[lbo-talk] J Butler on Theory & Practice

Tayssir John Gabbour tayssir.john at googlemail.com
Fri Aug 31 16:54:14 PDT 2007


On 8/31/07, Carrol Cox <cbcox at ilstu.edu> wrote:
> In other words, sometime theory can be advanced by acting first and only
> afterwords determing the theory implicit in that action. In the case of
> major advances in theory I would say that is _always_ and not merely
> sometimes the case. That, incidentally, is one of the reasons I fancy
> Tattersall's speculation on the origin of language through the invention
> of children -- language following play which called for language.

It's weird how often this topic comes up. I just read:

"It has long been my personal view that the separation of

practical and theoretical work is artificial and injurious. Much

of the practical work done in computing, both in software and in

hardware design, is unsound and clumsy because the people who do

it have not any clear understanding of the fundamental design

principles of their work. Most of the abstract mathematical and

theoretical work is sterile because it has no point of contact

with real computing."

-- Christpher Strachey, 1965

"To review: Classical Marxism says knowledge derives from

practice, guides it, and is either verified or transformed by

it. It says production is at the root of people's consciousnesses

but it doesn't say much about precisely how. It doesn't go into

details of how productive influences manifest themselves in

consciousness and thus overlooks the extents to which they often

do not. It doesn't tell how emotional needs, creative potentials,

previously arrived at knowledge, and previously adopted thought

habits all subjectively affect new perceptions and analyses. It

doesn't deal sufficiently with the ways people's subjective

weaknesses affect their consciousness formation processes.

"Like the classical dialectical methodology, the classical

understanding of consciousness formation sees the forest, or at

least one aspect of it, but directs attention away from the trees,

thus often completely misunderstanding the interrelation. It

overcomes many idealist errors but in doing so pays only lip

service to the fact that thinking is a process involving on-going

interactions between various aspects of people's natures, of their

personalities, and of the contexts or things they're thinking

about."

-- Michael Albert http://www.zmag.org/WITBU/witbu07.html

Tayssir

--

"In theory there is no difference between theory and practice. In

practice there is."

-- Yogi Berra (or someone else)



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