Re: Re(2): On Leontiev

From: Paul H.Dillon (illonph@pacbell.net)
Date: Wed Sep 27 2000 - 16:25:08 PDT


Phillip commented:

> except, these problems were/are being dealt with in the west but he can't
> acknowledge them.

I'm not sure that is totally true would need demonstration.

> ah, so we are using anthropological/archaeological sources - but did
> Leontiev have access to this information? it's pretty new, isn't it?

Three points: (1) this information was available already in the 1950s. (2)
Leont'ev was aware of this (I believe he has sections in DMS on hominid
evolution, other animal behavior) But marxists have traditionally assumed
this position, a la Engels, The Role of the Hand, etc. I was just citing to
evoke the depth of "millions of repetitions" that lead to transformation of
the evolving hominid physically, adapting to an environment of its own
creation; (3) of course we are dealing with anthropolgoical/archaeological
sources. How else would one deal with phylogeny which is the key to the
apparent "chicken-egg" problem of recognizing the ideal.
conditions of existence.

> >THE PROBLEM: how, having sensory perceptions as its only source, thought
> >penetrates the surface of phenomena that act on our sensory organs.
>
> for this i refer to Edelman. and other neurologists.

Leont'ev states his disagreement that pyschological laws can be reduced to
neurological ones. Perhaps you can explain how Edelman accounts for such a
mapping. But even supposing a complexly networked topological mapping
between neurophysiological states/spaces/models and psychological states
**concrete experience (e.g., the taste of green) ** a la The Matrix, even
with this power, neurophysiology itself cannot have the knowledge that one
has when one perceives an object, penetrating the surface phenomena. In
fact, that knowledge is what produced the field of neurophysiology. Not
surprisingly, the product now stands over against the producer as something
Other.

> >> >On [16] Leont'ev neatly addresses himself to (a) vulgar materialists,
(b)
> >transcendental idealists, and (c) neo-positivists: "In contrast to the
> >views of the laws of logic (a) as if they arise from principles of the
> >working of the mind (or (b) as if they express immanent laws of a
thinking
> >spirit, (c) or finally as if they are evoked by the development of the
> >language of science itself), the marxist position is . .
>
> why the very specific name-calling?
> >

Phil, I wasn't calling names, I was just noting how he had identified three
major philosophical directions (each with its corresponding psychology) as
opposed to the marxist position. the operative word for me was "neatly"

> it is a genre i'm bothered by - is this the local soviet genre of
> dealing with others

I'm unsure what you're referring to. As you said at the beginning:

>i'm just struggling to sort the
>Communist Soviet political dogma from the Marx. it seems like many
>Russians were attempting to do this to, but still had to encode their work
>with dogma.

but the term "Communist Soviet political dogma" itself reflects a dogma.
Marx certainly proposed the creation of communist society, the abolition of
private property, smashing the bourgeoisie and their institutions
(criticized the fatal error of the Paris Commune (not taking the Bank out of
respect for private property)), all as a precondition for the
transcendence of the alienation that the development of capitalism
engendered. I tend to look at reading Leont'ev as a question of developing
what wasn't developed (including where political ideology restrained
development) as opposed one of weeding out. undesirable "Communist Soviet
political dogma".

Paul H. Dillon

>



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