Last week's thread>>25214473Hegel talked about the nature of his dialectics in contrast with Fichte. Fichte had a schema of thesis-antithesis-synthesis, which Hegel disparages because it features A form and B form and then a mix. In contrast he follows Heraclitus: there nothing BUT flux. His dialectic is abstraction (generalized conception)-negation (think of it like circumscription in its broadest sense)-concrete (particularization in its broadest sense), which he says is the basis of all concepts and reality. If you have ANY confusion about the reading or want something cleared up, this is the thread to ask.This week we continue with Hegel's Science of Logic (download linked in the original thread), Section Two
>>25230587Sounds like he is saying the same thing as Fichte, just worded differently
>>25230587No dialectical writing group still I see...
>>25230606Hegel does not believe in Platonic forms, he believes that reality is change and change is reality. So dialectic for him cannot be the contradiction between two distinct pure things or states, because no such things or states exist for Hegel. As he says, "pure consciousness" is identical with nonconsciousness, and therefore to speak of consciousness we can only talk about it as also something with is other than consciousness, or we are not talking about reality at all. He even says at the outset that "pure being" would be empty of content and so be nothing. But also nothing is a being (like zero is a number), so the idea of a dialectic between pure being and pure nothing is nonsense, neither concept has any meaning
>Dialectical Reading Group
>>25230587dialectics are fake and gay. history has never following a narrative and you're all fucking stupid.
>>25232298Why do you think dialectic = narrative?
>>25230587I have not read any books on socialism or communism. Where would I start if I wanted to learn?
>>25232399Probably start with the topic of labor alienation. Although originally talked about extensively by Hegel, the best place to start on on it would be The Economic and Philosophic Manuscripts of 1844, by Marx
>>25232399If you want to understand Marx specifically, I would actually start with Rousseau. The Social Contract is a good start
>>25232399You should read about Jonestown, the Holodomor, and the Shinning Path. The actual implementation of Marxism in practice.Read like actual history and ignore what pseuds write (Like Marx) about because they're just going to lie about it.
>>25232411>>25232757It's always fascinating when someone asks communism it's always some theoretical bullshit and concrete information about life under communismhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WSH8c-js7xc
>>25232411>>25232757Thank you.>>25232770>>25232780I know authoritarian regimes kill people. I consider myself more of a libertarian socialist and I favor a kind of social democracy. I am interested in knowing the historical context and theory behind these ideas. Recent events have radicalized me and should have radicalized you society doesn't work if people can gain so much wealth and power they can be above the law.
>>25232798>Historical contextWhat other historical context you need besides countless, repetitive examples of communism in practice?>Recent events have radicalized me and should have radicalized you society doesn't work if people can gain so much wealth and power they can be above the lawAnd why would you want to learn about a philosophy that exactly did that for anyone who wasn't a party official?
>>25232823Communism is dialectically inevitable, anon. Just as the capitalists overthrew the obsolete aristocracy, the proles will overthrow the obsolete capitalists--because capitalist logic itself will destroy capitalism
>>25232399Settlers by J. Sakai.
>>25232862Communism is so old and retarded that Aristotle even debunked it back when Plato was shilling it in the RepublicIt was a joke and failure back then and its a joke and failure now, get a job
>>25232878Goddamn, how is it that hubris feeds on stupidity so much more often than intelligence?No where did Plato ever advocate that labor own and run capital.
>>25232889>I'm just going to re-define communism something its not because I'm retardedCommunism comes from the latin word "communis", you stupid fuck.You don't even know what you're talking about because you think Marx invented communism.Imagine calling yourself a communist, and not even knowing the basics about your ideology's history. Retard.
>>25232902I know what the word comes from. Marx made a firm distinction between the ideology of "utopian socialism" and what he was talking about, which was the resolution of the union of labor overthrowing the class above them
>>25232399dont read. just go to work, and interact with your coworkers. talk about each others conditions, and pay. confront your bosses. live it, don't read it.
>>25232917Karl Kautsky's own book "The Forerunners of Modern Socialism" cited Plato as one of first people who developed communism as a concept. A book that was cited by Engels, no less. Engels wrote an entire book on communist peasant revolts, and Marx regularly glazed Müntzer as a communist. You're so dumb and uneducated, you don't even know what you're talking about. You're just embarrassing yourself at this point.
>>25232942Trying to shrink your worldview and class down to just your workers, doesn't work. Even if you have a union, as I do, it doesn't encompass your relationship will all the labor outside your union, all the society and world your labor is part of. Obviously if AREN'T in you union, you can't even go that far until your workplace votes to unionize
>>25232949This thread is specifically about dialectics. It is very specific. By communism in this context you clearly meant that. All you can do is seethe and name call because your criticism of Marx is so vapid, like criticizing some sort of airplane engineering because of a flying machine described in the past and how it was incorrect.
Even more retarded, you think the word "utopian" means these were forms of communism did not exist. I don't even think you know what Marx & Engels meant by utopian. Communist experiments, like communes, were very common and cited by Marx and Engels as being examples of existing communism. They called them "utopian", retard, because they were largely apolitical sects or even religious. Utopian doesn't mean "it didn't happen and didn't exist" , retard. Marx and Engels became communists because they mesmerized into it by man called Robert Owen who set up communist colonies all over New England. That's the only reason why they became communists in the first place.At least learn about what the fuck you are talking about retard before you discuss it.
>>25232965Nah, you're retard. You don't even know what you're talking about because you don't even understand the genealogy of communist ideas. And you're shilling an ideology that collapsed and died in the 20th century because it was a failure so profound that even philosophers over thousands of years ago new it would just by logic alone. Starvation jewish santa isn't going to save you lil bro, get a job
>>25232942>>25232954I think it's important to emphasize that we have "workers" but no "working class" in the sense of an organized political force. Workers can certainly advocate for themselves in the workforce via a union (regardless of your attitude towards unions), but this is not the same as advocating for themselves as a class per se.
Watching poltards getting bodied by Marxists every single time never gets old.
>>25232974Utopian is specifically in contrast to scientific, and those refer to the theory of socialism's place in society. Marx didn't have a "scientific" blueprint for running socialism, in fact that is something utopians often had. Rather he had a much more concrete idea of what and WHO would establish socialism on a widespread level and why
>>25232986All forms of communism are utopian. Marx calling his communism "scientific" doesn't mean a stateless, moneyless, and classes society is real or possible. Essentially when Marx's ideas were tested before and long after his death to only result in failure.
>>25232982We have a working class>but this is not the same as advocating for themselves as a class per se.That is called class consciousness. The understanding that one is part of labor class and this is closely linked to his interests and that they rise and fall together. The working class is submerged in false consciousness, or "ideology": a laborer does not think of himself as a member of the wage slave class most of the time, in fact he tries to forget it. Most of his media does not feature wage slave characters, he doesn't want to be reminded of being one because labor alienation hurts. By contrast, capitalists always know themselves as their class, the bourgeoisie, wherever they go and in all their media. So despite being their slave, the laborer likes to think of himself as a capitalist individual rather than as a prole.
>>25232994Thebes tried to abolish slavery and it collapsed, this doesn't make it impossible to have a society without slaves though it took thousands of years to actualize.
>>25232999This analogy doesn't even make any sense considering communism never, ever accomplished any of its goals so you can't even compare it to someone who did.
>>25233003You don't think any of the ten planks of communism has ever been accomplished?
>>25233008We actually have examples of slavery being abolished, in practice, being successful.We have no examples of communism being successful.What a dumb point to make.>You don't think any of the ten planks of communismDid any of those planks create a society without classes, money or the state?
>>25233012Now you're shifting the goalposts. Marx never wrote a manifesto for a society without a state. He theorized about the state withering away someday but he adamantly opposed anarchists on the point of communists abolishing the state by political fiat, that was not a goal he set out for the labor movement or one of the ten planks of communism
>>25233030>We implemented these policies because we believe they would achieve communism>They didn't implement communism, so that proves communism worksWhat goal post was pushed exactly. Pointing out communists never accomplished what they set out to do isn't "pushing the goal post." Its exposing your own failures and your inability to defend your ideas without lying.
>>25233035Marxists never set out to abolish the state, so what are you even talking about?
>>25233037>Marxists never set out to abolish the state,Are you retarded? Communism calls for the abolition of the state. How do you not know this?
>>25232949>Karl Kautsky's own book "The Forerunners of Modern Socialism" cited Plato as one of first people who developed communism as a concept. A book that was cited by Engels, no less.Nta, but how is a book that came out in the 1890s, a book that, if anything, Engels influenced, decisive on the subject? That anon is arguing sensibly that the communism of the Republic (which itself owes something to how Sparta was politically organized) isn't the same as Marxist communism: the "communism" in the Republic is a communism of a community of women and children, and communism of property applies only to the two upper classes, since the lowest class is in control of the productive arts and are allowed to own wealth like gold and silver and private property forbidden to the upper classes. This is like arguing that Aristotle's "energeia" and the modern concept of energy in physics are the same because the latter is descended from and sorta kinda resembles the former.
>>25233058>but how is a book that came out in the 1890s, a book that, if anything, Engels influenced, decisive on the subject? Because Karl Kautsky and Fredrick Engels are the principle theorists of your ideology. Shouldn't you at least know what they believed before you profess their beliefs?>isn't the same as Marxist communism: the "communism" in the Republic is a communism of a community of women and children, and communism of property applies only to the two upper classes, since the lowest class is in control of the productive arts and are allowed to own wealth like gold and silver and private property forbidden to the upper classesIt is the same because they are both utopian strands of thought with the same results in practice. You're essentially just against the historical record of communism despite calling yourselves historical materalists. Neither Plato's Republic or Marx's "communism", both which advocated for communism were ever fruitful, or realistic ideas because they are both idealistic conceptions of society and never worked in practice. If communism never worked on a smaller scale, as Plato predicted (as many smaller, utopian communist experiments failed in history), how the fuck could it ever work on the international scale Marx called for. This is pretty basic, logic and common sense. Like, you're acting like Marx's ideas weren't tried in the Soviet Union and Maoist China with the large scale abolition of private property and other retarded shit like centralized planning.
>>25233046Anarcho-communism does. Not Marxist communism
>>25233109Wrong, they both do, in different ways.Both are retarded.
>>25233122No they don't. You haven't read Marx. You are just making things up and guessing
>"The proletariat seizes from state power and turns the means of production into state property to begin with. But thereby it abolishes itself as the proletariat, abolishes all class distinctions and class antagonisms, and abolishes also the state as state."No, you're just retarded and don't know what you're talking about lol
>>25233131This isn't an imperative, "calls for". This is Engels writing after Marx died on what he believed Marx saw as the ultimate destination of communism
>>25233078>they are both utopian strands of thoughtI didnt know hobbes was a communist
>>25233142>conflating Thomas More with Thomas Hobbes
>>25233138You must be ESL. He explicitly says communism abolishes the state.
>>25233150Lmao, this is the level of "Marxist" we're dealing with here.These people are fucking retards. No wonder they think communism doesn't abolish the state or don't even know a fucking thing what they're talking about
>>25233154By making everything state property it abolishes the state as the instrument used to enforce property rights. He isn't talking about anarchism, which Marx wrote extensively against. But then there is a reason you are ignoring everything Marx wrote and preferring to stick to a paragraph from Engels after his death commenting on what he wrote
>>25233163And history shows that despite Marx and Engels calling for the abolition of the state, and saying that would abolish the state, it did not. It just led to the most tyrannical states in history.>anarchismNo one said anything about anarchism, retard. You have the same goals of anarchists, who are just as stupid as you. You believe the state will abolish itself if you just give complete control to a single entity that will force everyone to hold hands and sing kumbaya until the state abolishes itself forever retarded reason. You lack pretty basic critical thinking skills. You think like someone who took the short bus to school.
>>25233183Nothing in the Communist Manifesto says "abolish the state!"You keep shifting your goalposts. First it is, "They could not accomplish a single plank," then it's, "they could not accomplish this thing Engels felt would happen in the future and he mentioned in passing," the it's, "well by accomplish it I mean in my idiosyncratic romanticist sense divorced from all the terminology and concepts Engels is reflecting on." Soon it will be, "They couldn't make replicators like in Star Trek communism."
>>25233194Marx wrote the Paris Commune wasn't a state in the strictest sense. Why would he write that if he didn't believe in the abolition of the state?Why would the fuck would he publish the Communist Manifesto, which called for the abolition of nationalities, said workers have no country, wasn't for the abolition of the state?You're literally retarded. Nobody is buying this non-sense but you. You're just really bad at lying and its too easy to expose you for being a pseud.You're the same retard who confused Thomas Moore with Thomas Hobbes dude. Stop being a clown.
>>25233199I'm the guy who corrected him, and now you: it's More, not MooreI am not going to deal with le "I'm just inferring, guessing, thinking, perhaps..." Glenn Beck bullshit with you. The Communist Manifesto is very straightforward as a communist platform and you don't read
>>25233202Dude, you're just stupid. You started this argument saying planks of the Communist Manifesto was proof that communism worked despite none of these ideas, which were implemented, led to communism anywhere on the planet.Where is the stateless, moneyless, classes Marx talked about, retard? Where is the abolition of classes and the wage system?You're just going in circles of your own delusions because you don't live in reality.Get a job dude and stop being a loser shilling dead, failed ideologies on the internet
>>25233204You started it here>>25233003You said communism never accomplished any of its goals, which are the 10 planks
>>25233208Those weren't the goals of communism, retard.The goals of communism were to implement a stateless, classless, and moneyless society by abolition national borders, the wage system and private property.If those were the goals of communism, then the US is already communist and there's no reason for you to be a communist, idiot.You're arguing against yourself.
>>25233216I don't think you know anything about communism. You should read more. Probably starting with the communist manifesto instead of /pol/ memes
>>25233220>Hates Glen Beck>Thinks communism is when the government does stuffMarxist btw
>>25233223My advice stands especially in light of the board you are on.
>>25233228You should get a job. There's no way you'll never do anything remarkable with your life. You're on /lit/ trying to shill people into your retarded atheist cult. Thank god you will never have any kids.
>>25233229I have a job but I hardly consider myself better than people who don't. I refrain from having kids because I don't want to have them without ensuring they will have a great life.
>>25233266You refrain from having kids because no one loves you. You are a miserable, communist piece of shit that no one would ever want to pro-create with.Why don't you have your communist revolution so we can just shoot you like we did Luxembourg and get it over with?You don't have a legacy to leave behind or any kids, just get it over withOr just commit suicide so at least you have some use to the world as fertile soil.
>>25233278I have been with multiple girls who wanted to have a kid with me. You sound like you're hyperventilating.
>>25230587>dude reality HAS to be rational dude>and like, that's why history has a direction, because it must be rationalI don't know maybe I'm missing something but this doesn't seem all that justifiable. From my understanding, a lot of Hegelian thought rests on rejecting traditional formal logic in favor of a more "totalizing" view of the object studied, which would seemingly grant more capabilities for the subject studied.So, on the topic of history for instance, instead of accepting that you cannot with certainty provide an explanation for what causes change, you analyze change itself, look at the conditions required for it, and seek which elements reproduce it.But, if that's your method of analysis, it just seems akin to a less rigorous method of inquiry, as opposed to traditional metaphysics and formal logic. Your position is still not granted certainty, and the reasoning is still very much "logical", albeit contextualized. It looks a lot like a method for applying logic itself to different objects rather than an entirely different strand of thinking>>25232399Read "Karl Marx" by Lenin. It's on marxists.org and provides a good intro to marxist thought in general.>>25232399If you posit labor as the source of dialectical struggle you're arguing from an erroneous anthropology
Communism is retardedPeople who believe in communism are the same people who believe in MLM scams and Nigerian Princes
>>25233295Maybe you should read the OP
Explain to a smart 13 year old what Aufhebung IS and what it DOES
>>25233738Imagine pure light, so pure you cannot see any color. Imagine pure darkness. So pure that you cannot see any color. They are functionally the same. Suddenly you dim the blinding light a tiny bit and colors, shapes, shades and so on, start to appear. Now you can actually "see the light". This is light's Aufhebung of darkness. Or think of adding a light to the pure darkness bit-by-bit until colors and shapes and shades emerge so that now you can actually "see" darkness; this is the darkness's Aufhebung of light.This isn't my example, it is the one Hegel used in last week's reading.
>>25233078>Because Karl Kautsky and Fredrick Engels are the principle theorists of your ideology. Shouldn't you at least know what they believed before you profess their beliefs?I'm not a Marxist, I'm just a classicsfag, but appeal to Kautsky is lame because you're looking at a theorist writing a history almost 5 years after the Communist Manifesto was published, and just granting that author his point when he's restrospectively trying to give his preferred ideology authority after the fact by appeal to older philosophers.>It is the same because they are both utopian strands of thought with the same results in practiceThey're not the same; appealing to the "utopian" character only establishes that they're utopian, not the contents of the Republic's communism nor that of ancient Sparta's system are the same as Marxist communism. I'll make a further example similar to my energy example: it's like reading Machiavelli and saying his "virtu" is the same as the treatment of virtue in Aristotle's Ethics, simply because of the word virtue. But doing so ignores all differences in content, just as you're doing with Marx's communism and the "communism" in Plato's Republic. If you try to compare but won't talk about their contents, then you might not understand either.>Neither Plato's Republic or Marx's "communism", both which advocated for communism were ever fruitful, or realistic ideas because they are both idealistic conceptions of society and never worked in practice. If communism never worked on a smaller scale, as Plato predictedWrong, Plato DOESN'T predict communism will work; this is a fundamental misunderstanding of the point of the Republic. It's presented in the Republic as laughable and ridiculous to most people, *and as implausible*, and as soon as it's introduced, one of the characters of the dialogue, Glaucon, asks Socrates whether such a regime could actually be put in practice, and Socrates point blank tells him it's beside the point of their discussion (because they're really only trying to work out what justice is and whether it's good), and practically ends the dialogue by emphasizing being concerned with one's own soul rather than in actually founding such a city.
>>25233964>looking at a theorist writing a history almost 5 years*50 years
>>25233964>I'm not a Marxist, I'm just a classicsfag, but appeal to Kautsky is lame because you're looking at a theorist writing a history almost 5 years after the Communist Manifesto was published, aKautsky himself was referred to as the "Pope Of Marxism" he was endorsed and groomed by Marx and Engels as their successor. You're just too ignorant about socialist history and have no idea what you're talking about. You're not a Marxist (as you've said), you clearly have no background in the history necessary to discuss the topic at all (its shows), so, why are you even giving your uninformed opinion in the first place? It's of no value here.>But doing so ignores all differences in content, just as you're doing with Marx's communism and the "communism" in Plato's Republic. If you try to compare but won't talk about their contents, then you might not understand either.You're intentionally being obtuse and slow here. Plato and Marx foremost were political theorists who wrote practical political theories and they genuinely believed their political ideas could be replicated in real life. You seem to be very confused here, and not understand this, maybe you need to familiarize with Marx's own personal life, as well as Plato's life as a political advisor to Dion of Syracuse. Your analogy here just shows you have a fundamental misunderstanding of what is being discussed and argued here. Plato and Marx weren't devising political ideas for shits and giggles, retard. They were articulating political systems they thought were viable in practice, and that were testable in practice. Both failed in practice because they share a similar thought of abolition of property and other misconceptions of human nature that is apparent with genetics and culture. For example, the Soviets themselves wrote how difficult it was to collectivize Ukrainians, Siberians because of how individualistic their culture was. Traditionally Ukrainians were rowdy people, simple commodity farmers, as opposed to Russians who had a history of communal farming-with like a serf like mindset , such as the Obshchina, but still that did not stop the communists from implementing their moronic ideas of abolishing private property, in Ukrainian countryside , to disastrous effects. Communism, just as in Plato's Republic and Marx, made the same fundamental mistake that humans are some tabula rasa, blank slate that can easily be morphed into any being at will with the right amount of planning and coercion by those at the top. History shows that never has, and never will, be the case, no how many times you wish it to be true. >Wrong, Plato DOESN'T predict communism will work; this is a fundamental misunderstanding of the point of the Republic.Marxian communism and Platonic communism are no different because they are both systems that are fundamentally idealistic. The point went over your head. Why do you think I called it a joke? You seem really slow and intentionally not understand things.
