I think the misstep that you’re taking is equating ‘material’ with ‘physical’ or relating to ‘(physical) matter’.
Marxists don’t study things, they study relations and processes. So when Marxists talk of ‘material’, they’re speaking of ‘material relations’. This includes physical objects, of course, and also social relations and e.g. gravity or magnetic fields. Money or value as social relations are as material as gravity or a flower; such relations have very real, very tangible effects on the world even if you can’t see or touch the relations.
You seem to be transposing your own definition of ‘material’ onto historical and dialectical materialists who hold a very different definition. You’re just going to speak past people if you do that.
I could be wrong: are you referring to any particular Marxists as a source for your definition of materialism and it’s coincidence with idealism? You say that you’re:
yet to encounter any conflicts in … [t]he entire foundation of Marxism (dialectical materialism) [and] the foundation of idealism[.]
Personally, I haven’t come across a single Marxist who treats materialism and idealism as compatible. Even those who admit that ideas can shape reality (including Marx himself) do so from a position of rejecting idealism. In that sense, just as material does not equate to (physical) matter, idealism does not equate to ideas simpliciter.
All these debates are rooted in historic philosophical traditions. You can’t dismiss the essence of Marxism on the basis of modern, dare I say idealistically universalised, notions of what these terms mean; you have to go back to the beginning and situate the terms in their historical context. That is another aspect of Marxism—insisting that relations are historically contingent, meaning that e.g. definitions can change through the epochs.
I apologise for disappearing for a few days. Dealing with stress, in particular due to this discussion, and with more ‘professional’ stuff. I have not read everything in the thread that got posted since I last replied here yet, and will probably not be able to do so quite right now.
I think the misstep that you’re taking is equating ‘material’ with ‘physical’ or relating to ‘(physical) matter’
But then what you mean by ‘material’ also encompasses non-material things, which doesn’t align with how the word ‘material’ is used in philosophy. This also supports the thoughts that I have been left with for a while at this point that there is no conflict between Marxism and idealism. Just between Marxism and some forms of idealism that are often presented to encompass all of idealist schools of thought.
Also, can you provide a source for your definition of the word ‘material’? Also, as of right now, I do not understand what exactly it is that you mean by it if not that a ‘material’ object is one that consists of matter (and, perhaps, that a ‘material’ process is one that involves material objects, etc.).
I could be wrong: are you referring to any particular Marxists as a source for your definition of materialism and it’s coincidence with idealism?
I never claimed that materialism ‘coincides’ with idealism. What I have claimed is that Marxism doesn’t conflict with idealism (in particular, with the views that I subscribe to).
Strictly speaking, my claim is incorrect, because at least usually Marxists do seem to take as an axiom that all ideas depend on matter in some way, but
I don’t see any significant conclusions that are drawn from that assumption that conflict with idealism.
Judging by how often Marxists who criticise/reject idealism don’t actually mean idealism in general, but just some idealist schools of thought. More specifically, ones that only distinguish mental stuff out of non-material. These would be people like, for example, (some of) idealist mathematical intuitionists seem to believe (as opposed to materialist mathematical intuitionists).
Personally, I haven’t come across a single Marxist who treats materialism and idealism as compatible
I do not treat them as compatible, except in the sense that there are types of materialism of different strictness. I don’t think that anybody here subscribes to strict materialism that posits that nothing but matter exists, for example.
What I am saying is that Marxism is fundamentally ‘agnostic’ in this sense. All of the relevant conclusions can be made in various idealist and materialist frameworks, especially if we allow for some basic rewording. Again, at the very least currently I am not aware of any relevant conflicts.
Although, I think that all the ‘idealism vs materialism’ arguments do lack an evaluation of a view that neither matter nor ideas have any sort of ‘primacy’ in any reasonable sense, considering that idealism and materialism are often defined through specifically the ‘primacy’ thing (as opposed to through what is labelled as ‘existing’, which is how the relevant terms are defined in at least some traditions), and, bizarrely, I have not encountered the position that I just outlined yet.
idealism does not equate to ideas simpliciter
Not sure what you are trying to say here.
If you mean that, literally, that words ‘idealism’ and ‘ideas’ are not synonymous, then that is obviously correct.
If you mean that idealist schools of thought do not generally say that ideas are the only thing that exists, then yes, that is correct. In particular, I do say that matter exists.
If you mean that idealism does not necessarily claim that ideas have primacy over matter, then there is an issue. While, for example, I claim that there are ideas (such as what mathematicians study) that are independent of matter but not vice versa, and that I also claim that there are ideas (like, for example, our imagination and perception of things, including what is studied by mathematicians as well as how that stone that you just threw skimmed over the water) that either have dependency on matter but not vice versa or, at least, that matter has some sort of ‘primacy’ over those, I do claim that some ideas do have some sort of ‘primacy’ over matter. If you do not define ‘idealism’ and ‘materialism’ through some sort of ‘primacy’ or even existence of relevant objects, then how do you define those?
In any case, my main point is that, so far, I do not see any significant conflicts between Marxism and idealism.
Thanks for responding. Don’t worry about the delay. At least on my instance, there’s no issue with taking your time, especially with tricky issues that require thinking space. I’m preparing a longer response for you because there’s a lot to unpack, here. It may take me a day or two to collect my thoughts.
It’s late in the day but if I don’t reply this evening I’m going to keep forgetting!
I used spoiler tags to make reading easier.
I recommend Maurice Cornforth’s three very short volumes on dialectical materialism, historical materialism, and epistemology.
I’ll begin with what seems to be at the core of the disagreement.
You say:
what you mean by ‘material’ also encompasses non-material things, which doesn’t align with how the word ‘material’ is used in philosophy.
All philosophy is class philosophy. Bourgeois philosophy tends not to acknowledge that fact and its obscurity furthers its class position.
Marxists always treat materialism as dialectical materialism. While materialism relates to matter and treats the material as primary, it is matter as a relation as opposed to matter as ‘things’. Engels in Anti-Dühring:
Motion is the mode of existence of matter. … On the earth, for example, a body may be in mechanical equilibrium, may be mechanically at rest; but this in no way prevents it from participating in the motion of the earth and in that of the whole solar system, just as little as it prevents its most minute physical particles from carrying out the vibrations determined by its temperature, or its atoms from passing through a chemical process. Matter without motion is just as inconceivable as motion without matter.
Matter, then, cannot be reduced to the physical object that appears to rest in front of you. The object is the relation of all its constituent atoms and forces, always moving. You say that I must mean that '“material” also encompasses non-material things’. This suggests that something like motion would count as a ‘non-material thing …’. While motion is not tangible, it is ‘matter’ according to dialectical materialism.
Marxists do not see motion as falling within the category of matter. Marxists treat matter and motion as a dialectic. If motion is matter and motion is intangible, then other intangibles could be material. That is, not every intangible is reducible to an idea.
… it is the ultimate aim of this work [Capital], to lay bare the economic law of motion of modern society[.] … My standpoint, from which the evolution of the economic formation of society is viewed as a process of natural history, can less than any other make the individual responsible for relations whose creature he socially remains ….
Which is to say that social laws of motion are not inescapable just because society somehow all agrees to be bound in some way (which is an idealist refrain to the power of money that I have heard before), but because these laws (relations) are material. These relations are no less material for being expressed in symbols, linguistic or mathematical. I’m unsure whether you or your sources would consider such relations as material or ‘non-material’ for not being physical – possibly not. Marxists treat these relations of production as material.
I reject the equation of material to ‘physical’ or relating to ‘(physical) matter’ because that definition is neither materialist nor dialectical. The framing suggests a definition of matter from an idealist perspective. This is unsurprising if you consider yourself to be an ontological idealist. It may explain why you thought (in another comment) that ‘“dialectical materialism” … can just as well … work … fine within an idealist framework/alongside subscription to idealist schools of thought’. That view fails to accommodate the motion-matter dialectic and must exclude value, social relations, and laws of motion.
If that’s wrong and you are reading philosophy that accepts the above concepts as material, then we must start again because I have misread you.
Cornforth’s Materialism and the Dialectical Method should clarify things further:
Materialism is not a dogmatic system. It is … a way of interpreting, conceiving of, explaining every question.
… Materialism is opposed to idealism. On every question, there are materialist and idealist ways of interpreting it, … of trying to understand it.
Thus materialism and idealism … consequently … express opposite approaches in practice and lead to very different conclusions in terms of practical activity.
This leaves no room to say that ‘Marxism doesn’t conflict with idealism’:
Idealism is the way of interpreting things which regards the spiritual as prior to the material, whereas materialism regards the material as prior. … [T]his difference manifests itself … in general philosophical conceptions of the world as a whole, and in conceptions of particular things and events.
If your philosophy rejects social relations, etc, as matter, it is bourgeois philosophy. Idealist, bourgeois philosophy does not provide the tools to fully grasp the claims of materialist dialectics.
Example:
Why are there rich and poor? [An] … idealist [explanation] … is because some … are careful and farsighted, and these husband their resources and grow rich, while others are thriftless and stupid, and these remain poor. …
The materialist … seeks the reason in the material, economic conditions of social life[,] … divided into rich and poor … because the production of the material means of life is so ordered that some have possession of the land and other means of production while the rest have to work for them. However hard they may work and … scrape and save, the non-possessors will remain poor, while the possessors grow rich on the fruits of their labour.
Summary (emphasis added):
The basic teachings of materialism stand in opposition to these three assertions of idealism [omitted].
Materialism teaches that the world is by its very nature material, that everything which exists comes into being on the basis of material causes, arises and develops in accordance with the laws of motion of matter.
Materialism teaches that matter is objective reality existing outside and independent of the mind; and that far from the mental existing in separation from the material, everything mental or spiritual is a product of material processes.
Materialism teaches that the world and its laws are knowable, and that while much in the material world may not be known there is no unknowable sphere of reality which lies outside the material world.
… Marxist philosophy is characterised by its absolutely consistent materialism all along the line, by its making no concessions whatever at any point to idealism.
On the broad attempt to philosophise away the differences between materialism and idealism:
[I]dealism serves as a weapon of reaction; and … when socialists embrace idealism they are being influenced by the ideology of the capitalists. … Whatever fine systems of philosophy have been invented, idealism has been used as a means of justifying the rule of an exploiting class and deceiving the exploited.
This is not to say that [materialist] truths have not been expressed in an idealist guise[;] … they have. For idealism has very deep roots in our ways of thinking, and so men often clothe their thoughts and aspirations in idealist dress.
Cornforth, again, to tie this back in with dialectics:
The problem of understanding and explaining development in a materialist way … is answered by dialectical materialism.
Dialectical materialism considers the universe, not as static, not as unchanging, but as in continual process of development. It … seeks for the explanation, the driving force, of this universal movement, not in inventions of idealist fantasy, but within material processes themselves—in the inner contradictions, the opposite conflicting tendencies, which are in operation in every process of nature and society.
Cornforth, quoting Lenin:
“… dialectics is the study of the contradiction within the very essence of things. …”
Where contradiction is at work, there is the force of development.
This materialist understanding of dialectics is the key to understanding the forces of development within the material world itself, without recourse to outside causes.
I realise this was a long comment. I hope it clears some things up. To finish with Cornforth:
[T]he whole history of human thought has been the history of the fight of materialism against idealism, of the overcoming of idealist illusions and fantasies.
What do you mean by ‘material’?Nevermind, I saw your comment below.
I think the misstep that you’re taking is equating ‘material’ with ‘physical’ or relating to ‘(physical) matter’.
Marxists don’t study things, they study relations and processes. So when Marxists talk of ‘material’, they’re speaking of ‘material relations’. This includes physical objects, of course, and also social relations and e.g. gravity or magnetic fields. Money or value as social relations are as material as gravity or a flower; such relations have very real, very tangible effects on the world even if you can’t see or touch the relations.
You seem to be transposing your own definition of ‘material’ onto historical and dialectical materialists who hold a very different definition. You’re just going to speak past people if you do that.
I could be wrong: are you referring to any particular Marxists as a source for your definition of materialism and it’s coincidence with idealism? You say that you’re:
Personally, I haven’t come across a single Marxist who treats materialism and idealism as compatible. Even those who admit that ideas can shape reality (including Marx himself) do so from a position of rejecting idealism. In that sense, just as material does not equate to (physical) matter, idealism does not equate to ideas simpliciter.
All these debates are rooted in historic philosophical traditions. You can’t dismiss the essence of Marxism on the basis of modern, dare I say idealistically universalised, notions of what these terms mean; you have to go back to the beginning and situate the terms in their historical context. That is another aspect of Marxism—insisting that relations are historically contingent, meaning that e.g. definitions can change through the epochs.
I apologise for disappearing for a few days. Dealing with stress, in particular due to this discussion, and with more ‘professional’ stuff. I have not read everything in the thread that got posted since I last replied here yet, and will probably not be able to do so quite right now.
But then what you mean by ‘material’ also encompasses non-material things, which doesn’t align with how the word ‘material’ is used in philosophy. This also supports the thoughts that I have been left with for a while at this point that there is no conflict between Marxism and idealism. Just between Marxism and some forms of idealism that are often presented to encompass all of idealist schools of thought.
Also, can you provide a source for your definition of the word ‘material’? Also, as of right now, I do not understand what exactly it is that you mean by it if not that a ‘material’ object is one that consists of matter (and, perhaps, that a ‘material’ process is one that involves material objects, etc.).
I never claimed that materialism ‘coincides’ with idealism. What I have claimed is that Marxism doesn’t conflict with idealism (in particular, with the views that I subscribe to).
Strictly speaking, my claim is incorrect, because at least usually Marxists do seem to take as an axiom that all ideas depend on matter in some way, but
I do not treat them as compatible, except in the sense that there are types of materialism of different strictness. I don’t think that anybody here subscribes to strict materialism that posits that nothing but matter exists, for example.
What I am saying is that Marxism is fundamentally ‘agnostic’ in this sense. All of the relevant conclusions can be made in various idealist and materialist frameworks, especially if we allow for some basic rewording. Again, at the very least currently I am not aware of any relevant conflicts.
Although, I think that all the ‘idealism vs materialism’ arguments do lack an evaluation of a view that neither matter nor ideas have any sort of ‘primacy’ in any reasonable sense, considering that idealism and materialism are often defined through specifically the ‘primacy’ thing (as opposed to through what is labelled as ‘existing’, which is how the relevant terms are defined in at least some traditions), and, bizarrely, I have not encountered the position that I just outlined yet.
Not sure what you are trying to say here.
In any case, my main point is that, so far, I do not see any significant conflicts between Marxism and idealism.
Thanks for responding. Don’t worry about the delay. At least on my instance, there’s no issue with taking your time, especially with tricky issues that require thinking space. I’m preparing a longer response for you because there’s a lot to unpack, here. It may take me a day or two to collect my thoughts.
It’s late in the day but if I don’t reply this evening I’m going to keep forgetting!
I used spoiler tags to make reading easier.
I recommend Maurice Cornforth’s three very short volumes on dialectical materialism, historical materialism, and epistemology.
I’ll begin with what seems to be at the core of the disagreement.
You say:
All philosophy is class philosophy. Bourgeois philosophy tends not to acknowledge that fact and its obscurity furthers its class position.
Marxists always treat materialism as dialectical materialism. While materialism relates to matter and treats the material as primary, it is matter as a relation as opposed to matter as ‘things’. Engels in Anti-Dühring:
Matter, then, cannot be reduced to the physical object that appears to rest in front of you. The object is the relation of all its constituent atoms and forces, always moving. You say that I must mean that '“material” also encompasses non-material things’. This suggests that something like motion would count as a ‘non-material thing …’. While motion is not tangible, it is ‘matter’ according to dialectical materialism.
Marxists do not see motion as falling within the category of matter. Marxists treat matter and motion as a dialectic. If motion is matter and motion is intangible, then other intangibles could be material. That is, not every intangible is reducible to an idea.
Marx, Capital, Volume I (Preface to the first German edition):
Which is to say that social laws of motion are not inescapable just because society somehow all agrees to be bound in some way (which is an idealist refrain to the power of money that I have heard before), but because these laws (relations) are material. These relations are no less material for being expressed in symbols, linguistic or mathematical. I’m unsure whether you or your sources would consider such relations as material or ‘non-material’ for not being physical – possibly not. Marxists treat these relations of production as material.
I reject the equation of material to ‘physical’ or relating to ‘(physical) matter’ because that definition is neither materialist nor dialectical. The framing suggests a definition of matter from an idealist perspective. This is unsurprising if you consider yourself to be an ontological idealist. It may explain why you thought (in another comment) that ‘“dialectical materialism” … can just as well … work … fine within an idealist framework/alongside subscription to idealist schools of thought’. That view fails to accommodate the motion-matter dialectic and must exclude value, social relations, and laws of motion.
If that’s wrong and you are reading philosophy that accepts the above concepts as material, then we must start again because I have misread you.
Cornforth’s Materialism and the Dialectical Method should clarify things further:
This leaves no room to say that ‘Marxism doesn’t conflict with idealism’:
If your philosophy rejects social relations, etc, as matter, it is bourgeois philosophy. Idealist, bourgeois philosophy does not provide the tools to fully grasp the claims of materialist dialectics.
Example:
Summary (emphasis added):
On the broad attempt to philosophise away the differences between materialism and idealism:
Cornforth, again, to tie this back in with dialectics:
Cornforth, quoting Lenin:
I realise this was a long comment. I hope it clears some things up. To finish with Cornforth: