> that's your faith.
WS: What else is there about socialism other than someone's word i.e. "faith?" Can I identify socialism empirically, measure or describe its properties in empirical terms, and show in a reasonably objective fashion what it is and what it is not? Until you show how to do this, I am afraid that my word or faith about socialism is as good as anyone else's.
As to the rest of your posting - I made a New Year's resolution not to react to snide ad-hominems or insinuations posted to internet discussion lists, so I'll pass.
Jerry: <<<You are bag full of prejudices and false attributions of what you think other people think and believe!>>>
WS: Moi? Are you sure you did not confuse my posting with that of Jim Devine? ;)
Jerry: <<<And why do you constantly confuse social hierarchies, economic class, logical hierarchies, and cognitive categories. To conflate and confuse these notions is to make one category mistake after another. >>>
Again, why moi? Emile Durkheim does that quite convincingly in the _Elementary Forms of the Religious Life_ in which he connects cognitive categories with social organization (which I believe is one of the most important contributions to philosophy since Kant.) I believe Claude Levi Strauss & Co walk the same path - so why can't I?
As to the rest of your missive, I am not quite sure what it is exactly that you are trying to argue. That there are hierarchies in human and animal societies, but they do not form classes because that word was copy-righted by followers of Marx? Or that there are small non-hierarchical egalitarian groups in h-g societies? Or that there are variety of different kinds of hierarchies?
Without knowing which is your argument, let me address all these in order.
I used the term "class" in in its lexical sense meaning "set" (e.g. a class of objects) to say that there have always been different classes (i.e. sets) of people and as a rule these sets had unequal social status, power or access to resources. The way some Marx's followers use the term "class" (i.e. sets of people defined by their relations to the means of production around the 19th century) is a specific case of this more broad term "class" - so if you argue that the term "class" as used by Marxists does not apply to h-g societies strikes me as purely semantic.
As to the in-group egalitarianism of h-g societies that you claim - it does not preclude the existence of hierarchies and inequalities. It is quite conceivable that a group of people (connected by blood or culture) maintain strictly egalitarian relationship among its own members, and yet enforce strict subordination of other groups. You can find that in modern societies as well. So what this really shows that inequalities can be manifested in many different ways, sometimes cutting across groups defined by blood or common cultural identity, sometimes going along the boundaries of such groups. Which is exactly what I said in the posting to which you are replying - if you bother to check.
Third, your argument that there are different kinds of hierarchies among human and animal societies is exactly what I argued - so I am not sure why you are mentioning it following a statement that I am confused. I think I was pretty clear about that saying that there would always be hierarchies, if not based on money then on something else. How is that not to be confused with your statement <<<But you should really study primate societies with an open mind because you show little understanding of their great variety?>>> Something is confused here, to be sure, but it is not me.
To wrap it up, I argued - and still stand by it - that divisions into distinct groups of unequal status and power are endemic to human societies, and hoping to eradicate these divisions and inequalities is unrealistic, utopian and naïve. A more realistic expectation is to reduce some of the more adverse effects of these divisions and inequalities on living human beings. If you disagree with this statement, please say so and explain why - if you care - otherwise I simply do not see how your positing contradicts mine.
Wojtek