[Xmca-l] Ilyenkov, Marx, & Spinoza

[Alexandre Sourmava]

Dearfriends!
First, excuse me for the delay with my reaction to your posts. Among otherthings I metdifficulties with putting my answer here (I have sent it twice without any effect :-( ). 

David,thank you for your kind advice with more exact translation of word «условный». I agree with you, that the best translation willbe “conventional”. This term coincides well enoughwith Vygotsky’s idea that mature word in development of infant’s speech is something entirely "random","reason-less", and "irrational", something established by mereagreement (conventions). (See “Орудие и знак в развитии ребенка”) 
As for Vygotsky's attitude to Pavlov and his entirely Cartesian theory, I’llagree with your idea again. I do think that similarity of Vygotsky's andPavlov's conceptions is based not on mere discretion. Pavlov’s “teaching” wascanonized as something ideologically obligatory substantially later, closer to1950 – the year of so called Pavlovian session of the Soviet Academy ofScience. So a fresh trauma of this “historical event” evidently shade in Luria’sand Leont’ev’s mind the earlier situation. The affinity of Vygotsky's idea ofHMF and Pavlov's Second Signaling System is not something coincidental. Anyhow,this subject deserves seriousinquiry.



Mike, yourhistorical meeting with Bernshtein was something fabulous!!!  Had you a chance to have a chat with him this time orlater, and had you discussed with Alexander Romanovitch Bernstein’s ideas?
Thank you Mike for attached pdf with “Soviet psychology”. It is somethingfantastically interesting. I am much younger than heroes of thebook, so even from my soviet perspective it looks extremely colourful :-) andindeed it explains much…



Andy, Ilike very much your witty formula “In the 21st century, Spinoza is no longer a dead dog, but he is adead end” :-)
But I decisively disagree with you…
I probably have too many objections to Vygotsky's theorizing, but regardingSpinoza’s (and Marx’s) role in future psychology I agree with him absolutely.
I can not agree with you that “Any attempt to deploy Spinozian ontology in experimental Psychologyis a charade” too. Surely, it is impossible to try to apply Spinozian ideas to(and even this in the best case) so called “experimental Psychology” whichis based on primitive Cartesian logic.  
However, I’m sure thatHegels’s motto that Spinozism is a necessary basis of any genuine philosophizing is as true now as it was twohundred years ago, and that it can be applied to psychology as well. 
All the best!

Sasha

P.S. In a few days I hope to finish updating of fullRussian version of “Ilyenkov and revolution in psychology”. I’ll put it hereand on Academy.edu