[Xmca-l] Re: In Defense of Fuzzy Things

[Andy Blunden]

David, it may seem picky, but I can't agree with this formulation below, 
in particular the use of "thinking". To interpret Vyotsky's observation 
in terms of "thinking" is to *intellectualise* Vygotsky, or to put it 
another way, to impute to Vygotsky an intellectualisation of human life. 
This move was a principal line of attack of Vygotsky during the 
Stalinist years after his death, so it is important not to repeat it 
now. You correctly analysed the difference for a child of having a drunk 
for a mother, rather than for a father or a neighbour. But this was not 
a question of what the child *thought* about these relations, but the 
real significance of each relation for the child having its vital needs 
met, within the horizon of consciousness of the child. And I use 
"consciousness" here as a Marxist, to indicate the entirety of 
subjective processes of the child which mediate between their physiology 
and their behaviour, not as a synonym for the intellect. The child will 
perceive their situation (and threats to it) in the only way they can, 
that is, in an age-appropriate way. And they will change their own 
activity in response to the perceived threat also in an age- and 
circumstances-appropriate way too. All of this - significance, 
perception, needs - are not to be interpreted as categories of thinking, 
but categories of the life-activity of living beings, that's all, not 
necessarily thinking. But of course, the capacity for thinking - the use 
of symbolic actions - and the capacity for extended reflection on an 
experience, are additional resources and points of vulnerability, over 
and above vital relations which do not imply intellectual relations.
Andy
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*Andy Blunden*
http://home.pacific.net.au/~andy/


David Kellogg wrote: ...
> It's not that nothing is real until thinking makes it so; it is only that
> meaning is made by thinking and not simply by experiencing. ...
>
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