Antonio Negri - A Revolt That Never Ends (1 of 5)

[RnBramwell]

Idiots do not learn from history. Negri has chosen the doom of repeating it.

[pianofolle]

@RnBramwell 'repeat' how? may I ask you to explain why you think that?

[RnBramwell]

@pianofolle All of the thinking he promotes is just a rewording of Marx, with little extensions into particulars that interest him. Leftist professors, hippies, unionists and various authors, have been trying to justify Marx in this way for over 100 years. Marx was/is egregiously wrong. The Left Right axis of politics is utterly false, since both ends promote statism, not Individual Rights. Heads you lose, tails you lose.

[pianofolle]

@RnBramwell "extensions into particulars that interest him" ??!!?? I am astonished. I thought the points at issue interest mankind and society. Your assumption that Marx is the basis of Negri's thought is wrong. Negri's background is Foucault + Deleuze/GuattarI = Structuralism. So -though your observations about left/right axis of politics are interesting- they are not at stake here.

[RnBramwell]

@pianofolle Look at the broad fundamentals. Foucault etc are extensions of the same school as Marx: collectivism with its subjectivist/mystical basis (Marx rose from Hegel, who discarded God but kept a mystical view of humanity). Foucault is more mystical (semiotics goes beyond 'mere' concept labeling), but do not forget structuralism's Althusser (a Marxist). Their ideas are narrowings, or refinements within, a larger body of very false views —Negri is only different within them.

[pianofolle]

@RnBramwell Totally right. But the 'only' mention of marx in your first comment was too reductive and simple; in a way, not fair towards the rich philosophical background of Negri. Just that.

[RnBramwell]

@pianofolle Thanks, comments are not a place for detailed explanations, of course. I still contest the idea that Negri's background is particularly "rich" or even original. Even Marx & Hegel's ideas were not all that original, since they go back to Plato who was, in the practices he seemed to prefer, communistic. Throw in Immanuel Kant, and his effort to critique reason with reason, and the fundamental altruism that drives all these men explains their lean to religious or secular communism.

[pianofolle]

@RnBramwell There's no altruism (let alone communism) whatsoever in Hegel! He can't stay in the same pot as the other -in any respect. Besides, looking just at general features among philosophers flattens the potential of all their ideas.

[RnBramwell]

@pianofolle I like your flatness point... but I am focusing on the core or fundamental elements & what they point to. I am not a Hegel expert by any means, but this statement in Wikipedia (FWIW) seems quite indisputable: Karl

"Popper further proposed that Hegel's philosophy served not only as an inspiration for communist & fascist totalitarian governments of the 20th century, whose dialectics allow for any belief to be construed as rational simply if it could be said to exist."

cont'd

[RnBramwell]

@RnBramwell

Similarly, under the Hegelianism Wiki:

"His philosophy is the highest expression of that spirit of collectivism which characterized the nineteenth century." Communism & Socialism (i.e. democratically achieved communism) are the political manifestation of collectivism. For some reason that relationship escapes even many academics' they do not recognize the latter as it occurs, and therefore do not see the trend to communist (dictatorship) until it is well underway.

[pianofolle]

@RnBramwell So it seems to be right, but it's wrong. For 2 reasons. 1) collectivism is hardly a philosophical term and -again- too GENERAL ("any philosophic, political, religious, economic, or social outlook that emphasizes the interdependence of every human being"-what the heck can we make out of this?!). 2) Hegel stresses the identity of single nations and people against each other (sic!), being so against the socialistic relevant feature of internationalism.(cont next comment)

[RnBramwell]

@pianofolle What is the _essential_ or core notion of Collectivism if not seeing the individual as morally & politically inferior to a group of humans? ~if not seeing the ideas, property & even life of an individual as subject to the wishes of the group (or their 'great' leaders)? Morally, then, the better individual serves, gives to, or sacrifices for others. Politics establishes law & policy on that basis, and enforces it with a gun. Deviate, & the gun emerges, totalitarianism.advances

[pianofolle]

@RnBramwell Nothing to object to all this.Moreover,Hegel would perfectly agree with it. Only it wouldnt make of him a communist.In order to be that he would need -for example-to be against war & against nationalities(2 of the basic principles of communism) which he was NOT;on the contrary these were fundamental elements of his dialectic of history.I'm afraid that u don't see that collectivism is just a necessary but no way sufficient condition for communism.

[RnBramwell]

@pianofolle I agree that he was not an explicit communist, fair enough. However, being against war is only a list item, not an essential of communism, which is why it is so widely ignored by Communists.

You are right, I don't see, b/c even the purist notions of communism are fundamentally collectivist. E.g. "Form each according to his ability to each according to his need" is a mighty fundamental of redistributionist communism, & is entirely collectivist. Is there something more fundamental?

[pianofolle]

@RnBramwell (same for me-as to our debate :)So,to summarize, i see communism[comm] to collectivism[coll] as a species to its genus,while u make them coincide.This explains why I dont reject ur coll.vistic description of comm,tho I judge it uncomplete: a species has evth of its genus,but not the other way around.U r free 2 put comm into the container of coll,but must pay the price of having other stuff inside:e.g. fascism.How u distinguish this from comm if u use the coll-category?

[pianofolle]

@RnBramwell Popper (which I love in his view of epistemology but value little in his philosophical-political interpretations) is probably referring to Hegel's view of "total State", where each individual is organically interconnected with the other and with the whole statal structure. And this is of course a strong basis for any totalitarian conception. But the equation totalitarism=communism is absurd, though some forms of actualized communism in history have been totalitarian.

[RnBramwell]

@pianofolle "Organically interconnected" is pure collectivism. Men interact, at their choice, to their benefit or peril, but such interaction is testimony to the uniqueness of individuals in society. It is patently observable, despite such claims that "no man is an island" because weall use the same (say) market! All communism _necessarily_ leads to totalitarianism or collapse (see previous comment).

cont'd

[RnBramwell]

@pianofolle To me, Popper was terrible. One cannot conduct science without induction, yet he only accepted deduction. Hypotheses had to be just made up, so science is driven by whim —I know, I did post-graduate science, & that is written everywhere but in flowery terms to hide the embarrassing truth.

The awful falsifiability principle: we can only know what is disproven, so Truth cannot be achieved. This rejects contextual facts, when all facts have context.

The best scientists cheat Popper.

[pianofolle]

@RnBramwell Again (my comment to your "what is the essential..") we r saying the same thing but drawing different conclusion. I contest that u can legitimately pass from communism to totalitarism via collectivism. "Leads to" doesnt mean "is equal to", a cold can lead to a fever but is not equal to it. Phalansteres of 1830's and parisian Commune of 1870 didnt lead to totalitarism.

[RnBramwell]

@pianofolle [U r decent 2 debate with. Thanx.] "Phalansteres .. & parisian Commune [PC] .. didnt lead to totalitarism." I was thinking the same of the Israeli Kibuttzim, but realized they were not political entities, only cooperatives under a (relatively speaking) Rights respecting State. Participants' decisions were truly voluntary, as communism is supposed to be! PC had rifts & interestingly, Marx wanted conscription & *harsher* treatment of PC 'reactionaries' —just my point to Statism :-)

[pianofolle]

@RnBramwell Kibuttzim is another good example. 'they were not political entities' -i would say: GREAT. Why would marx care if you actualize communism with political means or any other?.."as long as" it solves the problems....(alienation, poverty etc.). PS-do u have a facebook ?

[JosephKnight93]

Thanks a lot for uploading this.