Frank wrote on Feb 11
th, 2022 at 7:02am:
I "tried", did I??
dialectical materialism, a philosophical approach to reality derived from the writings of Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels. For Marx and Engels, materialism meant that the material world, perceptible to the senses, has objective reality independent of mind or spirit. They did not deny the reality of mental or spiritual processes but affirmed that ideas could arise, therefore, only as products and reflections of material conditions.
Yes; and does that preclude hunter-gatherers looking up at the night sky and inventing dream time myths?
Quote:Marx and Engels understood materialism as the opposite of idealism, by which they meant any theory that treats matter as dependent on mind or spirit, or mind or spirit as capable of existing independently of matter.
Matter of course is NOT dependent on mind or spirit;
the latter evolved from matter in an originally unconscious universe - except if we posit an eternal creator ie 'eternal consciousness' existing before the 'big bang'.
Quote:For them, the materialist and idealist views were irreconcilably opposed throughout the historical development of philosophy.
Well as noted above, materialism is a fact which preceded consciousness and hence idealism. Consciousness evolved, reaching its highest forms in the human cerebral cortex which perceives 'fairness' and 'justice', concepts which don't exist in the non-human natural world.
Quote:They adopted a thoroughgoing materialist approach, holding that any attempt to combine or reconcile materialism with idealism must result in confusion and inconsistency.
Well I am a little confused with that sentence....
Quote:Marx’s and Engels’ conception of dialectics owes much to the German idealist philosopher G.W.F. Hegel.
Idealism: the concept of a just and fair world?
Quote:In opposition to the “metaphysical” mode of thought, which viewed things in abstraction, each by itself and as though endowed with fixed properties, Hegelian dialectics considers things in their movements and changes, interrelations and interactions. Everything is in continual process of becoming and ceasing to be, in which nothing is permanent but everything changes and is eventually superseded. All things contain contradictory sides or aspects, whose tension or conflict is the driving force of change and eventually transforms or dissolves them.
NOW I am confused.....but let's read on:
Quote:But whereas Hegel saw change and development as the expression of the world spirit, or Idea, realizing itself in nature and in human society,
Ahha...so the 'world spirit/idea' existed before nature....
Quote:for Marx and Engels change was inherent in the nature of the material world.
I don't see mutual exclusivity between the two ideas
Quote:They therefore held that one could not, as Hegel tried, deduce the actual course of events from any “principles of dialectics”; the principles must be inferred from the events.
https://www.britannica.com/topic/dialectical-materialism
So, you can't deduce the course of events from logic as asserted by Hegel, the logic must be inferred from the events.
Yes well, as I have shown in my commentary, ideas reside in
consciousness, and consciousness is introduced into the universe, either by God or by spontaneous evolution of ever increasingly complex life forms.
So where does this leave us?
Well I'm still able to assert the idea of 'fairness' - a concern of Marx - is
innate in humans and not dependent on social engineering.
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