Fido is back, and barking mad:
To you, because you're insane.
Ah, you are an amateur psychologist, as well as a mystic, are you?
He didn't have to, as you're empiricism is obvious to many but you.
So, you admit there is no evidence; you mystics just like to make stuff up, and not just about me, but about Marx and his alleged adherence to Hegelian gobbledygook.
But, as if to prove me right, and in response to this from me:
(in which not a trace of Hegel can be found) as the ‘dialectic method’.
[This was in reference to Marx’s comment, that a reviewer had summarised his “dialectic method” without a trace of Hegel anywhere in it.]
Fido woofs back:
Rosa's concrete skull can't process this. That quote had the dialectic method, and it didn't need Hegel.
You may be an expert “yup”-er, my fine fury friend, but you are not too good at processing complex arguments – or even a simple one like this – are you, Fido?
Let me walk you through it once more; if you won’t accept my word, perhaps you might accept Marx’s (although the signs are not good – you like to ignore anything that does not compute in that doggy brain of yours): Marx quoted a short review of his book, in which, according to him, that reviewer had summarised the “dialectic method”.
Now, you can search through that review, but you won’t find a trace of Hegel.
Even you admit that, later!
Now, that, according to Marx, is the rational core of Hegel’s method, i.e., with Hegel 100% removed. Indeed, Marx called his method the opposite of Hegel’s, and with 100% of that bumbler’s ideas excised, you can’t get more opposite than that.
And, as if to rub it in with you Hegel-freaks, Marx even went on to say that in Kapital, all you will find of that Hermetic and logical incompetent’s work are a few bits of jargon, with which Marx merely “coquetted”.
Pick a fight with him, not me!
But, we know you like to read stuff into passages, ideas that conform only to the mystical fog that clouds your canine brain (er…, sorry, empty skull).
So, insert what you like into Marx’s work -- you mystics have been doing that for well over 130 years, not noticing how unsuccessful the resulting Dialectical Mumbo Jumbo actually is, and not noticing that if Marx is right, and truth is tested in practice, your ‘theory’ has been falsified by history – it won’t change the above facts.
I then said this:
This, apart from the irrelevant bluster below, is his “refutation” of my argument.
My refutation consisted in quoting Fido to the effect that all ideas come from the ruling class, and hence, because Daoists have ideas (although there is some doubt about that too), these must have come from the ruling-class.
Here is what Fido had originally said (before he realised he was dropping himself right in it:
Because you are unable to understand that fact that all ideas have come from the ruling class, including Marx's.
Now, I admit that the serious damage done to Fido’s brain by the cocktail of mystical bo**ocks and Hegelian sub-literate logic he has downed over the years means that he will not be able to see that this refutes his claim that Daoist ideas do not come from the ruling class, but the rest of us will just have to be patient with one so afflicted until the penny drops.
But, it would help if someone would take him to one side, and slap some materialist good sense into him. [Ok, that might take several hours of sustained slapping, but I can live with that.]
Proof?
Well, just check out this irrelevant response from Fido:
since Rosa is unable to understand Class struggle and Class ownership and ideas, well then of course she can't deal with the contradiction that all ideas of a socio-historic period come from the ruling class, are adapted by the working class, and continue to contain the aspirations of the oppressed classes. She can't see the rational kernel of anything since she's stuck in absolutist empiricism.
Can anyone see how this is at all relevant to showing that my refutation of his earlier claims is in any way invalid. How does that show that if:
Fido: “all ideas have come from the ruling class”
that Daoist ideas are not ruling-class ideas as I alleged pages ago?
Now Fido tries to wriggle out of the bind he is in by deflecting attention to my alleged incapacity to comprehend the class struggle, not realising that my point is in fact motivated by that struggle, and my endeavour to stay on the side of the working-class, and not roll over before ruling-class hacks to get his tummy tickled.
To that end, I pointed out that all of philosophy is ruling-class twaddle, and so are mystical ideas, like those found in Daoism. Fido denied this. He asserted the following:
The Tao was originally a rulling (sic) class ideology now? Hmmm... Well, it may have been turned into a ruling class ideology of pacifism, but that's not what it started as. Again, her superficial analysis of history has her miss how the ancient Yin Yang school and the early taoists (sic) inspired the golden turban insurrections in ancient China. They were suppressed (sic), but they were fighting to create an egalitarian society and to wipe out all aristocrats. They weren't as theoritically (sic) advanced as Marx and Kropotkin, but I would consider their movement to be a valid revolutionary movement.
[Bold emphasis added.]
http://libcom.org/forums/thought/thesis-antithesis-synthesis?page=6
Notice that, unlike Fido and Posey, I back up what I allege with evidence.
Impartial readers will now wait upon Fido to explain how “all ideas come from the ruling class”, while of Daoism “it may have been turned into a ruling class ideology of pacifism, but that's not what it started as.”
Fido now tries to argue, in contradiction to himself:
since Rosa is unable to understand Class struggle and Class ownership and ideas, well then of course she can't deal with the contradiction that all ideas of a socio-historic period come from the ruling class, are adapted by the working class, and continue to contain the aspirations of the oppressed classes.
Under pressure, he has to admit that such ideas come from the ruling class (as I asserted earlier), which contradicts the following, as we have seen:
The Tao was originally a rulling (sic) class ideology now? Hmmm... Well, it may have been turned into a ruling class ideology of pacifism, but that's not what it started as.
Of course, he now tries to use ‘dialectics’ in his bid to squirm out of this corner, claiming that:
since Rosa is unable to understand Class struggle and Class ownership and ideas, well then of course she can't deal with the contradiction that all ideas of a socio-historic period come from the ruling class, are adapted by the working class, and continue to contain the aspirations of the oppressed classes.
Not only is the above not a contradiction (or if it is, Fido will need to explain how it is – I predict he will bottle that one too), impartial readers will be able to see in this why I reject the importation of this word (i.e., “contradiction”) from Hegelian mysticism into Marxism, since it allows numpties like Fido to ‘defend’ their own sloppy thinking (which is riddled with genuine contradictions), on the grounds that everything is contradictory anyway, so their thought can be too (a get-out-of-a-hole-free-card they preserve for their own exclusive use – no one else is allowed to use it!).
Just as I hope they will see that the comrades who argued that ‘dialectical contradictions’ are not formal ones, they relate to conflict and struggle, were mistaken in their view that mad dog dialecticians like Fido here, will use this word in just such a way (as a formal contradiction) to excuse their own contradictory pronouncements – in this case, the one that exists between Fido’s claim that Daoism was not originally a ruling class set of ideas with his claim that all ideas originate with the ruling class:
Fido: “all ideas have come from [i.e., “originate with”, RL] the ruling class”
which contradicts this:
The Tao was originally a rulling (sic) class ideology now? Hmmm... Well, it may have been turned into a ruling class ideology of pacifism, but that's not what it started as [“originated as, RL].
So, I was right to assert, pages ago, that this mystical set of ideas (in Daoism), just like those found in Hegel, did indeed originate with the ruling-class.
But, how does Fido handle my earlier argument, outlined above, but summarised in this passage he quoted from me?
Can anyone see in here a response to my claim that Daoist ideas not only are, but came from, the ruling class? So, which bit is the metaphor?
Well, we get this:
Of course others can, but Rosa just can't deal with figurative langauge (sic) as it would short circuit her. And the house was the metaphor Rosa, but you can't read so that's okay.
However, these “others” are remarkably silent – but, what is the betting that they speak to Fido in his dreams – after all that is what mystics usually claim.
Once more, can anyone see in what Fido has posted anything that explains this serious contradiction in his claims?
That being so, I once more assert that Fido gets all his ideas from the ruling-class, including those found in Daoism.
Once more, good people, do not take my word for it, Fido admitted this himself:
Because you are unable to understand that fact that all ideas have come from the ruling class, including Marx's.
But then he moans because I want to throw all this away, and start afresh.
Why? Well as I show at length in Essay Nine Part Two, mystics like Fido here cling on to this set of ideas because (as Marx argued) it provides them with some form of consolation – in this case for the fact that Dialectical Marxism has been such an abject and long-term failure – but in the fond belief that all will turn out well in the end, when the negation of the negation finally kicks in (this second negation being their equivalent of the second coming).
http://homepage.ntlworld.com/rosa.l/page%2009_02.htm
In short, Fido is a quasi-religious nut, a doggie dogmatist.
And, once more, as if to prove that evidence and Fido are total strangers, in response to my suggestion that he actually check his facts by consulting (Marxist scholar) Conner’s recent book he ignores this. Here is the full passage that Fido ‘edited’:
And in response to my request that he actually find out the facts from a Marxist scholar (hence my reference to Conner’s book), which show that science is not a ruling class pursuit, or not exclusively theirs, Fido responds thus:Quote:
This is ridiculous. All science is owned by the ruling class and is politically movivated [sic] to benefit them, existing within that science is a progressive force in direct opposition to it.In other words, he prefers to cling onto his erroneous belief that science is a ruling class activity, in defiance of the evidence that Conner has produced, calling my request that he check his facts “ridiculous”.
Fido now woofs back:
Yes, science is a ruling class activity in so much as they own it and propel it in their own interests. That's basic class struggle, but Rosa has already proven that she doesn't know jack all (eh?) about Marxism.
Bold “eh” added.
Which once again shows that Fido is super-glued (crazy-glued) to an a priori[/] view of reality, where facts are not allowed to ruin the mystical picture.
Check this out:
http://www.booknoise.net/sciencehistory/index.html
And read this:
December 18, 2005
'A People's History of Science,' by Clifford D. Conner
Proletarian Science
Review by JONATHAN WEINER
"GIVE thy heart to letters," an Egyptian father advised his son on a piece of papyrus more than 3,000 years ago, in the hope that his child would choose a life of writing over a life of manual labor. "I have seen the metal worker at his toil before a blazing furnace. . . . His fingers are like the hide of the crocodile, he stinks more than the eggs of fish. And every carpenter who works or chisels, has he any more rest than the plowman?"Laborers are "generally held in bad repute," Xenophon wrote about 700 years later, "and with justice." Manual jobs keep men too busy to be decent companions or good citizens, "so that men engaged in them must ever appear to be both bad friends and poor defenders of their country."
Clifford D. Conner thinks this kind of snobbery has distorted the writing of history from ancient times to the present, because historians are scribes themselves and it is a clean, soft hand that holds the pen. In writing about science, for instance, historians celebrate a few great names - Galileo, Newton, Darwin, Einstein - and neglect the contributions of common, ordinary people who were not afraid to get their hands dirty. With "A People's History of Science," Conner tries to help right the balance. The triumphs of science rest on a "massive foundation created by humble laborers," he writes. "If science is understood in the fundamental sense of knowledge of nature, it should not be surprising to find that it originated with the people closest to nature: hunter-gatherers, peasant farmers, sailors, miners, blacksmiths, folk healers and others."
It's a good subject for a book of popular science, which is what Conner sets out to give us: "a history not only of the people but for the people as well." Most science writing really is dominated by the Great Man theory of history. I can see that just by glancing at the books on my own shelves - a few of which I've written. I don't know if we're much worse about this than historians of art, literature, politics or sports, and I don't know if we're snobs, but we do love to honor the great. Even the great scientists honor the great. "If I have seen further," Newton wrote, "it is by standing on the shoulders of giants." At the same time, Newton also stood on the backs of "anonymous masses of humble people," as Conner says, "untold thousands of illiterate artisans." An accomplished army of the anonymous bequeathed him their tools, data, problems, ideas and even, Conner argues, the scientific method itself.
Conner's book works best in the early chapters. Hunter-gatherers and early farmers domesticated plants and animals and gave us corn, wheat, rice, beef, pork, chicken, almost every kind of food we eat. They changed the world more than modern genetic engineers have done, so far. Pacific islanders navigated not only by the stars but also by wave patterns; lying down in their canoes, they could read the stars with their eyes and the swells with their backs. Anonymous blacksmiths added tin to copper and made an alloy that is much stronger and yet also more malleable than copper - bronze. Since copper and tin are rarely found together in the ground, the invention of bronze probably required a long series of experiments. Generations of experimenters sweated in the mouth of the furnace. Tough, trial-and-error, sometimes live-or-die work like this was gradually refined into the intellectual and rarefied pursuit we call science. The Greeks didn't invent science; they learned from the Egyptians, Babylonians and Phoenicians. And the Industrial Revolution could not have taken place in England without the work of brewers, salt makers, miners and canal diggers. Conner does include one case of poetic justice. A great moment in the history of science was the publication of Andreas Vesalius's anatomy book, "De Humani Corporis Fabrica," in 1543. What made the book a triumph wasn't the Latin text Vesalius wrote but the 420 illustrations. He never took the trouble to name the artists he'd hired to draw them. Nobody has ever translated the whole of Vesalius's text into a modern Western language; the illustrations have stayed in print from that year to this.
As science gained prestige, and its leaders joined the elite, artisans and mechanics often had a hard time getting recognized. Anton van Leeuwenhoek, the linen draper who founded the science of microbiology, felt inferior because he was not university-trained. John Harrison, the British carpenter and clockmaker who solved the longitude problem, was badly treated by the elites. So was William Smith, who gave geologists their first stratigraphic maps.
By the 20th century, it had become almost impossible for outsiders to contribute to the scientific enterprise. Conner calls this "the downside of a people's history of science."
Some of the people in this book would make terrific subjects for popular biographies. John Harrison's story has already been celebrated by Dava Sobel in "Longitude," and Smith's by Simon Winchester in "The Map That Changed the World." Next someone should tell the story of Cornelius Drebbel, a Dutch alchemist who, according to Conner, plunged a submarine into the Thames in 1620, providing the passengers with bottles of oxygen - more than 150 years before the gas or the very concept of gases had been officially discovered…."
Or this:
Media Mouse: Grand Rapids News & Independent MediaA People’s History of Science: Miners, Midwives, and “Low Mechanicks”
June 25 2006
Clifford D. Conner’s A People’s History of Science is an ambitious five-hundred page book that systematically moves through a broad history of western science and identifies the many ways in which the history of science is improperly taught in the United States by revealing how, in many cases, it was not the “great minds” that made scientific discoveries but rather the cumulative efforts of people cutting across class lines. Conner begins by describing how the history of science is taught by giving students a history that spans long periods of times in which nothing of consequence happens until a “eureka” moment when some “great” man “discovers” a great idea and moves humanity forward. This method of science leaves no room for ordinary people beyond placing them in the debt of those who were great enough to scientific discoveries. Beyond seeking simply to uncover the role of people in science, Conner is also writing for people with his history intended to be read by anyone who has an interest in science and not the narrow audience of academics that frequently discuss the history of science.
If there is one common theme that runs through the hundreds of years covered in Conner’s book, it is that ordinary people—not great men—were at the root of almost every scientific invention. Conner describes how it was merchants who made mathematical innovations, sailors who gathered the knowledge used to expand the science of astronomy, midwives who learned about the female body, and host of other people who made important discoveries as part of their daily struggle to survive.
Scientific innovation thus was not handed to people by academics and great inventors, but rather often resembled a pyramid where innovations were made by a large number of people until one person was associated with a particular invention, regardless of whether or not it was indeed an individual contribution. Indeed, Conner describes how medieval academics, the church, and the ancient Greeks often had a stifling effect on scientific innovation with many academics choosing to focus on the purely theoretical rather than the science in practice learned by artisans. In the case of the ancient Greeks, Conner makes a persuasive argument that the failing of Greek philosophers such as Aristotle to really understand the world, and their subsequent idolization by medieval European academics, may have set the course of scienftic progress back by hundreds of years.
Conner ends by taking on the corporatization of science and the notion that all science is good science because science as scientific innovation means technological process and thus is to the benefit of humanity. Conner shatters this myth by examining the green revolution of the twentieth century and explaining how that supposed innovation in agriculture has done little to combat hunger around the world. It is not a coincidence that many of the “benefits” of the green revolution were promised by large corporations who now make up what Conner describes as the “Scientific-Industrial Complex.” To Conner, the Scientific-Industrial Complex is a result of the “intricate entwinement of university, government, and big business” with the benefits of scientific discovery frequently going to a handful of educational institutions and corporations who have come to “own” many scientific innovations. Conner describes the collaboration of scientists on corporate and military projects ranging from the Manhattan Project to develop a nuclear weapon (an effort that has resulted in one of the most serious threats to the world) to scientists developing proprietary computers systems that stifle innovation. In his concluding remarks, Conner describes how many critics have charged that science has not improved the quality of most people’s lives and indeed has to respond to social movements calling for socially responsible uses of scientific innovation. For Conner, this is an inevitable consequence of the union of science and capital, with the only solution being a globally planned economy where scientific innovation and discovery will be put to the benefit of all.
Conner’s A People’s History of Science is an engaging and quick read that offers a refreshing re-interpretation of the history of science. Those who suffered through survey history courses in high school or college where they were required to memorize a series of inventions and their inventors will find Conner’s history to be interesting and full of unexpected surprises. Ultimately, Conner presents a portrayal of ordinary people as the ones who can make progress in society, a considerably more inspirational tale than the traditional tale of great white men, their inventions, and their almost god-like status.
Clifford D. Conner, A People’s History of Science: Miners, Midwives, and “Low Mechanicks”, (Nation Books, 2005).
http://www.mediamouse.org/reviews/062506_a_pe.php?print_page=1
Backed into a new corner, Fido gets another dose of selective blindness, as follows:
Originally I had alleged that the [i]Grundrisse was not published by Marx or Engels, and so cannot be used by dialectical mystics to argue that Marx was still indebted to Hegel when he wrote Kapital.
Now, I might be right, I might be wrong. But Fido responded (in his previous post to this one) to this allegation thus (as summarised in my last post):
Rosa: With respect to the Grundrisse, Fido asserts this:Quote:
1.) There's no proof that Engels even knew of its existence.According to Fido, however, in the Marx/Engels correspondence, there is such proof.
Here is Fido before he was rumbled -- (on page five above, in response to this from me):
Quote:
Oh, so it [the Grundrisse] was published by Marx then? Or by Engels??Fido said:
Quote:
and if you read the dialogue between them, then you'd know why.Is he being ‘metaphorical’ again?
And this on, page six, from our very own canine numpty:
Quote:
Apparently she hadn't read it or she would know that The Grundrisse was the work that Marx wanted to publish, but the publisher and Engels warned him not to publish only one text, as money had to be made.Bold emphasis added.
So, if Fido is right, there’s my proof.
Notice that my ‘authority’ for saying that Engels knew of this work was Fido himself:
Quote:
if you read the dialogue between them, then you'd know why… Apparently she hadn't read it or she would know that The Grundrisse was the work that Marx wanted to publish, but the publisher and Engels warned him not to publish only one text, as money had to be made.[Collapsing two of his responses together.]
How does he now respond to the above? Here’s how:
Quote:
this is another example of Rosa not knowing history, as Marx knew of its existence but Engels did not. Engels told him how to produce the series of Capital, but did not know of Grundrisse. She's so daft it's pathetic.But this makes a mockery of his earlier response to me, for in my original complaint I asked this question:
Quote:
Oh, so it [the Grundrisse] was published by Marx then? Or by Engels??To which he replied:
Quote:
if you read the dialogue between them, then you'd know whyimplying Engels did know of it.
It is only now, when he has been caught out, that he back-tracks:
Quote:
but the publisher and Engels warned him not to publish only one text, as money had to be made.doesn't mean they knew of the existence of just one text as Engels was discussing the opening introduction of one of Hegel's texts that, according to him, precluded having to read the whole work.
Fine, if he now wants to change his mind.
But in doing so, he steps on another landmine, for if Engels did not know about this work, it cannot have been all that important to Marx!
He did not even tell his closest friend and confidant about it!!
Either way, Fido’s theory is blown apart.
Oh dear!
Now, in relation to this comment of mine:
The bottom line is that this work remained unpublished, even by Engels. Why?
Fido replied thus:
Uhm, because Marx was poor and in debt and had to sell books. Oh yeah, and he was working on the 6 or 7 (disputed) volumes of Capital.
Fido might be right here, he might not.
But, once more, since Marx did not publish this work, nor did he direct anyone to it (in Kapital, that is), it cannot be used by the likes of Fido to show that Marx remained indebted to Hegel in his Kapital-writing period.
Especially as I went on to say this (omitted by Fido):
The bottom line is that this work remained unpublished, even by Engels. Why?Now, when this fact is viewed in the light of Marx’s own words --, that the “dialectic method”, summarised for us by the reviewer he quoted, which contains not an atom of Hegel --, this decision not to publish becomes a little clearer: by the time it came to publishing Kapital, he had himself ditched all traces of Hegel, except, of course, for some jargon, with which he merely “coquetted”.
This is the rock against which all of Fido’s ideas crash.
No wonder he wants to read into these words of Marx whatever takes his fancy.
This can be seen from his response to this comment of mine:
Which was in turn a reply to Fido’s alleged capacity to see in Marx’s text the exact opposite of that which confronts the eye.
namely:
Her tendency to believe that what she sees is what all people see, as she is now saying "the eye" for her lack of sight.
Which is Fido-esque for “I can make up what I like, so there!”
Exhibit A for the prosecution; in reply to this comment of mine:
So, either way, Marx believed the opposite of Hegel.
Fido responds:
This word, opposite, has a specific meaning within the context of the dialectic method. But, Rosa hasn't learned the basic fourth grade understanding that different words mean different things in different contexts.
How does he know Marx meant it the way Fido says he does?
Well, Fido has spoken, and his word is law.
In short, Fido can use the word “dialectical” as a magic wand; all he has to do is wave it about and any word can be made to say anything he likes.
And we already know Fido does not do evidence --, but now we can see why.
He does not need any! With this magic wand, he can magic anything into anything he desires.
[Someone tell him to magic himself a working brain, please!]
But, Rosa is not allowed to do this – oh, no: only the dialectical faithful are permitted this handy device.
Now, in response to my saying I had no philosophy, we get this gem:
As I say to existentialists all the time, the denying of a philosophy is in itself a philosophy. Silly little Rosa, and to think you spent so much of your life on this rubbish.
And how does Fido know that “the denying of a philosophy is in itself a philosophy”?
He does not say, and we had better not ask – for he is a minor deity, with a magic wand.
He could do you real damage if you diss him….
But, back on planet earth, when one denies something, it does not (except to the alien visitors from Planet Fido) mean that one is admitting to the thing denied!
Now, in an earlier post we had this exchange:
Rosa: And how is my discourse “saturated with the state”? In fact, you are the one who lionises the ruling-class --, from whom, according to you once more, humanity receives all its wisdom.Fido chooses to ignore the last half and chest beats this response:
Quote:
Fido: Uhm, no. I'm a communist. I smash states.
How are we to read this denial, in the light of the wisdom pouring in from planet Fido, where the opposite of what you say is what you mean?
Well, applying this doggie-logic, it must mean that Fido, in denying that he lionises the ruling-class, is thereby admitting that this is indeed what he does: lionise the ruling-class.
How else are we to understand the odd use of denial on planet Fido?
So, whenever any of you, dear readers, deny you are supporters of capitalism, do not be surprised if this emissary from another world says of you that your denial merely confirms that you are a class traitor!
Once more, and here, we can see the deleterious effects of too much Hegel on the brain of this diminutive little poodle.
Now, I hope he denies this, since doggie-logic means that will merely confirm what I say.
Indeed, every time he now tries to deny something, no prizes for guessing what he is going to get thrown back in his doggie face.
But, in response to admitting that I am in good company, not knowing what the ‘dialectic’ is (as he sees it), since no one seems to understand it, what does Fido woof back?
Wonder no more, for it is this:
I love how she argues from ignorance, and then denies, outright denies the dialectic. She doesn't even pretend to understand that which she's arguing against. She's much closer to Simpatico in Gallileo's (sic) text.
Notice: no attempt to respond.
So, after 200 years of no one knowing WTF Hegel was on about, may I suggest to the mystical-faithful who post here at LibCom not look to this alien being for assistance, for it is plain he is as much in the dark as anyone else is -- perhaps more so..
In response to this from yours truly (about the nature of ‘the dialectic’, as Marx saw it):
But, I do know what it is (in its rational form): Marx very kindly spelt it out for us in that quotation from his reviewer, which he called the “dialectic method”, in which not a shred of Hegel is to be found.
This canine from outer space ‘responds’:
And here's where the stupid elitist pharasee (Pharisee?) buries herself. She stumbled onto the fact that the dialectic exists outside of the jargon of Hegel. Boy is she nuts.
Now, this is either a concession that we do not need an ounce (or even a picogram) of Hegel to understand Marx, or it is an admission that this point tool has sailed over his hairy head (and face).
And, once again, Fido’s reference to my alleged ‘elitism’ sits rather badly with his own lionising of the ruling-class, and his open adulation of that famous coal miner, Hegel.
Now, earlier, I alleged that only Fido was allowed to interpret words any way he wanted, but in reply to this comment of mine:
the opposite of Hegel’s ‘dialectic’ is in fact a ‘dialectic’ with not trace of Hegel in it, as the word “opposite” means.
which comment was, it is worth recalling, based on Marx’s own description of that reviewer’s summary of his method (in which not an atom of Hegel is to be found) as “the dialectic method” (notice the definite article here, so it is not a version of it, but the version), Fido responds thus:
Not exactly, but close. a dialectic without a trace of Hegel's idealism in it.
So, Fido is allowed to interpret things anyway he see fit (and defiance of Marx’s own depiction), whereas I am not allowed to do the same (even though I am in accord with Marx’s own depiction)!
And then, how does he substantiate this significant advance in the science of make-believe?
Like this:
Keep on chucking on the dirt ya stupid twit.
So cogent, so lucid!
But, if our doggy friend is not even good at abuse, is he good for anything?
Perhaps not; maybe he is the good-for-nothing we suspected from page one onward?
Nevertheless, we can only thank him that, a score or so posts later, this fact is abundantly clear even to the malnourished fleas on his scraggy coat.
And now, it seems that this canine coward is wilting under Rosa’s incessant attacks, for he yelps this in obvious pain:
The best response of her rambling idiotic rants is when I say that we can learn from everything and everyone, and she just vents vitriol. Pours it right out, but can't refute the simple truth that knowledge can be found in all sources of knowledge [eh??], but a critical analysis is necessary to cull the idealism away. The critical analysis is called Marxism, based on the dialectical material method.
Bold “eh” added.
Now, Fido here began in his first post in response to me with abuse, invective and an abundant use of scatological language.
Unfortunately for him, in those far off days, he did not know what he was taking on, since, as Posey has since noted, I usually go for the jugular from the get-go; but, quite out of character, I was rather nice to him at first. When it became apparent to me what a plonker he is, and how unfair hew was --, and what a fifth-rate abuser he still is --, I decided his jugular looked far too tempting to resist any more. Since then, I have attacked him mercilessly. So he yelps.
In general, Dialectical Mystics like Fido to dish it out but they cannot take it in return.
What was that about every action prompts an equal and opposite reaction? Not in me it doesn’t. I go the extra ten yards.
I always give far worse that I get.
Why?
Well, I explained why at my site (referring to a section at there that records the many pages of Fido-esque abuse I have had to endure over the last 18 months on the internet from similar mystics, and of a superior quality to anything he can dole out):
This page contains links to forums on the web where I have 'debated' this creed with other comrades.For anyone interested, check out the desperate 'debating' tactics used by Dialectical Mystics in their attempt to respond to my ideas.
You will no doubt note that the vast majority all say the same sorts of things, and most of them pepper their remarks with scatological and abusive language. They all like to make things up, too, about me and my beliefs.
25 years (!!) of this stuff from Dialectical Mystics has meant I now take an aggressive stance with them every time -- I soon learnt back in the 1980's that being pleasant with them (my initial tactic) did not alter their abusive tone, their propensity to fabricate, nor reduce the amount of scatological language they used.
So, these days, I generally go for the jugular from the get-go.
Apparently, they expect me to take their abuse lying down, and regularly complain about my "bullying" tactics.
So, these mystics can dish it out, but they cannot take it.Given the damage their theory has done to Marxism, and the abuse they all dole out, they are lucky this is all I can do to them!
However, even those who disagree with me will wonder at the following Fido-esque tautology:
but can't refute the simple truth that knowledge can be found in all sources of knowledge
He’ll be challenging me to refute the claim that all regicides are king-killers next!
But, what of this seemingly ‘substantive’ point:
The best response of her rambling idiotic rants is when I say that we can learn from everything and everyone, and she just vents vitriol. Pours it right out, but can't refute the simple truth that knowledge can be found in all sources of knowledge,
And how does Fido know this? How does he know we can learn from “everything and everyone” (which, if correct, must, of course, include Nazis, madmen, George W Bush, toilet seats and dog fleas (these are part of everything, I believe)).
Then why can’t he learn from me?
But, let us not stop there; this does mean he can learn from me.
[And this will be yet another Fido-ism he will get thrown back in his hairy face.]
Excellent! In that case, and from now on, I expect him to agree with all I say, including this: “Fido, you are a very silly little doggie!”
But, will he learn from this?
I suspect not.
Odd though this might see, that is good news: for that fact alone refutes his claim that we can “everything and everyone”, which is fine by me.
If he can’t learn form me then he has refuted himself!
[Watch and learn, Fido, this is how to do polemic….]
Now, I had earlier complained that when Fido said this:
Throughout the whole of our argument, and basically throughout each and every argument that you've tried to dismiss. Yeah, you seem to basically hinge your logic on the fact that inference doesn't exist.
He was misrepresenting me.
How does he respond?
Wonder no more, for here is the latest crackly message from planet Fido:
The only inferences this insane twit allows are the ones that she makes up herself. She denies any associative or inferential methodology.
So, whatever their alleged quality, Fido now admits I allow inferences.
Another retreat, then!
But, is this another example of the ‘dialectic’ method at work? Does it mean that those whose brains (or in Fido’s case, empty spaces between the ears) it colonises have to contradict themselves all the time?
Well, it seems it must if Fido is of their ilk, for he does it incessantly.
May I suggest, therefore, to the dialectical-mystical community that you take Fido in hand, and at least house train him, for he is intend on dropping steaming piles of doggie mess wherever he goes, which he then unhelpfully calls “materialist dialectics”.
If this is indeed “materialist dialectics” in action, may I then suggest its name be change to “materialist do-do’s”?
No wonder Marxism stinks in the nostrils of the international working class when comrades dump at will, and everywhere, like this.
And when, Fido woofs this:
She denies any associative or inferential methodology.
he knows, for I have told him many times, what I actually deny are the inventive ‘inferences’ he wants to use, which, as we have seen above, allow him to make stuff up about Marx (or anything else that finds itself swilling around his doggy brain), and to refuse to post the supporting evidence -- but, when he demands the exact opposite of rational souls like my good self (in that he requires me to prove everything, and moans when he thinks I have invented something).
And, now we find a return to neurotic laughter (did he catch this from SIMCP, or was it the other way around?):
It was hilarious how she can't deal with my rebuttal in reference to Lenin's use of whole, since she can't understand language in context.
How he knows what Lenin meant, Fido kept to himself, but I suspect those voices in his head are back again.
So, no wonder I cannot ‘explain’ this word, or this word as Fido has processed it, for, unlike him, I do not hear ‘the voices’ that have caught the ear of this canine casuist.
[I have to say that it can only be hoped that these voices one day say to him: “under that bus, now”, and rid our movement of this doggy dreamer, and his frequent ‘droppings’.]
Now in response to this long comment of mine:
But:1) If I do not know what it is, how can I be an empiricist?
2) I note you do not quote a single passage from my work that supports this contention. And it is clear why: as we have seen several times already, you like to make stuff up, and claim that anyone who disagrees with you is either an “elitist” or is “unable to read”.
Which is yet more evidence that you and logic are total strangers, Fido.
Dingbat here responds to this with:
Quote:
The same way you can drink water and not know [it’s] H20. You not knowing something doesn't mean you can't use it. Empiricism is the dominant current of capitalist ideology, of which you're regurgitating.But I had expressly asked how I can be “an empiricist”, not how I can use such ideas:
Quote:
1) If I do not know what it is, how can I be an empiricist?He tries to argue his way out of this hole thus:
Quote:
The same way you can drink water and not know [it’s] H20. You not knowing something doesn't mean you can't use it.But this analogy is lame; if I went about the place saying “water is H2O” and someone said I did not know that water was H2O the absurdity would be apparent.
How then can I (as Fido alleges) go about the place openly spouting empiricist ideas and not know they are such (especially when I have a degree or two in the subject Fido is trying to correct me over!).
His analogy is clearly about specialist knowledge; so just as those who know no chemistry at all can drink water while not knowing what it is made of, those who know no, er…, well, what?
Well, it seems that just as those who do know what empiricism is do not know what it is!
That seems to be his ‘argument’!
Fido replies (with his usual penetrating logic, skilful use of new and never before seen terms of abuse – and, of course, that doggy style we have come to know and loathe):
[Rosa]Rosa's an idiot. You're an empiricist if you use empirical methodology. Just like you're a racist if you use racist methodology, regardless of whether or not you believe you are. And, she forgets that she is using her methodololgy (sic) on this site within this polemic. She's as dumb as they come.
Notice how he merely asserts I use empiricist “methodololgy” (which, I venture to suggest he cannot describe for us – he certainly cannot spell it!), but, like Posey (by the way, is Poesy Fido’s trainer?? That will explain the shared tactic of invention. I’d suggest they were sock puppets, but hat would be an insult to socks.), he cannot actually quote an example – you can bet he would have done so if there were one to quote.
Posey has spent countless hours over the last week or so, having been reduced to trawling through my Essays in order to find an atom of proof for his wild allegations (no luck so far; I suspect, even now, he is ransacking my dustbin, and rummaging through my smalls! He wears them with such style, though!) – Fido skips even that lunatic phase(!). He never bothers to check.
Is it against the religion around here to produce evidence for one’s assertions – or can I start making stuff up, too?
Ok, here goes: Posey is mad at me ever since I refused him a **** ***.
You can fill in the blanks yourself.
“Evidence!” -- you say??!!
You must be a “pedant” and an “egotist” to boot, to demand such things on the web!
Ask Posey – he promulgated that eternal verity himself (it’s called naturalised piss taking…).
But, now we get this Fido-ism:
Just like you're a racist if you use racist methodology, regardless of whether or not you believe you are.
But, if you are going to call someone a “racist”, you are going to need evidence.
On planet Fido, though, I suspect you do not, but on earth, you do. Us humans are rather picky that way.
And I have tried to tell him, but it is all too much for this canine chump.
So, where is Fido’s evidence I am an empiricist?
For uncommitted readers of this post, if such it finds, I suggest you do not hold your breath waiting for an answer to that one, since Fido here thinks us human beings do things as they are done in his whacky world back home: make allegations and then act surprised when proof is required – and, then to cap it all, deny any proof is required.
Posey would call it “inference to the most convenient explanation”.
Indeed, he has perfected this art form.
Now, a while back, Fido argued thus:
If your logic can't represent reality, then it's useless. The [sic] it's pointless.
To which I responded:
Well, formal logic is used to run the computer you are using, so it can’t be useless, even though it represents nothing. It has countless other applications in technology and the sciences. [Details in Essay Four at my site.]Diabolical logic has no known technological or scientific application/use. So, if ‘representing’ the world is what ‘your logic’ does, then thank goodness genuine logic does not do this.
Fido then came back with this sharp riposte:
Yes, but it can't penetrate into the internal and illustrate the underlying connetions [sic] and interrelations of things.
To which I replied:
Notice how he has ignored my demonstration that formal logic does not need to be able to represent anything to be useful, which had been his original assertion. Does he withdraw it, or try to defend it?
How did Fido handle this dose of reality; did it disturb his doggie daydreams?
Are you kidding!?
This Hydra cannot be tamed by lopping it’s heads off. That just strengthens it even more.
Here is his devastating reply (put your safely helmets on, comrades, this is explosive, if badly-typed, stuff[/]):
Useful [to??] the working class in our attempt to smash the bourgeoisie and set up a communist society.
Yes, I know! This completely wipes the floor with me.
One small niggle: when have the working class [i]ever used Hegel, or even upside-down-Hegel? Or Hegelian ‘logic’ to “smash the bourgeoisie”?
And yet, they will use the internet (as we are now doing), and mobile phones, which work thanks to formal logic (and the latter does this without ‘representing’ the world), if ever they do rise up.
One thing they won’t be using is the whacky ‘logic’ found in Hegel.
How do I know?
Well, they already use the internet and mobile phones to plan strikes and demonstrations.
But, have you ever heard (has anyone ever heard) a single one discourse (in the heat of struggle) about “un-becoming”, and the rest of that dog’s boll*cks?
If so, you were drunk.
And, of course, we know they never will, since not even its most avid fans can explain it to us, or even to one another.
So, they stand no chance of explaining to workers.
And, you can just imagine the response from the massed ranks of the working class when this good little doggie, Fido the Fearless, turns up, just when they are ready to “smash the bourgeoisie”, and he woofs at them these immortal words:
…in order to become you must unbecome, and the process of becoming is unbecoming. All that is, was once all that was, and will be the seeds for all that will be. It's that simple and that complex.
They will surely hoist him onto their shoulders, and proclaim this poodle top dog, hero of the revolution, master of all the gobbledygook he surveys….
In your dreams!
So, let’s here no more about the ‘superiority’ of diabolical ‘logic’.
[If we do, those so foolish as to try to tell us of it will, of course, need to access the superiority of formal logic (in their computers) to communicate such follies to us over the internet.
“Diabolical logic is superior, but we need formal logic to tell you so!”
A nice dialectical inversion, if ever there was one.]
And in reply to this post of mine:
One small nagging doubt: where is the Hegelian stuff in here?In fact, it is a huge doubt, which grew non-dialectically from that infant doubt.
Do the old leaves ‘contradict’ the new ones?
Presumably not.
Does the tree contradict either of these?
No, since trees know no language, and cannot speak.
Fido “yups” back:
Here ignorance is displayed for all to see since she is unbable (sic) to deal with what contradiction means within the context of dialectics. So, she was given an example, and she dropped the ball, much like she drops any understanding of Marx, though she is saturated with pretension.
Instead of explaining the term (which, to this day remains unexplained), Fido merely snarls back at me.
In that case, we are left to conclude that Fido here thinks that leaves do indeed argue with trees, and like in the song, the trees “whisper back”.
Now UK Prince Charles used to talk to his plants, since, dolt that he is, and member of the ruling class that he also is, he holds dotty ideas like this. Fido, apparently agrees with him.
Is this the source of the voices Fido hears? Do his plants talk to him because of all the Dialectical Manure he heaps on them, mostly from his rear end?
Perhaps so?
And now, dear, long-suffering reader, you can see why I said I was in good company, for Fido here does not seem able to explain ‘dialectics’ to us, as I alleged all those pages ago.
Now, if he’d have been an honest little poodle, and admitted this from the start, he could have saved himself this prolonged public humiliation.
However, in response to this from me (but he failed to note the trap warned him about):
But, if everything changes because of its ‘internal opposite’ then communism must exist already, in the here and now…
Fido leaps in, hairy paws first:
Communism does exist now! It exists as potential, it exists in sensual human relations, it exists within the corpse of this capitalist world, and it exists in revolutionary movements. Her stupidity is clearly illustrated with this comment. Malatesta has a great article on how anarchism exists everyday, and I'll find it and post it later.
We’ll put to one side for now the fatal qualification Fido introduced into his ‘argument’ when he concedes that communism does not actually exist in the here and now, but merely somehow “exists as potential”, to ask where this potential actually came from?
It cannot have come from capitalism (its opposite) since capitalism can only change because of its own opposite (namely – communism!) -- unless this potential being existed before it existed!
So, this potential being must have popped into existence from nowhere, or it was always there (was it in the Big Bang – or whatever began the whole show?).
And that is why I posted this general objection to this non-theory of change of his (which seems to have sailed right over Fido’s canine cranium):
In fact, as is easy to confirm, dialecticians have been hopelessly unclear as to whether things change because of (1) their internal contradictions (and/or opposites), or (2) whether they change into these opposites, or, indeed, (3) whether they create such opposites when they change.Of course, if the third option were the case, the alleged opposites could not cause change, since they would be produced by it[i], not the other way round. And they could scarcely be 'internal opposites' if they were produced by change.
If the second alternative were correct, then we would see things like males naturally turning into females, the capitalist class into the working class, electrons into protons, left hands into right hands, and vice versa, and a host of other oddities.
And as far as the first option is concerned, it is worth making the following points:(A) If objects/processes change because of [i]alreadyexisting internal opposites, and they change into these opposites, then they cannot in fact change, since those opposites must already exist. So, if object/process A is already composed of a dialectical union of A and not-A, and it 'changes' into not-A, where is the change? All that seems to happen is that A disappears. [And do not ask where it disappears to!]
At the very least, this account of change leaves it entirely mysterious how not-A itself came about. It seems to have popped into existence from nowhere.
[It cannot have come from[i] A, since A can only change because of the operation of not-A, [i]which does not yet exist! And pushing the process into the past will merely reduplicate the above problems.]
(B) Exactly how an (internal) opposite is capable of making anything change is somewhat unclear, too. Given the above, not-A does not actually alter A, it merely replaces it!
http://homepage.ntlworld.com/rosa.l/Why%20I%20Oppose%20DM.htm
So, capitalism cannot change into communism as we had been led to believe, since the latter must already exist to cause that very change.
But, then what created this already existent (even potential) communism?
That could only have been capitalism.
But capitalism can only change because of an already existent opposite, which means, once more that communism must exist before it exists!
Fido missed all this in his doggie desire to rescue his ‘theory’ from the knackers yard, or his knackers from the vets….
What is the betting he misses it again?
And exactly what is this “potential” version of communism doing here anyway?
It is no use to man nor dog nor dog flea.
Capitalism, so we are told, will change into communism, but capitalism can only change because of an already existing opposite.
But this means, given Fido’s dog’s dinner of a ‘theory’, that capitalism will change into merely a potential version of communism, not into communism itself!
This is because, Fido tells us that communism only exists now in this form only:
It exists as potential, it exists in sensual human relations, it exists within the corpse of this capitalist world, and it exists in revolutionary movements.
In that case, capitalism must change, but not into communism as such (an economic system run by workers (as us Marxists believe) but into a mere “potential” (Fido’s exact words), or into something that exists only “in sensual human relations”, etc.
Since capitalism can only change into its opposite, and that opposite only now exists as a “potential”, we are forced to conclude that capitalism will change into just such a “potential”.
Try selling that to workers: “Forget worker’s power, down-trodden masses! Your fight is for a ‘potential’, for something that exists only in ‘sensual human relations’…!”
“Workers of the world unite, you have nothing to lose but your lack of ‘potential’…!”
“There is a ‘potential’ spectre haunting Europe…!”
Not grabbers, I think you will agree.
No wonder Dialectical Marxism has been such a long-term failure if this is what you non-Marists have been trying to sell them since 1850.
And it is no use saying this “potential” will change too, for if it is to change, then its opposite must also exist now, or, according to this ‘theory’, it cannot change.
So, if the opposite of “potential” communism is actual communism (i.e., workers’ power), then that opposite must exist now.
On the other hand, if it does not exist now, where could it possibly come from?
Why only from its own opposite, too (according to this Fido-fantastic ‘theory’), which is “potential” communism (or whatever).
But the latter can only change, too, because of its opposite, which must exist now, so how can that opposite be produced by “potential” communism?
This is the trap Fido happily leaped into.
Let’s sit back and watch him squirm.
More likely, however, he will throw another weak term of abuse at me, and ignore the problem.
He may, therefore, be the first doggie in history that likes to put its head in the sand.
Now, in reply to this taunt:
So, in a classless society, there is a ruling class!
Fido snapped back:
Stupid Rosa! That's exactly right and the next comment of her's (sic) here:
But then it can’t be a classless society.
That is, “classless” -- as in no classes, including ruling-classes
Get it?
No, I didn’t think you would.
I then asked this:
Who on earth did they rule over, then?
And this doggie dingbat replied:
is themselves in the interest of what was necessary to preserve the whole of themselves. She's as dumb as they come.
Fido does not explain how it is possible for anyone to rule over themselves, unless of course, he thinks that this future society comprises only of schizophrenics.
[I only ask: but, is that the source of his own ‘voices’?]
And this sentence needs preserving for posterity as a warning to children of what a diet of melted Hegel on Taost (deliberate misspelling!) can do for the human intellect:
…in the interest of what was necessary to preserve the whole of themselves
Perhaps this sentence has the “potential” to become a comprehensible sentence one day? I will, however, leave that to the professionals to decide --, once they have cured Fido of his ‘inner voices’.
Even so, I asked Fido this question:
Where does Marx say this?
And Fido very helpfully corrected me:
Marxism Rosa, I said Marxism. Discourse is a term used in modern Marxism. You're the one that said you've read EVERYTHING on Marxism for the past 30 years. It's surprising that you don't know the basics.
But wait! My question was in response to this from our very own canine correspondent:
Bingo! Discourse is the form within which the content of a social conversation occurs. This is pretty basic Marxism.
So, this “basic” Marxist idea cannot be found in Marx.
In that case, Fido was being ironic.
But, where in “basic Marxism” is this idea to be found?
I’d ask for a reference or two from Fido to show that this is indeed “basic Marxism”, as he says -- you know, the basic sort of stuff we use to agitate and organise workers --, but he tends to ignore such direct requests for proof.
I think that is because proof is only required of me!
So can someone else contact the dog pound where he has been put, and get his keepers to pose this request to him?
[Or is he in quarantine? I was only joking when I called him a “Mad Dog Dialectician”! Honest!]
Whatever; just ask him for a quote from one[/] of the Marxist classics that shows that this term is “basic Marxism” (as we are assured it is by this inventive canine) and not, as cynics might claim, just the product of a trendy modern fad (derived perhaps from one of the social sciences, or from Saussure, and other non-Marxists).
Just to shut these cynics up, you understand.
However, do not expect an answer!
And if you persist, you will stand in real danger of being accused of “not understanding dialectics” (which is a Fido-ism for, “Stop questioning me! I have enough in my bowl with Rosa here!”).
Now this internationally-acclaimed, and unquestionably brave little poodle has very helpfully reminded us of his awesome powers -- a post or so ago.
Here it is again, if these historic words passed you by unnoticed ([i]shame on you!):
Uhm, no. I'm a communist. I smash states.
Now, dog help me, I try as best as I can to keep up with current affairs, but to my eternal shame, I cannot personally recall whether many (or any) states have been “smashed” recently.
Perhaps you can.
But, what did I do? I foolishly turned to our doggie dogmatist for help, and with these words:
Well, Blanqui, how many of these have you “smashed”…?
And what does this modern day Blanqui do? He blanked me:
Again, Rosa doesn't even understand her own retorts. The first state you smash is your own, as you learn how to communisate (eh?) as a communist.
Bold “eh” added.
But Fidqui (or is it Blanqo?) said he smashed states (plural), and yet he now acts all shy when asked which ones he has “smashed” (as if he were ashamed of these historic blows against the boss class):
I smash states
Correct me if I am wrong, but if someone says they do something (of historic importance), it is only reasonable to ask for a few examples (even if only to tell the grandchildren).
So, far from not understanding my own “retort”, I am still in the dark as to which states Fido “smashes”.
But, our very own Fido Canine Castro is being coy, This hero of the working class, this doggie desperado, will not tell us.
I refuse to believe the slanders of those who say he made this up….
So, perhaps he means he did all this “smashing” this ‘dialectically’?
Which, apparently, means it did not happen (since fun boy Fido tells us that everything means its opposite).
So, it could indeed mean absolutely anything! Even its ‘opposite’ -- as in “I consolidate states”, or maybe even “I smash communes”! – who can say what goes on, on planet Fido, or in his canine cranium?
But no --, we get a clue in this comment of his:
The first state you smash is your own…
That seems to mean he has smashed his own state!
I smash states
And then, this implies (see, I use implications too!) he has moved on to others (note the plural here: “states”).
Well, since our canine communist, our mongrel militant, won’t tell us, can anyone else say which states Fido has finished?
Or, are these “smashed” states only to be found on his home planet: which exists a long way off, slap bang in the middle of cloud nine (or is that cloud canine?).
So, proletarian here Fido it seems has paws of clay, This is no Blanqui, it is Bozo, the fabulist. This is no Malatesta the communist, it is Maladroit the confused.
But, what is this now:
I'll get to the rest of her rant later, as I'm too busy to finish this up now.
He’s “smashing” more states I’ll warrant.
Well, at least a few plates….
] 
Can comment on articles and discussions
oh well. the world has its assortment of fruits and nuts. her response is bizarre because i wasn't abusive towards her at all in this thread. i try to avoid personalizing debates.