Re: on Bhaskar's politics was Re: BHA: DPF introductory chapter

["Andrew Hagen" <xah@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

On Mon, 05 Feb 2001, engelskirchen wrote:
>So you can evaluate my posts, Andrew, I rely on Marx, Engels, Lenin and Mao.

I've gone through some of your posts in the past, and I think they are
quite good. For example, I found your post illuminating from last
February (thread: "How is New York Today. . . ") as to the differences
between the intransitive and transitive dimensions.

As an item of interest, Bhaskar himself notes some contributions made
by Lenin and Mao to dialectic in his entry on "dialectic" in  the
"Blackwell Dictionary of Twentieth-Century Social Thought" (editors:
Outhwaite and Bottomore) published by Basil Blackwell, 1993, p.156.

Thus, I can hardly fault you for arguing from your position in bad
faith. Nevertheless, when examining what Lenin said and did in his
life, it's hard to forget all of the political murders he ordered, all
the terror he inflicted, and all the ramifications of his actions that
were felt by liberation forces around the world. Even if I were to
suppose that Lenin's thought was crystal and golden (and I do not), I
would want to know all about his practice (or his praxis, if you
prefer).

It's hard not to recall what Bhaskar termed in DPF C1.7 (page 26) the
"theory/practice inconsistency." Bhaskar's words are worth quoting:

RB: "Unfortunately, locally and globally theory/practice inconsistency
. . . or incoherence is always for Hegel resolved in thought, in
theory. The practice therefore remains. Transformative negation is
confined to thought. There is no 4D in Hegel."

Does that sound like Lenin to you? He thinks one thing, does another,
and then justifies his disreputable actions with theory? Earlier, I
argued that Lenin was more of a Hegelian than anything else. Thus far,
no one has decided to tackle this point directly.

Andrew Hagen
xah@xxxxxxxxxxxxx






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