Re: Intelligence vs stupidity

[Adam Rose <adam@xxxxxxxx>]

Rahul writes:
>
> >>>Better an intellegent idealist than a stupid materialist.
> >
> >Adam and Rahul agree wholeheartedly here.
> >
> >I am gobsmacked.
> >
>
> You can just gobsmack yourself again, Hugh. Obviously, he (and I) meant
> better in the sense of better for the purpose of making sensible analytical
> statements about the world, not in any ethical, political, or (most
> relevant for you) religious sense.
>

Actually, I meant better from the point of view of changing the world,
not analysing it, although of course the later is neccessary to do
the former.

Someone who starts from the incorrect basis that ideas determine society,
and then sets about trying to changing those ideas, is infinitely preferable
to someone who uses a non dialectical but superficially materialist approach to
decide, for instance, that we live in an "affluent society" and that therefore
there's no point trying to change things to start with.

Perhaps you, Hugh, plopped out of your mother's womb as a perfect Marxist.
Me, I was simultaneously an ultra left maniac and in the Labour Party,
ignoring the structure of the thing and trying to change all the foolish
reformists' ideas. Now I'm . . . :-)

Adam.

Adam Rose
SWP
Manchester
UK

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