How can the subject of science in general be discussed if the question of truth is left to one side?
To say that "I am an epistemological pragmatist and a scientific realist." is not a position, but a non-position. Fine there are all soughts of things in the world where we take non-positions and rest firmly on handy ideological short-cuts. Most of the time this does not matter.
However when a "science" is in trouble I am specifically referring of course to Historical Matrerialism then assumptions have to be questions and some of them are likely to go pretty deep.
Now let us both be epistomological pragmatists and scientific realists - is Marxism going well at the moment - is the owrking class is a healthy political position and is the socialist movement serving them and history well.
No questions here about the nature of truth, but the truth of the answers is hard to honestly ignore. Now lets assume just for a moment that Historical Materialism is a science and now lets be realistic about it.
Is it on firm foundations? What is it exactly? On what does it rest and how does it develop? What can move it forward?
All general questions which could be raised on any science which became stuck. But raised here to point out that not one of these questions can be answered if Historical Materialism is just a number of discreet theories. If they are not discreet theories what is it?
If I am "... some sort of Hegelian who wants a supra-scientific necessity and intelliginility that I don't aspire to and don't think we can have." then the supra-historic necessity is no more than the need to give shape to the thing I wish to develop further for very simple and intelligable political reasons.
Now if you don't think we can have this, then what do you propose from a purely pragmnatic and realistic point of view we can have?
I did not begin this discussion in order to asses what is science (an idle occupation when so much of science is doing so well) but to conceptualise science in a way that was useful to comprehend the current probelms of Historical Materialism (whether it is a science properly called is a mute question, whether such an approach is useful is not).
There is a way of conceptualising science which can embrace Historical Materialism and does point to where problems in recieved Marxism lay. It is by way of seeing its ontological nature.
However, I cannot get the discussion out of its first groove - the conceptualisation of sciences as ontologies - which is a bit distressing because until this hurddle is overcome I don't know how we can address the central problem which is Historical Materialism as recieved Marxism.
So round the circle we go.
Is there a way of breaking out of this? I pose the question in all honesty. Would it help leaving science out of it altogether - would the simplier propsoition that Historical MAterialism represents an ontology meet with less resistence?
The ontology bit is crucial because only be accepting from the outset that all the parts must relate to one another can we avoid the intellectual opportunism of the debates which have so clouded Marxism.
This is the opportunism whereby discordant parts of the heritage of Historical Materialism are dismissed, glossed over or unrecognisably distorted in order to present a neat structuralist view of the Marxist Project. My pragmatic and realistic point is that this has become a failure - or do you disagree?
Assuming Historical Materialism to be an ontology forces us to re-examine may parts of recieved wisdom and in this we will find that much of this so-called wisdom has been severely misplaced.
For instance the old Modes of Production debate, now so ignored calls into question the very way Marxism has presented Historical Materialism, likewise the analysis of Marx and Engels on the Origin of the family, state and private property which has for the most part been put aside with embarasment actually underscores a unity of concept which differs very much from how Marxism in general portrays itself.
The list could go almost endlessly, from small remarks like the three tenents of Historical Materialism being German Philosophy, French politics and English Political economy to the much larger question of finding Hegel's science of logic buried within the very fabric of Marx's Capital.
Viewed ontological Marx's famous lack of clarity on what is the nature of socialism and communism actually can be seen a voluminous and specific (it just does not accord well with the popular notions - hence the actual references tend to become invisible). Ontologically ideology is not some sets of belief but an emmensely practical way of viewing the world, hence it is tenacious precisely because it is useful.
What I am trying to say that many of the loose threads which have become in the hands of recieved Marxism definitions of a structural type become when Historical Materialism is approached as a whole to be no such thing.
Despite Charles Jannuzi's rather dismissive interjection, the question is no idle one, but somehow the circulrity of the current argument must be broken - I am open to suggestions - especially from Charles seeing he has deemed fit to pass a hasty judgement.
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>Justin we appear more at cross purposes in light of your reply below.
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This is evident. I am an epistemological pragmatist and a scientific realist. I think science is how we know the way the world is. You are some sort of Hegelian who wants a supra-scientific necessity and intelliginility that I don't aspire to and don't thionk we can have.
>I am basically unhappy with any forumation which does not explain why a
>scientific explanation is better then an non-scientific one.
Better for what purpose? If I want to know why my love is true, I'm probably not looking for a scientific answer.
>On the other hand I think you approach it on the basis of accepting a
>scientific answer and seeing this problem resolved in how scietists come to
>such answers.
A Hegelian insight: we start where we are. And broadly speaking, scientific materialsim is where we are.
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Greg Schofield Perth Australia g_schofield at dingoblue.net.au _______________________________________________ _______________________________________________
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