I do agree with the quote. Dialectics as Marx understood, expressed and used I would say is not based on such distortion. The one he is talking about when he says: "My dialectic method is not only different from the Hegelian, but is its direct opposite. To Hegel, the life-process of the human brain, i.e., the process of thinking, which, under the name of “the Idea,” he even transforms into an independent subject, is the demiurgos of the real world, and the real world is only the external, phenomenal form of “the Idea.” With me, on the contrary, the ideal is nothing else than the material world reflected by the human mind, and translated into forms of thought."

I didn't "dodge" it Rosa, I simply missed it.

What can I say? I consider idealist thought, (chronologically) from Plato to even Hegel, to have made some contributions to human thought, and at least expressed thoughts of the times. I agree with Marx when he says "The chief defect of all hitherto existing materialism – that of Feuerbach included – is that the thing, reality, sensuousness, is conceived only in the form of the object or of contemplation, but not as sensuous human activity, practice, not subjectively. Hence, in contradistinction to materialism, the active side was developed abstractly by idealism – which, of course, does not know real, sensuous activity as such." I agree with Marx when he says "The mystification which dialectic suffers in Hegel’s hands, by no means prevents him from being the first to present its general form of working in a comprehensive and conscious manner." Should I go through every idealist thinker and show how they contributed?

Leo:

But he also added a summary of 'his method':


In the passage that Marx quotes not a single Hegelian concept is to be found (no "contradictions", no change of "quantity into quality", no "negation of the negation", no "unity and identity of opposites", no "interconnected Totality"), and yet Marx calls this the "dialectic Method", and says of it that it is "my method". So, Marx's "method" has had Hegel completely excised --, except for the odd phrase or two here and there with which he merely "coquetted". In that case, Marx's 'dialectic method' more closely resembles that of Aristotle and Kant.

There is thus no 'rational kernel' to Hegel's dialectic.

No wonder Marx waved it goodbye.

I said just one would do.

And good luck finding it...

Certain terms not being in a certain passage doesn't really prove anything; it doesn't even prove that the concepts that aren't included aren't used even in that passage only. The fact is though that Marx does call dialectic method "my method".

Well in a way yes, it "turns Hegel upside down" as Marx says, and of course Marx was not a Hegelian after he grew out of it. There are clearly some influences and it is not a secret that Marx did respect Hegel a lot despite arguing strongly against Hegel's mysticism. We can at least say that there is not a trace (or very little trace) of Hegel's mysticism.

With Kant I can indeed see where you are coming from - and of course Kant was influential on Hegel's dialectics as well. With Aristotle, I don't really see lots of similarities.

You can take up that Marx quote about Hegel if you want then, that would count as one example.

Leo:

1) It does when Marx pointedly said that he would only be 'coquetting' with Hegelian terms in Das Kapital -- in other words, he would be using them non-seriously.

2) It also does when the only method Marx endorsed as his method contains not one atom of Hegel.

3) Indeed the dialectic is his method, but as I pointed out, when every trace of Hegel has been removed, Marx's method resembles the classic dialectic of Aristotle and Kant, not Hegel. So, there is no rational core to Hegel's 'dialectic'. To up-end Hegel is to crush his head.

In his early work, you are right, but not in Das Kapital. So, by the time he wrote Das Kapital, not only has Hegel's mysticism gone, so has Hegel, too, and in his entirety. What few traces there of that sub-logical and incompetent bumbler in Das Kapital are a few bits of jargon, which Marx confines to 'coquetting'.

And sure, Marx thought Hegel was a great thinker, but in Das Kapital he pointedly put that comment in the past tense. If he had maintained that opinion in Das Kapital, he would not have 'coquetted' with Hegelian terms there, but would have treated then with respect.

Finally, I think Plato, for example, is a great (even a 'mighty') thinker, but I also disagree with everything he says, so much so that I too use Platonic terms in my essays non-seriously.

Same with Marx and Hegel.

Loads of them.

Try these:

http://74.125.77.132/search?q=cache:...lnk&cd=1&gl=uk

http://books.google.co.uk/books?id=r...um=2&ct=result

http://books.google.co.uk/books?id=L...um=6&ct=result

But we have already seen that this is an empty example. In fact, Marx had to ditch Hegel completely, and return to the Historical Materialism of Kant and the Scottish Historical Materialists, and also return to Aristotle, too, to make his theory work

"Non-seriously"? What do you mean? You mean as a joke or something?

Marx himself obviously disagrees on that. I certainly don't think he was a Hegelian, but he was clearly influenced by Hegel all his life to an extent. I am not even saying all this influence is good even but this is a fact.

OK, we agree on that then.

As I said, I certainly do see the point about Kant, on the other hand Kant never claimed to be using dialectics let alone "classic dialectics" (the term classic dialectics more resembles Socrates and Plato to me to be honest). As for Aristotle as I said I am not convinced.

Ah, the old distinction between young Marx and mature Marx - I don't buy it to be honest, methodologically they are one and what they say are completely connected. In any case, there is some Hegelian terminology borrowed and used (albeit for completely different purposes for what Hegel intended to be, but Marx's entire relation with Hegel was this to begin with: twisting and using what Hegel said for completely different purposes, perhaps to the point of allowing it to be perceived that he "removed every trace of Hegel") as well as the commonly repeated thing about Das Kapital itself, in it's structure, being modeled after Hegel's work.

Well, Hegel was dead after all.

Yes, he was.

Yet from an admittedly brief look, I saw all these form a resemblance between their ideas in the ethical and political, not in the methodological sense (and being especially skeptical of Aristotle's ideas about ethics and politics, I am rather dubious about the accuracy of what is argued as well).

I don't think you can call Kant or the Scottish political economists "historical materialists". Especially with Kant, the man considered himself to be an idealist! I am not saying that either weren't inspirational or influential for Marx or shouldn't be as such today for marxists even, but historical materialism refers to a specific method after all.

Leo:

No, as I said: not seriously. Marx was in the process of waving good-bye to Hegel, and these were his parting salvos in that direction. These days we put such terms in 'scare quotes'.

What does he 'disagree' with? The review? Well he not only quoted it, he endorsed it.

Once more, I agree, Marx was influenced by Hegel in his younger days, but by the time he got to Das Kapital, the best he could do was 'coquette' with a few bits of Hegelian jargon. [But see below.]

Then, do the reading, and get back to us.

1) Are you trying to say that it is not possible that Marx changed his mind at some stage in his life? [But, we already know he did -- after reading Feuerbach, for example, he dropped Hegelian idealism.]

2) As for Hegelian terms, Marx himself (not me) tells us that he merely 'coquetted' with them in Das Kapital.

3) But, anyway, we needn't speculate about whether Marx dropped Hegel or not, for Marx himself indicated he did when he included that review of his book, calling it 'his method', in which there are absolutely no traces of Hegel.

But, the past tense refers to his being a pupil of that 'mighty thinker', not to Hegel's mortal state.

For example, I can now say that I am (present tense) a pupil of Frege, even though he died over 80 years ago. Now, if I put this in the past tense, that would imply I no longer considered myself his pupil. Marx put his identification with Hegel in just such a past tense. And that explains why he included that summary of 'his method' (in which there is no trace of Hegel) and why he merely 'coquetted' with Hegelian jargon. He would not have treated Hegel that way if he still regarded himself as a pupil of Hegel.

And they link this to the labour theory of value -- which is a core HM principle, Also, they link it to Aristotle's idea that human beings are political animals -- also an HM concept.

Scott Meikle sets out the evidence here:

Meikle, S. (1985), Essentialism In The Thought of Karl Marx (Open Court)

As Wikipedia notes:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marxist_theory#cite_ref-1

Hegel was heavily influenced in all areas of his thought by Aristotle; Marx just cut the gobbledygook, and returned to the mother lode in Aristotle. He is on record, too, saying that Aristotle was his favourite ancient philosopher.

These aren't my terms, but those of others:

Meek, R. (1967a), Economics And Ideology And Other Essays (Chapman Hall).

--------, (1967b), 'The Scottish Contribution To Marxist Sociology', in Meek (1967a), pp.34-50.

Wood, A, (1998), 'Kant's Historical Materialism' in Kneller and Axinn, Chapter Five.

--------, (1999), Kant's Ethical Thought (Cambridge University Press).

Kneller, J., and Axinn, S, (1998), Autonomy And Community: Readings In Contemporary Kantian Social Philosophy (State University of New York Press).

[Allen Wood is also a Marxist. So was Prof Meek.]

Hmm okay I see what you mean.

What does he 'disagree' with? The review? Well he not only quoted it, he endorsed it.

Which to me shows that Hegel influenced Marx's thinking but that Marx was not a Hegelian in any way.

No, I am saying that once established, he kept using the same methodology.

Well yes, he paid his respects so to speak.

I don't think he has to be a Hegelian going on about Hegelian concepts to have traces of Hegel. He has traces of Hegel in his methodology (and not much but nevertheless), doesn't have to repeat them in his terminology though.

Well yes, but I don't necessarily give the same meaning to this that you do. One could give it a positive meaning as much, even more so than the negative one you are giving it. Again I am not saying Marx was an Hegelian, this term basically proves that while Marx was not a Hegelian, he was paying respects to Hegel for influencing his methodology.

Well, he says he reversed the relation Hegel sees in between thought and matter. This is "a trace of Hegel". Had he "dropped" Hegel completely he'd be saying there is no relation between thought and matter. He summarizes his difference quite clearly: To Hegel, the life-process of the human brain, i.e., the process of thinking, which, under the name of 'the Idea,' he even transforms into an independent subject, is the demiurgos of the real world, and the real world is only the external, phenomenal form of 'the Idea.' With me, on the contrary, the ideal is nothing else than the material world reflected by the human mind, and translated into forms of thought."

Certainly. Marx being a pupil of Hegel still would mean that he would be a Hegelian. He clearly wasn't.

They can link things as much as they want: Aristotle did not have a labour theory of value though. The first fella who came up with it is Ibn Haldun.

Doesn't Marx describe human beings as laboring animals, animal laborans?

In any case though, these too are similarities in the details and aspects of Marx's thinking, but not methodological similarities.

While I don't think Marx was too influenced by ancient philosophy to begin with, he certainly paid more attention to Epicurus than Aristotle, writing a major study about him. Of course it is not unnatural for him to be fond of Aristotle too, the guy was rather similar to Marx himself, a freaking writing machine.

Fair enough but still doesn't make any difference.

I would be interested in how you'd argue that, especially about Kant though. Maybe you could write something about it in this thread: http://www.revleft.org/vb/showthread.php?t=100146

Leo:

Indeed, and Hegel's influence halted at or about the time Marx write Das Kapital.

But, Marx indicated that he had changed this 'methodology' by the time he wrote Das Kapital.

I nowhere said he was a 'Hegelian'; what I said is that we need not speculate since Marx helpfully added a summary of 'his method' from which every trace of Hegel had been removed. So, this new method owes nothing to Hegel.

Unless you can show otherwise.

In that case, your interpetation will have to ignore the summary of 'his method' that he endorsed which contains not one atom of Hegel, or his 'method'.

Not so, this is a return to Aristotle.

Hegel had mystified Aristotle and Kant, Marx simply indicated that he rejected this. So he is not using Hegel's method, just signalling his return to Aristotle.

Maybe so, but the seeds of the labour theory of value are in Aristotle:

http://www.economyprofessor.com/econ...y-of-value.php

Bold added.

Quoted from here:

http://192.220.96.165/untpltcl/exchvljs.html

From Rubin's history:

More here:

http://www.marxists.org/archive/rubin/value/ch10.htm

See also:

http://cas.umkc.edu/ECON/Oeconomicus...0IX/Avsar1.pdf

Leo:

And yet he quotes Aristotle across eight pages in Das Kapital, and Epicurus not once.

Here are a few of them:

MECW, Volume 35, Capital Volume One, pp.69-70. Bold added.

Notice, no past tense when he calls Aristotle a 'great thinker', and that his work is that of 'genius'. I do not think he ever described Hegel that way. Lenin did, but not Marx. 'Mighty thinker' is the best we get.

And here:

Ibid., p.92.

Ibid., p.96.

He quotes him again at length on pages 163, 175, 331 (where he notes that Aristotle called 'man' a politcal animal), and then on page 411 we find this:

Maybe I'll write something on Kant -- when I have time. I am just putting the finishing touches to a 130,000 word essay, which is already ten days overdue.

Apologies, I didn't have time to respond to this thread:

I am not convinced, I don't think that quote shows that either.

This is quite a big thing to say since it means that Marx's methodology before a certain point basically "marxist". It is evidently untrue, Marx's methodology remains the same - but of course constantly developing - methodology in more or less all his work, even before he was fully a communist.

Well, lets let the man speak for himself: The mystification which dialectic suffers in Hegel’s hands, by no means prevents him from being the first to present its general form of working in a comprehensive and conscious manner. With him it is standing on its head. It must be turned right side up again, if you would discover the rational kernel within the mystical shell.

Marx says it quite clearly whether you like it or not, and denying this reality doesn't help the point you are making.

No it isn't though, Aristotle's understanding of the relation between thought and matter is completely apart from that of Marx. Aristotle's conception, what is called universalia in rebus, basically is in the same school with Plato's conceptions later called universalia ante rem. Marx's conception stands opposed to the understanding of both Aristotle and Plato on this, and is in line with the tradition of universalia post rem, an ancient representative of which would be Antisthenes rather than Aristotle. It is of course telling how Plato and Aristotle's mystical conceptions on this question dominating medieval philosophy and represented by the likes of Augustinus, Boetius and Thomas Aquinas were challenged by the likes of William of Ockham and Roscelinius near the end of the middle ages, in a way signalling the beginning of the renassaince.

You have a point there.

Well yes, then again Epicurus doesn't really have much to do with economics and Marx had already written two studies on him.

I don't think the degree of praises Marx made on different philosophers has got much to do with the point, what you are making is a sematic point. There is of course nothing surprising about Marx quoting Aritotle several times since he made a point about the connections he saw between what Aristotle said and his economics.

Considering that Aristotle is the philosopher who has the highest amount of works that survived so that it seems as if the bastard wrote about every subject imaginable, this is an understandable comment.

Leo:

Ok, but you will admit that my interpretation is viable.

Plus, it absolves Marx of involvement with a theory that implies change is impossible!

http://www.revleft.com/vb/showpost.p...5&postcount=54

http://www.revleft.com/vb/showpost.p...6&postcount=55

So you say, but Marx indicated in Das Kapital that it had changed.

Indeed, let him speak for himself, so we need not speculate here:

You will note that Marx calls this the 'dialectic method', and 'his method', but it is also clear that it bears no relation to the sort of dialectics comrades usually attribute to Marx, for in it there is not one ounce of Hegel -- no quantity turning into quality, no contradictions, no negation of the negation, no unities of opposites, no totality...

So, Marx's method has had Hegel totally extirpated. For Marx, putting Hegel on 'his feet' is to crush his head, and we find that the 'rational kernel' is empty.

And of the few terms Marx uses of Hegel's in Das Kapital, he tells us this:

So, the 'rational core' of the dialectic has not one atom of Hegel in it, and Marx merely 'coquetted' with a few bits of Hegelian jargon in Das Kapital.

That is hardly a ringing endorsement of this mystical theory.

Well, I do not wish to take issue with all this here (but the argument is not as clear cut as you would have it -- I can find no reference in Marx that supports this view of yours), but even if you were right, I am not sure what this has to do with the issue at hand. I nowhere said Marx fully agreed with Aristotle.

Maybe so, maybe not, but the point is that Marx was happy to wave goodbye to Hegel in Das Kapital, hence his use of the past tense, and his dismissal of Hegelian jargon as a joke (i.e., something with which he 'coquetted').

I am not sure what quantity has got to do with this. Are you suggesting that Marx was that superficial?

Marx should've agreed with Aristotle on demarchy vs. electoralism (the basis of modern-day republicanism). At least then his critique of the Paris Commune would have been stronger.

Yes, it is viable but I am not convinced nevertheless.

Well, I don't think we need to push things that hard in order to distance Marx from the gross distorted Stalinist understanding of Engels' approach to the question, which in its own turn was rather dogmatic and confused, while he of course did have some points.

That's not how I read it. He is talking about his method, he is not saying that he changed his method.

It can actually be argued that all these sort of things are indeed used in Das Kapital in Marx's arguements without being particularly mentioning them. On the other hand I would say that the main contribution of Hegel to Marx's method, that is seeing things not just in what they areat the moment, but historically, in what they were and what they will become, seeing things with perspective, remains.

I'm sorry but again I am not convinced, putting something on it's doesn't mean crushing that things head. We've all read how Marx behaved those whose heads he actually crushed, he neither coquetted them nor paid them any respect.

Again, you can argue this, but I am simply not convinced that this is what Marx thought based on what he says.

You don't need to find a referance for it in Marx about it though, the similarity between Marx's views on the question of universals and those of the "nominalists" of the renaissance and antiquity is quite clear.

No, but you described this quote from Marx: "To Hegel, the life-process of the human brain, i.e., the process of thinking, which, under the name of 'the Idea,' he even transforms into an independent subject, is the demiurgos of the real world, and the real world is only the external, phenomenal form of 'the Idea.' With me, on the contrary, the ideal is nothing else than the material world reflected by the human mind, and translated into forms of thought." as a "return to Aristotle". I was pointing out that what is expressed here is basically distant from Aristotle's mystical understanding of the relationship between thought and matter.

Again I think you are reading too much into those things in a rather speculative way and it doesn't help your arguement.

I don't see it as being superficial. You can't really compare Aristotle with for example Thales or another philosopher whose works haven't survived. Quantity becomes quality

Leo:

Except, Hegel has now completely gone, and that constitutes a major change.

Well, Marx's own description of 'his method', from which all traces of Hegel have been removed, plainly indicates that the 'rational kernel' of Hegel is empty.

Unless, of course, you think some traces of Hegel have been left. If so, which?

So, let me get this straight; my view is based on what Marx actually said, whereas yours isn't.

That seems fair...

Well, this is your reading. For my part, I think Marx is just confused here; so best to pass over it in respectful silence.

Except, it is based on what Marx actually says, not on what traditional tells us.

In that case, Marx should have thought highly of St Bonaventure, whose works easily dwarf those of Aristotle.

Or, if you are concentrating only on ancient philosophers, he should have thought more highly of Plato and Plotinus than he did of Epicurus or Democritus.

So, not even you believe that quantity is related to quality here.

It is an interpretation that doesn't really sound that reasonable, since you are basically saying that while Marx was saying something he meant the opposite.

No your view isn't based on what Marx actually said either. Marx never said that there was the slightest similarity between his and Aristotle's understanding of the question of universals. Marx, like other nominalists before himself, sees that concepts come after material reality and is shaped by it, that thought comes after matter and is shaped by it. This is basically a modern and developed understanding of what those who have been called nominalists said. Aristotle has a completely different understanding of the question of universals which is mystical.

It's not "my reading", it's what he says - you can't make the point that Marx has got nothing to do with Hegel when you say ignore it when he himself says there are connections or when you just dismiss his comments as silly confused remarks. You are denying something that is obviously there. For the sake of your own arguement though, I think you should rather criticize the influences of Hegel in Marx's thought that ran through his thought and were a part of his method all his life than arguing that these things were non-existant.

Anyway, I don't find it confused at all, he quite clearly says that thoughts, concepts, universals etc. come after material reality and are shaped by them, and he is exactly rigth. What he says is the reverse of what Hegel says, that thoughts, concepts, universals etc. come before material reality and shape them, thus Marx "reverses" Hegel. The relation he has with Hegel is similar to that of Plato and Anthisthenes on this question, both of whom use the Socratic method, while Plato is saying that ideas come before material reality and that the material reality is merely shadows of ideas, and Anthisthenes criticizing him saying that universals basically names of things given to material things. Aristotle's mysticism on this quetion of course isn't even in the picture.

Yet nothing I said has got anything to do with "tradition". You are not basing yourself on what Marx actually says though, you rather "pass over it in respectful silence".

But saying that someone is the greatest philosopher of antiquity isn't exactly the same thing about thinking highly of that philsopher. Of course it doesn't just have to do with the amount of things Aristotle wrote, but they too have an influence. For example I think more highly of philosopher like Heraklitos, Democritus, Anthisthenes, Diogenes and Epicurus that I do of Aristotle. I would not say that either is a greater, mightier philsopher, than Aristotle though.

Uh... i was joking

Leo:

I am almost tempted to respond with 'That's dialectics for you -- a unity and identity of opposites...', but won't.

How can I be saying this when Marx himself, not me, told us he was merely 'coquetting' with Hegelian jargon in Das Kapital, and he went out of his way to add a summary of 'his method' in which not one atom of Hegel (or his method -- whatever it is) can be found.

I am sorry, you misunderstand me. When I said my view was based on what Marx said, I was referring to his jettisoning of Hegel, not his adoption of Aristotle.

I don't deny Marx said those things (how cpuld I?). My point is that his words are not self-interpreting. You have your view of them, and that's OK. All I did was to point out it was your view.

For myself, I prefer not to interpret these words, since they are among the most confused things Marx said in his later work.

You are welcome to make of them what you can.

I beg to differ. A priori psychology of this sort always turns me off.

And it's not even good a priori psychology. I will be publishing an essay on this in the next year or so, and will say no more about it until then.

Well, it seems to me that you are defending a traditional view: that Marx, in Das Kapital, found that the 'rational kernel' of Hegel's system was of great use to him, and thus that is was not empty, as I claim it is.

In fact, there is no 'rational kernel' to be found (I defy you to tell me what it is), and, as I have pointed out, Marx's own words indicate that this 'kernel' is empty.

And no wonder, if dialectics were true, change would be impossible.

I take from Marx what I think is defensible, and this a priori psychology (worked out in an armchair, with no experimental detail to back it up, no surveys, no brain scans, etc., etc.) isn't.

You are welcome to it; I still prefer to pass by in respectful silence. [Marx was not a deity. He screwed up from time to time. I acknowledge that fact, but do not trumpet it about the place.]

Well, we have been over this already. Here is what I posted earlier:

Notice, no past tense when he calls Aristotle a 'great thinker', and a 'gaint thinker' and that his work is that of 'genius'. I do not think he ever described Hegel that way. Lenin did, but not Marx. 'Mighty thinker' is the best we get.

So, Marx had a very high opinion of Aristotle. Can you think of anyone esle he described in this way? Did he describe the philosphers you mention in this way? I think not.

So was I.