Dear Andy--
I like your point very much:
> While I think he is innovating in using the word "ideal," in the way he
> does, I think Ilyenkov was deliberately aiming at the Stalinised version
> of
> "historical determinism" which relegates all human agency to the Party and
> its Great Helmsman. The counter-attack calling Ilyenkov an "idealist" was
> just the result he would have been looking for.
Excellent point!
Eugene
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Andy Blunden [mailto:ablunden@mira.net]
> Sent: Thursday, May 13, 2004 5:02 AM
> To: xmca@weber.ucsd.edu
> Subject: Re: Discussion of EVI's Concept of the Ideal
>
> Well, I'm a great fan of Ilyenkov. This article was a turning point for
> me.
> While I think he is innovating in using the word "ideal," in the way he
> does, I think Ilyenkov was deliberately aiming at the Stalinised version
> of
> "historical determinism" which relegates all human agency to the Party and
> its Great Helmsman. The counter-attack calling Ilyenkov an "idealist" was
> just the result he would have been looking for.
>
> That is I see his move in terms of a nod to Thesis On Feuerbach #1.
> http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1845/theses/index.htm
>
> Virtually all my writing over the past few years is hinged around this
> idea. I don't see Ilyenkov as dealing with an ontological problem. The
> issue of subject-object is an issue of human agency not images being
> reflected in a mirror. That's why I remarked in a side-discussion with Dot
> Robbins (bless your heart Dot!) that I really didn't like the way Vygotsky
> used the "mirror" metaphor so beloved by Lenin.
>
> My current writing http://home.mira.net/~andy/works/social-solidarity-
> 1.htm
>
> relies heavily on Ilyenkov. Actually, I think this discussion is somewhat
> like the one on Leontyev vs. Vygotsky on "activity." I think Leontyev's
> notion is a better one, but I wouldn't like to counterpose it to Vygotsky.
>
> Andy
>
> At 01:31 AM 13/05/2004 -0700, you wrote:
> >Well said, Andy.
> >
> >Have you written on this issue of the ideal?
> >
> >Best,
> >- Steve
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >Andy Blunden wrote:
> >>I think that Ilyenkov clarifies and develops what was only partially
> >>developed and "hesitant" in Marx. In Chapter 3 of Capital Marx says:
> >
> >
> >>"The price or money-form of commodities is, like their form of value
> >>generally, a form quite distinct from their palpable bodily form; it is,
> >>therefore, a purely ideal or mental form."
> >>and he later contrasts price and value in a way that does not allow us
> to
> >>say that Marx saw money as an objective ideal as Ilyenkov does. He uses
> >>"ideal" in Capital on several occasions in the way engineers talk about
> >>equations as "just ideal" in contrast to real behgaviour. I would
> venture
> >>to say that Marx was not able to go as far as Ilyenkov at an historical
> >>time when a "life force" was still being posited as the cause of body
> >>temperature and the memory of Hegel's Geist was still very fresh.
> >>Personally I find Ilyenkov's extension of the Marx's idea valid and
> >>appropriate. Marx for example, uses the word "abstract" in just the way
> >>that Ilyenkov uses it, but it does appear that he did not go so far as
> to
> >>use the word "ideal" in quite that way.
> >>
> >>Andy
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