Althusser and randomness part 1
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- Опубликовано: 28 сен 2024
- Even homicidal maniacs are worth reading from time to time. First of two videos on Althusser's book Philosophy of the Encounter. I will shortly be giving a live stream lecture on Turing and materialism see this link • Paul Cockshott - “Mate...
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I had never considered the huge break Althusser made from Classical Marxism in terms of critizicing Hegelian dialectics (redefined by Marx and Engels in a materialist framework, or as they used to say, "correcting them by turning them upside down"). Though I'm not so convinced that Russell and the failure of his formalist project had any extrapolation to Marxian dialectical materialism, nor its application on social sciences (historical materialism): Russell himself was always pretty critical of Marxist philosophy because of his formalist and mechanical perspective, and any true orthodox Marxist already aknowledged refutations to him even before Turing himself.
It could still be argued however that the epistemological break from Newtonian to Quantum physics, and from Darwinian to neo-Darwinian evolutionary theory, would fundamentally affect Marxist analysis of political economy in ways that haven't been widely or seriously discussed yet on any important Marxist circles. Most Marxist-Leninist, Maoists, Trotskyists, Left-Communists, or even (as you said) Occidental Marxists like Humanists, Situationists, Autonomists, neo-Marxists, or (even less so) post-Marxists, still base their conclusions on a pre-Einstenian and Darwinian 'half-step epistemological unbroken' lecture of materialism. None of these major groups (some of them still with relatively massive organizational and mobilization power) have ever considered revising Marx based on the progresses of scientific paradigms of the 20th century. And that's scary, because even when most of modern Marxists see themselves as radically self-critical, even then, they still base their fundamental knowledge about society on texts who don't reflect the current understanding of natural processes.
I think a deep and serious critic of Marx is urgently needed today (as it was in Althusser's time), and your work is a first step into it. Keep doing the good work.
Looking forward to your new book, made a documentary on sunday which i referenced you, though looking back it wasn't the best photo of you, hope you don't mind.
Looking forward to part 2!
Mathematics and science ought to be based on observation and experimentation. Leopold Kronecker worked on an experimental mathematics fully grounded in Materialism using the Natural Numbers as a physical base.
oh, I didn't know that! that sounds very interesting. Do you recommend a point to start reading on it?
@@yurigouveawagner9432 Kronecker's idea of the arithmetization of mathematics by Yoshiaki Ueno.
Metaphyics of Mathematics by John Engelsted Hester.
Where Mathematics comes from by G. Lakoff and R. Nunes.
The philosophy of mathematics, logic and the foundations of mathematics by the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy.
@@cosmicwakes6443 thank you!
THE POWER OF BEEHIVES COMPELS YOU!
Edit: AND OTTERS!
Heisenberg? i think he only cook meth
No actually the man you are referring to was Walter White. He used Heisenberg as an alias in the meth buisness.
@@clobertrober4265 turn on you sarcasm detector please
Dear dr Cockshott, could you give me your critique of my recent idea? (i know it's a little long for the comment section) :
An economy could be created that would combine the good features of profit motivation (economic growth, investments) with the absence of the greatest negative features of profit motivation (lowering labor costs (wages), unemployment). For enterprises democratically managed by employees, the transactions would be mediated by the state. As a result, instead of paying workers directly from profits, which motivates minimizing the number of mouths to be fed, the state would pay the workers' wages directly, which avoids the problem of profit sharing. The wage would be calculated using the equation: wage = [(net domestic product / national annual number of man-hours worked) * (company's product or service sale growth / average growrh) * 1 if (companys productivity/average productivity) is at least 1. Other expenses of the enterprise, including investments, would be paid from the joint contribution of the enterprise's employees from their salaries. Essentially buying costs but selling is rewarded by the state, not at the moment of transaction. Thanks to this, there is a monetary incentive to increase production and reduce production costs, without lowering wages and without employing fewer people. (it is worth adding here that reducing labor costs, unlike other production costs, does not bring any benefits to the economy or society, on the contrary, it reduces its efficiency due to the unproductivity of the unemployed). In fact, it is profitable to hire as many people as possible to maximize funds available for investment etc. This wont promote labour intensive techniques because the ability to grow by hiring more people will quickly stop with full employment. Calculating the wage on the basis of the succesfully SOLD part of the product introduces the market mechanism of equilibrium of supply and demand.
You should read up on what Meidner was proposing in the 1950s for Sweden which is a more sophisticated version of this. By the 70s though he had become convinced that the mean of production had to be transfered to the workers.
Aleatory Materialism is proved very important throughout Althusser’s “Machiavelli and Us”
That turn-around on Althusser had me laughing hard.
-ogy? where's the rest T.T
Sorry the vokoscreen app seems to have a second or so delay between responding to a stop button and the audio stream at that point
Your video cut out
I'm not going to give an opinion - as I am nowhere near qualified (and so question my sanity for even taking an interest). But the concerns in this video have been plaging my mind already - so here I am checking it out I guess.
A very brief summary of my thinking, from physics to reification via economics and network theory is laid out below: -
...comes from going from the time dilation equation t' = tsqrt(1 - 2Gm/rc^2), which I am not even sure why it is so simple? (given how complicated Einstein's ten equations of relativity are). Then via the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle h/4pi = mc^2 x t = mr^2 x f, and some substition we get t' = tsqrt(1 - 2Gh/4pir^3fc^2). Then the equation for Black Hole entropy, S = pir^2Bkc^3/2Gh, and the equation for entropy S = Bk*ln(W) we get after some substituion and re-arranging 1/ln(W) = 2Gh/pir^2c^3. This can then be subsituted into the time dilation equation to get t' = tsqrt(1 - c/4ln(W)rf). And basically wavelength r = c/f, and so we end up with t' = tsqrt(1 - 1/ln(W)) (the 1/4 is lost because reasons).
So time dilation appears defined now in terms of entropy. But I also know there is a relation between entropy and prime numbers - due to randomness of both. Indeed the approximate gap between primes is given by ln(x) where x is any given natural number, e.g. there are roughly ln(100) = 4.6 gaps on average between primes up to 100. The exact number is 4 though because there are 25 primes up to 100. There is no actual precise equation for determining the exact gaps between Primes up to a given natural number x.
So this begs the question of whether t' = tsqrt(1 - 1/ln(W)) could ever be accurate? - because W could have the same level of approximation as 'x' above in ln(x) for prime number theory. And there is no formula for determining the sequence of primes - they appear to be completely random.
I'd already come across ln(x) relationships in network theory - such as 'degrees of separation' = erdos number = ln(nodes)/ln(average connections per node), which itself is only an approximation - and I managed to relate this to Marxist economics by saying that average connections per person (to other people) goes down as 'constant capital' increases (i.e. constant capital relations - if you can call it that - replace 'viarable (human) capital' relations)... Meaning ln(x) gets smaller, meaning the entropy ln(W) gets smaller if we're relating it to that (and t' gets smaller as well which could be thought of as relating to 'labour time') ...i.e. relating it to 'Alienation' and so then also the mind destroyer that is trying to properly comprehend 'Reification' 😭
What do you think of Lewontin and Gould's use of dialectical materialism as heuristic for their developing a saltationist account of evolution? John Maynard Smith thought that it is good only in the absence of math to wrestle with that kind of complex phenomena. Is the lesson to be learned that idealism should be jettisoned even as a heuristic? Thanks for the video, Dr. Haven't read Althusser. The French are very idiosyncratic and daunting to the layperson as they use too much jargon that isn't well-defined. Might give him a try, though.