually/dialectically de-capitalize material and ideological systems/processes, including our own minds – whilst gradually/dialectically democratizing/socializing/positively transforming the world and our individual and collective minds.

which brings me to the core of my thesis regarding sustainable and positive global transformation:

The synchronized change of these two halves produces a moving central nexus in which the two halves reciprocally facilitate and cause each other – an active core in which we are switching capitalist relations to social relations and making visible the next layer of the remaining capitalist reality and working out what to replace it with. Any change is at the same time progress in our understanding of ourselves as parts of capitalist reality. The battleground is our own mind: change must at the same time be a change in our understanding of ourselves as parts of capitalist reality: We are all capitalists – even workers and marxists – until we have uncovered the roots of our own unconscious ideology.

Positive global transformation and revolution can only happen through our minds self-transforming, not through re-setting or inversion of power relations!

Or, more generally: To be able to deliberately change something, one must see it.

 

*If one analyses the passage in terms of standard extensional logic, then the passage is very simple and obviously easily compatible with a fairly standard and modest philosophy/worldview.¹ However, this may be an example for the limitations of analysis of extensional logical form, as the important questions only really appear when one departs from the question of material truth conditions and instead considers candidate concept structures or processes as models that may be co-extensional but that differ in very significant ways in their implications in the actual context of capitalism, ideology, and the project of material or ideological change. 

** I do this firstly for contextual reasons – the context here being the thinking in and near marxist tradition in general, especially Dialectic Materialism, and criticism of capitalism, and of course the idea of revolution involving use of material power to abruptly dislodge or invert the power relations of capitalism – and secondly because it’s important to explore such critical interpretations and find out whether they do indeed match the [intended] meaning [within a tradition], precautionarily playing the devil’s advocate. You can of course judge for yourself whether my interpretation fits – on the one hand how it fits the passage and on the other how it fits marxism – and indeed it may turn out that my interpretations are just ideas loosely inspired by the passage and are, in a way, extreme misinterpretations.

*** ‘economy’ here in the broadest sense, i.e. not implying specific types of economy such as economies that feature money or commodities

****As you may notice, this whole thing seems to be taking the form of a self-similar structure of nested pairs.

¹ for example, the passage’s logical form may be taken as this pair of simple propositional logic phrases:

p → q ; r → (p ˄ q)

with p, q, and r being statements as follows:

p: (we transform ourselves/are transformed – we change)    q: (we transform the world/the world is transformed/the world changes)    r: (we understand the world in a new/better way – we reach a next step of understanding of the world)

entry 15

This entry and the next address the same question in different ways, the first written around 7 weeks ago, the second written a few days ago. This first one was posing difficulties to me on re-reading it and trying to understand it, though in this transcription I’m happier with it again. The second note addresses the same topic in a different way and together they may make more sense.

[human] History is the process consisting of the reciprocal duality of material changes & ideological changes: material conditions and [largely] unconscious ideological conditions change and cause/precipitate eachother and so constitute the dialectic process that is history. 

It is philosophy’s task to understand this dialectic, which means to make the unconscious ideology conscious & visible so that it can be seen and consciously processed and reacted to by society/humanity. Hegelians, e.g. Zizek, seem to understand this – however, Marxists, following Marx’ Dialectic Materialism*, actually don’t:

Marxists [at least ostensibly] want to move on to the post-capitalist phase of history, which would be the dialectic synthesis of capitalism and capitalism’s antithesis: The synthesis would be a new whole that fully produces and holds/includes the antithesis to capitalism. The antithesis is the dialectic negation of capitalism – which would negate exactly every component of capitalist ideology. To negate all components of the ideology, one requires exactly all components of the ideology – identifying the underlying generative process/concepts of capitalist ideology, aka finding the thesis of capitalism.

Now, only such an antithesis would be the true, exact negation of capitalism – and a less thorough negation is not dialectic*, it’s just a contradicting thesis. And such an antithesis or full negation would require capitalist [unconscious] ideology to be understood completely, i.e. made conscious at its deepest/root levels.

However, Marx’ approach is to go straight to changing the material conditions (marxist revolution, workers seizing power over production) in the blind hope that material change will end capitalist ideology or at least provide a way out of it, i.e. hoping that, in the changed material conditions, current/existing ideology won’t inevitably re-produce the same dialectic and the same problems and that there aren’t deeper material or ideological conditions/processes/concepts – i.e. a deeper dialectic – that also re-produce capitalism. And marxist denial of the necessity of fully working through this excavation of ideology makes it impossible to complete the step of the historical dialectic and reach the next higher level of the dialectic totality. And what Marxist endeavor instead leads to is a different, very speculative, question.

So one thing I’m proposing – which I think corresponds to Hegelian
thought – is that changing the material conditions in order to escape a certain material-ideological reality is ineffective without understanding the [logical] relations between existing ideology and proposed altered material conditions, and without ascertaining that the proposed material conditions aren’t just one of many possible manifestations of an underlying ideology and that the proposed material change really is a way out of the dialectic in question.

 
 

*Marxists do of course excavate, explore, analyse and critique capitalist ideology, to varying depths/degrees. But it seems to me that their aim in this isn’t to reach full understanding, but instead to reach sufficient understanding to be able to see and explicate enough problems of capitalism to motivate material change…

 

entry 14

I’ve recently been considering my criteria for selecting which notes I transcribe from my notebook to here:

Should I practice more restrictive selection leading to a low post frequency and high average quality or should I practice less restrictive selection, posting many notes that are more random, speculative, imperfect and that I am less certain about and are subject to probable revision? This question has been particularly current as I have been thinking a lot about politics, an area that a) I have spent relatively little time studying, especially and b) arguably contains especially complex questions.

In the last few days I’ve decided to practice looser selection, here are a few reasons:

1) Simply producing more has certain brute-force practical advantages regardless of content or quality.

2) In transcribing notes that are less clear/perfect, I am re-ordering and tidying them up in a way that makes them easier to work with later.

3) If I post many of the notes that are more unfinished, temporary and speculative, this can produce a visible record of my meandering philosophical journey, which could be interesting. In particular, maybe a Hegelian *Bewegung der Begriffe* will become observable in the way that – as I have sometimes noticed – after gradually thinking through a topic and reaching a feeling of understanding and conclusions, I tend to then later go back and explore a direction that opposes those conclusions – i.e. I continue to move conceptually instead of accepting reached understandings/conclusions as given, in the faith that if my originally perceived understanding was indeed an understanding, that then I will eventually return to it anyway, finding and seeing it again.

4) It should help me to avoid counter-productive levels of inhibition/self-doubt/self-censorship – I don’t want to consider each post so carefully that doubt is multiplied counter-productively. Plus I anyway only write things in my notebook if I feel the thing is important enough to need to be written down – I’m a lazy person – and ultimately I trust my own judgement in this regard and shouldn’t be second-guessing judgement of potential readers.

entry 13

für die [phil.] Praxis eine Festhaltung/Wiederholung eines mir schon bekannten, einfachen Problemschemas/Phänomens bzw. einer Unterscheidung:

[induktive] Verwechslung von Zusammenfassung mit Erklärung:

Naturgesetzte bzw. Prinzipien – die ja in [wissenschaftstheoretischen Schemen von] wissenschaftlichen Erklärungen den erklärenden Gehalt liefern sollten – sind* eigentlich gar nicht erklärend, sondern nur verallgemeinernd/zusammenfassend.

Der eigentliche Sinn einer Erklärung – bevor man versucht ‘Erklärung’ zu definieren, etwa im Rahmen der Wissenschaftstheorie – ist ja, dass sie eine befriedigende Antwort auf eine ‘Wieso?’ Frage darstellt, d.h. dass sie einem zu neuem Verstehen verhilft. Und das wird nicht unbedingt erfüllt durch eine gewöhnliche wissenschaftliche Erklärung anhand eines Allgemeinen Prinzips – auch wenn die [wissenschaftsth.] Kriterien einer wissenschaftlichen Erklärung erfüllt werden und das zu erklärende tatsächlich eine logische Instanz des herangezogenen Gesetzes ist. Denn das Gesetz ist oft eigentlich nur eine [durch logische Induktion/Statistik] von gesammelten Einzelfällen/Daten zustandekommende allgemeine/zusammenfassende Beschreibung der Welt – was vielleicht praktische Anwendungen hat aber das eigentliche Wieso nur innerhalb der selben Ebene verschiebt statt mit einer zweiten Ebene zu verbinden – d.h. statt das Verständnis der Sache zu vertiefen durch Verbindung mir einer zweiten Sache die prima facie nicht logisch/statistisch verwandt/ähnlich ist, sondern erst gemeinsam ein neugesehenes, qualitativ komplexeres Ganzes bildet bzw sichtbar macht…

*Ja – ein quasi-genereller Satz der etwaige pedantische Leser irritieren könnte. Aber man kann sich selber fragen, auf welche empirische Gesetze/Methoden bzw in welchen Kontexten meine Analyse zutrifft und auf welche nicht…