Explananda Re: Psycho-sexual explanation

BrownBingb at aol.com BrownBingb at aol.com
Mon Mar 31 12:25:36 PST 2003



>
> From: andie nachgeborenen <andie_nachgeborenen at yahoo.com>
>
>
>
> I have repeatedly stated what I mean. I have never denied that economic
> explanations of political behavior are valid, as you know. I merely insist
> that political explanations, and psychological ones too, are also valid. I
> do not understand the idea that psychological explanations are merely
> individual and therefore (!) not explanatory.
^^^^^^^^^

CB: The idea is that politics and economics are social phenomenon, and that therefore must have social , not individual explanations. This is not vulgar materialism or economism. It is applying Marx's famous maxim that the human individual is a social individual. or even Aristotle's "man is the social animal'. Tjhis Marx's emphasis on the social ( he _was_ a socialist, ha ha) not his emphasis on determination by class struggle.

Let me say it this way. "Individual explanations" are more valid for non-human species because many of the general patterns of say dogs are caused by their instinctive or individual genetic makeup, by the individual dog's psycho as it develops from its genetic makeup. Say the way dogs lap up water or something or chase small prey. It is not socially or historically learned and caused. It is the instinct of the individual dog, no matter how they are raised. Even if they are not around any other dogs to learn it from. Humans on the other hand have very few purely instinctive patterns of behavior. As individuals, we are very socio-historically determined compared to other species.

So, what is meant in what was discussed before is that psycho-sexual explanations, in the sense of sexual "instincts" ,are not what causes somebody to accept the myth of the black rapist or inquire as to a child's sex or gender at birth. They need social-psycho-sexual explanations.

*******

I reject both parts of that proposition. Since I cannot make myself understood,
> despite having repeatedly stated what I mean in plain English, I leave the
> field to you all. Enjoy it. You may imagine that you grasp a deeper truth,
> a world where only economic reduction counts. I would have hoped this
> caricature of historical materialism was long dead. Alas, it is not. jks
> BrownBingb at aol.com wrote:

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