Re: Galvano Della Volpe

[Jim Farmelant <farmelantj@xxxxxxxxxxxx>]

I believe that Roy Bhaskar makes many of these points concerning Della
Volpe,
in his philosophy articles
in the *Dictionary of Marxist Thought*, eds. Tom Bottomore et al.

Jim F.

On Mon, 10 Jul 2000 19:28:49 -0400 (EDT) Andrew Wayne Austin
<aaustin@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> writes:
> Jim,
>
> Thanks for that summary. I want to add Marx's point that critical
> historical-social science presupposes the social ordering of the
> world.
> This explains Marx's use of models as heuristics. Since the
> social-historical is necessarily prior to the individual it must
> also be
> logically-theoretically prior. In practice this makes for a dramatic
> separation between critical realist science (Marxism) and positivism
> (logical empiricism). Because that which remains outside the head of
> thinker - the concrete totality - necessarily becomes abstraction in
> the
> human mind (which is a social product) the best attempts at mentally
> reproducing the concrete totality (1) do not seek out the most
> general and
> thin abstractions (the empirically-empty categories of the idealist)
> but
> the most historically-specific and empirically-rich abstractions,
> which
> then are useful for their heuristic value - they are validated and
> their
> soundness reckoned through their successful application in
> subsequent
> scientific practice; and (2) connect the thinker to the world by
> recognizing that thought is the product of her/his circumstances and
> the
> historical epoch in which all are embedded - by grasping the
> totality, even
> its broad outlines, one is in connecting the thinker to society and
> history able to transcend location. Gramsci argues that this is why
> the
> development of organic intellectuals is so vital to any attempt at
> political-social supremacy.
>
> Andrew Austin
> Knoxville, TN
>