[Xmca-l] Re: Leontyev's activities

[Huw Lloyd <huw.softdesigns@gmail.com>]

On 20 August 2013 23:05, Lubomir Savov Popov <lspopov@bgsu.edu> wrote:

> Hi Huw,
>
> Integrating systems and systems-functional views with
> dialectical/historical materialism is not a problem at all because of their
> objectivist nature.


It is not always straightforward.  The "single basis" of the dialectical
unit is one such problem.


> In addition, dialectical/historical materialists claim that the founders
> of their philosophy are precursors of systems thinking. Several of their
> capital writings are usually cited as examples. There is a huge difference
> between Positivism and Dialectical/Historical Materialism regarding their
> foundational axioms and principles, as well as their attitudes to the role
> of induction/deduction in the process of knowledge production. However, at
> lower levels of abstraction, they exchange knowledge with ease. I already
> mentioned this regarding field research methods. However, it happens also
> when borrowing theoretical products.
>

Positivism in the "measuring elements" sense is not holistic.


>
> Now, try to integrate systems thinking with the humanistic paradigms. I am
> very interested in good examples of such work. I mean epistemologically
> sound examples, not eclectic attempts to put together their concepts in one
> text.
>

Yes.


>
> It is interesting to study how ideas about holistic presentation of
> reality are operationalized/concretized in Dialectical Materialism and in
> the humanist approaches. I see a huge difference in preferred topics,
> concepts, and terminology. All this makes the translation of knowledge from
> one tradition to the other very complicated, complex, and prone with
> errors. People interpret the words (the terms are always paradigm and
> discipline specific) the way they want, with full disregard to the original
> intentions and the habitual interpretation of these terms in their original
> paradigmatic environment. I have seen that very often. I myself have
> experienced such states of mind many times. You will be astonished, but
> many historical materialist concept are interpreted very differently by
> authors outside that community.

The background for interpretation is different; there are huge inaccuracies
> in translating words instead of terms and concepts; many of the terms and
> concepts simply cannot be translated; and so on. Usually, the definitions
> of terms and concepts cover only their core. The "mantle" around the core
> cannot be explicated because it is very fluid, requires a lot of text, and
> actually, there is no full agreement about it. Researches develop a sense
> about the periphery by constantly reading authors that are very close in
> thinking. This is one example of tacit knowledge (we talked about that
> yesterday).
>

These are all difficulties.  But this is not the same as "not possible".

Best,
Huw


>
> Let me stop here...
>
> Lubomir
>
> Lubo
>
>
>