[lbo-talk] Re: Biology and Society

[Louis Kontos]

Jerry,
sure monkeys are capable of making decisions. If you give them a  
banana and tofu, they will choose the banana every time. People are  
like that too, in that much of their 'behavior' is self-referred,  
patterned and predictable. At the same time, most of what we call  
human behavior has the quality of social action, in that it is  
ritualistic, oriented toward the expectations and judgments of  
others, and full of surprises. It is surprising, for instance, that  
people take up any struggle against great odds. What makes them want  
to do that? What makes them think they might succeed? What accounts  
for idealism, passion, good and bad faith, etc.? Exactly what Ted is  
talking about -- namely the embodiment of the 'universal' in the  
particular, the fact that the most central concepts, beliefs, ideals,  
etc., of any society, transcend immediate situations.
Moreover, not only is it impossible for people to engage in monkey  
type behavior without appearing anti-social (try eating as you please  
next time you have dinner with someone), but any recognizably social  
behavior, even deviant behavior (in most cases), involves concepts,  
ideas, even theories, that transcend their immediate situation.  
Universality is contained therein -- in that people can only justify  
and/or explain their actions as instances of something else, e.g.,  
work, relaxation, acts of love, sacrifice, etc. All these 'concepts'  
are transcendental and universal (thus providing a basis of appeal  
for Marxist theory, which is a form of 'immanent' critique, not only  
a theory of society, social relations, dynamics, economic and  
'structural' forces, etc.). The 'contradictions' Marxism deals with  
are immanent to bourgeois society and political economy. What makes  
its critique of ideology 'immanent' is that it engages the very same  
concepts that provide a source of BOTH motivation and justification  
of complex social forms of social action. No explanation of 'eating'  
is needed in this context -- ideology critique -- or any other  
context that 'progressives' need be concerned about. Here's the  
explanation: people eat because they are hungry. Dinner is not the  
same thing as eating. Physical labor is not the same as 'work'.  
Revolt is more than crowd behavior. Social action is not the same  
thing as behavior in any form. Society is not a jungle (though it  
might become just that, through extant tendencies).
How to engage people as social actors, as members of society, rather  
than monkeys, or atomized 'individuals', or mere producers or  
consumers, that's a real question for 'progressives'. Such engagement  
can't possibly have anything to do with 'sociobiology' (this most  
recent version of extreme reductionism and determinism).
Religion, mythology, practically anything besides sociobiology, has  
more relevance to progressive projects than sociobiology. (By the  
way, the term 'progressive' itself is meaningless and, alternatively,  
reactionary, in my view, but I'm using it in keeping with previous  
posts, as something intended to resolve 'social problems' through  
'social change' -- none of which amounts to hill of beans, in my  
view, without a real passion for socialism.)
Louis Kontos

On May 30, 2006, at 1:12 PM, Jerry Monaco wrote:


> On 5/30/06, Ted Winslow <egwinslow at rogers.com> wrote:
>
>> They would only be irrelevant if in fact "choice" and "purpose" had
>> nothing to do with these phenomena.  Asserting that they don't isn't
>> an argument.  The Catholic School ploy isn't an argument either.
>
>
> Ted,
>
> I am not making an argument.  I am asking you to explain. (if you
> wish and if you have the time.)
>
> I believe that choice and purpose matter to human beings, I just don't
> believe that there is any coherent way to explain them in a
> theoretically coherent way or even in a way that is not paradoxical.
> (Perhaps this is what the novel form is for, helping us to understand
> these issues.  At least that is what I get from "Anna Karenina.") If
> you will explain how we can discuss them I will certainly discuss
> them.  I do not see how the very vague notions of choice and purpose
> necessarily brings us to "Marx's ontology".  We can leave out Marx's
> ontology and still agree that "choice" and purpose in some way matter.
> I don't see how bringing it in helps us one way or another in
> discussing Kropotkins critique of Huxley.  That is part of the point
> I've been trying to bring out.  (There is no "Catholic School
> Argument" here, I am just very tired of arguing over what
> "authorities" said one way or another, when we are actually trying to
> figure out whether Kropotkins critique of "social darwinism" from an
> ur-Sociobiological point of view is helpful to trying to understand
> the issues of surrounding evolutionary psychology or sociobiology.)
>
> Now I am also willing to have you explain to me how we can talk about
> "choice" or self-determination in a way that helps toward
> understanding the issues at hand.  For instance you never answered my
> question in a previous post.  Do chimps have "choice?"  If not, why
> not?  I ask this question not to be funny but in order to understand
> what you mean by choice.  I will understand if you just say "I don't
> know," because that is my main point in this thread, there is no use
> pretending that we know what choice is when we don't.
>
> Forgive me but what I have been trying to do is have you state to me
> an argument that I can understand as relevant.  So far (and this may
> be what Chris calls my stupidity) you have not told me why ontology
> matters, just that it has something to do with "self-determination"
> though I don't know what.   I don't see that you are at alll talking
> about anything at all and I am pleading for you to put it in terms
> that I understand.
>
> I don't think, as a matter of principle,  it matters what Marx said in
> the 1844 manuscripts  or what Hegel said in the 1820s on this or any
> other issue that impacts on evolutionary biology or any other
> scientific issue.  I don't even see how the 1844 manuscripts matter
> even to basic notions of how societies are structured through human
> history.  Why quote them to me as if they show me something besides
> what they show about intellectual history.  If you can explain to me
> how it is relevant I would appreciate it.
>
> Sorry.
>
> I simply may be frustrating you.  So once again let me say it would be
> a pleasure if you could explain to me how these "ontological" issues
> matter at all to "how the human species (and other species for that
> matter), live, "came about" in biological history, created their own
> ecological niches, "developed culture," and how they, in the course of
> history, built various complex societies with their own rules,
> institutions, etc."
>
> Jerry
>
>
>
>
> -- 
> Jerry Monaco's Philosophy, Politics, Culture Weblog is
> Shandean Postscripts to Politics, Philosophy, and Culture
> http://monacojerry.livejournal.com/
>
> His fiction, poetry, weblog is
> Hopeful Monsters: Fiction, Poetry, Memories
> http://www.livejournal.com/users/jerrymonaco/
>
> Notes, Quotes, Images - From some of my reading and browsing
> http://www.livejournal.com/community/jerry_quotes/
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