I'm not sure what the point you're trying to make is, but I meant metaphysical materialism, not historical materialism, which is a whole other kettle of piscines.
Metaphysical materialism is logically incoherent because "matter" is an idea. Historical materialism, which is merely that human beliefs and cultures are determined by technological development and so forth, is not logically incoherent.
--- On Thu, 9/3/09, c b <cb31450 at gmail.com> wrote:
> We never knew White was a member of the Socialist Labor
> Party in the
> ’30s and early ’40s, contributing articles to The
> Weekly People under
> the name John Steel. Nor could you have guessed from his
> so-Americanized version of Marxism: a theory of cultural
> evolution
> based singularly on technological progress. Progress in the
> Neolithic,
> he claimed, came from the increase in the amount of energy
> harnessed
> per capita because of plant and animal domestication. He
> was not
> amused when I objected that energy “per capita” was the
> same as in the
> Old Stone Age, since the primary mechanical source remained
> the human
> body.
>