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Re: [xmca] On metaphysics: origin of the term



Martin,

Ironically, I think it is not only a question of methodology pertaining to a specific discipline, but a problem of "metaphysics" as well :)
In the model of "individuals constituting a crowd", the "individual"  
is a genetic and logical given before the "crowd". But, again,  
individual bodies come to a demonstration already participating in  
numerous projects. These bodies cannot dress, talk, or move without  
explicitly and "empirically" acknowledging their participation in  
various "social forms", i.e. systems of activity, projects, etc.  
Returning to Marx, individuals are really ensembles - coherent wholes  
- of social relations. An individual actor is, on the one hand, a  
discrete agent participating in countless activities, and, on the  
other, a microcosm of the activities (s)he participates in.  
"Individuality" (cf. Voloshinov 1973) is just one of the many projects  
an individual participates in.
It is important to realize that individuals do not assemble into a  
"crowd" independently from the activity. Their intentions are not an a  
priori as well. They are, in fact, formally and informally "invited"  
to participate. With regard to the 25 January demonstrations, people  
were formally invited through leaflets, facebook and twitter messages,  
and face to face conversations. But people were also informally "drawn  
into" the activity of protesting by the saliency of its actions. The  
organizers of the first protesters had decided to gather first in  
popular neighborhoods and move in mini-demonstrations from there to  
Tahrir, in order not to get arrested on an individual basis. This  
action had the unintended side-effect that people from the  
neighborhood began discussing with the protesters and began to  
physically join the demonstrations. Groups of a few hundred protesters  
swiftly swelled to a few thousands. The rest is history.
At the moment of the "invitation" people were already drawn into the  
activity of protesting. What was left for them was to *recognize* the  
project as their own and participate in its leading action: the  
demonstration. Conversely, the project had to prove its rationality  
and necessity to potential participants. The basis on which each  
discrete individual decided to agree and participate was quite varied.  
Often the decision to participate was not taken on an individual  
basis, but already as a collaborative activity, "in group", for  
example the Ultras (hardcore football supporters), families living in  
the same street, or workers belonging to a strike committee. But the  
fact that, in the end, millions did, indicated that the activity of  
resistance (expressed in vague concepts such as "the regime is a bunch  
of thieves" and survivalist or basic forms of resistance such as  
evading taxes, not going to vote, etc.) already existed and was taken  
to the next level of open and explicit mobilization.
Likewise, a strike is not the first moment of resistance, it is the  
moment where already existing forms of resistance (often individual or  
by small groups) becomes organized, salient, collaborative,  
intentional, etc. Even when an individual engages in a singular  
activity he employs the tools and signs that are developed through his  
participation in projects. Even indirectly, his/her activity is still  
socially mediated. When participating in a collaborative activity this  
mediation becomes "direct" (dialogical?), and takes on a wholly  
different developmental logic.
People who were "passively resisting" were suddenly thrown into the  
collaboration of "active protest". They came into confrontation with  
the police, and more importantly, in a few street battles, they "won".  
They came into confrontation with each other and realized they were  
"legion" because they were already practical-materially a massive  
force. They were already making a revolution in their deeds and  
demands before they fully realized they were making a revolution and  
conceptualized their own activity as a revolution. If anything,  
revolutionary intentions came *after* practically being a  
revolutionary - emerging from the activity. Their individual  
consciousness of the newly emerging goals of their activity was  
semiotically mediated by slogans such as "down with the regime",  
"bread, freedom, and social justice", revolutionary songs, graffiti  
and cartoons that expressed power relations and the necessity to  
overthrow them, ..., and practically by their organization and  
crafting of tools (from molotov cocktails to stages for speeches).
From *this* perspective, there are no two levels (1) "one  
perspective, actions in collaborations are drawn into a new activity,  
which then defines new actions"; and (2) the other perspective,  
individuals act intentionally (and reason and feel) towards and with  
others with whom they share a network, and this inspires and motivates  
others who have previously not participated." It is a story of  
mediation and of development, where individual intentions and actions  
are entwined with collaborative efforts.
When I speak of revolutionary institutions I mean this in a broad  
sense of stable and systemic objectifications of struggle. An ad hoc  
meeting to organize a demonstration or a strike is not yet an  
institution, but it can become one. The occupation of Tahrir at one  
point had the potentiality of becoming an institution (it was even  
called the "Republic of Tahrir"). Why did this institution not  
crystallize? Because the military was successful in drawing a majority  
of protesters into its own project of "transition". It demobilized the  
participants of the occupation action which then played a leading role  
in the revolutionary process. How was this possible?  It was the  
outcome of a specific hegemonic struggle, which the military won,  
because of reasons I won't detail here now. To put it in abstract  
terms: the military formally agreed with the goal of the popular  
project, but substituted its own top-down actions for the grassroots  
action of the protesters. This created confusion, and the rest is,  
unfortunately, also history.
On the other hand, many strike committees that popped up during the  
revolution DID crystallize into more or less stable independent  
trade-unions. Why? Because these strike committees often had a longer  
history of organized struggle and collaboration, because they were  
better organized, and because the fall of Mubarak, which demobilized  
broad layers of "political" protesters, was appropriated as a call for  
*increased* mobilization from "social" protesters. But that's also a  
different story which would lead us too far.
In conclusion there is a no strict separation between "social  
movements" and "institutions". Organizing a demonstration (movement)  
already presupposes degrees of organization (institutions), and from  
the activity of a collective action organizations may develop.  
However, in the development of an activity, there are phases where  
"movement" or "institution" is leading or dominant. After the fall of  
Mubarak, it was obvious that mobilizations were still important, but  
that the point of gravity shifted to building revolutionary  
institutions. And the fact that this formation process was fragmented,  
diverted, and retarded because of the so-called "democratic  
transition" from above (= counter-revolution) is the reason Egypt is  
still a mess today.
Best,

Brecht


Citeren Martin Packer <packer@duq.edu>:

Brecht,

I can see the logic of exploring the mutual constitution of actions and activities, rather than of individuals and crowds. Especially since you're in a Department of Conflict and Development Studies. But speaking as a psychologist, what would happen if one looked this phenomenon in Egypt in *both* ways - rather like MCM and CMC in Capital?
From one perspective, actions in collaborations are drawn into a new activity, which then defines new actions. From the other perspective, individuals act intentionally (and reason and feel) towards and with others with whom they share a network, and this inspires and motivates others who have previously not participated.
It may even be that what seems organic and spontaneous from the one  
perspective seems logical and inevitable from the other. And vice  
versa.
Finally, you write that...
by instances of "institutionalization"... Only a few of the spontaneous movements of the insurrection have been crystallized and developed as stable and coherent "systems of activity".
I'm trying to make sense of institutions these days. Do you have  
ideas as to why this has not occurred? What does it take to  
constitute an institution? The power to declare it? I mean, in a  
non-revolutionary society this is precisely what happens: one  
institution designates people (role inhabitants) who define a new  
institution. In a situation where all institutions, I suppose, are  
questionable, what alternative basis might there be?
Martin

On Mar 25, 2013, at 1:58 PM, Brecht De Smet <Brechttie.DeSmet@UGent.be> wrote:
I think a "crowd" is too loose a concept to investigate such a process.

Firstly, the category of "crowd" lumps together fundamentally different actions and activities. A lynch mob or a mass concert obviously has a different developmental logic than a political demonstration or a strike.
Secondly, I rather study the relation between collaborative actions  
and collaborative activities than between "individuals" and  
"groups". Individual bodies are not entering actions as  
individuals, but because they are already a part of existing  
collaborations which are drawn into a new activity/project. So the  
"seeds" of any "crowd" already exist before its formation as a  
"crowd". For example, the first demonstrations on 25 January 2011  
in Cairo mobilized (1) existing "networks" of activists that had  
been built slowly since the last decade, both "real"  
(organizations) and "virtual" (internet-based); (2) non-organized  
people from popular neighborhoods who "spontaneously" joined the  
smaller protest marches towards Tahrir. But even these people  
joined the action (concrete demonstration) as part of an already  
existing project (neighborhood, workplace, community, etc.).
Thirdly, instead of "individuals" constituting a "crowd", the mass  
mobilizations rather represented a coming together of different  
projects into a joint action, which then "organically" gave rise to  
a new project of "revolution". I say organically and spontaneously,  
because the goal of revolution emerged from the coming together of  
these various projects and the development of their joint action -  
no organized political force had dreamed of moving forward the call  
for an end to the regime. There was a dual developmental process:  
A. the goals of the activity developed from a vague and soft  
critique of the regime to the radical demand of overthrowing the  
current order; B. the actions that comprised the activity changed  
from mass demonstrations, over small-scale "guerrilla warfare" in  
the streets against the police at night, to occupation of public  
spaces.
This dual developmental process was determined by, on the one hand  
the internal relation between actions and activity, and, on the  
other, the external encounter between the actions and organized  
state power. For example, internally, from the occupation of Tahrir  
emerged the need for grassroots forms of governance (tents, food,  
doctors, art and songs, prisoners, etc.), which, in turn, strongly  
encouraged the feeling that a societal revolution was taking place.  
Externally, the withdrawal of the police from the streets  
stimulated the formation of popular committees to protect  
neighborhoods from thugs and criminals (who were often set loose by  
the regime...), which, in popular and working class neighborhoods,  
became pillars of revolutionary self-organization.
Fourthly, this touches upon activity as a developmental process  
where moments of "movement" that bring together individual bodies  
in new forms of collaboration has to be grounded by instances of  
"institutionalization" (or systematization) if it is to become a  
stable social form. And this is where the Egyptian revolution has  
largely failed, up until now. Only a few of the spontaneous  
movements of the insurrection have been crystallized and developed  
as stable and coherent "systems of activity". But that's another  
discussion.
Best,

Brecht


Quoting Martin Packer <packer@duq.edu>:

What an interesting investigation, Brecht!

You write of a relationship of 'constitution' that runs both ways between individual actions and group activity. Years ago I read Elias Canetti's book Crowds and Power, and the memory I have of that book (probably distorted by the passage of time) is that Canetti was exploring the way a crowd has an existence that is more than the sum of its parts: when individuals 'constitute' a crowd this really gives rise to something emergent, new. Do you see that in Egypt?
Martin

On Mar 25, 2013, at 11:01 AM, Brecht De Smet <Brechttie.DeSmet@UGent.be> wrote:
Unfortunately, I don't know enough about Activity Theory to engage in a detailed criticism; during my brief encounter with CHAT I immediately "jumped" to Andy's concept of project collaboration (PC) (which is of course partially rooted in AT). Likewise, because my research focus is more on the "meso"-level of groups, movements, and organizations, I can't really say much about ethnographic descriptions of micro-activities such as opening windows on election days.
The advantage of PC for my research is that the object of an  
activity is conceived of as emerging within the developmental  
process of the activity itself. As I'm studying the revolutionary  
process in Egypt, such a perspective allows for an understanding  
of the real transformations of actions and activities involved. A  
concrete activity obviously constitutes concrete actions (e.g.  
the broad activity of protesting on 25 January constituted the  
actions of meetings, demonstrations, etc.), but the development  
of actions has the potential to reconstitute the activity (the  
demonstration on Tahrir turned into an occupation, which, in  
turn, created a space for alternative politics; the mass  
character of the demonstrations reconstituted the object of the  
protest towards "an end to the regime", i.e. revolution; etc.).  
In abstract terms: the relation between individual protesters and  
the activity of protesting (the project) is mediated by  
particular actions (their collaboration), and, vice versa, the  
relation between individual protesters and their particular  
actions is mediated by the "overarching" activity of protest.
This neat scheme becomes much more complex when you take into  
account the relations between various projects, both  
"horizontally" and "vertically". Horizontally, the spontaneous  
revolutionary project arises in contradiction /solidarity to a  
bunch of other projects (e.g. Islamism, the state, etc.).  
Vertically, and "from the bottom-up" this project is part of such  
historical systems as the Egyptian social formation and global  
capitalism; and "top-down" it is constituted by and reconstitutes  
a series of smaller projects (students' movements for better  
education; workers' movements for better wages; villages  
demanding water and electricity, etc.).
Added to this - and against the notion of the "omniscient"  
scientist-observer - the social researcher him/herself is a  
constitutive/constituted actor vis-à-vis the project, in the  
sense that his/her actions (publishing papers, doing fieldwork,  
writing books, attending conferences, conducting interviews,  
etc.) plays a potential mediating role, for example in the  
understanding of the project of itself, in crafting intellectual  
tools to achieve (or undermine) the goals of the project, etc.
I do not know if this amounts to a critique of AT, but this is  
the way "actions" and "activity" have been productive concepts  
for my research.
Best,

Brecht



Quoting Martin Packer <packer@duq.edu>:

Hi Brecht,

Yes, a rational critique of ontology is possible, and indeed necessary. I was trying to engage in such a critique of activity theory, which it seems to me departs considerably rather the admirable (though not unquestionable) ontology that Marx proposed. (And yes, as you suggest, the claim to be "purely empirical" seems to me a return to the outdated and simplistic notion that there is on the one hand 'metaphysics' and on the other hand 'genuine science.' But let that pass.) Activity theory, in my view, essentializes a particular organization of human activity and in doing so obscures the historical character of that organization. Would you agree?
Martin


On Mar 25, 2013, at 4:00 AM, Brecht De Smet <Brechttie.DeSmet@UGent.be> wrote:
Martin, I obviously agree with your presentation of the historical lineages of the "word" metaphysics. However, with regard to the current discussion on the "terms of the debate", it is quite obvious that Andy's original remark: "So there is no metaphysics here. No hypothetical "states of mind", or intelligent infants, etc" clearly deployed metaphysics in the critical (derogatory?) sense of a "false ontology", i.e. the domain of fantastic "a priori" speculation. Retorting that everyone uses metaphysics, a.k.a. an ontology-epistemology, paradigm, Weltanschauung, etc. obscures the fact that a rational critique of particular ontologies is possible and even a necessary part of the scientific project.
With regard to the "concept" of metaphysics, the Marxian  
critique is important because at the time it did not only  
posited its "own" metaphysics against the dominant paradigms,  
but, instead of analyzing the social relations and politics  
that emerged from a certain philosophy, it studied the concrete  
historical social relations and politics that gave rise to  
shapes of metaphysics. In this sense it constituted a  
"Copernican revolution". Superficially, yes, "the materialist  
method" as Marx calls it in the German Ideology has an  
"ontology", in the sense that it is based on a number of  
premises, but, in contradistinction to the theories that came  
before: "The premises from which we begin are not arbitrary  
ones, not dogmas, but real premises from which abstraction can  
only be made in the imagination. They are the real individuals,  
their activity and the material conditions under which they  
live, both those which they find already existing and those  
produced by their activity. These premises can thus be verified  
in a purely empirical way."  
(http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1845/german-ideology/ch01a.htm)
Of course we can make a lot of fuss about the supposed  
empiricism of this passage, but its essence amounts to a call  
for an emancipatory project with at its core real, historical  
humanity. Within the history of this project, the "insult of  
metaphysics" has taken on many forms, from a rational critique  
of a-historical, idealist, or anti-humanist ontologies to the  
sectarian attacks by the ideologists of (ironically the  
extremely "metaphysical" ossified doctrine of)  
"Marxism-Leninism". We may deem such insults as unfortunate,  
but they are perhaps unavoidable when the domain of ontology is  
as much penetrated by politics as politics is by metaphysics.  
To conclude: if anything, Marx subverted the "neutrality" of  
the philosophical "category" of ontology/epistemology and its  
"constitutive" position within society.
Best,

Brecht



Hi Brecht,

Yes, of course you're correct, Andy is reading Hegel from a Marxist point of view, therefore upside down, so to speak. But Marx's materialism is still an ontology, still a metaphysics.
Your confusion comes from the fact that there have been two  
uses of the word 'metaphysics.' One use is to label some kind  
of talk as having no basis in reality, as completely  
speculative and unverifiable. The logical positivists, for  
example, wanted to eliminate metaphysics in this sense from  
science - for them any notion was metaphysical if it was not  
verifiable. They realized that Newtonian physics contained  
unverifiable concepts, and they believed that Einstein's  
physics had eliminated metaphysics by defining everything in  
terms of operations of observation and measurement.
We know now how narrow, unfruitful, and inconsistent the  
positivist view of science turned out to be. The second use of  
the word 'metaphysics' helps us understand why: "'metaphysics'  
refers to accounts of what truly exists, and to accounts of  
relationships between 'existences' (e.g. reduction relations,  
and perhaps other forms of dependence or priority)" (Kreines,  
2006). That is, metaphysics is the brach of philosophy that  
deals with ontology (and sometimes epistemology is included),  
as well as the assumptions that any science makes about the  
entities that it studies.
One person's ontology is another person's metaphysics. That  
is, when someone disagrees with another's ontological claims,  
a quick and easy insult is to label them "metaphysical." But  
the word itself simply came from the sequence of titles in  
Aristotle's texts: the text which dealt with what we would now  
call ontology and epistemology was simply next in the  
traditional list of titles after the 'Physica,' and so was  
called  'Meta-physica.'
Did Marx make ontological assumptions? Certainly! For example,  
as you point out, for Marx the "essence of man" is "in  
reality,' "the ensemble of social relations." In this passage  
Marx states one of his core ontological assumptions. Much has  
been written about the ontological assumptions of Marxism  
(e.g. Gould, 1978). In the same passage Marx himself confuses  
things by using the term metaphysics in its first, derogatory  
sense. Unsympathetic readers of Marx's writings have also at  
times judged them merely metaphysical. Others, sympathetic  
readers, have also often referred to them as metaphysical, but  
in a positive sense. The negative use of the term is falling  
into disuse, with good reason. As the importance of ontology  
is now understood, it no longer makes sense to reject all talk  
about ontology as speculative and unscientific, or  
unphilosophical.
Martin

Gould, C. C. (1978). Marx's social ontology: Individuality and community in Marx's theory of social relations. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.

Kreines, J. (2006). Hegel's metaphysics: Changing the debate. Philosophy Compass, 1(5), 466-480.

On Mar 24, 2013, at 5:16 AM, Brecht De Smet <Brechttie.DeSmet@UGent.be> wrote:
Because I do not want to derail the current thread, I start a new one:

My point was that Hegel is hardly the person to turn to if one wants to avoid metaphysics! Individual, Universal, Particular - there's a whole metaphysics here.
Well, if you look how Andy appropriates Hegel in his various  
writings I think you can hardly call what he does a form of  
metaphysics. On the contrary, he turns Hegel upside down,  
reading his logic in a materialist and non-metaphysical way.
In this regard I think the philosophical implications of  
Marx's Theses on Feuerbach are still grossly underestimated.  
In a few lines he summarizes the deficiences of both idealism  
and materialism, subjectivism and objectivism, finishing off  
a few centuries of philosophical thought (of course the  
theses were but the end product of a whole project). After  
the theses Marx largely moves on from philosophical critique  
to developing his "materialist method".  
http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1845/theses/index.htm
Thesis 1: with regard to "ontology": Marx criticized  
classical materialism because it conceived of the actual  
world not as human practice (subjective), but as merely  
objective. Whereas for Hegel the world consisted merely of  
thought-objects, for Feuerbach the world was constituted by  
sensuous objects. In both perspectives human practice was  
absent, as either an objective or subjective activity. As  
such both were forms of metaphysical thinking, i.e. a form of  
thinking and activity that did not place human practice at  
its core. (Also see thesis 5)
Thesis 2: with regard to "epistemology": "The question  
whether objective truth can be attributed to human thinking  
is not a question of theory but is a practical question. Man  
must prove the truth, i.e., the reality and power, the  
this-sidedness [Diesseitigkeit] of his thinking, in practice.  
The dispute over the reality or non-reality of thinking which  
is isolated from practice is a purely scholastic question."
This is almost a Copernican revolution with regard to  
epistemology. True knowledge, "truth", is not derived from  
either formal or dialectical logic, but from the encounter  
between human thought and human practice. The reality of any  
phenomenon outside this encounter "is a purely scholastic  
question" or an exercise in metaphysics. Cf. snare theory,  
dark matter, etc. Thesis 8 reasserts this premisse: "All  
social life is essentially practical. All mysteries which  
lead theory to mysticism find their rational solution in  
human practice and in the comprehension of this practice."  
Real human practice or activity is the only base for gaining  
true knowledge about humanity.
Thesis 3: with regard to "emancipation": classical  
(mechanical) materialism pointed out that humans are the  
product of their environments. Changing their environments  
resulted in changed humans. Of course, who changes their  
environments? Humans themselves. So transformation of  
circumstances + human activity = self-change = revolutionary  
practice.
Thesis 4: with regard to the position of a critical or  
emancipatory science: It is insufficient to just deconstruct  
oppressive ideological concepts, "after completing this work,  
the chief thing still remains to be done". The reverse  
movement should be explained as well: how real social  
relations are the basis for these ideological forms. Of  
course, this means that the contradiction cannot be resolved  
in thought, but has to be overcome in reality, in practice.  
This is the core meaning of thesis 11: "Philosophers have  
hitherto only interpreted the world in various ways; the  
point is to change it."
In this sense, metaphysics was also a way of resolving real  
contradictions in the realm of thought.
Thesis 6: with regard to the "essence" of humankind: "...the  
essence of man is no abstraction inherent in each single  
individual. In reality, it is the ensemble of the social  
relations." Taking "the individual" as the unit of  
philosophy/social sciences is an a-historical and atomizing  
abstraction which "belongs in reality to a particular social  
form" (Thesis 7). A social science basing itself on the  
actions, intentions, emotions, etc. of discrete individuals  
takes a metaphysical and abstract view of humanity as its  
departure point. See also thesis 9 and 10.
--
Brecht De Smet
Assistant Professor at the Department Conflict and Development Studies
Researcher at MENARG (Middle East and North Africa Research Group)
Department of Political and Sciences
Ghent University
www.psw.ugent.be/menarg
Universiteitsstraat 8 / 9000 Gent / Belgium



Citeren Martin Packer <packer@duq.edu>:

Oh! (he exclaims). My point was that Hegel is hardly the person to turn to if one wants to avoid metaphysics! Individual, Universal, Particular - there's a whole metaphysics here. Take a look at the Stanford Enc of Philosophy entry on Hegel (link below) for a sense of the debate over this. There has been an "orthodox or traditional understanding of Hegel as a ?metaphysical? thinker in the pre-Kantian ?dogmatic? sense. This was followed by a view by some that "particular works, such as the Phenomenology of Spirit, or particular areas of Hegel's philosophy, especially his ethical and political philosophy, can be understood as standing independently of the type of unacceptable metaphysical system sketched above." (But Andy hates the Phenomenology!) And then there are people who are "appealing to contemporary analytic metaphysics as exemplifying a legitimate project of philosophical inquiry into fundamental ?features? or ?structures? of the world itself."
Myself, I'm closest to the last of these views. I don't  
think we want to *avoid* metaphysics (ontology and  
epistemology) ; indeed I don't think that is possible.  
rather, we need to adopt the *right* metaphysics. We can  
debate what the criteria of that need to be. But to claim of  
a position, in philosophy or the social sciences, that there  
is "No metaphysics here!" is a tad naive.
<http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/hegel/>

Martin

On Mar 23, 2013, at 12:36 PM, Carol Macdonald <carolmacdon@gmail.com> wrote:
I thought that what he said was avoiding it: back up your exclamation Martin
Carol

On 23 March 2013 16:48, Martin Packer <packer@duq.edu> wrote:

I though you wanted to *avoid* metaphysics, Andy!

Martin

On Mar 22, 2013, at 8:17 PM, Andy Blunden <ablunden@mira.net> wrote:
Thank you Manfred for that clear explanation, and for correcting my
typing mistake! :(
This might be an occasion to mention how my own development of Activity
Theory differs from yours and that of ANL.
I do not work with duality of "the publically assigned meaning and the
personally felt sense". Rather I use Hegel's approach in which the
Individual and Universal are mediated by the Particular. This is a relation which is applicable not just to motives, but any concept. It allows the meaning of the situation to be something which is *realised*. This word
"realised" is what Wiulliam James would have described as a
"double-barrelled word" (following Charles Dickens' "double barrelled compliment), in that it means both "realised" in the objective sense of "made real", as in "The plan was at last realised when the judge delivered
his verdict," and subjective in the sense of "woke up to", as in "I
realised that my efforts to reconcile with my wife were doomed to failure." I believe that this resolves certain problems which arise in Actvity Theory, but remaining within the Activity approach as outlined in your
excellent paper.
Andy

Holodynski, Manfred wrote:
Dear colleagues,

thank you very much for all your valued comments on my article. There
are a lot of aspects already discussed and I have some difficulties to follow all lines of argumentation. Therefore, I would like to answer to the
following:
1. Emotions as psychological function within the  
macrostructure of
activity.
As Andy claims it I get my Activity Theory from AN Leont'ev and I
focused especially on his concept of macrostructure of activity and its levels of activity that is related to motives, actions that are related to goals and operations that are related to the conditions under which an action is given. And Andy gets precisely to the heart of it when he stated that my article needs to be read with attention to motivation and how the macrostructure of an activity is related to the motives and goals of an individual. One activity can be realized by different actions, and one
action can realize different activities.
May I quote Andy's words:

" Because motives are not given to immediate perception; they have to
be inferred/learnt. Emotional expression and experience signal the success, failure, frustration, expectation, etc. of goals and motives for both participant/observers and the individual subject themself, emotion is tied up with motives and goals and therefore with the structure of an activity. One and the same action could be part of different ??actions activities (!) (MH)??. It is the emotions which signal (internally and externally) the success, etc., etc., that is, in an action's furthering an activity, and it is this which makes manifest and actual that connection between action and activity, for both the observer/participant and the individual subject.
So there is no metaphysics here. No hypothetical "states  
of mind", or
intelligent infants, etc."
a) Take the example of the opening of the window. That's  
the behavior.
What's the goal?
b) Imagine the person is a leader and opens the window  
in order to
greet his followers and to hold a speech. That's the goal. What is the
activity?
c) If one look at the circumstances one can derive that  
the speech is a
part of a political activity in order to celebrate the election victory. So, if the leader also feels pride and enthusiasm about the victory there is coincidence between the publically assigned meaning and the personally felt sense of the situation. However, it may also be possible that he
doesn't feel pride but a great burden and he personally feels to be
overloaded with the duties and future expectations. Then the societal meaning assigned by the followers to this situation and the personal sense assigned by the leader himself are not congruent. The leader framed this situation under an achievement perspective whether he is able to fulfill
the leadership.
But, note when we talk about actions and activity, then  
we speak about
an advanced level of activity e.g. in children or adults, but not in infants who start to have intentions but still not a mental image of a
future state of affairs.
2. Differentiation between the basic level in infants  
and advanced
level in older children:
- A young infant has not already established a  
goal-driven level of
actions. In the first weeks one can observe the acquisition of first
operations and of first expectations what should happen. But these
expectations are not yet represented as a mental image about the desired future states. This is the product of the acquisition of a sign system which enables the person to evoke and imagine a future state in the here and now and to start to strive for it. And for this starting point, not only to imagine different future states, but also to select one of them and to start to strive for it, emotional processes come into play that color one of the imagined future state e.g. in a state worth striving for and
that mobilize the executive power to start striving for it.
However, the ability to form such notions of goals and  
to transform
them into actions is not something that occurs automatically. It emerges in a long-drawn ontogenetic learning process in which the attainment of goals
through actions is tried, tested, and increasingly optimized. Older
children are
So, for an understanding of my emotion concept the  
macrostructure of an
activity is very decisive because I embedded emotions as a specific
psychological function within the macrostructure of an activity.
Best

Manfred

Prof. Dr. Manfred Holodynski

Institut für Psychologie in Bildung und Erziehung

Westfälische Wilhelms-Universität Münster

Fliednerstr. 21

D-48149 Münster

+49-(0)-251-83-34311

+49-(0)-251-83-34310 (Sekretariat)

+49-(0)-251-83-34314 (Fax)

http://wwwpsy.uni-muenster.de/Psychologie.inst5/AEHolodynski/index.html

manfred.holodynski@uni-muenster.de

-----Ursprüngliche Nachricht-----
Von: Andy Blunden [mailto:ablunden@mira.net]
Gesendet: Freitag, 22. März 2013 04:13
An: eXtended Mind, Culture, Activity
Cc: Holodynski, Manfred
Betreff: Re: Polls are closed: Manfred Holodynsk's article is choice
Mike, Manfred gets his Activity Theory from AN Leontyev,  
rather than
Engestrom's "systems of activity."
So actions and activities are defined by their goals and  
motives. So
Manfred's article needs to be read with attention to motivation and how the structure of an activity is related to motives and goals. Because motives are not given to immediate perception; they have to be inferred/learnt.
Emotional expression and experience signal the success, failure,
frustration, expectation, etc. of goals and motives for both
participant/observers and the individual subject themself, emotion is tied up with motives and goals and therefore with the structure of an activity. One and the same action could be part of different actions. It is the emotions which signal (internally and externally) the success, etc., etc., that is, in an action's furthering an activity, and it is this which makes manifest and actual that connection between action and activity, for both
the observer/participant and the individual subject.
So there is no metaphysics here. No hypothetical "states  
of mind", or
intelligent infants, etc.
It's all in there.

Andy

mike cole wrote:

Hi Andy - and here I was wondering why operation/action/activity were
not prominent in Manfred's article. Where does he lay out the views in
this note? Am I reading too superficially as usual? Seems important
for me to get clear about!
Mike
On Thursday, March 21, 2013, Andy Blunden wrote:
Think of your illustration,Martin, about whether, in opening the
window, you were acting as a technician or moral leader. I.e., the
meaning of the action lies in the activity of which it is a part,
which is not immediately given. Manfred does not refer this to
"intention" or "belief". Manfred is quite specific that the
signalising and self-perception of an action in relation to an
activity - i.e., an action's being of this and not that activity -
is a function played by emotion. Concepts like internal state and
intention are derivative from operation/action/activity, not
fundamental.
Andy
--
------------------------------------------------------------------------
*Andy Blunden*
Home Page: http://home.mira.net/~andy/
Book: http://www.brill.nl/concepts
http://marxists.academia.edu/AndyBlunden

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--
Carol A  Macdonald Ph D (Edin)
Developmental psycholinguist: EMBED
Academic, Researcher, Writer and Editor
Honorary Research Fellow: Department of Linguistics, Unisa
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