[Xmca-l] Re: Отв: Re: Object oriented activity and communication
Alfredo Jornet Gil
a.j.gil@iped.uio.no
Mon Oct 16 05:42:58 PDT 2017
Your point in the first paragraph is what I was trying to convey to Haidy, to see if there is room there for common ground between your positions.
Alfredo
________________________________
From: Andy Blunden <ablunden@mira.net>
Sent: 16 October 2017 14:39
To: Alfredo Jornet Gil; xmca-l@mailman.ucsd.edu
Subject: Re: [Xmca-l] Re: Отв: Re: Object oriented activity and communication
Yes, yes, Alfredo! But what is often overlooked is that the aim of Marx's research is not commodity exchange (in itself a harmless business) but capital. But he does not *start* with capital, but goes down to its roots, its source, in the circulation of commodities.
Compare with Vygotsky's analysis of the intellect (thinking). Word meanings are *not* the subject matter of Vygotsky's research (who gives a damn!?), but concepts! But he does not start with concepts, but goes down to its roots, its source, in speech arising in collaborative activity. Actually, AN Leontyev missed this, as can be seen in his trenchant attack on Vygotsky in his “Study of the Environment in the Pedological Works of L. S. Vygotsky".
Andy
________________________________
Andy Blunden
http://www.ethicalpolitics.org/ablunden/index.htm
On 16/10/2017 11:31 PM, Alfredo Jornet Gil wrote:
Damn! Commodity exchange is the unit of burgeons society... I have to study more! Thanks Andy
"The wealth of those societies in which the capitalist mode of production prevails, presents itself as “an immense accumulation of commodities,”[1] its unit being a single commodity. Our investigation must therefore begin with the analysis of a commodity"
Alfredo
________________________________________
From: xmca-l-bounces@mailman.ucsd.edu<mailto:xmca-l-bounces@mailman.ucsd.edu> <xmca-l-bounces@mailman.ucsd.edu><mailto:xmca-l-bounces@mailman.ucsd.edu> on behalf of Andy Blunden <ablunden@mira.net><mailto:ablunden@mira.net>
Sent: 16 October 2017 14:22
To: xmca-l@mailman.ucsd.edu<mailto:xmca-l@mailman.ucsd.edu>
Subject: [Xmca-l] Re: Отв: Re: Object oriented activity and communication
Just to illustrate that I am being an orthodox Marxist here,
from Chapter 10, Vol. 3 of Capital:
"In the case of capitals of average, or approximately
average, composition, the price of production is thus
the same or almost the same as the value, and the profit
the same as the surplus-value produced by them. All
other capitals, of whatever composition, tend toward
this average under pressure of competition. But since
the capitals of average composition are of the same, or
approximately the same, structure as the average social
capital, all capitals have the tendency, regardless of
the surplus-value produced by them, to realize the
average profit, rather than their own surplus-value in
the price of their commodity, i.e., to realize the
prices of production."
Andy
------------------------------------------------------------
Andy Blunden
http://www.ethicalpolitics.org/ablunden/index.htm
On 16/10/2017 11:18 PM, Andy Blunden wrote:
No, Alfredo. A unit of capital is a firm (or company). It is
impossible to explain the formation of a rate of profit (at
least as Marx does in /Capital/) without the conception of
units of capital, namely, firms and the competition between
them. Firms are of course, what Engestrom would call a
"system of activity" or I would call a "project" and
Leontyev almost could call an activity. But in the USSR
there were no firms, only the state. It is perhaps A N
Leonytev's greatest discovery that there are both micro and
molar units in any complex process. True in Psychology and
true in political economy. Whereas exchange of commodities
is an artefact-mediated action, a firm is an activity, a
specific aggregate of actions, directed towards the
quantitative maximisation of the value of the unit of capital.
English is not a perfect language either. : ) The word
"consciousness" has the unfortunate connotation of being a
mass noun (or continuous substance) whereas it is know only,
of course, in individual "consciousnesses" or "minds." But
it sounds so clumsy to say "a consciousness."
Andy
------------------------------------------------------------
Andy Blunden
http://www.ethicalpolitics.org/ablunden/index.htm
On 16/10/2017 11:07 PM, Alfredo Jornet Gil wrote:
Haydi,
I think Andy does not mean 'one capital' versus 'several capitals', for, if I read Andy adequately, Capital is for him not a unit but rather the whole of which commodity exchange is the unit. Thus, the germ cell of Capital is thus not Capital, or 'a' Capital, which you seem to attribute to Andy; just as I don't think he is arguing that there is consciousness, and then many consciousnesses. So it may be that you two agree more than disagree, judging by your last paragraph.
Whether his position on singular and plurals is more or less adequate than another positions, that I leave it up to the discussion.
Alfredo
________________________________________
From: xmca-l-bounces@mailman.ucsd.edu<mailto:xmca-l-bounces@mailman.ucsd.edu> <xmca-l-bounces@mailman.ucsd.edu><mailto:xmca-l-bounces@mailman.ucsd.edu> on behalf of Haydi Zulfei <haydizulfei@rocketmail.com><mailto:haydizulfei@rocketmail.com>
Sent: 16 October 2017 09:45
To: eXtended Mind, Culture, Activity; Andy Blunden
Subject: [Xmca-l] Re: Отв: Re: Object oriented activity and communication
Thank you David for your explanation! Though for me it needs more than one read.
The point was whether use of activity and activities in Leontiev is a contradiction. Whoever L was and whatever he believed in , he was not so negligent to the point of posing activity first and immediately after that recounting 'activities'. Translation ruled out a committed error. Then such a blundering display must have a justification rather than a misunderstanding in comprehension.
In one sense all things are related. The more so with the Monistic View. We have so many corporate and incorporate things , two of them so problematic communication and practical activity since Descartes and we are determined to avoid Dualism and refer and return all phenomena to that same thing , the one substance. In the actuality of the world , there's nothing discrete , that is , absolutely unrelated. Is that pretext for us not to see this unbounded versatility and hues and dues as distinct coloring? Maybe one of the ways was for man to let Nature go unrestrained?? But man also did not come of its own will.
The sole way destined or open to Man was of its Nature to engage with the surrounding. To deal with it sensually and subjectively/agently. Then Man in one time interpreted all phenomena as they appeared to him. But he grew up further than his infantile period. He learnt to delve into matters , go deeper and deeper. With one spectacle (plane) he observed how that single substance let its attributes multiply themselves into different shapes and colors and Modes. With another plane of the one spectacle observed the variation of the Modes themselves. I mean Ontology and Epistemology not yet separate from each other as I used a pair of planes for that matter.
Then we usually don't use a nail-clipper for alterations and manipulations in Genes. Or devices for Genes for our feeding and nutrition. It is then within these constraints that corporate and incorporate phenomena differ. Singles and plurals differ. Discrete and the indivisible differ. Parts and Moments differ. Wholes and mere entities differ. A process and a product resulting from that process differ. No justification to interchange them because of the use of A in front of them.
I wonder if this is true for others too. For me it's difficult to accept to say "this capital that capital" "those 8 capitals united" "capitals of the world dissolved into unanimity". If I'm correct in this , it's , I think , because Capital is a Whole , coming out of a long process of functions and disfunctions , moments of circulations and transient stagnation , booms and boosts and drawbacks and failures. The moment of its conception in the exchange of commodities up to the discovery of the private appropriation of the surplus value to the point of harnessing every means to penetrate each tight corner of the big World.
Best
Haydi
From: David Kellogg <dkellogg60@gmail.com><mailto:dkellogg60@gmail.com>
To: Andy Blunden <ablunden@mira.net><mailto:ablunden@mira.net>; "eXtended Mind, Culture, Activity" <xmca-l@mailman.ucsd.edu><mailto:xmca-l@mailman.ucsd.edu>
Sent: Monday, 16 October 2017, 2:21:12
Subject: [Xmca-l] Re: Отв: Re: Object oriented activity and communication
Of course, neither an object nor a process is discrete (or even, as Andy
says, "discreet"). Who can tell me where a mountain river ends and the
alluvial plain begins? Certainly not Cezanne or the phenomenologists who so
loved him. Yet a mountain is most assuredly an object, just as surely
as climbing the mountain to ascertain its degree of montagnitude is a
process.
This last week I've been struggling through the "Curriculum Reforms"
wrought by three right wing governments in Norway, Finland, and New
Zealand. Like Catalonia, these are all countries where unpopular coalitions
of right parties are replacing a much more popular but obviously
unsuccessful social democratic coalition of left parties. In Norway and in
Finland, the coalition actually includes the far right, neo-fascist,
anti-immigrant parties, and in New Zealand it includes the ACT, that is, an
"association of consumers and taxpayers" whose main interest is cutting
education budgets, starting by making teachers and students fight each
other for scarce resources in the form of "block grants".
Now, all of these governments are more or less bound by something called
DeSeCo, which is short for Describe and Select Competences. This is because
right-wing ideology sees education not as a public good but as a commodity,
to be judged by tangible results and priced accordingly. This presents a
real theoretical problem for right-wingers, because they ALSO see that
"flexible labor markets" and "entrepreneurial spirit" means that there
isn't any way of deciding on what skills or even what knowledge the
"economy of the future" will demand.
We can see this in the emphasis on "competence". Competence is not a thing
or a process, and it is neither discrete nor discreet. Of course, if you
are a linguist, competence is something Chomsky thought of in the sixties,
an abstract form of knowledge in a hypothetical native speaker-hearer in an
imaginary homogenous speech community. It is "discrete" in the sense of
being nowhere and nowhen connectible to performance in any way. It is
therefore "discreet" in the sense of being untestable--as soon as you test
it, you have a form of performance, not competence. It's like standing in
front of a classroom with a picture of a guy swimming and trying to teach
the expression "i can swim". What you have in the picture is not "I can
swim"; it's manifestly "he is swimming".
But in DeSeCo, you get these lists of competences, which are set up as if
they were discrete so you can list them on a Powerpoint slide and sell them
to ministries of education. And the real selling point is that, on the one
hand, because they are all "meta-skills" and "meta-knowledges", they don't
have any practical outcome or real commitment to a job and a livelihood.
And on the other, they sound terribly powerful when you phrase them as
"learning to learn" or "transversal competence" or "meta-cognitive skills"
or something like that. Jobs, in other words, are discretionary. After
centuries of promising jobs and livelhood in return for school and boredom,
the Western economies have decided that sticks are cheaper than carrots,
and the thing to do is simply to rule people who don't have educational
certificates out of the job market rather than try to provide
actual know-how and factual know-that.
Here are my four favorites (i.e. the four that we stress in our own
curricular reform here in South Korea):
interpersonal competence (sociability, the ability to 'be alone with
others' as Hughlings Jackson put it)
cultural competence (enculturation, the ability to understand traditions,
mores, and norms)
creative competence (intelligence, innovation, yadda yadda)
individual competence (the ability to dress yourself, feed yourself, and
show up for an interview where you will not be offered a job)
Vygotsky, as usual, has a better idea--it's a mountain. We just turn the
DeSeCO PPT upside down. Then we add each competence---freedom, creative
intelligence, encultured habits and tastes, and instiinctive
sociability--as a superstructure erected on the basis of the previous one:
free will (the ability to make choices that are not necessarily intelligent
or habitual or instinctive)
intelligence (the ability to make choices that are not habitual or
instinctive but nevertheless adaptive)
enculturation (the ability to make choices that are not instinctive but
conform to the choices that have proven successful in the now socialized
environment)
instinct (the ability to make choices that are responsive to the
environment and which conform to the choices that have proven successful in
phylogenesis)
Are theses objects? Of course, if we say so. And processes? Well, how else
could they have come about? What they are not, however, is either
"discrete" or "discreet": they are clearly linked to each other, and they
are all linked, through the lower layer, to adaptations ot the environment.
And there's the rub--where the rubber meets the road. The real question,
for our teachers and for our children, is about what will happen to them
now that these competences can no longer be redeemed in jobs. Will the
anti-Faustian bargain of exchanging your youth for a
stable middle-aged livelihood survive?
David Kellogg
On Sun, Oct 15, 2017 at 5:13 PM, Andy Blunden <ablunden@mira.net><mailto:ablunden@mira.net> wrote:
Haydi, you say "AN activity is not a thing ; it's a
process." I wonder then what is a thing which is not also a
process? (I interpret "thing" as meaning "something
discrete," otherwise your objection makes no sense.) The
point is that Hegel does not make this dichotomy - every
thing is also a process and vice versa. That a process is
also discreet is important because it is only thanks to its
discreteness that we can cognise the process and in fact
only thanks to its discreteness that a process can affect
anything else. To speak of processes which are not also
discrete is to speak in abstractions.
On this point, when Hegel puts ideas above matter, it has to
be realised that for Hegel "ideas" are social practices - he
is simply place human practice at the centre of human life
and its comprehension, rather than the mechanical and
chemical processes of Nature. If you think that "ideas" are
simply chimera inside our heads, then, of course, Hegel's
idealism seems like madness.
Yes, all the Marxists have blasted Hegel. As they must.
Otherwise they must end up advocates of Constitutional
Monarchy. But while Marx uses almost every mention he makes
of Hegel to criticise him, often in extreme terms, it can go
unnoticed the extent to which in practice Marx follows Hegel
in philosophy. Of course Marx is not equal to Hegel, but
simple formulae do not contribute to understanding the relation.
Andy
------------------------------------------------------------
Andy Blunden
http://www.ethicalpolitics.org/ablunden/index.htm
On 15/10/2017 6:51 PM, Haydi Zulfei wrote:
Andy,
Let me first apologize to David Kellog because in others'
wandering and perplexity it was he who in his reading of
Gramsci's prison letters came across this point and made
you not only accept the inappropriateness of Hegel's
headstand as Crowning every worldly affair deriving from
the People's Heads "Idea" , "Absolute" but also
intensifying this point with more examples and references
from Engels' "utopian versus genuine socialism" on your
part. Of course you've been helping us on many occasions
and you're very welcome for this nothing to be denied.
At this point we have no problem with translation.
Leontiev meant it.
Suppose that ANL does not know "individual" which is very
ambiguous because in what then one should seek the
embodiment of the "particular" and if one takes the very
particular as individual , then everything gets mixed up .
Then what about you who stick firmly on individual
discrete detached activities as an objection to Sasha's
sole ACTIVITY as theoretical understanding.
As you well know even AN activity is not a thing ; it's a
process. And you once distinguished between GENERAL WORK
ACTIVITY and LABOUR ACTIVITY or VALORIZATION ACTIVITY
which was quite right and timely though you recently gave
differing definitions in no way harmonious to your
previous definitions. But the main problem is blending
clarity in expression with concrete in theory. No doubt
you're a Fan of Hegel. I should repeat myself : Hegel is a
hero of theoretical concepts. In theorizing , and for him
to explicate the Essence of Phenomena , he begins with
apparently concrete things as ABSTRACTS finally reaches
CONCRETE UNIVERSALS as concepts. And here we again very
surprisingly see you put your finger upon what you should
have known in person is contrary to your own erudition.
Turning Hegel down as believing in discrete abstracts.
And now to his son's comment : What individual are you
pursuing? Your Hegel sees phenomena in their relations.
According to him and also according to ANL ACTIVITY as a
unit of Life is Molar non-additive. He even does not see
operations as single acts. It's a matter of the angle of
vision not detachment and concreteness. If his son had
talked of concreteness in moments of activity , then you
were right in your objections and oppositions. You please
give us your last definition of activity here (not in
lengthy references) so that we can have a discerning
option.
So far to remove the problem we should accept operations
are separately and independently carried out ; actions in
their own are carried out ; activities are carried out
arbitrarily. And these are done to the realization of man
as the ensemble of social relations based on some
infrastructure.
Hegel's metaphor has been thrown back at him by Marx ,
Engels , Lenin , Vygotsky , Ilyenko , and many others. If
you like to stand above all Giants of Marxism , it's
something perfectly and absolutely Personal as you're
speaking out loud! Then why give us so many references.
Best
Haydi
P.S. Alfredo! Though you have my previous private response
concerning the matters you pose I see myself accountable
to rewrite them to the Public. Thanks!
------------------------------------------------------------
*From:* Andy Blunden <ablunden@mira.net><mailto:ablunden@mira.net>
*To:* xmca-l@mailman.ucsd.edu<mailto:xmca-l@mailman.ucsd.edu>
*Sent:* Sunday, 15 October 2017, 5:35:40
*Subject:* [Xmca-l] Re: Отв: Re: Object oriented activity
and communication
Haydi, partly the problem with ANL's
philosophy-as-we-know-it is simply a product of its
translation into English. But partly it is also in his
philosophy. As Victor Kaptelinin first pointed out (so far
as I know), ANL knows the universal and the particular but
he does not know the individual. And his son's comment that
ANL did not conceive of Activity as being discrete proves
this to be the case. Thus his concept of Activity is not a
fully concrete concept. And this is not a product of
translation.
As David Kellogg has kindly pointed out to me, it was Hegel
who actually first introduced this metaphor of people
"walking (or standing) on their heads." Personally, I don't
think it has ever helped anyone understand the defect of
Hegel's philosophy to throw this metaphor back at him. As
demonstrated in this issue (the concept of activity) it was
Hegel who understood that a concept must have all three
moments - universal, particular and individual.
Andy
------------------------------------------------------------
Andy Blunden
http://www.ethicalpolitics.org/ablunden/index.htm
On 15/10/2017 9:24 AM, Haydi Zulfei wrote:
Dear Mike,
Giving thanks to a scholar and a philosopher and an
activist for his concreteness and clarifications is
crucially appreciated. But alas! you apparently forgot
ours and also dear Andy's discussion over Wholes , Parts ,
and Moments. He personally provided us with examples from
Hegel to the effect that considering wholes , they convert
Parts into Moments. Then , he's here again faced with the
same problem. Theorization in Hegelianism (his most
valuable contribution) does not begin with the individual
case in isolation which phenomenologically speaking (in
contemplation) seems to be concrete (your cause for
appraisal) . Hegel says this way Essence is not obtained
because one instance is considered detached from all
relations and its subservience to the service of the
Whole. Each individual case (as abstract) is particular in
some feature/s. And these particulars are essential. With
other particulars in other individuals they are related
actively to make the Whole. In narrower sense , this whole
could be General Life Activity as the Unit of Life itself.
Leontiev is not satisfied with theory only , that is ,
with category and concept only therefore , following Marx
and quite contrary to Hegel , he puts Hegel again on his
feet (not that the firmament to that time did put "idea"
on the throne people walking (in fact thinking) on their
heads but to put them again headstand thinking and acting
with all their bodies and organs and tools and not just
with their brains. Then taking all options in translation
even that of a Machine into consideration it does not seem
to exist any contradiction between Leontiev's use of
Activity now Activities or a series or cycles of
activities thereafter. These activities are those arising
from the properties of versatile objects in turn arising
from versatile motives in turn arising from versatile
needs in order of priority of hierarchies. And I think
Leontiev by broader sense means associating individual
activities as moments with the broadest idea of the
Monistic Substantial Modes or States in Philosophical
terms. That is , when Wholes in their turn integrate and
are dissolved into Monism of Substance.
Sasha rejecting double psyches believing psyche
(thinking identical to being--extension comprising one
Substance) is already there with the organism actively and
spontaneously and quite arbitrarily on its own ,
positioning its due object and moving along its contours
and its shape and form thusly allocating psyche to itself
, rejects arousal of psyche in evolution as leaps and
bounds (accumulation of quantity leading to mutation as
novel quality). Such reasoning goes word for word with
Spinoza's ideas in Ethics. Thus we are dealing with a huge
gap between meaning of word as the unit of analysis of
consciousness , now apparently ascending to "wording" and
"structure of sentence" (Linguistic Configuration) further
"communication" as something indispensable and necessary
and inevitable to the realization of life affairs.
Best
Haydi
From: mike cole <mcole@ucsd.edu<mailto:mcole@ucsd.edu>
<mailto:mcole@ucsd.edu><mailto:mcole@ucsd.edu>>
To: Andy Blunden <ablunden@mira.net<mailto:ablunden@mira.net>
<mailto:ablunden@mira.net><mailto:ablunden@mira.net>>; "eXtended Mind, Culture,
Activity" <xmca-l@mailman.ucsd.edu<mailto:xmca-l@mailman.ucsd.edu>
<mailto:xmca-l@mailman.ucsd.edu><mailto:xmca-l@mailman.ucsd.edu>>
Cc: Alexander Surmava <alexander.surmava@yahoo.com<mailto:alexander.surmava@yahoo.com>
<mailto:alexander.surmava@yahoo.com><mailto:alexander.surmava@yahoo.com>>; ivan-dgf
<ivan-dgf@migmail.ru<mailto:ivan-dgf@migmail.ru> <mailto:ivan-dgf@migmail.ru><mailto:ivan-dgf@migmail.ru>>; Ivan
Uemlianin <ivan@llaisdy.com<mailto:ivan@llaisdy.com> <mailto:ivan@llaisdy.com><mailto:ivan@llaisdy.com>>;
Haydi Zulfei <haydizulfei@rocketmail.com<mailto:haydizulfei@rocketmail.com>
<mailto:haydizulfei@rocketmail.com><mailto:haydizulfei@rocketmail.com>>
Sent: Saturday, 14 October 2017, 4:06:50
Subject: Re: [Xmca-l] Re: Отв: Re: Object oriented
activity and communication
Thanks for being so concrete, Andy.Could someone post
the Russian text next to the English so that it is
possible to compare it with the translation? I spent
several hundred hours on trying to edit "Development of
Mind" for Progress as a post-doc and it totally defeated
me. I sent it back with an apology and not extra rubles in
my pocket.
Perhaps the expertise in this discussion can warrant us
a "true" translation.
mike
On Fri, Oct 13, 2017 at 5:21 PM, Andy Blunden
<ablunden@mira.net<mailto:ablunden@mira.net> <mailto:ablunden@mira.net><mailto:ablunden@mira.net>> wrote:
The Progress Publishers English translation of "Activity and
Consciousness" in /Philosophy in the USSR, Problems of
Dialectical Materialism/, 1977 has the following:
Activity is a non-additive unit of the corporeal,
material life of the material subject. In the narrower
sense, i.e., on the psychological plane, it is a unit of
life, mediated by mental reflection, by
an /image,/ whose real function is to orientate the
subject in the objective world.
In the "Problem of the Origin of Sensation" in "The
Development of Mind" we have:
Thus, the principal ‘unit’ of a vital process is an
organism’s activity; the different activities that realise
its diverse vital relations with the surrounding reality are
essentially determined by their object; we shall therefore
differentiate between separate [i.e., qualitatively
different] types of activity according to the difference in
their objects.
By calling "activity" a "unit," the first quote uses
"activity" as if it were a countable noun. The effect has
been that the meaning of "unit" has been mystified for
English-speakers. It has generally been taken to mean simply
"category." The second does the same, but in addition makes
it evident that the plural does not refer to different
activities, but to *types* of activity. This blocks the
possibility of forming a true concept of activity
altogether.
With reference to your paragraph, Sasha, if your claim is
simply that "such an initial *category* can only be
object-oriented activity" I have no objection, supposing
that you do not aim to utilise Vygotsky's method of units,
even in the half-hearted way AN Leontyev did.
Andy
------------------------------
------------------------------
Andy Blunden
http://www.ethicalpolitics.
<http://www.ethicalpolitics./><http://www.ethicalpolitics./>org/ablunden/index.htm
On 13/10/2017 11:57 PM, Alexander Surmava wrote:
Dear Andy!
I am glad that our communication was resumed after many
years. The other day I was reviewing old letters and files
and found that the problem of "object oriented activity OR
communication" we discussed in the summer of 2006 before
our meeting in Melbourne. Well, the problem is serious and
it deserves to return to it today.
Last year I was close to being silent forever.
Fortunately, fate and well-chosen chemotherapy postponed
this case for an indefinite period. Therefore, I had the
opportunity and the time to try to sum up some of my
theoretical studies without entrusting this matter to my
descendants :-).
I will begin with honest recognition that I do not
understand your question. What means the distinction
between singular and plural number in your remark? Could
you give an example of the "wrong" translation of the
Leontief theoretical texts you mentioned? Although my
concept and the concept of AN Leontiev do not coincide,
moreover, I formulated the "Principles of the theory of
reflexive activity" (that is the title of my dissertation
work) in direct controversy with AN Leontiev's "Theory of
Activity", we coincide with him in method. Therefore,
having understood the theoretic meaning of your claims to
AN Leontiev or his translators, I can more easily
understand the essence of your objections to me.
In the meantime, I can say that both AN Leontiev and I
view "activity" as a theoretical category, and not as a
particular empirical case of its manifestation. Therefore,
object-oriented ACTIVITY there can be only one. Just like
Matter, Nature, or Substance.
Of course, with the Substance as totality, we come across
only in theory. Empirically, we are dealing with its
innumerable Modes. However, to draw from this the
conclusion that Substance is just a fiction of old
philosophers and that only the numerous individual "atomic
facts" of Wittgenstein with their plural number really
exist, it means to leave Spinoza and Marx for vulgar
positivism and empiricism.
However, all of this may not apply to your position ...
I will be glad to hear your explanations on this issue.
Best wishes
Sasha
воскресенье, 8 октября 2017 16:15 Andy Blunden
<ablunden@mira.net<mailto:ablunden@mira.net> <mailto:ablunden@mira.net><mailto:ablunden@mira.net>> писал(а):
I'll ask Sasha a question.
Sasha, when you say "activity" as in "such an initial
category can only be object-oriented activity" as it
stands,
in English, this is clearly wrong, though it may be
that you
are translating it from a Russian statement that is
correct.
Surely you mean "object-oriented activities", as in when I
say "every activity has an object." But in your expression
above "activity" is not a word which has a plural and
unless
you are a religious person is not something which can
have a
specific object. All English translations of A N Leontyev
make this mistake which has caused no end of confusion
among
English-speakers.
Am I right? You meant "activities" not "activity," just as
you wouldn't say "water is a unit of water."
Andy
------------------------------
------------------------------
Andy Blunden
http://www.ethicalpolitics.
<http://www.ethicalpolitics./><http://www.ethicalpolitics./>org/ablunden/index.htm
On 9/10/2017 12:03 AM, Alfredo Jornet Gil wrote:
Dear Sasha, all,
thanks for this brilliant, though also demanding
response. I think you are right in your assertion that we
are discussing some of the most fundamental problems of
CHAT, and therefore it may be worth the try. However, one
can see in the lack of response by other members that
not everyone has the privilege of the time it requires to
go through all of it. In any case, I continue believing
that this is a valuable resource for xmca to produce and I
hope it is/will be appreciated as such.
If I may summarise the core of your argument, I quote
from your response:
"If we want to make our choice of the initial category,
without looking back at the academic fashion, then for us
as for the materialists the choice is obvious. We will
choose the one of the two categories from which one can
derive the entire diversity of human life, including
another, the opposite category. And it is obvious that
such an initial category can only be object-oriented
activity, for it is easy to deduce communication from the
latter, which is an attribute property of life. But from
communication, addressness, love, empathy and other such
spiritually uplifting plots, we will not get life or
object oriented activity with the greatest diligence"
If we stay within the boundaries of the framework
according to which we are looking of the most original
germ cell, the one from which all others can be
developed, then object-oriented activity is primary. I
think it is possible, or perhaps necessary, to agree on
that.
But once we are back to the development of a concrete
Psychology, we still have to deal with the fact that, for
any child to participate in human forms of object-oriented
activity, and not just the forms of object-oriented
activity that also characterise any other multi-cellular
organism, this child needs to somehow socialise into those
forms of activity. So, while I assume that any category
devised to account for human psyche needs to agree with
the initial germ cell of reflexivity that you describe, is
this germ cell initial to human concrete psychology, or is
it a pre-requisite and not yet Psychology's one?
As moderator, I should stop there and let others answer
(which I hope some do).
As a participant, I'd like to give the question a try:
Object-Oriented activity can be found to be primary in
ontogenetic development too. Even in the case of teaching
deaf-blind children, as the classical studies show, this
is only possible through *involvement* in collective
activity. So, yes, object-oriented activity is primary
over, for example, the teaching of a language (which is
only possible in and through object-oriented activity).
But then, is not the teaching, the instructional aspect of
the relation between adult and child, inherently tied to
this collective object-oriented activity? Is not this
object-oriented activity already characterised by all
those attributes that you just called 'spiritually
uplifting' in the very moment in which we describe such
activity as human? Addressivity, empathy, how do you get
collective activity without them? On this, and precisely
in an edited volume titled "The Practical Essence of Man",
Vladislav Lektorsky (2015) writes, 'it is evident in that
case that communication is included in activity and is its
essential component: without relation to another
person(s), activity is impossible' (144). Although I not
always share all of the ideas with Lektorsky, here I can't
see how he can be wrong.
So, let me summarise that I agree that the idea of
reflexivity that you discuss and, in that sense, the
category of object-oriented activity, is most primary. Let
me also note that there are other authors who have
developed similar ideas to that of reflexivity that you
discuss, including Michel Henry, who himself built on
French philosopher Maine de Biran, and for whom
affectivity is the concrete 'essence of auto-affection' (
https://www.amazon.com/ Incarnation-Philosophy-
Studies-Phenomenology- Existential/dp/0810131269
)
As we work towards a concrete human psychology, I wonder
whether we should be forced to choose between activity
and communication. Is not the distinction just an artefact
of a partial understanding of what it means activity and
what it means communicating. I still feel that
communication, in the sense of addressivity that Mikhailov
describes, is not a synonym for verbal activity, or for
semiotics. If the question is whether practical activity
precedes verbal activity, the answer is clear. You don't
get the latter outside of the former. But, in my perhaps
naive view, we ought to have a notion of communication
that would not reduce itself to 'verbal activity' (as in
the opposition 'practical' vs 'verbal' activity), for I
don't see how any practical activity can have any sense
(and so be achieved) for any human outside addressivity.
Unless this is a sense-less, human-less activity we are
talking about; one machines could perform on their own
without consciousness.
Best wishes,
Alfredo
______________________________ __
From: Alexander Surmava <alexander.surmava@yahoo.com<mailto:alexander.surmava@yahoo.com>
<mailto:alexander.surmava@yahoo.com><mailto:alexander.surmava@yahoo.com>
<mailto:alexander.surmava@ yahoo.com><mailto:alexander.surmava@yahoo.com>>
Sent: 30 September 2017 01:54
To: xmca-l@mailman.ucsd.edu<mailto:xmca-l@mailman.ucsd.edu>
<mailto:xmca-l@mailman.ucsd.edu><mailto:xmca-l@mailman.ucsd.edu>
<mailto:xmca-l@mailman.ucsd.
<mailto:xmca-l@mailman.ucsd.><mailto:xmca-l@mailman.ucsd.> edu>; Ivan Uemlianin; Alfredo
Jornet Gil; Haydi Zulfei ; Mike Cole
Subject: Object oriented activity and communication
Dear Alfredo, Ivan et al
The discussion really becomes more and more interesting,
touching on the most fundamental categories. But before
proceeding to the answers, a short replica aparté (replica
aside) :-)
Theoretical discussion can be productive only if it is
conducted in the context of a single theoretical approach,
based on the general principles accepted in its framework
and shared by the debaters. Here, on the XMCA, such a
common, unifying conception are usually considered the
theories of Vygotsky, Spinozism or even Marxism.
Meanwhile, I am afraid that the course of our discussions
reveals not just a difference, but a gap in the
interpretation of these concepts.
For example, is semiotics compatible with the principle
of activity, is Spinoza's materialistic monism compatible
with the plurality of bases of the theory, that is, it is
possible to consider both objective activity and
communication as the "germ cell" of the theory. Or maybe
for completeness of the theory it is necessary to add to
these two principles something third, say - "subjectness"?
I am convinced that without answering these and similar
fundamental questions at the very beginning of our inquiry
and without answering them in the most general form, we
are doomed to stumble on them at every next step. But this
leads us to another difficulty. Over and over again,
returning the conversation to the most basic theoretical
grounds, we come across the inevitable reproach that
instead of discussing a substantive psychological theory,
based on which we can practically solve socially
significant problems, let us say, create a consistently
democratic education system, we draw everyone to the
interesting only for us theoretical
verbiage<https://www.
<https://www./><https://www./>multitran.ru/c/m.exe?t=188297_
1_2&s1=%EF%F3%F1%F2%EE%F1%EB% EE%E2%E8%E5>
about imposed on everyone in the teeth psychophysical
problem, and the real or imaginary contradictions between
Vygotsky and Leontiev.
Believe me, it would be much more interesting for me too
to reflect on how to help find the path to education and
culture for the children of poor migrants from Central
Asia in Moscow or migrants from Mexico to San Diego.
Agitprop
sticks
in my teeth too,
and I’d rather
compose
romances for you -
more profit in it
and more charm.
But I
subdued
myself,
setting my heel
on the throat
of my own song.
Vladimir Mayakovski
И мне
Агитпроп
в зубах навяз,
и мне бы
строчить
романсы на вас —
доходней оно
и прелестней.
Но я
себя
смирял,
становясь
на горло
собственной песне.
Владимир Маяковский
Among other things, such an over and over again forced
return to the very foundation makes it difficult to
understand even these very basics, for it forces us to
return to the most abstract level all the time, literally
stuck in abstractions, instead of moving from the abstract
to the concrete.
Alfredo, you put in your post very interesting questions
about how to understand the principle of interaction as
such and about the relationship of object oriented
activity to communication. With pleasure I will answer
them. I will only note in brackets that the detailed
answers to these questions have been formulated by me in
my theoretic research almost thirty years ago ORIGIN OF
LIFE, PSYCHE AND HUMAN CONSCIOUSNESS.docx In Russian
Принципы теории рефлексивной
деятельности<https://www.
<https://www./><https://www./>academia.edu/34223109/ORIGIN_
OF_LIFE_PSYCHE_AND_HUMAN_ CONSCIOUSNESS.docx_In_Russian_
%D0%9F%D1%80%D0%B8%D0%BD%D1% 86%D0%B8%D0%BF%D1%8B_%D1%82%
D0%B5%D0%BE%D1%80%D0%B8%D0%B8_
%D1%80%D0%B5%D1%84%D0%BB%D0%
B5%D0%BA%D1%81%D0%B8%D0%B2%D0%
BD%D0%BE%D0%B9_%D0%B4%D0%B5%
D1%8F%D1%82%D0%B5%D0%BB%D1%8C%
D0%BD%D0%BE%D1%81%D1%82%D0%B8> .
Since 2006, an article with a brief outline of the
principles of the "theory of reflexive activity" is
available in English. It was even sent in published in
English international journal... but for some strange
reason was not published then or later.
So, it's easy for me to answer both of your questions,
especially since I can answer by quoting my old text
https://www.academia.edu/ 33954148/LIFE_PSYCHE_
CONSCIOUSNESS.
But before I start to quote myself :-) I would like to
repeat - I completely agree with you that the interaction
of the subject and his object (predmet) should in no case
be understood as a symmetrical interaction of two
ready-made things. I'm not sure if such a false approach
should be called a "dualism," the term dualism has in my
opinion a fairly precise theoretical meaning that should
not be expanded without special need, but it is obvious
that such a logic of interaction is characteristic of the
type of interaction that Hegel and Schelling called the
mechanism and chemism. When it comes to the object
oriented activity of a living organism, we are not dealing
with the logic of abstract interaction, but with the logic
of positing, positing of the object (логика полагания
предмета), or "organic" type of interaction in the
terminology of German classics. In other words, "positing"
is also an interaction, but that is its highest,
essentially different from the mechanism and the chemism
type. Mechanism and chemism are symmetric, in the sense
that one can not in principle separate out its active and
passive side, on the contrary, in organic interaction, in
the process of positing of an object one side is active,
subjective, while the other is passive, objective. There
are many interesting differences between them, but let us
return to this somehow later.
In the meantime, the promised quote from my graduation
work of 1988:
“Active or predmet directed (object oriented) relation
can not be possibly comprehended as interaction of two
objects external to each other. For example, the sun taken
abstractly, out of touch with the process of life, is
neither “predmet” for a plant, nor for astronomy. It
receives a specific predmet quality exclusively due to
spontaneous activity of a green plant (or astronomer)
“selecting” the sun as its predmet and “scrupulously”
imitating its celestial movement with that of the plant
leaves (with his telescope).
That is to say that living, active or predmet relation
as such is possible only between a living, spontaneously
acting subject and a predmet positioned by its vital
activity.
Something else again is a stimulating-reactive relation,
or a relation of irritability. Firstly, it is not
spontaneous on the side of a subject being stimulated.
Secondly, it is not productive since the organism does not
determine its predmet but has to satisfy itself with
accidental and therefore indifferent external influence.
Thirdly, the response of the organism (if only it is not
just a mechanistic action of an external cause) can be
conditioned only by abstract inner nature of the organism
itself but in no way by the shape of the external thing
indifferent to the organism incidentally coming into
contact with its living subjectivity. To put it
differently, we can find not the slightest trace of
predmet directedness within a stimulating-reactive
relation.”
Now about the object oriented activity and
communication, and it does not matter whether in the
verbal form, or in the form of a special Mikhailovsky's
"addressing" to another person.
Which of these two categories should be considered
primary and universal, in which of them we have to try to
discern the notorious "germ cell" of human consciousness
(psyche) is essentially the main problem that has been and
remains the central problem of theoretical psychology
associated with the names of Vygotsky, Leontyev and
Ilyenkov.
To begin with, one preliminary consideration. If we want
to build scientific psychology in accordance with the
famous Marxist method of ascent from the abstract to the
concrete, whereas all three mentioned above thinkers
believed that the method of ascent, the method of
"Capital", is the only scientifically correct method, to
ignore which means to condemn one's own theoretical
discipline on vulgarity, then you will have to choose one
thing - either activity or communication. And at first
glance, the answer for any person who wants to be a
Marxist is obvious - of course, communication, of course
sociality, for it is not for nothing that the classic
coined his famous sixth thesis, stating that ".…the human
essence is no abstraction inherent in each single
individual. In its reality it is the ensemble of the
social relations.. "
And if the construction of a Marxist or, in Vygotsky's
view, which we fully share, the construction of a purely
scientific psychology consisted only in the need to
reconcile the basic propositions of theoretical psychology
with the "correct" ideological quotations from Marx, then
the task ... Then we would again be in an extremely
difficult situation, because the classics left us with
different meanings on this topic and with which of them it
is necessary to harmonize our theory in the first place,
and with which in the second, it would still have to be
solved by ourselves.
So in the 1970s soviet psychologists divided on this
issue into two camps clustered around two «bosses». A
group of Moscow-Kharkov psychologists, whose leader was AN
Leontiev and to which Davydov and Ilyenkov undoubtedly
belonged, was inclined to the primacy of object oriented
activity, that is, to the formulation of the first, second
and fifth thesis "Theses On Feuerbach", whereas a group of
Leningrad psychologists, led by B.F. Lomov was inclined to
formulations of the sixth thesis. In other words,
"Muscovites" were for activity, whereas "Leningraders"
were for communication.
Here, it is necessary, however, to clarify that our
reference to Marx's Theses on Feuerbach is not a literal
reproduction of a real theoretical discussion, but our
current reconstruction of its logic. In reality, such a
direct appeal to the texts and the authority of the
classics of Marxism in the 1970s was considered something
rather indecent.
The end of the discussion between supporters of
"activity" and supporters of "communication" is also
characteristic. Lomov won a purely bureaucratic victory,
convincing the ideological authorities that, by organizing
the international Vygotsky conference, Davydov was
dragging through dangerous Zionist ideas. Davydov was
expelled from the party and dismissed from the post of
director of the Institute of Psychology, and the dean of
Leontief's psychology department was appointed a
well-known adherent of "communication" Leningrader
Bodalev. Thus, "communication" with the useful people in
the ideological department of the Central Committee of
CPSU won a pure victory over the supporters of scientific
"activity." This concludes all meaningful discussions in
Soviet / Russian psychology. To the leadership of the
Faculty of Psychology were no longer allowed supporters
of any kind of controversial scientific ideas. Davydov's
short-term return to the Institute of Psychology of RAE
could not reverse the situation too.
Let us return, however, to our sheep, that is, to
"communication" and "activity."
If we want to make our choice of the initial category,
without looking back at the academic fashion, then for us
as for the materialists the choice is obvious. We will
choose the one of the two categories from which one can
derive the entire diversity of human life, including
another, the opposite category. And it is obvious that
such an initial category can only be object-oriented
activity, for it is easy to deduce communication from the
latter, which is an attribute property of life. But from
communication, addressness, love, empathy and other such
spiritually uplifting plots, we will not get life or
object oriented activity with the greatest diligence.
And this is not an unsubstantiated assertion, but a fact
realized in a theory called the "Theory of Reflexive
Activity", which demonstrates how inner reflexivity and
the entire affective sphere associated with it is first
generated by objective activity at the most basic level,
in the evolution of life itself. Then a complex dialectic
of the relation of activity and reflexivity in the course
of the evolution of multicellular organisms is traced.
And, finally, it demonstrates how the external
reflexivity, that is, the relations of individuals,
together and practically producing their own lives,
assumes a specifically human character, being a
reflexivity, mediating the joint-tool activity of man.
We emphasize that in the "Theory of Reflexive Activity"
communication and the affective side of life are taken not
as initial and independent concepts, of the origin of
which no materialist can say anything meaningful, but as
necessarily inherent to object oriented activity it’s
REFLEXIVE side.
The concept of reflexivity was introduced by me in my
diploma thesis in 1988 and, it seems to me, it is a
Marxist theoretical solution to the question of the
relation of objective activity and "communication". In the
same time, reflexive object oriented activity, that is,
the active relation of the subject to the object and to
itself, is the only possible "germ cell" of the human, as,
indeed, any other, psychology.
Формат интернет чата не самое подходящее место для того,
чтобы вводить столь фундаментальные понятия, потому тем,
кто хочет разобраться в проблеме пресловутой «клеточки»,
следует заглянуть в не слишком большой английский текст
https://www.academia.edu/ 33954148/LIFE_PSYCHE_
CONSCIOUSNESS
и прочитать его дальше первых нескольких страниц.
The format of the Internet chat is not the most suitable
place for introducing such fundamental concepts,
therefore, those who want to understand the problem of the
notorious "germ cell" should look into not too large
English text
https://www.academia.edu/ 33954148/LIFE_PSYCHE_
CONSCIOUSNESS
and read it to the end :-).
Полный текст на русском ORIGIN OF LIFE, PSYCHE AND HUMAN
CONSCIOUSNESS.docx In Russian Принципы теории рефлексивной
деятельности<https://www.
<https://www./><https://www./>academia.edu/34223109/ORIGIN_
OF_LIFE_PSYCHE_AND_HUMAN_ CONSCIOUSNESS.docx_In_Russian_
%D0%9F%D1%80%D0%B8%D0%BD%D1% 86%D0%B8%D0%BF%D1%8B_%D1%82%
D0%B5%D0%BE%D1%80%D0%B8%D0%B8_
%D1%80%D0%B5%D1%84%D0%BB%D0%
B5%D0%BA%D1%81%D0%B8%D0%B2%D0%
BD%D0%BE%D0%B9_%D0%B4%D0%B5%
D1%8F%D1%82%D0%B5%D0%BB%D1%8C% D0%BD%D0%BE%D1%81%D1%82%D0%B8>
Наконец, краткий текст на русском, соответствующий
английскому переводу
https://www.avramus.com/app/
download/5446025763/%D0%9A%D0%
BE%D0%BD%D0%B5%D1%86+%D0%BF%
D1%81%D0%B8%D1%85%D0%BE%D1%84%
D0%B8%D0%B7%D0%B8%D1%87%D0%B5%
D1%81%D0%BA%D0%BE%D0%B9+%D0%
BF%D1%80%D0%B1%D0%BB%D0%B5%D0% BC%D1%8B.doc?t=1486819527
.
Dear Alfredo, Ivan et al
The discussion really becomes more and more interesting,
touching on the most fundamental categories. But before
proceeding to the answers, a short replica aparté (replica
aside) :-)
Theoretical discussion can be productive only if it is
conducted in the context of a single theoretical approach,
based on the general principles accepted in its framework
and shared by the debaters. Here, on the XMCA, such a
common, unifying conception are usually considered the
theories of Vygotsky, Spinozism or even Marxism.
Meanwhile, I am afraid that the course of our discussions
reveals not just a difference, but a gap in the
interpretation of these concepts.
For example, is semiotics compatible with the principle
of activity, is Spinoza's materialistic monism compatible
with the plurality of bases of the theory, that is, it is
possible to consider both objective activity and
communication as the "germ cell" of the theory. Or maybe
for completeness of the theory it is necessary to add to
these two principles something third, say - "subjectness"?
I am convinced that without answering these and similar
fundamental questions at the very beginning of our inquiry
and without answering them in the most general form, we
are doomed to stumble on them at every next step. But this
leads us to another difficulty. Over and over again,
returning the conversation to the most basic theoretical
grounds, we come across the inevitable reproach that
instead of discussing a substantive psychological theory,
based on which we can practically solve socially
significant problems, let us say, create a consistently
democratic education system, we draw everyone to the
interesting only for us theoretical
verbiage<https://www.
<https://www./><https://www./>multitran.ru/c/m.exe?t=188297_
1_2&s1=%EF%F3%F1%F2%EE%F1%EB% EE%E2%E8%E5>
about imposed on everyone in the teeth psychophysical
problem, and the real or imaginary contradictions between
Vygotsky and Leontiev.
Believe me, it would be much more interesting for me too
to reflect on how to help find the path to education and
culture for the children of poor migrants from Central
Asia in Moscow or migrants from Mexico to San Diego.
Agitprop
sticks
in my teeth too,
and I’d rather
compose
romances for you -
more profit in it
and more charm.
But I
subdued
myself,
setting my heel
on the throat
of my own song.
Vladimir Mayakovski
И мне
Агитпроп
в зубах навяз,
и мне бы
строчить
романсы на вас —
доходней оно
и прелестней.
Но я
себя
смирял,
становясь
на горло
собственной песне.
Владимир Маяковский
Among other things, such an over and over again forced
return to the very foundation makes it difficult to
understand even these very basics, for it forces us to
return to the most abstract level all the time, literally
stuck in abstractions, instead of moving from the abstract
to the concrete.
Alfredo, you put in your post very interesting questions
about how to understand the principle of interaction as
such and about the relationship of object oriented
activity to communication. With pleasure I will answer
them. I will only note in brackets that the detailed
answers to these questions have been formulated by me in
my theoretic research almost thirty years ago ORIGIN OF
LIFE, PSYCHE AND HUMAN CONSCIOUSNESS.docx In Russian
Принципы теории рефлексивной
деятельности<https://www.
<https://www./><https://www./>academia.edu/34223109/ORIGIN_
OF_LIFE_PSYCHE_AND_HUMAN_ CONSCIOUSNESS.docx_In_Russian_
%D0%9F%D1%80%D0%B8%D0%BD%D1% 86%D0%B8%D0%BF%D1%8B_%D1%82%
D0%B5%D0%BE%D1%80%D0%B8%D0%B8_
%D1%80%D0%B5%D1%84%D0%BB%D0%
B5%D0%BA%D1%81%D0%B8%D0%B2%D0%
BD%D0%BE%D0%B9_%D0%B4%D0%B5%
D1%8F%D1%82%D0%B5%D0%BB%D1%8C%
D0%BD%D0%BE%D1%81%D1%82%D0%B8> .
Since 2006, an article with a brief outline of the
principles of the "theory of reflexive activity" is
available in English. It was even sent in published in
English international journal... but for some strange
reason was not published then or later.
So, it's easy for me to answer both of your questions,
especially since I can answer by quoting my old text
https://www.academia.edu/ 33954148/LIFE_PSYCHE_
CONSCIOUSNESS.
But before I start to quote myself :-) I would like to
repeat - I completely agree with you that the interaction
of the subject and his object (predmet) should in no case
be understood as a symmetrical interaction of two
ready-made things. I'm not sure if such a false approach
should be called a "dualism," the term dualism has in my
opinion a fairly precise theoretical meaning that should
not be expanded without special need, but it is obvious
that such a logic of interaction is characteristic of the
type of interaction that Hegel and Schelling called the
mechanism and chemism. When it comes to the object
oriented activity of a living organism, we are not dealing
with the logic of abstract interaction, but with the logic
of positing, positing of the object (логика полагания
предмета), or "organic" type of interaction in the
terminology of German classics. In other words, "positing"
is also an interaction, but that is its highest,
essentially different from the mechanism and the chemism
type. Mechanism and chemism are symmetric, in the sense
that one can not in principle separate out its active and
passive side, on the contrary, in organic interaction, in
the process of positing of an object one side is active,
subjective, while the other is passive, objective. There
are many interesting differences between them, but let us
return to this somehow later.
In the meantime, the promised quote from my graduation
work of 1988:
“Active or predmet directed (object oriented) relation
can not be possibly comprehended as interaction of two
objects external to each other. For example, the sun taken
abstractly, out of touch with the process of life, is
neither “predmet” for a plant, nor for astronomy. It
receives a specific predmet quality exclusively due to
spontaneous activity of a green plant (or astronomer)
“selecting” the sun as its predmet and “scrupulously”
imitating its celestial movement with that of the plant
leaves (with his telescope).
That is to say that living, active or predmet relation
as such is possible only between a living, spontaneously
acting subject and a predmet positioned by its vital
activity.
Something else again is a stimulating-reactive relation,
or a relation of irritability. Firstly, it is not
spontaneous on the side of a subject being stimulated.
Secondly, it is not productive since the organism does not
determine its predmet but has to satisfy itself with
accidental and therefore indifferent external influence.
Thirdly, the response of the organism (if only it is not
just a mechanistic action of an external cause) can be
conditioned only by abstract inner nature of the organism
itself but in no way by the shape of the external thing
indifferent to the organism incidentally coming into
contact with its living subjectivity. To put it
differently, we can find not the slightest trace of
predmet directedness within a stimulating-reactive
relation.”
Now about the object oriented activity and
communication, and it does not matter whether in the
verbal form, or in the form of a special Mikhailovsky's
"addressing" to another person.
Which of these two categories should be considered
primary and universal, in which of them we have to try to
discern the notorious "germ cell" of human consciousness
(psyche) is essentially the main problem that has been and
remains the central problem of theoretical psychology
associated with the names of Vygotsky, Leontyev and
Ilyenkov.
To begin with, one preliminary consideration. If we want
to build scientific psychology in accordance with the
famous Marxist method of ascent from the abstract to the
concrete, whereas all three mentioned above thinkers
believed that the method of ascent, the method of
"Capital", is the only scientifically correct method, to
ignore which means to condemn one's own theoretical
discipline on vulgarity, then you will have to choose one
thing - either activity or communication. And at first
glance, the answer for any person who wants to be a
Marxist is obvious - of course, communication, of course
sociality, for it is not for nothing that the classic
coined his famous sixth thesis, stating that ".…the human
essence is no abstraction inherent in each single
individual. In its reality it is the ensemble of the
social relations.. "
And if the construction of a Marxist or, in Vygotsky's
view, which we fully share, the construction of a purely
scientific psychology consisted only in the need to
reconcile the basic propositions of theoretical psychology
with the "correct" ideological quotations from Marx, then
the task ... Then we would again be in an extremely
difficult situation, because the classics left us with
different meanings on this topic and with which of them it
is necessary to harmonize our theory in the first place,
and with which in the second, it would still have to be
solved by ourselves.
So in the 1970s soviet psychologists divided on this
issue into two camps clustered around two «bosses». A
group of Moscow-Kharkov psychologists, whose leader was
Leontiev and to which Davydov and Ilyenkov undoubtedly
belonged, was inclined to the primacy of object oriented
activity, that is, to the formulation of the first, second
and fifth thesis of Marx's "Theses On Feuerbach", whereas
a group of Leningrad psychologists, led by Lomov was
inclined to formulations of the sixth thesis. In other
words, "Moscovites" were for "activity", whereas
"Leningraders" were for "communication".
Here, it is necessary, however, to clarify that our
reference to Marx's "Theses on Feuerbach" is not a literal
reproduction of a real theoretical discussion, but our
current reconstruction of its logic. In reality, such a
direct appeal to the texts and the authority of the
classics of Marxism in the 1970s was considered something
rather indecent.
The end of the discussion between supporters of
"activity" and supporters of "communication" is also
characteristic. Lomov won a purely bureaucratic victory,
convincing the ideological authorities that, by organizing
the international Vygotsky conference, Davydov was
dragging through dangerous Zionist ideas. Davydov was
expelled from the party and dismissed from the post of
director of the Institute of Psychology, and the dean of
Leontief's psychology department was appointed a
well-known adherent of "communication" Leningrader
Bodalev. Thus, "communication" with the useful people in
the ideological department of the Central Committee of
CPSU won a pure victory over the supporters of scientific
"activity." This concludes all meaningful discussions in
Soviet / Russian psychology. To the leadership of the
Faculty of Psychology were no longer allowed supporters
of any kind of controversial scientific ideas. Davydov's
short-term return to the Institute of Psychology of RAE
could not reverse the situation too.
Let us return, however, to our sheep, that is, to
"communication" and "activity."
If we want to make our choice of the initial category,
without looking back at the academic fashion, then for us
as for the materialists the choice is obvious. We will
choose the one of the two categories from which one can
derive the entire diversity of human life, including
another, the opposite category. And it is obvious that
such an initial category can only be object-oriented
activity, for it is easy to deduce communication from the
object oriented activity, which is an attribute property
of life. But from communication, "addressness", love,
empathy and other such spiritually uplifting plots, we
will never get life or object oriented activity even with
the greatest diligence.
And this is not an unsubstantiated assertion, but a fact
realized in a theory called the "Theory of Reflexive
Activity", which demonstrates how inner reflexivity and
the entire affective sphere associated with it is first
generated by objective activity at the most basic level,
in the evolution of life itself. Then a complex dialectic
of the relation of activity and reflexivity in the course
of the evolution of multicellular organisms is traced.
And, finally, it demonstrates how the external
reflexivity, that is, the relations of individuals,
together and practically producing their own lives,
assumes a specifically human character, being a
reflexivity, mediating the joint-tool activity of man.
We emphasize that in the "Theory of Reflexive Activity"
communication and the affective side of life are taken not
as initial and independent concepts, of the origin of
which no materialist can say anything meaningful, but as
necessarily inherent to object oriented activity it’s
REFLEXIVE side.
The concept of reflexivity was introduced in my diploma
thesis in 1988 and, it seems to me, it is a Marxist
theoretical solution to the question of the relation of
objective activity and "communication". In the same time,
reflexive object oriented activity, that is, the active
relation of the subject to the object and to itself, is
the only possible "germ cell" of the human, as, indeed,
any other, psychology.
The format of the Internet chat is not the most suitable
place for introducing such fundamental concepts,
therefore, those who want to understand the problem of the
notorious "germ cell" should look into not too large
English text
https://www.academia.edu/ 33954148/LIFE_PSYCHE_
CONSCIOUSNESS
and read it to the end :-).
The full Russian text: ORIGIN OF LIFE, PSYCHE AND HUMAN
CONSCIOUSNESS.docx In Russian Принципы теории рефлексивной
деятельности<https://www.
<https://www./><https://www./>academia.edu/34223109/ORIGIN_
OF_LIFE_PSYCHE_AND_HUMAN_ CONSCIOUSNESS.docx_In_Russian_
%D0%9F%D1%80%D0%B8%D0%BD%D1% 86%D0%B8%D0%BF%D1%8B_%D1%82%
D0%B5%D0%BE%D1%80%D0%B8%D0%B8_
%D1%80%D0%B5%D1%84%D0%BB%D0%
B5%D0%BA%D1%81%D0%B8%D0%B2%D0%
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D1%8F%D1%82%D0%B5%D0%BB%D1%8C% D0%BD%D0%BE%D1%81%D1%82%D0%B8>
Finally short Russian text which corresponds to short
English one
https://www.avramus.com/app/
download/5446025763/%D0%9A%D0%
BE%D0%BD%D0%B5%D1%86+%D0%BF%
D1%81%D0%B8%D1%85%D0%BE%D1%84%
D0%B8%D0%B7%D0%B8%D1%87%D0%B5%
D1%81%D0%BA%D0%BE%D0%B9+%D0%
BF%D1%80%D0%B1%D0%BB%D0%B5%D0% BC%D1%8B.doc?t=1486819527.
Sasha
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