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Well Named and Red Economist: Does "spiritual" knowledge exist?

lovemuffin

τὸν ἄρτον τοῦ ἔρωτος
I think Marxism is an attempt to reach a synthesis rather than an anti-thesis. An Anti-thesis would be more characteristic of an eliminative materialism, which tries to eliminate consciousness and therefore all religious belief, whereas Marxism does recognize an objective source for religious belief in the world, only that it is material and not spiritual. It is the fact that matter is primary, which leads to the rejection of mystical concepts.

"Every illusion has its source in reality..."

To me, the quoted part still seems eliminative. That's what "illusion" indicates. Or at least its eliminative as far it having some significance beyond the physical. It eliminates the part that is important to me by dismissing it as illusory :)

The closest Marxism comes to mysticism is 'Freudo-Marxism'

Just want to say, I love this term. Maybe because it sounds like Pseudo. :p

How did people achieve the state of purity with which to experience God? There must necessarily have been a predictable path for people to follow for religious belief to reproduce itself through the generations. That suggests that it is not ineffable, but again comes back to the question of "how" something can be known.

This probably depends on the religious tradition, but we might first of all distinguish between the ineffability of the divine, as far as the impossibility of a comprehensive knowledge about that reality, and the possibility of a path that is (at least somewhat) dependable at leading towards the experience of that ineffable reality. Even here I think it's a "yes, but..." in many religious traditions. There is the element of "grace", to use a Christian term, which is unpredictable.

In a sense, in Christian monastic tradition, there is this sort of expectation that striving towards purity will allow a more complete and full experience of God, but it's neither a pre-requisite to having any experience, nor is it a guarantee of having a specific experience. It is neither strictly necessary nor entirely sufficient, at least as far as mystical experience goes. There is a saying in the Dhammapada that says "in the sky there are no footsteps", which was echoed independently by St. John of the Cross. Past a certain point in the cultivation of spiritual experience, there are no formulas. But there is also the idea that in order to be open to a certain experience and knowledge and reality, in order to grow and reach your full potential, you do have to be open to that reality, that "who has ears to hear may hear", as Jesus said. The paths, the idea of purification, of ascesis, spiritual and moral effort, is a pre-condition in that sense. It prepares the ground, so to speak. But it's not a strict formulaic sort of thing, and I think the best explanation for that is that we are not simple machines, and it's not purely a question of achieving an artificial experience but a cultivation of one's entire life and being, where individual psychology, history, conditioning, culture, and everything else comes into play.
 

Laika

Well-Known Member
Premium Member
To me, the quoted part still seems eliminative. That's what "illusion" indicates. Or at least its eliminative as far it having some significance beyond the physical. It eliminates the part that is important to me by dismissing it as illusory :)

There is a reoccurring problem with Marxism I have found, which is that many concepts which look 'negative' or 'destructive' are in fact 'positive' or 'creative'. There is a dialectical relationship in which the old in destroyed and the new is created. Most importantly this refers to the idea that revolution is a primarily creative rather than a destructive process, but it also works on a much lower level. This is to do with the Marxist conception of "negation".

"When in the process of development the old stage is negated by the new, then, in the first place, that new stage could not have come about expect as arising from and in opposition to the old. The conditions for the existence of the new arose and matured within the old. The negation is a positive advance, brought about only by the development of that which is negated. The old is not simply abolished only after it has itself given rise to the conditions for the new stage in advance."

This is related to the idealism-materialism conflict in Marxism. An 'idealist' may well argue that negation is an 'either-or' or 'yes or no' distinction because what is negated only exists in thought. Whereas a (dialectical or Marxian) materialist would say that what is negated has a material existence, objective of the mind and hence what is negated is the condition (or in this case the understanding) of an object, rather than the existence of the object itself. There is a 'unity and struggle between opposites' in dialectical materialism; the necessity of conflict between two forces is derived from the fact that their ongoing development is interconnected with one another. the 'progressive' side has to overcome the 'reactionary' one.

In relation to the concept of illusion, religion is "negated" is so far as it is an 'old' and is dying in the struggle with materialism. This does not mean it ceases to exist however- since religion is only an idea, but the idea is a reflection of the objective world. So the 'death of god' only comes about with the end of the socioeconomic system; in it's place is the creation of a new socioeconomic system, communism, in which society become self-conscious, that is not only of it's effects, but it's cause, and understands that society is governed by objectively existing laws and that development can be planned. Religious illusions are negated as materialism means that people become self-conscious and aware of the material nature of the causes of religious illusion. People can therefore see through it, as a projection of mans powerlessness in the natural and social world and it is up to materialism to provide scientific evidence that man can have power over these forces and that religious explanations (the 'god of the gaps' as I think you said in an earlier post) is no longer necessary.

In this sense Marxism does not constitute a form of eliminative materialism in eliminating all consciousness, but it does 'eliminate' some ideas by asserting that matter is primary and thought is secondary (and consequently, god, the soul, mysticism are 'illusions' because they necessarily imply that thought or spirit is the cause of the material world rather than the effect.).

Just want to say, I love this term. Maybe because it sounds like Pseudo. :p

:D

I think this really boils down to the hard problem of consciousness. the difference in view may well be the difference between seeing consciousness as unknowable or simply an unknown in materialist terms. In the former view, that consciousness is unknowable in terms of objective and scientific methods, the explanation for consciousness is sought in making consciousness the cause of matter, in the form of god or mysticism. Where as arguing the latter, that consciousness is simply unknown at present but it is not inherently unknowable and that knowledge can be gained by objective and scientific methods because consciousness is a property of matter and can therefore be understood. Both represent logical arguments so the question is which one is a better fit for the evidence with each representing a view on the origin of spiritual knowledge. I've included a quote on the Marxist conception of consciousness and I hope it will prove useful to the discussion and in anticipating my argument. I think you'll have to be the one that defends the hard problem of consciousness whereas I'll have to say it can be overcome.

My apologies again for the vulgarities of Soviet prose:

"Consciousness is a product of the activity of the human brain, which is connected with the intricate complex of sensory organs. In essence, consciousness is a reflection of the material world. It is a manifold process that includes various types of mental activity, such as sensation, perception, conception, thought, felling and will. Without proper functioning of the brain there can be no normal mental activity. Derangement of this functioning by illness, say, or alcohol, impairs the capacity for sound mental activity. Sleep is a partial, temporary inhibition of the activity of the cerebral cortex- thinking ceases and consciousness is obscured.
But from these correct materialist views it does not follow that thought is a substance secreted by the brain. the nineteenth-century German bourgeois materialist Karl Vogt defined thought as a special substance secreted by the brain, just as our salivary glands secret saliva or the liver bile. That was a vulgar conception of the nature of thought. Mental activity, consciousness, thought, is a special property of matter, but not a special kind of matter.
On the fundamental question of philosophy we counter-pose consciousness and matter, spirit and nature. Matter is everything that exists independent and outside of our consciousness, and it is therefore a gross error to regard consciousness as part of matter. Lenin said: "To say that thought is material is to make a false step, a step towards confusing materialism and idealism." And indeed, if thought is the same thing as matter, that removes all difference between matter and thinking; it makes them identical.
The idealist opponents of Marxism persist in ascribing to it the view that consciousness is of a material nature. They do so in order to make it easier to 'refute' Marxist philosophical materialism. It is a time-honored device- first to ascribe some absurdity to your opponent and then to subject it to 'annihilating' criticism.
Actually, this identification of consciousness and matter belongs not to dialectical, but to vulgar materialism. Marxist philosophy has always combated this view, always drawing a distinction between consciousness- the reflection of the material world- and matter itself.
But this difference should not be exaggerated, not made into an absolute break. Such a break between consciousness and matter is characteristic psychophysical parallelism, which maintains that thought, consciousness, are processed taking place parallel to, but independent of, material processes occurring in the brain. Science rejects that standpoint. It proves that human mental activity is only a special aspect of the vital activity of the organism, a special function of the brain.
Dialectical materialism rejects any break between consciousness and matter. For such a break would, in essence, signify a return to the primitive, ignorant views of early human history, when all phenomena of life were explained as due to a soul that was supposed to enter the body and control it.
In solving the psychophysical problem, i.e. the problem of relation between man's mental activity and its organ, the brain (as a material organ, a physical body), one must see both the difference and the connection between them. It is important to bear the difference in mind, because identifying consciousness with matter leads to sheer absurdity. But neither should consciousness be separated from the brain, for consciousness is a function of the brain, i.e. of matter organized, in a special way."
 
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