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Re: [xmca] Lave and McDermott and 'values'

Julian, I don't think it is useful to say that this and that are "in dialectical relation with" each other or other things. Except explicitly as posing a problem to be solved. It leaves the question of exactly *what* relation that is. Otherwise, if you just identify this and that, and make some claim about their relation, then ipso facto they are *not* in dialectical relation to one other. I would say that "activity/actions" (or praxis or practice) differ from "behaviour" because these concepts are both subjective and objective, that is, the concept of action includes the intentions as well as the mechanical movement. It contains an internal contradiction, because what we mean is not always how we behave. "Behavior is a concept of mechnical movement of the body which is abstracted from consciousness and is inclusive of autonomous nervous activity as well as (intentional) actions. Likewise "goal" and "activity". The goal is an emergent moment of an activity, otherwise we have an abstract general (sociological) concept of activity, not a dialectical concept at all: we take a goal and an activity and then stick them together and claim that they are "in dialectical relation with" one another. Likewise again, an activity is nothing other than the aggregate of actions. That means internally contradictory relations within activity, which are comprehended under the notion of "an activity." 

Does that make sense?
Andy

Julian Williams wrote:

My use of 'project/ion' (I find I use this quite often, even though I don't know if it's in Vygotsky or Ilyenkov) is meant to imply that consciousness Is not just a reflection of action/activity, but also a source of goals and so of action. (Actually I understand CHAT-Marx to imply that consciousness is in dialectical relation with other moments of activity.)




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