The passage,
"The weak points in the abstract materialism of natural science, a materialism that excludes history and its process, are at once evident from the abstract and ideological conceptions of its spokesmen, whenever they venture beyond the bounds of their own speciality."
is in a footnote at the beginning (2nd page) of _Capital_, Vol. I, Chap. 15, Machinery and Modern Industry.
In the present case, the pomos are the ones who have ventured beyond the bounds of their own specialities, and their abstract and ideological conceptions of the natural sciences have been revealed by S & B.
I haven't read the book, and I have little sympathy for Sokal's ontology -- the term "abstract materialism" is apt. But I have read a good deal of the prior debate on the "Sokal affair," and Sokal has certainly demonstrated his crucial points: the pomos in question (1) are guilty of confusing and conflating ontology and epistemology -- using the social construction of knowledge as "evidence" that reality is socially constructed, for instance, and (2) do not make sense when they discuss natural science.
The responses to Sokal have been dishonest and diversionary, evading these central points.
Andrew ("Drewk") Kliman Home: Dept. of Social Sciences 60 W. 76th St., #4E Pace University New York, NY 10023 Pleasantville, NY 10570 (914) 773-3951 Andrew_Kliman at msn.com
"... the *practice* of philosophy is itself *theoretical.* It is the *critique* that measures the individual existence by the essence, the particular reality by the Idea." -- K.M.