APOLOGIES for my previous posting -- I hit the send button accidentally.
I appreciate Andrew's candor in anwering the questions I posed. First,
let's review the predictive aspect:
I wrote:
>> But what kind of socialism?
1/07/98, Andrew Wayne Austin responded:
>We will have to see what emerges. One can only assert socialism in very
>broad outlines.
>> Are there political parties?
>We will wait and see.
Apparently then, Marx tells us very little about the architecture of what
is to replace capitalism. I'm interested in investigating what can and
should replace capitalism, in terms of political reality and economic
possibility; I continue to find Marx of little value in that regard.
>> And what exactly is it that this "practical system" tells us that is
>> useful?
>One objectifies reality. It is a matter of becoming conscious of the
>process of objectification and take over the process of world
>construction. I recommend Marx's Theses on Feuerbach (1845).
It was brilliant that Marx was able to predict so much about capitalism
when he did, but the objective realities of capitalism and its "takeover
of world construction" are now obvious facts; I find it more useful now to
analyze current conditions than review old analyses. Has marxism become a
neo-aristotelianism? Is one to learn about flowers from reading the master
instead of examining real flowers?
---The remainder of Andrew's responses, apparently, are to be interpreted as Andrew's own vision, rather than marxian prescriptions.
>People will have to make the system for themselves, where >they are.
We agree here, and my interest is in being one of those "people" "making the system", not just an observer and commentator.
>It would be based primarily in collective ownership of the means >of production and a distribution system based on effort and need.
This would seem to be adopting the most discredited economic agendas of communism as we have seen it implemented in the Eastern block. A more mixed economic solution would seem to make more economic and political sense.
>> That's _your_ opinion >Everything can be said to be opinion. The >point is whether somebody's "opinion" carries more validity than another >person's opinion. Biological evolution is an opinion. Creationism is >another.
Quite right: an opinion based on evidence and understanding has more validity than one based on false authority. What I see you saying, all to often, is that "materialism is truth" and "materialism decrees x to be true". This line of "argument" has no more validity than "the Bible decrees x to be true". If you can't explain why "x is true" here-and-now without reference to authority then I remain unconvinced.
rkm