BTB:

As you have had pointed out to you, Cohen's work has been lionised by Alex Callinicos, who, in fact, develops many of the latter's ideas.

The fact that Cohen gave up Marxism is irrelevant (he wimped out). On that score, you'd think Alex would give in, too. The fact that he hasn't suggests that Cohen's actions were indeed based on something other than his book.

Moreover, Hegel was not even a Marxist, and yet you are quite happy to use many of his ideas.

Trotsky's verdict on comrades like you is therefore quite apt:

Problems of Everyday Life, p.221.

Zim:

Well, as I noted, this is simply because they are dealing with far more complex systems, but that does not alter the nature of History.

And, it is a moot point whether or not History has its own laws. Marwick, being an anti-Marxist can be expected to argue the way he does. But that does not mean we have to agree with him.

And the laws scientists deal with are controversial too: they are not the iron 'laws' of 'deterministic' physics, but at best general descriptions of how nature proceeds. In that case, general historical descriptions work in the same way.

[Marwick, and you it seems, is operating with an out-moded notion of 'law of nature'.]

On this, see this Internet Encyclopedia article, and the on-line book (by the same author) that explains this idea in more detail:

http://www.iep.utm.edu/l/lawofnat.htm

http://www.sfu.ca/philosophy/physical-law/

1) Human beings knew this before science was thought of.

2) The so-called 'law of gravity' is merely a general description of how things have so far proceeded. There is no law in nature that stones 'understand', and thus 'obey'. We make predictions based on our knowledge of the past -- but the future is not bound by anything.

3) Even if you were right, I challenge you to go alone and down a dark an alley, confront a group of Nazi skin heads, and tell them you hate Hitler, and that you are a gay Jew. I predict you will not survive, and my knowledge is based on historical events (and theory), and the result is nearly as certain as your stone dropping thought experiment.

So, once again, history is not much different from the 'usual' sciences.

Once more, this is just a problem of complexity, it does not reflect an inherent difference between history and the 'usual' sciences. Biologists, for example, cannot predict the next major steps in evolution, but that does not stop Biology from being a science. Physicists cannot predict whether the universe will continue to expand or collapse in on itself. Does this man that physics is not a science?

And even over simple things, this is still the case, because of those ceteris paribus clauses. Hence, if a scientist predicts that a certain drug will have a certain effect, and it does not, he/she will appeal to those clauses to explain why that effect did not happen.

Indeed, you may recall the hoo-ha over the millennium bug -- we had all sorts of predictions from computer scientists that disaster would hit on January Ist 2000. Nothing happened, as things turned out. Does this mean that the word "scientist" should be denied of computer scientists?

There is in fact a small cottage industry of books detailing the many failed predictions of scientists. Here are just two, for example:

http://www.amazon.com/Scientific-Blu.../dp/0786705949

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Discarded-Sc...5112450&sr=1-1

Indeed, the internet is full of such material:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/education/...ighereducation

http://www.lhup.edu/~dsimanek/whoops.htm

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of...great_blunders

http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/science/...20041111.shtml

So, historians are not the only ones befuddled by the complexities nature throws our way; scientists have been doing this for thousands of years, and show no sign of slowing down.

And, of course, some of these errors go undetected for centuries, and are often picked up by non-scientists (and there are good sociological reasons for this).

So, Marwick is wrong about that aspect of science too: the ability of scientists to spot their own errors.

You can read all about this in the following books:

Broad, W., and Wade, N. (1985), Betrayers Of The Truth. Fraud And Deceit In The Halls Of Science (Oxford University Press).

Kohn, A. (1986), False Prophets. Fraud And Error In Science And Medicine (Blackwell, 2nd ed.).

For example, Claudius Ptolemy falsified the data he used to construct his model of the solar system, which fact was not discovered for nearly 2000 years.

Newton, R. (1977), The Crimes Of Claudius Ptolemy (Johns Hopkins University Press).

Isaac Newton also cheated (and this remained undetected until recently), so did Galileo, Mendel and Millikan (among many others). Many of these errors were detected by historians of science, not scientists (in fact, in some cases. scientists covered them up). You can read the details in the above books.

So, Marwick is about as wrong as he can be.

And as I pointed out to you, historians do not just deal with "the testimony of other people". They carry out (or rely upon) observations and experiments on such things as: soil samples, parchments, battle tactics, weapon construction, disease transmission, ship design, money flows, price fluctuations, building techniques, the composition of cements used, pottery design, the composition of alloys, production techniques, and so on.

Moreover, it's a mistake to think that 'mainstream' scientists do not deal with testimony. They have to trust the data other scientists report, and they have to trust the peer review system. We have already seen that fraud and error are endemic in science, and always have been, which means that it is not as 'objective' as you seem to think.

Sure, their primary material is in many cases 'non-human', but not in all cases. Physiologists, for example, have to examine human beings. Psychologists have to listen to people.

So, while there are differences between History and the other sciences, they are not as stark as you make out.

And you too have chosen particular examples from the sciences (some rather specialised ones at that). As I have shown (above, and in earlier posts), if you take more examples from History and the other sciences, the differences are much less than are the similarities.

And, of course, archaeology has it own unique structure, as you say, but historians rely on the findings of archaeologists (and anthropologists, and numismatists, and forensic biologists, and metallurgists, and...), as one would expect of any other science.

Sure, but scientists have agendas too. Moreover, they have to interpret data; the data does not interpret itself. Furthermore, as I noted above, other scientists (linguists, psychologists, anthropologists, etc.) also have to study human beings. Are you saying that these are not sciences?

Not so; in view of the fact that you seem to believe (and actually appeared to say) that science is just about observation and experiment, what I said does contradict you -- for no science is just about these things.

Who suggested that scientists did do this? Certainly not me. [The story about Newton is in fact false.]

The point is, of course, as you now seem to agree, that scientists operate with theories they inherit from the past; they work with them, modify them, or reject them. This makes science more like History, as I pointed out. [I am not sure if you have read Kuhn on this, but it might be a good idea to do so.]

I will be posting a long Essay on this sometime next year.

I pointedly did not deny that speciation has been observed; this is what I actually said:

Now you may want to argue that the observation of speciation is in fact the same as observing evolution, and I have some sympathy with that view, but evolution is not just about speciation. In order to account for the descent of life, evolution has to account for the origin of genera, families, orders, and phyla, and this is unobservable. Once more: that is why evolutionary biologists have to examine the fossil record -- just like historians have to examine artefacts, etc.

Sure there are differences, once again, but I think you exaggerate them. Fossils do not interpret themselves, and neither do the artefacts that historians examine. So, while there are differences between evolutionary theory and History, these are no bigger that the differences between evolutionary theory and, say, nuclear physics. And, I agree, there are similarities between History and the Humanities, but there are also significant differences between these two, which, I think, are sufficient to put History in the science camp.

I do not disagree, but then you could argue the same for any of the 'usual' sciences. Moreover, all the sciences co-operate. Biologists rely on Chemists and Geologists, who in turn rely on Physicists. The same can be said for archaeologists and forensic anthropologists, and a host of other disciplines. And they do this because they are all sciences. So, when a historian relies on the findings of archaeologists and/or forensic anthropologists, we ought, I think, to be consistent and count History as a science. Certainly, there seems no good reason not to.

Not so. I have argued that historians rely on archaeology and other disciplines (such as Chemistry, nuclear physics (for the carbon dating of artefacts), metallurgists, forensic psychologists and anthropologists, and so on).

To turn this around, your reasoning seems to be that we can only count evolution as a science when it is based on geology, or on genetics. Now, I know this is not your view, but then neither is it mine.

I am sorry, but I think Marwick is so confused here, I do not think anyone knows what he means.

That was un-called for. We have been relatively civil to one another up to now.

I am well aware of the debate within the profession; I just do not think that many of those taking part have a secure grasp of the nature of science (or they are operating with an a priori, perhaps even a Positivist view of it), one that is at odds with the way it is actually practiced.

Here then are few more of Marwick's errors (to add to those noted above):

Depends on what he means by 'controlled experiments'. If he means simple observation, then he is wrong, as I have shown. If he means more than this, then many of the 'genuine' sciences would fail this test. For example, astronomers in many cases just observe the phenomena that the heavens send our way. They cannot control supernovae or the orbits of the planets.

Once more, this is controversial among us Marxists, for we claim that there are such laws. Anyway, there are plenty of sciences that do not have general 'laws', for example, psychology, anthropology, much of chemistry, and forensic archaeology. According to Marwick, these are not sciences!

Finally, as I pointed out, it is controversial among many philosophers of science that there are any 'general laws' at all.

So, Marwick is either an ignorant critic or is deliberately deceiving his readers.

As I noted earlier, not according to many philosophers of science. And such 'laws' are often wrong. I can post evidence if you want to see it.

In fact, you can find out why from this book:

Cartwright, N. (1983), How The Laws Of Physics Lie (Oxford University Press).

So do many of the 'non-sciences' -- such as architecture, urban planning, and history itself. The latter may seem controversial, but unless we knew what had succeeded/failed in the past, science would be no use at all. Moreover, we use our knowledge of the past in order to avoid repeating its mistakes. Finally, the detailed study of the past has refined technology in several ways, for example, it has helped designers and engineers build better bridges, canal systems, alloys, communication systems, and so on.

Sure, this is not as impressive a contribution as that provided by, say, chemistry or electronics, but it is no less a mistake to say that History has no material pay-offs. And without our knowledge of the past, science would fail far more often than it already does.

Firstly, you stretch the point that Cohen's work is lionized by Callinicos; but even if it is, so what? Am I not allowed to disagree with him as, in fact, most of my party does? Further, Alex's work, whatever its faults, does not rely on functionalism and technological determinism - although as you've pointed out, his chapter on agency is too weak to allow him to entirely escape.

There's no comparison as Alex has been an active revolutionary within a particular tradition, whereas Cohen was a mere academic. Plus, given that Alex's work is not at all identical to Cohen's then even if 'the book' or the theory was the cause of Cohen's disaffiliation, we would not expect an identical outcome for Alex. For a logician, you're not very good at the informal kind, are you.

Wow. No one's suggested that Hegel was a Marxist or that non-Marxist ideas cannot be useful. But anyway your accusation is hollow as I espouse the material dialectic of Marx. It stand in contrast to the bourgeois analytical school you are mired in. Still, as Marx points out, the ruling ideas are the ideas of the ruling class, so perhaps you can be forgiven.

Well we all know the verdict Trotsky had on anti-dialectics and opportunism (http://www.marxists.org/archive/trot...14-burnham.htm) so it is disingenuous to claim him for your camp. You'd be better off supporting your claims with quotes from figures in your own camp - Shachtman, for instance.

BTB:

Sure you are allowed to disagree with Alex, but then, if you are consistent (ha!), you should be arguing that Alex will, sure as eggs are non-dialectical eggs, abandon Marxism. [But see below.]

The point is, of course, that one of the SWP's leading theorists sees nothing inherently wrong with Cohen's main theses.

And, with respect to technological determinism and functionalism, I am always careful to exclude these two (as I have done here), a fact you well-know.

But, why does that prevent Alex from abandoning Marxism if Cohen's ideas are as lethal as you seem to believe?

And I have already noted that Alex's work is different from Cohen's, but what has that got to do with anything? Alex relies on and develops many of Cohen's ideas, which should, if you are right, lead him straight out of Marxism.

1) You did not even know of the existence of 'informal logic' until I told you about it a few months back. Suddenly, you are an expert!

2) It now turns out that you are the one whose logic is a little 'odd', shall we say.

Sure, no one has suggested this of Hegel, but the point is, if you actually learned to think for a change, that Marxists have been quite happy to appropriate his work to a greater or lesser extent ('upside down' and the 'right way up') for over 150 years.

If so, there can't be an inherent problem with the work of non-Marxists. And if that is so, there can be no inherent problem with the work of ex-Marxists, either -- especially if one of our leading theorists has appropriated it himself.

And I am not an 'analytic Marxist'. Whatever gave you that idea?

[Answer: nothing at all did; you are simply back to your old tricks of making stuff up about me.]

This is a bit rich coming from someone who accepts a 'theory' that was derived from the work of a card-carrying mystic and ruling-class hack ('upside down' or the 'right way up').

I think historical materialism is quite grounded and not at all mystical, if anything it might be criticised for being a little too simplistic in some ways. Anyway, part of problem in giving Marxist history (or any history for that matter) status as science is that what constitutes science is the subject of debate. We can't define things like 'pseudoscience' as such until we're clear on what makes for 'proper' science. Personally I think history can be considered a science, but only on the basis that not all activities in science come up to the methodological standards of some activities in some disciplines (such as the predictive powers in chemistry or physics for example) which are often presented, wrongly, as representative of all 'good' science.

I hope you forgive my not addressing every passage of your post, I have left those I feal I have addressed earlier in the post.

I disagree. I think it is a reflection, not simply based upon the complexities of human society, but because of the very sources historians analyse, which as I have pointed out are fundermentally different to that of a 'hard' scientist. The former are subjective the later is objective.

I disagree, i think it is highly relevent, as the existence of general predictable processes is one of the key differences between history and a 'hard' science. History lacks these easily determinable processes, and if they are noticed then they are usually very difficult to project into the future; or even into the past without a huge deal of debate, criticism and flat out rejection.

Hardly, the term 'law' is simply an easy definition of a complex idea, and more than suitable for this discussion.

It depends on how one defines science, if it is simply examination and study of the natural world, then no it hasn't. If you refer to the dawn of the term 'natural philosophy', which has its roots in the 16th century or 'science' coined in the 19th century, then sure.

But it is of course not a matter of a stone understanding, it is simply that objects with mass attract one another. We know this, thus we can make predictions; predictions which allow flight, etc. There are no similarly exact, accurate or useful predictions possible based on historicial analysis because humanity, as a whole, has a horrible habbit of being irritatingly unpredictable.

That issue was caused because early computer system operated the date in two digit format. This bug was noted early on, and priot to the year 2000 a large number of institutions world wide set about upgrading their systems. Thus it is perfectly arguable that it was the prediction of computer scientists, based on simple mathematics, that avoided possible catastrophy. Furthermore, it is not as if the bug did not cause problems to some system which were not upgraded.

Something of a bad example there Rosa.

In one of my previous posts i actually provided a news article where a biologists were making predictions based on knowledge of evolutionary science. Albeit, they were modest predictions, but far more detailed and fart more plausable than those predictions made by historians moonlighting as futurists.

Sure scientists can be mistaken, but they have far more success than historians do. You can list various failures on the part of scientists when it comes to predictions, how many famous and accurate predictions do you suppose historians have made?

Richard Evans, in his famous critique of both postmodernists and those who would depict history as a science (such as Geoffrey Elton), In Defence of History first published in 1997, said: -

"Time and again, history has proved a very bad predictor of future events. This is because history never repeats itself; nothing in human society, the main concern of the hisorian, ever happens twice under the exact same conditions or in the exact same way."

Richard J. Evans, In Defence of History, (London, 2000, p. 59.

But as I pointed out, such methods are not actually used by your typical academic historian or any other comparable method. Such techniques are within the juristriction of another disipline, which certainly is a science, archaeology. To call an archaeologist a 'historian', without qualifying his or her actual trade is to be misleading. And sure a historian may choose to draw from the work of archeologists, but for the vast majority of the time, they don't. It would be like calling a chemist an artist because he/she employs diagrams in their work.

The vast majority of historians do simply deal with "the testimony of other people".

[QUOTE]Furthermore, as I noted above, other scientists (linguists, psychologists, anthropologists, etc.) also have to study human beings. [/QUOTYE]

And now you move from the hard, or physical sciences, to the social sciences. Granted history is a good deal closer to being a social-sciences; as people like E. H Carr, and Arthur Marwick for that matter, argue, but I think even then it isn't quite the same.

I look forward to it.

And i would argue, as something approaching a historian, and certainly having read far more work by historians than most people, that this is not the case. Those academic historians who employ archeology, etc, do so in very limited fields within history. Most, myself included, have little call for it.

Well if they are, as you claim scientists, it is rather damning of the disipline that most within it do not grasp what it is they endevour to achieve.

Firstly I don't think we really do take heed of our mistakes, after all the 'Great War to end all wars', was repeated with an even bloodier affair in less than a quarter of a decade. Genocide has been repeated, etc.

Secondly, observing what has been successful within your industry, and building upon that, is hardly a testiment to the field of academic history.

Thirdly, what has academic history actually produced? My partner, also doing post-graduate research, is investigating how lead, cadmium, etc, enter the human (biological) system. Her work contributes to a field which has the material benefit of helping to reduce poisoning. I fail to see how my research has any similar benefit. Indeed I see my work, and work like it, as being an improvement of our understanding of our society, and valuable for its own sake. But its value is inherently different in that respect, than to that of my partner, whose has a material pay-off.

In that case you have my apologies. I didn't mean to be offensive, rather to say your criticism of Marwick's point was a quibbling one, and that most would understand his point.

PS. James Anthony Froude summed up a rather unique, if only in extent of the scale of it being an issue, problem with history rather nicely: -

"It often seems to me as if history is like a child's box of letters, with which we can spell any word we please. We have only to pick out such letters we want, arrange them as we like, and say nothing about those which do not suit our purpose."

J. A. Froude, Short Studies on Great Subjects (London, 1963, first published 1867), p. 21.

I think this is a little unkind to history and maybe a little too kind to science at the same time. Within science itself we can see the picking and choosing of concepts and categories with which to explain the world and which, at least when examined historically (ironically enough), have been seen to fit social and political agendas. The most obvious example that comes to mind is the way 'scientific' concepts of biological race emerged, fitting folk (even Biblical) notions for the purposes of establishing a hierarchy to justify the likes of slavery, imperialism and so on. We can even push the argument to a more radical point in highlighting Judith Butler's critique of the biological sex binary as a socially constructed privileging of some differences over others.

I'm all for recognising the limitations of historical inquiry but you're on shaky ground if you think 'science' stands as a philosophically and methodologically unified force, or that it is based on things like complete data or demonstrably unbiased processes.

And there are many 'sciences' which do not predict. Palaeontology is essentially an examination and interpretation of the past. Specialisms within astronomy, such as the observation of how galaxies have evolved, are also limited in their predictive aims - the central intent is to explain how things have happened. Elsewhere there are scientific endeavours which aim for predictivity but struggle, seismology being the obvious example. Evans makes the mistake which many do by equating 'science' with certain methodological possibilities within some sciences. By doing so he misleads about what 'science' amounts to in the round and thus distorts the limitations of history.

Rosa:
And I am just as careful to add that once you remove the functionalism and the technological determinism, there is very little left which is distinctive in Cohen's exposition. Moreover, remove these elements and his theory collapses.

Have I ever claimed them to be lethal? I wouldn't accord them that much force. I simply note that every attempt to rid Marxism of the dialectic has led to Marxism being rid of those who oppose the dialectic. You actually validate that position by claiming that you will be the first not to.

Meanwhile, as I suggested in my last post, you overstate the attachment Callinicos has for Cohen's theory (you know, the theory that historical materialism can only be rescued with an injection of techno-determinism and functionalism ). Further, your attempt to seek an ally in Alex's work is equally misleading. Callinicos does not reject the material dialectic (which he does an excellent job of describing in his early The Revolutionary Ideas of Karl Marx). Neither does he have a problem utilising dialectical concepts such as contradiction, as evinced by his latest work, The Resources of Critique, where he adopts a critical realist ontology which emphasises the interdependence of, and interactions between, different levels of social reality. In truth it is more that he has a problem with the more Hegelian formulations of this, but I welcome his interrogation of these issues.

So it looks like you'll need to find allies elsewhere. May I suggest you try Duhring, Bernstein, Eastman or Shachtman?

Except where the problem is if these non/ex-Marxist texts stand in conscious opposition to Marxism and the working class, where have I claimed there is an inherent problem? I'll repeat this again as you'll probably need reminding: I simply note that every attempt to rid Marxism of the dialectic has led to Marxism being rid of those who oppose the dialectic.

You do me a disservice and give yourself too much credit. I've never accused you of being any kind of Marxist. I merely observe that your approach is rooted in the analytical tradition. It appears that it is you making things up - and about yourself!

All I can say to that, is this:

I think this is what Alex is attempting to do in his own way. You should take a leaf out his book.

BTB:

Not so. This takes out one full chapter, and the motor of his theory. About 80% remains intact.

You might not have used those words, but your implication was reasonably clear: it killed Cohen's Marxism.

And you have had it pointed out to you that the vast majority of attempts to retain 'the dialectic' have led to counter-revolutionary results, since the vast majority of dialecticians are or have been Stalinists and Maoists.

So, there is nothing inherently good about this Hermetic 'theory' of yours.

Indeed, and quite the opposite: it has been associated with almost total failure for the last 150 years.

So, if you also believe that truth is tested in practice, you also ought to conclude that History has refuted 'the dialectic'.

But no, you cling on to it like a drunk to a lamppost, since it provides you with much needed consolation for the fact that Dialectical Marxism is such an abject failure. And this is in view of the additional fact that it teaches that appearances are contradicted by underlying 'essences', hence you can ignore or downplay the last 150 years of almost total failure as 'success' in disguise.

I know that Alex has wavered on the 'dialectic' over the last 30 years, but in his latest book, as I have quoted to you before, he calls Cohen's argument "compelling" (Making History, second edition, p.xx), and Cohen has more entries in the Index than any writer other than Marx and Anthony Giddens (the latter of whose entries are all negative).

And where have I suggested that Alex rejected the 'materialist dialectic'? In fact this is what I have written in Essay Nine Part Two on this:

References and links can be found here:

http://homepage.ntlworld.com/rosa.l/page%2009_02.htm

Hence I am well aware of Alex's theoretical decline; this is what I have also written in Essay Ten Part One about it:

And in Note 16:

References and links can be found here:

http://homepage.ntlworld.com/rosa.l/page%20010_01.htm

His adoption of 'Critical Realism' is no less regrettable, since that theory makes no sense at all (as I will be showing in the next Essay I publish: Thirteen Part Two).

But, quite apart from this, not even Alex has been able to explain what 'dialectical contradictions' are, or account for that fact that Marx abandoned this way of conceiving of the development of capitalism.

Of course, Shachtman was a dialectician, and his modern day disciples (the AWL) are enthusiastic supporters of 'materialist dialectics', Zionism and US imperialism.

Perhaps they are your friends?

[Or if they are not, then the characters you mention have nothing to do with my ideas, either -- as I have pointed out to you many times before.]

And I'll repeat a point you have had made to you many times before: there are far more reactionary and anti-Marxists supporters of 'materialist dialectics' than there are otherwise, namely the Stalinists, Maoists, Hoxhaists and Libertarian Marxists. So, if you are looking for historical support for your adherence to this mystical theory, you might be advised to desist, for history tells us it leads far more away from Marxism than it superglues to it.

I am quite proud of the fact that Analytic Philosophy has given me the tools to be able to refute this 'theory' of yours. The fact that you cannot win a single argument against me suggests that your dalliance with Hermeticism has not done your brain too many favours.

As you have had proven to you many times, Marx abandoned this mantra like faith of yours, for in a summary of 'his method' added to the Preface to Das Kapital, there is not one atom of Hegel to be found (upside down or the 'right way up'): no 'contradictions', no 'quantity passing over into quality', no 'negation of the negation', no 'unity of opposites', no 'mediated totality', no 'universal change'...

So, Marx cannot be recruited to your side, I am happy to say. In short, according to Marx, the 'rational kernel' of Hegel's 'theory' is in fact empty.

Even better advice: you should take more than a leaf out of that anti-dialectical classic: Das Kapital.

Zim, I'll be responding to you tomorrow.

Rosa: Eureka! At last! Yes, because the dialectic is the motor of historical materialism as you have had pointed out to you many times. Take it out and you are left with a static, inanimate corpse of a theory. So, I'll gladly agree that 80% of a corpse remains in Cohen's work - big deal.
Of course there isn't anything inherently good about the dialectic. it's not a moral question. Where are you getting all these strange ideas from?

His latest book on theory is The Resources of Critique (2006), as you know. Making History was first published in 1987. If you're referring to the Introduction to the 2nd Edition, then, yes, Callinicos has some nice things to say about Cohen's work, although this seems only to amount to praising him for "compellingly" analysing the relations of production as "relations of effective power over persons and productive forces" as satisfying the "reduction programme" of rational-choice theory before questioning the necessity of their "reduction programme" and accusing them of a "metaphysical individualism". He actually then uses a notation to criticise Cohen for excluding the productive forces as a social structure. Hardly a ringing endorsement of Cohen's system. Meanwhile, he also borrows what he thinks is good from other writers, praising them on the way - including Giddens who is not at all dealt with in a hostile or negative manner as you suggest. In fact Callinicos goes on to point out affinities in Cohen's and Giddens' approach to the structure-agency debate. Incidentally, whether these similarities could be shown to result in the anti-Marxist positions both theorists end up occupying, I'll leave to someone else to work out.
No, you've not been able to understand it.
Because he didn't.

Just because you refuse to shut up doesn't necessarily mean you've won the argument any more than you endlessly repeating the same falsehoods makes them progressively more true. Here's an example:

Like the proverbial statistic, you've just made that up.

BTB:

You need to calm down; your wishful thinking is affecting your judgement -- again. The motive force of Cohen's system is in fact his functionalism, not 'the dialectic'. Indeed, as I have shown, not only can 'the dialectic' not explain change, if it were true, then change could not happen.

http://www.revleft.com/vb/showpost.p...&postcount=360

http://www.revleft.com/vb/showpost.p...&postcount=361

http://www.revleft.com/vb/showpost.p...&postcount=362

http://www.revleft.com/vb/showpost.p...4&postcount=14

http://www.revleft.com/vb/showpost.p...&postcount=464

http://www.revleft.com/vb/showpost.p...&postcount=465

http://www.revleft.com/vb/showpost.p...57&postcount=2

Of course, if you think you are up to it, you can always try to show where I go wrong here. But, then, you'd have already done that if you were indeed up to the job.

Finally, Cohen's system, and Historical Materialism in general, does not need a mystical force (these unexplained 'dialectical contradictions') to make it work. As I have told you many times already, ordinary language contains plenty of words that account for (or can be used to account for) change, and they do this far better than the obscure jargon Engels and Co imported into Marxism from Hegelian Hermeticism.

Once more you miss the point. This was not a moral 'good', but a functional 'good'. As the examples I gave you show, there is nothing inherent in the dialectic that prevents its acolytes from becoming anti-Marxists. In that case, you cannot use the fact that those who abandon 'the dialect' become anti-Marxists as an excuse to brand anti-dialectics in the way you and others constantly do. And that is because there are far more anti-Marxists/counter-revolutionaries who accept 'the dialectic' than there are Marxists/revolutionaries who also accept it. So, if anything, 'the dialectic' causes more defections from Marxism than abandoning 'the dialectic' does -- if we now use an obverse version of your fractured logic.

Indeed, and as the rest of the book shows, Alex accepts many other things Cohen says about Historical Materialism. The negative things he says are largely confined to the same sort of comments I make, i.e., about his functionalism and his technological determinism. However, there are plenty of other positive things he says about Cohen. For example, on pages xxvi-vii he acknowledges he should have paid even more attention to certain arguments of Cohen's. On pages xxii-iii he further acknowledges he should have argued more forcefully in the first edition, in agreement with Cohen, over the primacy of the productive forces. On page xxxviii he refers to the "strengths" of Cohen's account, which he thinks can be made even stronger by the addition of other factors. On pages 41-70, Alex outlines those parts of Cohen's theory he accepts, which are quite considerable, and in view of what he added in the new Preface, it is clear that he did not go far enough in appropriating these aspects of Cohen's work.

I agree with you about Giddens, but it is clear that Alex is far closer to Cohen than he is to Giddens. But you are wrong to say that Alex criticises him for his adoption of 'rational choice' theory. In fact, in the pages I have listed above, he goes out of his way to distance Cohen from the rational choice 'Marxists', like Elster. Sure, he admits that he sided with Elster in the first edition, but it is clear from what he says in the new Preface that he has moved away from the latter and closer to the former.

Ah that old chestnut, beloved of mystics everywhere (even Christians will tell us that us atheists just do not 'understand' the gospel), used by dialecticians of every stripe to account for the fact that everyone else (including other dialecticians who take up contrary positions) does not "understand" the dialectic -- but only as they see it.

However, Alex (in Making History, and in The Resources of Critique) does not actually explain his use of 'contradiction'; he just helps himself to it (as do all other dialecticians), which he then employs it in a slightly different way -- and in the case of the latter book, he throws even more obscure jargon at it.

So, I am happy to admit that I do not 'understand' his use of this obscure word (and I am in good company too, since no one seems to 'understand' it), any more than I understand the 'Incarnation of Christ', and since Alex does not actually tell us what he means by this word (if you think differently, perhaps you can tell us where he explains it), it is clear that either he does not understand it, too, or he cannot explain it -- or both. And the same goes for all the hundreds of other books and articles I have, for my sins, had to read over the last 25 years on this drab theory: not one single dialectician can explain this phrase.

Not even you can.

Of course, if you think you can, then put us all out of our misery, and tell us, for the first time ever in over 200 years, what these obscure 'dialectical contradictions' are.

The fact that you haven't done so up to now, when you have been asked to do so several times, suggests that you too either do not 'understand' this phrase, or you can't explain it -- or both --, and it simply remains another 'dialectical mystery' to add to the dozens I have exposed at RevLeft over the last three years.

Unfortunately for you, the facts say he did. Do you want me to summarise them again for you? You seem not to be able to grasp them.

Whether or not I 'refuse to shut up', the fact is that I have wiped the floor with you now for well over two years. And you have yet to show that what I say is 'false'.

Then so did Marx.

Prove me wrong...

I am sorry Zim, but I am concentrating what little energy I have these days to slapping BTB about some more -- he seems to like public humiliation.

I will get back to you when he has been put back in his box.

Actually, you should concentrate your energies on developing your argument with Zim, which at least has the virtue of being educational.

Our exchange is sadly limited by your inability to understand Marxist concepts. Like two people speaking a different language we have limited means to extend our mutual understanding. This is why debates with you always end up as a competition of who can get in the "last word".

Well perhaps that is the problem, perhaps we should not consider these exchanges to be arguments, or even debates, but hopefully educational discussions between friends?

Certainly, that would be more in the spirit of the Education forum.

BTB:

As I noted, if I fail to 'understand' these 'concepts' then I am in good company, for no one seems to 'understand' them -- or if they do, they have kept that secret to themselves -- and that includes you.

ZIM:

As I pointed out, this would mean that psychology and anthropology are not sciences, and it ignores the fact that much of the 'hard sciences' are just as 'subjective' as is History. I gave evidence and argument in my earlier posts on this.

[In fact, there is no question-begging way to distinguish 'subjective' from 'objective' in the way you seem to be using these terms. More details on request.]

I did not deny this is relevant, I merely said:

ZIM:

Once more, this is merely a complexity issue. And it is quite independent of the fact that Marxists claim that there are indeed such features of history that allow us to delineate "determinable processes", for example, the complex and evolving relation between the forces and relations of production.

If you will forgive me for saying it, your argument resembles somewhat the 'god-of-the-gaps' argument of the Christians: if something has no natural explanation yet, then it must have a supernatural one. In your case this becomes: if something has no natural explanation yet, then it cannot be part of the sciences, or it must lack 'laws'.

If we took that attitude, we would get nowhere.

Indeed, I think I have given enough detail to suggest that you are being either too hasty in your judgement here, or are being unnecessarily restrictive in what you count as observation and experiment -- which I have shown historians either engage in, or rely on.

Once more you misread me, for I said this:

I nowhere denied this notion was not complex, or that it needs thorough discussion -- simply that what you have posted here (and have interpreted Marwick to mean) suggests that you are indeed operating with a naive and/or outdated view of such 'laws'.

Naturally, this maybe unfair to you both, but I can only speak about what I have read in your posts.

Well, if you are going to re-define the word "science" so that it now encompasses everyday knowledge that humans have been aware of for tens, if not hundreds of thousands of years, then much of history will be scientific too.

My point was simply that humanity has known that unsupported objects fall to the earth for hundreds of thousands of years. Indeed, many animals act as if they know this, too.

I agree, and that was the point behind my comment. The traditional view of natural laws was that they represented natural imperatives that objects had to 'obey', simply because that was 'God's' word, and it was how 'he' controlled 'his' creation. [This in fact led Leibniz, for example, to 'prove' that everything in the universe is actually a complex conglomerate of tiny minds ('Monads'), all programmed to obey such laws -- in Hegel this became just One Big Mind in 'self-development'.]

Now, if you want to abandon that view, as it seems you do in some of the things you say (but in others, what you say clearly depends on this view), then such laws merely become expressions of regularities which we use with greater or lesser probability to understand and control the world, and indeed make predictions.

However, the tendency today (especially among scientists) is still to regard these as something more, as 'iron laws' that nothing and no one can countermand -- and which objects and process have to 'obey' of necessity -- you can see this working behind the scenes in talk about 'determinism' (even in threads at RevLeft), and how objects 'obey' nature's laws. But, this is just a modern-day echo of the ancient belief I referred to above.

Now, I think you need this ancient view of laws to make your distinction between History and science proper work.

Here is why:

If it is just 'predictability' that you are interested in, as it seems in places you are, then it is simply a matter of complexity that prevents us doing the same in History. This is plainly contingent barrier.

But, you want to go further, and argue that there is nothing we can do to rectify this defect in our understanding of the past, and how to predict the future. And if you argue that, then you have to further argue that there are natural necessities in nature that do not feature in human affairs, and that is why no predictions can be made in History.

But, once you do that, you are back to the old theological view of laws I said both you and Marwick implicitly need in order to make your distinction work.

The distinction between the older, anthropomorphic view of laws and the more modern view is brought out very well in a link I posted earlier; I heartily recommend you read it:

http://www.iep.utm.edu/l/lawofnat.htm

According to the more modern view of laws, they are just expressions of regularities. This means that it is simply a matter of complexity that prevents us understanding our own historical laws fully -- it is not one that is a fundamental feature of the fabric of reality (which it is on the old view -- and which you need).

I am well aware of the reasons for this. The point was, of course, that scientists get predictions wrong. So the example was quite apposite.

Of course, biologists can make educated guesses (which have yet to be confirmed, so we do not even know if they got these 'predictions' right), but these are not the same as the predictions physicists make (for example, concerning the motion of the planets). And those 'modest' predictions you refer to are, as I indicated, not predictions of the next major steps in evolution, since biologists cannot possibly know the selection pressures that will be around in, say, 100,000 years time.

But, this puts biologists in the same boat as historians, except, in the latter case, because of the aforementioned massively increased complexity, historians cannot make many predictions at all. But, does this make History any less of a science that Biology? In fact, it just acknowledges the different orders of complexity here -- something that would afflict biologists, too, if you were to compare them just as unfairly with Physicists.

If complexity afflicts Biological 'prediction' (and unconfirmed ones at that), then, if you are consistent, you should declare that it isn't a science, since it is little better than History, and certainly far worse than Physics.

And, of course, I could make a historical 'prediction' -- I could 'predict' that there will be a war between 'Eurasia' and 'Neo-America' beginning on October 2nd 5075. Who today could confirm this? And yet, how is that different from the 'modest' predictions of the biologists, if neither has been or can be confirmed (in the here and now).

And it's no good replying that my 'prediction' is a wild guess, since a knowledgeable Historian could make an educated guess about what might happen in ten or fifty years time (in fact some do, and they sell books on that basis). The problem is that what they say is unconfirmable right now -- but that is just the situation with these 'modest' biological 'predictions'.

So, in this respect at least, History is no less of a science than is Biology.

Yes I have read Evan's book, and he has a naive idea about 'objectivity' too.

And, I never denied that 'hard scientists' were more 'successful' than Historians; manifestly they are. But, both exist on the same continuum, but at extreme ends of it. History is bad at making predictions simply because of the complexity of the phenomena. But, as I have shown above, that does not mean it is not a science.

And, just because historians have been bad at predicting in the past does not mean that they will be bad at this in the future.

Or are you, a historian, making a prediction here?

I went to great trouble to make several points in relation this in my last post:

1) Scientists rely on testimony, too.

2) Historians rely on data produced by other disciplines (I gave many examples).

3) Many 'genuine sciences' deal largely or exclusively with human beings (psychology, anthropology, physiology, etc.).

Hence, there is in principle no fundamental difference between History and the 'genuine sciences'.

Moreover, historians deal with the testimony they find in their sources in just as scientific a manner as do 'genuine scientists'. Historians do not just make stuff up; they analyse and question their sources. What is this if not a reflection of the scientific attitude?

Unless you believe that when they deal with human testimony, historians treat what they find in an irresponsible manner?

Sure, the primary sources historians study are 'subjective', but that does not stop them treating these sources objectively, using data from archaeology, forensic anthropology, carbon dating, etc., etc., to test and check the veracity of what they read in those sources.

This all sounds eminently scientific to me.

Are you saying that the social sciences are not sciences?

Well, I must bow to your expertise here, but you are not denying that they can, and sometimes do, appeal to archaeology, or to forensic anthropology, or numismatics, or carbon dating, or reverse engineering, etc. etc. But, on the other hand, because the vast majority of Biologists, say, do not spend most of their time referring to chemistry, or physics, that would not prevent you from saying Biology was a science.

No less so here.

This is no slur on historians; scientists themselves have an insecure grasp on the nature of science too. As the philosopher of science, Imre Lakatos, said:

Lakatos, I. (1978), The Methodology Of Scientific Research Programmes (Cambridge University Press).

Dupré, J. (2001), Human Nature And The Limits Of Science (Oxford University Press).

Lakatos was also a Physicist and Mathematician:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Imre_Lakatos

Yes I think you are right, but that can be put down largely to ideology. There is nothing inherent in History that prevents us learning from the past.

No, but unless we could trust History, or if the discipline did not exist, this would not be possible.

What has pure Physics or Biology ever produced? It takes applied scientists and engineers to exploit what the 'pure sciences' discover.

Does that make the 'pure sciences' non-sciences?

Now, I have given you a list of the spin-off products of History, and I could give you an even longer one of those of the 'pure sciences', but that would merely show once again that they all lie on a continuum, with the former at one end and the latter at the other.

Is that it Zim? No reply?