Alfred, I can't imagine there's anyone on this CHAT list who is not at some
point in that zone of fusion mentioned by Dot Robbins.
You say: "more important in their effects are the conditions produced by
fellow humans. ... human society does not, or to minor extents only,
reflect aspects of the natural world".
We do live in an overwhelmingly 'humanised world', and thinking is after
all the reflection of those non-sensuous, ideal, cultural forms, not the
data of the senses. But it *is* important that the human labour has
objective content.
"Minor extent only" you say.
I am a civil engineer by trade. Relativism in epistemology is not very
common in my profession. Of course, with the bridges and aeroplanes we
engineers build, we make humanity indifferent to the laws of gravity, able
to leap across chasms and fly through space ... but I'm sorry, only because
the practice of bridge-building and aerodynamics *reflected* something in
Nature. I don't think this is a "minor extent".
Andy
______________________________________
At 09:27 AM 12/10/2000 +0200, you wrote:
> Andy wrote:
> "" [...] is nevertheless a
> perfectly useful term which incorporates the idea that an objectively
> existing natural world is the utlimately determining side in the
> human-nature relation, and also expresses the way a host of processes find
> their properties reflected in another process, including human society
> reflecting aspects of the natural world it lives in. Surely?
>
> more important in their effects are the conditions produced by fellow
>humans. And those could as well be different than they are for any one
>individual or group at any time. So human society does not, or to minor
>extents only, reflect aspects of the natural world. Rather it reflects
>interests and aspirations of particular groups. Power relations come in,
>and more.
> """""""""""""" or plans set by some and to be executed by others. For the
>latter perspective I refer e.g. to Action theories a la Hacker proposed
>especially for industrial settings etc.
> As an illustration I quote from the introduction of Ilyenkov's The
>Metaphysics of Positivism (from the website you have given - I am very
>grateful for having those texts so readily available!) :
>
>>And only materialist dialectics (dialectical materialism), only the
>>organic unity of dialectics with materialism arms the cognition of man
>>with the means and ability to construct an objectively-true image of the
>>surrounding world, the means and ability to reconstruct this world in
>>accordance with the objective tendencies and lawful nature of its own
>>development.
>
>
>>
> """" and largely succeed so disguising their particular interest
>perspectives.
> I say this all in the greatest worry: it is the weakness of the cultural
>sciences that enables that silliest of transfers, namely to treat of humans
>in culture with the conceptual and methodological tools developed in the
>sciences of stuff and energy. We are in need of conceptual tools that span
>our world in toto and so allow to understand rather than to posit or deny
>the differences.
> Alfred --
> ---------------------------------------------------------------------
> Alfred Lang, Psychology, Univ. Bern, Switzerland ---
>alfred.lang@psy.unibe.ch Website: http://www.psy.unibe.ch/ukp/langpapers/
>---------------------------------------------------------------------
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| - Andy Blunden - Home Page - http://home.mira.net/~andy/index.htm - |
| All mysteries which lead theory to mysticism find their rational |
| solution in human practice and in the comprehension of this practice.|
+----------------------------------------------------------------------+
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