"The question whether objective truth can be attributed to human thinking is not a question of theory but is a _practical question_. Man (sic) must prove the truth, i.e. the reality and power, the this-sidedness of his thinking in practice. The dispute over the reality or non-reality of thinking that is isolated from practice is a purely _scholastic_ question."
Could this be any clearer ? Empiricism is passive contemplation. Marxism is practical-critical activity (See First Thesis on F.).
Of course, Carrol doesn't have to agree with Marx. but it is Marx's position that Carrol designates as absurd below, not mine. Seems a more likely reason he is not "launching a polemic" against it is not because it is absurd, but because he would have to argue with Marx's statement above and other fundamental statements on the issue by Marx , Engels and Lenin. (See _Anti-Duhring_ by Engels, and _Materialism and Empirio-Criticism_ by Lenin).
Nor should anyone listen to his nonsensical statement that you can be an effective communist and believe in any combination of theories. Not only is that a misrepresentation of my posts, but extremely misleading to potential Marxists. Maybe he's joking.
On the relationship between capitalism and racism in the U.S., I'd have to hear what Carrol's alternative theory is, and how it relates to his statements on "empiricism". He keeps saying that racism or male supremacy cannot be discussed in relation to specific events, based on an author he has read, but that doesn't sound like any kind of materialism.
CB
>>> Carrol Cox <cbcox at ilstu.edu> 06/18/99 05:08PM >>>
kelley wrote:
> the claim that gender and racial oppression is functional for capitalism is
> raised by charles all the time on this list. why don't you attack him?
I have every so often objected to his consistently empiricism interpretation of marxist principle. I gave up after you and he engaged in a mutual hymn to the beauties of empiricism, but I had previously made my point clear several times that the "unity" of theory and practice does *not* mean, primarily and other than accidentally that practice is the test of theory but that practice is prior to theory, the source of theory. It is those who believe
that practice is the test of theory who, on the whole, have dismissed marxism as a dead theory. I decide that really there was no point in launching a polemic against the absurd the proof of the pudding is in the eating line.
But Charles, whose devotion to the communist cause is obvious and unbending is a living proof that in fact one can be a communist while believing almost any combination of theories. On specific occasions I have argued with him and will again.
Your sudden quick summary of "what marxists believe," with its repetition of all too often heard cliches, seemed a different matter. I will wait awhile to digest your current bibliographical excursus before responding further. But I want to thank you now for being the occasion for my formulating at greater length than before my conviction of the necessity for the morale and fighting fitness of the working class that it (or its leading fractions) make the fight for social justice in general and against sexism, racism, and homophobia in particular central to the struggle for class unity.
Carrol
P.S. Marx took his basic theory of productive labor from Smith, and Smith was not above using the ambiguity of the phrase as part of his fight against priests and nobles. I don't think that figures in Marx's discussion. I might also add that I am not convinced that it is, in any case, a useful analytic category. But that is an entirely separate issue.