[Xmca-l] Re: Отв: Re: Object oriented activity and communication
Andy Blunden
ablunden@mira.net
Mon Oct 16 15:16:12 PDT 2017
The idea of producing for exchange being something essential
outside of a world in which products are exchanged is to my
mind something as curious as something being a hammer
outside of a world in which there are nails. In preparing
the conceptual foundation of /Capital/, Marx wrote the
/Grundrisse /and in the Introduction he makes clear that
production, distribution, exchange and consumption form a
unity, a whole, and have to be analysed as such:
https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1857/grundrisse/ch01.htm#loc2
"Thus production, distribution, exchange and consumption
form a regular syllogism; production is the generality,
distribution and exchange the particularity, and
consumption the singularity in which the whole is joined
together."
Andy
------------------------------------------------------------
Andy Blunden
http://www.ethicalpolitics.org/ablunden/index.htm
On 17/10/2017 8:49 AM, Alfredo Jornet Gil wrote:
>
> So, not commodity exchange, but commodity production,
> Sasha. That is of course in line with everything else you
> can read in Marx, including the introductory paragraphs of
> the German Ideology, and sounds right. Although I did not
> think that 'exchange of goods' was synonymous
> with 'exchange of commodities,' It is a whole different
> thing, and what you are saying is that these are different
> because of the type of relations of production. Sounds
> right to me.
>
>
> There are theories that take communication to be an
> exchange of words, or of signs, or of ideas as you write,
> a 'negotiation of meanings' others say. But there are
> alternatives to that too, some of which characterise the
> communicative relation as a productive force, an
> orderliness that is self-generating and irreducible to any
> of the communicating 'parties' or their messages. Led by
> W-M Roth, we have written about this. Taking that
> perspective, and this may be because I am 'only'
> a student, and one much less qualified than the one you
> speak about in your message, it becomes very difficult for
> me to have communication to be somehow secondary. As it's
> been suggested here. I feel more comfortable thinking of
> 'productive activity' or object oriented activity, as
> manifesting both as practical activity and
> as communicative activity; but not first the one and only
> later the other.
>
>
> I read Marx saying the same when writing this in the
> German Ideology:
>
>
> "The production of ideas, of conceptions, of
> consciousness, is at first directly interwoven with the
> material activity and the material intercourse of men-the
> language of real life."
>
>
> And then again,
>
>
> "Language is as old as consciousness, language
> is practical, real consciousness that exists for other men
> as well, and only therefore does it also exist for me;
> language, like consciousness, only arises from the need,
> the necessity, of intercourse with other men."
>
>
> I do not see here some hierarchy of primaries and
> secondaries, but rather immanence, humanity as a
> productive force that has practical and communicative
> aspects. But I am happyto be in the process of being
> corrected about this.
>
>
> Alfredo
>
>
> PS: The text by Ilyenkov that Sasha refers to is available
> at Marxists.org, here:
>
> https://www.marxists.org/archive/ilyenkov/works/abstract/index.htm
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------
> *From:* Alexander Surmava <alexander.surmava@yahoo.com>
> *Sent:* 16 October 2017 17:00
> *To:* ablunden@mira.net; eXtended Mind, Culture, Activity;
> Alfredo Jornet Gil; Mike Cole; Haydi Zulfei ; Ivan
> Uemlianin; Martin John Packer
> *Subject:* Отв: [Xmca-l] Re: Отв: Re: Object oriented
> activity and communication
>
> Dear colleagues,
>
> Excuse me for the delay in responding to your previous
> posts about Leontiev and Vygotsky. The problems that we
> are discussing are so serious that it takes a long time to
> think about them and formulate an answer. Especially in
> English :-).
>
> Therefore, the main answer I hope to put on the XMCA no
> earlier than tomorrow.
>
> But suddenly the discussion turned into an extremely
> interesting side. I mean analysis of the logic of "Das
> Kapital". It is discussed what can and should be properly
> considered the unit of analysis of both Capital and “Das
> Kapital”, the world system of capitalism and its
> reflection in Marx’ theoretic masterpiece. At least two
> hypotheses have been voiced. The first is that such a unit
> is a separate " business", a capitalist firm. And the
> second, that the unit of analysis is the exchange of goods.
>
> I think that I can hardly agree with both hypotheses.
> It seems to me that for Marx the first, most abstract
> stage of analysis is in no case the exchange of goods, but
> the commodity itself. And not an abstract commodity, but a
> commodity produced under capitalistic relations.
> Therefore, the unit of analysis is strictly speaking the
> very production of such a commodity.
>
> The exchange of goods occurs not only under capitalism,
> but also under slavery, and under feudalism. This is not
> an independent, not substantial concept. The exchange
> depends on the mode of production, and not vice versa.
>
> The same can be applied to "communication" in psychology,
> to the "exchange" of ideas, caresses or beatings. This
> communication does not occur due to certain immanent laws
> of interpersonal communication, but entirely depends on
> the collaborative object-oriented activity (predmetnoy
> deyatelnosty), collective labor of historically determined
> individuals. In turn, the nature of their collective work,
> depends not on the distribution of genes in their genomes,
> but on the distribution of the means of production, on the
> distribution of labor instruments. Let us emphasize, not
> on the distribution of verbal signs, not on ideology, but
> on the distribution of the most material weapons of human
> activity.
>
> With communist greetings :-) ,
> Sasha
>
> P.S. By the way, I enthusiastically welcome the fact that
> our discussion has switched from discussing Vygotsky's
> "units" to discussing the most abstract category of "Das
> Kapital" of Marx, that is, from a pale copy, to the
> original. By the way, in the future it might be
> interesting to re-read the "Dialectics of the abstract and
> concrete in scientific and theoretical thinking" by EV
> Ilyenkov. This work contains an elaborate analysis of the
> method of Marx, in comparison with which Vygotsky's
> methodological reflexion seems to be something quite
> student-like.
>
>
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------
> *От:* Andy Blunden <ablunden@mira.net>
> *Кому:* Alfredo Jornet Gil <a.j.gil@iped.uio.no>;
> "xmca-l@mailman.ucsd.edu" <xmca-l@mailman.ucsd.edu>
> *Отправлено:* понедельник, 16 октября 2017 15:51
> *Тема:* [Xmca-l] Re: Отв: Re: Object oriented activity and
> communication
>
> Capitals are units of capital. The only whole is the world
> market, within which units of capital grow and shrink,
> consume one another and so on. A capital (i.e. a firm) is
> not a "whole" in the true sense of the word, and I would
> have an issue with anyone who wants to treat a firm as a
> "system of activity" if there were any implication that this
> means a "closed system."
>
>
> Andy
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------
> Andy Blunden
> http://www.ethicalpolitics.org/ablunden/index.htm
> On 16/10/2017 11:42 PM, Alfredo Jornet Gil wrote:
> >
> > 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
> <mailto:ablunden@mira.net>>
> > *Sent:* 16 October 2017 14:39
> > *To:* Alfredo Jornet Gil; xmca-l@mailman.ucsd.edu
> <mailto: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./>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./>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>>
> >>>>>>>>> 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.
> <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./>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./>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./>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./>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./>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./>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>
> >>>>>>>>> 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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