The article Andy mentioned is on the MCA Leontev page at
http://communication.ucsd.edu/MCA/Paper/leontev/index.html. The subject /
object piece can be found directly at
http://communication.ucsd.edu/MCA/Paper/leontev/essay_77.htm.
Nate
-----Original Message-----
From: Andy Blunden [mailto:andy@mira.net]
Sent: Sunday, October 22, 2000 3:38 AM
To: xmca@weber.ucsd.edu
Subject: Re: Two Approaches in Psychology
This first part of Leontyev's Chapter addresses the age-old problem of
subject and object, and doesn't our discussion show how eternal it is! I
think the translation problems - important in themselves in trying to get
to the author's meaning and context, and concretising our understanding -
still, it's all around this same problem.
"THUS, the object of activity is two-fold; first, in its independent
existence as subordinating to itself and transforming the activity of the
subject; second, as an image of the object, as a product of the
psychological reflection that is realised as an activity of the subject and
cannot exist otherwise."
I have scanned the article in "Philosophy in the USSR" (which included
Ilyenkov's article on the Ideal and Leontyev's article) by Lektorsky
devoted to Subject-Object, and emailed it to Nate. Nate, can you post it on
the MIA and let people know the URL?
Andy
____________________________
At 05:26 PM 16/10/2000 +1000, you wrote:
>Leontyev summarises the first part of Ch. 3 "Two Approaches in Psychology"
>as follows:
>_________________________________________________________
>"The main thesis, the substantiation of which will be presented in a
>subsequent work, is that the real way to overcome this postulate [of
>directness, i.e. S->R], ... is through the introduction into psychology of
>the category of object activity.
>"... The question is one of activity, and not one of behavior or the
>neurophysiological processes that produce activity. The fact is that the
>“units” isolated by analysis and language, with the help of which
>behavioral, cerebral, or logical processes are described on the one hand,
>and objective activity on the other, do not agree with one another. "...
>either keep the basic binomial formula: action of the object -> change in
>ongoing condition of the subject ..., or devise a trinomial formula
>including a middle link - the activity of the subject and, correspondingly,
>conditions, goals, and means of that activity — a link that mediates the
>ties between them.
>"We will take either the position that consciousness is determined by the
>surrounding objects and phenomena, or the position that consciousness is
>determined by the social existence of people ...
>"But what is human life? It is that totality, more precisely, that system
>of activities replacing one another. ... activity appears as a process in
>which mutual transfers between the poles “subject-object” are accomplished.
>“In production the personality is objectivized; in need the thing is
>subjectivized,” noted Marx"
>_________________________________________________________
>
>Can I go on?
>
>Andy
>
>+----------------------------------------------------------------------+
>| - Andy Blunden - Home Page - http://home.mira.net/~andy/index.htm - |
>| All mysteries which lead theory to mysticism find their rational |
>| solution in human practice and in the comprehension of this practice.|
>+----------------------------------------------------------------------+
>
>
+----------------------------------------------------------------------+
| - Andy Blunden - Home Page - http://home.mira.net/~andy/index.htm - |
| All mysteries which lead theory to mysticism find their rational |
| solution in human practice and in the comprehension of this practice.|
+----------------------------------------------------------------------+
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