Personality? Desire? Mind? A Revolutionary Take on Psychology?
Posted by Mike E on May 18, 2008
by Mike Ely
For reasons never clearly explained, the communist movement has generally ignored (and really dismissed) psychology. At its crudest, the existing communist movement has reduced matters of psychology (personality, desire, illness, addiction, obsession, crisis etc.) simply to matters of ideology and conscious worldview — denying the particularity of mind, and the role of dynamic, underlying, unconscious and sub conscious factors.
There is often entrwined with this a reductionist denial of both biochemistry and genetics (so that the nurture/nature debate is often treated one-sidedly as if “all is nurture.” i.e. socialization — and then socialization is itself reduced one-sidedly to ideology and choice.
There are many examples in the handling of sexuality, in a priori assumptions about the origins of gender differences, in the approach some take toward alcoholism and other addictions, in the view of “mental illness,” in the suspicious negation of desire and passion (including of the non-sexual kinds)… and more.
Meanwhile, outside the organized communist movement, there has been a great deal of new and quite radical thought on these matters — new insights into the mind-body dynamics, new insights into the role of biochemicals in thought, new insights into the role of genetics (in gender, inclinations, etc.), new knowledge about how mind and personality is structured in child development, and more.
There are the works from Jacques Lacan to Lev Vigotsky — including many writers that many of us have never heard about. Let’s break out of the info diet on these matters too.
(Props to Tom, who has always tirelessly promoted Vigotsky among communists in Chicago. It was, at least, a start at going against that prevailing idealist and dogmatic tide.)
So…
I would like to open the door here on Kasama to a discussion of revolutionary, communist and contemporary-scientific approaches to psychology and mind.
- Send Kasama some short pithy essays to post on these matters (either yours or by others you respect).
- Make suggestions about which questions are worth exploring, and which writers are worth reading
- And let’s also dig in to excavate and critique the long-standing pretty unscientific approaches common among previously existing organized communists toward psychology. Who wants to peel back the history, lines, implications and underlying errors of the previous dismissal? Who wants to sketch what a more correct and scientific approach would be?
JJM+ said
I am currently taking a Psychology AP class at my high school. It is a pretty interesting class.
My teacher, an older woman, says that she is a fervent ‘humanist’, in psychological terms. In other words, it is all about the choices we make, and nothing to do with the circumstances we are faced with. I of course, disagree. I believe there is a dialectical relation between personal responsibility and social environment, but that the choices we make are ultimately a response to and determined by the environment. I suppose this is a question worth exploring.
LindaD said
[Moderator: this post was moved from another thread]
This post about psychology is extremely interesting.
“Taking a sniff at everything” as Avakian used to say is important. Am also interested not just in particular aspects of psychological study or prominent psychologists, but what about the phenomena of mass psychology heaped onto the masses? It has always been interesting to me that in terms of “therapy,” “psychology,” etc. a place like Mexico is way different than say the U.S.
The popularity of individual psychological therapies and theories, or psychology as science means little.
Most (and the relatively few that exist) Mexican psychologists are desperate for clients…then again, the majority of mexicanos suffer under the yoke of Catholicism.
Nil said
It’s dated and a bit weird in parts, but Wilhelm Reich’s _Mass Psychology of Fascism_ is still a good inclusion on a communist psychology or sexuality reading list.
Mike E said
Moderator note: If you refer to writings, it is helpful to include a link. You can line directly by inserting HTML code in your comment. If you don’t figure out how, then just insert the URL by familiar “cut and paste.”
So, for example:
Wilhelm Reich‘s book Mass Psychology of Fascism is available in pdf, but also in excerpted form.
some people may not know that Wilhelm Reich was a supporter of the German communist party (before the Nazis seizure of power) and then (in the early part of his career) sought to unfold a theory of sexuality in a communist/Marxist context. After writing this book (the Mass Psychology of Fascism) he was expelled from the KPD. And, it is hard to dispute that he became increasingly “weird” in this theories (“discovering” orgone energy as a driving force in the universe and trapping it in “orgone boxes” for theraputic purposes). He was persecuted for his increasingly eccentric theories in the U.S. (during the depth of McCarthy era madness) and died in federal prison for transporting an orgone box across state lines.
So, Nil, do you want to elaborate on the three parts of your assessment (of his early Communist-period theories)? How is that work dated? How is it a bit weird? What makes it still a good inclusion?
peper tiger said
I would really recommend Daniel Bennet books, Consciousness Explained and Darwin’s Dangerous Idea: Evolution and the Meanings of Life, in general Bennet has wrote a lot about the mind and has some interesting things to say about human nature in regard to the mind. One problematic idea of his is that ideas are like insects that try to evolve in our mind, by taking over us, and making us do irrational things. He brings as an example insects that invade animal brains and make them sacrifice themselves, so that the parasite can keep evolving in the stomach of the predator.
I will try to elaborate more about this when I finish my finals.
The issue of psychology is extremely important among communists. The RCP has been denying the importance of psychology, although almost all activists that I know have gone through some trauma that have awaken them to see the brutality of the system (not to deny that some people go through traumas, and do not become activists).
I remember that going to Narcotics Anonymous meetings was questioned (by some supporters) because of the religious comments made at meeting, (god help me change the things……). Sure, some of it is not true, what about the things that we should learn from? What about creating support groups where people can share with one another their deepest fears, traumas? What about learning how to support people who are going through the battle of becoming clean?
As a last comment, the myth, provided by the pamphlet written by Clark Kissinger (how the communist in china got read of drugs), is problematic, to say the least. Can the proletarian fight affectively and better supply and demand, when it holds state power? of course. The amount of people addicted to drugs was reduced dramatically in China, but it was not eliminated. We might need to reconcile that if addiction is related to genes, with some people the best that we can do is reduce the amount of drugs that they consume, while proving clean drugs and integrating them to the best of their abilities in society.
Also, to say that things about our behavior is connected to human nature, is not to endorse them (and this is obviously not to support racist books such as the ball curve, or acts such as rape) but a way for us to understand and deal with them better.
Carl Davidson said
IMHO, George Herbert Mead, one of John Dewey’s colleagues at the University of Chicago, is the mother lode on a deep and clear understanding the social nature of the self, and how self-consciousness arise through parent-child communication, from gesture to language.
The early Reich is good, even excellent, for analysis of how the right uses repressed sexuality as a weapon of domination, but his later work is wacko.
To deal with many of the psychological problems of living, I highly recommend starting with Albert Ellis, formerly a Freudian, but broke with it to found the rational-emotive-behavioral therapy school, REBT. It’s practical, group oriented and cheap. “A guide to Rational Living” is the seminal work, but there’s lots more.
To really go deep, I’d be remiss not to mention the Buddhist classics of various schools. They’ve been working at the study of consciousness and the self for thousands of years, and are no slouches when it comes to knowledge and insight. For starters, they’re both monists, and dialectical, and we are part of that tradition, albeit through a Western Hegelian lens.
TellNoLies said
Reich’s book “Sex-Pol Essays” written before “The Mass Psychology of Fascism” is still very useful. His essay “What Is Class Consciousness?” up-ended my thinking on the question by putting psychological liberation from authoritarian conditioning at the center of the revolutionary project. IIRC, Reich re-edited much of his early writing (though not “The Sex-
Pol Essays”) to bring it into conformity with his later crazier ideas. This might be the case with “The Mass Psychology” so there might be two different versions out there. It should also be noted that “The Mass Psychology” got Reich kicked out of the int’l psychoanalytic association for being communist at the same time it was getting him tossed from the KPD. Reich had some fucked up ideas but he is avery good place to start developing a revolutionary theory of personality.
I would also endorse reading G.H. Mead who has had a big impact on my own thinking. He is not a revolutionary, but very decidely a dialectical thinker with a deep understanding of how the self emerges from social processes.
SeriyVolk said
I’m surprised this topic has gotten as far as it has without mention of Noam Chomsky. After all here is a well-known leftist (anarchist) psychologist, but unfortunately I haven’t read enough of his work to really comment much further. He’s done a lot on US foreign policy, language psychology and mass media, and behavioralism (I believe, though I’d have to check my psych notes).
onehundredflowers said
I’m surprised no one has mentioned Freud. Controversial as he was, his thinking influenced the Frankfurt School and Jacques Lacan, and Zizek by extension. The Frankfurt School developed some interesting ideas on the psychology of authoritarianism and Zizek has attempted to use psychology to account for ideology in general.
Popular writings on consciousness tend be reductionist and connected to “evolutionary psychology” [critics consider this to be sociobiology under another name], but are best represented by Steven Pinker and Daniel Dennett, with Chomsky as a fellow traveler who believes that the mind has built-in modules. Progressive, but less well-known, critics of this approach are
Susan McKinnon, and Marxist neurobiologist Steven Rose.
No understanding of the psychologies of desire and sexuality can ignore Judith Butler and Luce Irigay.
These intellectuals and areas of investigation we are all putting out don’t even begin to approach the depth of debates surrounding all these issues. The fact that communists have marginalized ourselves out of this field is something that will take some real effort to remedy, but it seems that many of us have taken some important steps forward on an individual basis.
Paul said
Specific claims need to be evaluated individually. A general enthusiasm
for what’s interesting and novel, “new and quite radical,” often mistakes
what’s interesting for what’s true. Moreover, keep in mind that descriptions
of research in the popular media, as well in some scholarly sources, are
often exaggerated or distorted.
A general principle for evaluating a reductionist explanation of a higher
level into a lower level, for example the social in terms of psychology,
or psychology in terms of biology, is that it should identify material
causes that act between levels. Sahotra Sarkar for example recommends
restricting the usage of “genetic” to those traits in which the biochemical
products of the particular genes are part of the description of the trait;
that is, predictions concerning the genetic basis of a trait are based on
a physical system instead of a correlation.
In general skepticism about individualism and reductionism is warranted.
Here are several online sources that argue the case. These should refute
the claim that opposition to biological determinism is a “reductionist denial
of both biochemistry and genetics,” as if “all is nurture. i.e. socialization.”
Socialization is only a part of environment, and the crude concept of
“nature/nurture” is more productively replaced with the concept of developmental
systems. I’ve included studies of gender differences and addiction.
Lewontin’s Living Legacy: Levels of Selection and Organismic Construction of the Environment, by Val Dusek.
Richard Lewontin – Internalism and Externalism in Biology
Evolution’s Eye: A Systems View of the Biology-culture Divide,
by Susan Oyama.
The Ontogeny of Information: Developmental Systems and Evolution,
by Susan Oyama.
Not in Our Genes,
by Richard Lewontin, Steven Rose, and Leon J. Kamin.
Adapting Minds: Evolutionary Psychology and the Persistent Quest for Human Nature,
by David J. Buller.
A short description I wrote of sociobiology and evolutionary psychology
Genetics and Reductionism: Past, Present and Into the 21st Century, by Sahotra Sarkar.
Gender, Genes and Genetics: From Darwin to the Human Genome, by Lynne Segal.
Exploding the Gene Myth: A Conversation with Ruth Hubbard
A Conversation with Steven Rose
Sex and Race in the Long Shadow of the Human Genome Project, by Roger N. Lancaster.
Evolutionary Social Constructivism: Narrowing (but not yet bridging) the gap
A reflection on Christian Smith’s Moral Believing Animals, by David Sloane Wilson.
Book review: Darwin’s Cathedral: Evolution, Religion, and the Nature of Society
Psychology and Marxism: Dialectical Opposites?, by Ian Parker.
Wilson’s Ladder
,
The Fearless Vampire Conservator: Phillip Kitcher and Genetic Determinism, by Paul E. Griffiths.
,
Between genes and addiction: a critique of genetic determinism, by Craig Reinarman.
So-So Biology
,
The Mismeasure of Man, by Stephen Jay Gould.
Reply by Steven Jay Gould to Steven Pinker.
Frantz Fanon And The Psychology Of Oppression, by Hussein Abdilahi Bulhan.
The psychology of racism: Martin Luther King and Franz Fanon
Jean-Paul Sartre: Psychology
Paul said
Specific claims need to be evaluated individually. A general enthusiasm
for what’s interesting and novel, “new and quite radical,” often mistakes
what’s interesting for what’s true. Moreover, keep in mind that descriptions
of research in the popular media, as well in some scholarly sources, are
often exaggerated or distorted.
A general principle for evaluating a reductionist explanation of a higher
level into a lower level, for example the social in terms of psychology,
or psychology in terms of biology, is that it should identify material
causes that act between levels. Sahotra Sarkar for example recommends
restricting the usage of “genetic” to those traits in which the biochemical
products of the particular genes are part of the description of the trait;
that is, predictions concerning the genetic basis of a trait are based on
a physical system instead of a correlation.
In general skepticism about individualism and reductionism is warranted.
Here are several online sources that argue the case. These should refute
the claim that opposition to biological determinism is a “reductionist denial
of both biochemistry and genetics,” as if “all is nurture. i.e. socialization.”
Socialization is only a part of environment, and the crude concept of
“nature/nurture” is more productively replaced with the concept of developmental
systems. I’ve included studies of gender differences and addiction.
Lewontin’s Living Legacy: Levels of Selection and Organismic Construction of the Environment, by Val Dusek.
Richard Lewontin – Internalism and Externalism in Biology
Evolution’s Eye: A Systems View of the Biology-culture Divide,
by Susan Oyama.
Paul said
The Ontogeny of Information: Developmental Systems and Evolution,
by Susan Oyama.
Not in Our Genes,
by Richard Lewontin, Steven Rose, and Leon J. Kamin.
Adapting Minds: Evolutionary Psychology and the Persistent Quest for Human Nature,
by David J. Buller.
A short description I wrote of sociobiology and evolutionary psychology
Genetics and Reductionism: Past, Present and Into the 21st Century, by Sahotra Sarkar.
Gender, Genes and Genetics: From Darwin to the Human Genome, by Lynne Segal.
Exploding the Gene Myth: A Conversation with Ruth Hubbard
A Conversation with Steven Rose
Sex and Race in the Long Shadow of the Human Genome Project, by Roger N. Lancaster.
Evolutionary Social Constructivism: Narrowing (but not yet bridging) the gap
A reflection on Christian Smith’s Moral Believing Animals, by David Sloane Wilson.
Book review: Darwin’s Cathedral: Evolution, Religion, and the Nature of Society
Psychology and Marxism: Dialectical Opposites?, by Ian Parker.
Wilson’s Ladder
,
The Fearless Vampire Conservator: Phillip Kitcher and Genetic Determinism, by Paul E. Griffiths.
,
Between genes and addiction: a critique of genetic determinism, by Craig Reinarman.
So-So Biology
,
The Mismeasure of Man, by Stephen Jay Gould.
Reply by Steven Jay Gould to Steven Pinker.
Frantz Fanon And The Psychology Of Oppression, by Hussein Abdilahi Bulhan.
The psychology of racism: Martin Luther King and Franz Fanon
Jean-Paul Sartre: Psychology
Paul said
The Ontogeny of Information: Developmental Systems and Evolution,
by Susan Oyama.
Not in Our Genes,
by Richard Lewontin, Steven Rose, and Leon J. Kamin.
Adapting Minds: Evolutionary Psychology and the Persistent Quest for Human Nature,
by David J. Buller.
A short description I wrote of sociobiology and evolutionary psychology
Genetics and Reductionism: Past, Present and Into the 21st Century, by Sahotra Sarkar.
Gender, Genes and Genetics: From Darwin to the Human Genome, by Lynne Segal.
Exploding the Gene Myth: A Conversation with Ruth Hubbard
A Conversation with Steven Rose
r graves said
Bertel Ollman gives a good introduction to Reich’s thought an essay in his book “Social and Sexual Revolution”. (I believe this is the same essay that introduces “Sex-Pol”)
http://www.nyu.edu/projects/ollman/docs/ssr_ch06.php
Maurice Brinton’s pamphlet “The Irrational in Politics” is another excellent introduction to Reich, and the companion piece “The Russian Experience” presents an interesting capsule history of how sexuality was freed in the early days of the Russian Rev, then bottled back up as Stalinism took hold.
http://uncarved.org/pol/irat.html
The best work of socialist psychology that goes beyond theory into therapy, that I know of, is the book “Gestalt Therapy”, written chiefly by the anarchist Paul Goodman. It builds on the best of Freud and Reich, and presents practical psychological exercises you can try out at home, many rooted in the Buddhist traditions that Carl mentions. Taylor Stoehr’s introduction to the essay collection “Nature Heals” is an excellent overview of Goodman’s psychology.
Erich Fromm is also worth a look.
Freud remains, course, essential– best overview is “Introductory Lectures in Psychoanalysis”.
onehundredflowers said
Speaking of therapy, this is something that could use more exploration as well.
Even as revolutionaries, we are subject to many of the same psychological traumas as everyone else. Our problems can’t just be overcome by reading classic texts, immersing ourselves even more deeply in struggles, or depending on the collective support of our comrades, as valuable as all these things are. Although we may have a wider perspective on the causes of these problems, this does not necessarily translate into a viable strategy for treatment.
Some of us have benefited from seeing therapists, or know people who have, and I’d be interested in hearing some general observations – perhaps in some other more appropriate forum, but I think they should be looked at. From a Marxist perspective, I have not seen too many studies of psychoanalysis/therapy overall, its strengths and shortcomings, much less a sense of what Marxism could contribute to the field.
Nando said
I appreciate the lists of authors… from Reich to Fromm.
But I am curious, what is the place of psychology in developing revolutionary politics? What is the place of communist methodology in developing psychology?
How different are these various “left” psychological theorists? What are the divides that separate them?
Are they making a critique of what capitalism does to the human mind and personality (i.e. authoritarianism, subservience, uncritical thinking, fascist urges, selfishness, narcissism, patriarchy, sexual objectification of women, desires for oppressive relations, etc.)? Or are they applying dialectics to other aspects of psychology (therapy, transformation of backward ideas, sexual disfunction, etc.)?
In other words, listing these folks (and their works) is interesting, but it doesn’t say much about what they did and said.
Anyone have an overview of the landscape, and where the various figures stood?
Anon said
For clarification, I believe Peper Tiger meant Daniel Dennett… one of the four horsemen of the coming Atheist Apocalypse. ;)
Eddy said
At the risk of sounding flip, the dividing line in the social sciences is ultimately between a dialectical and materialist approach versus an idealist and/or metaphysical analysis.
Additionally, there are several areas of human activity that are foci for psychology, for example, cognitive development, learning theory, abnormal behavior, and so on. The word describes a wide range of fields, rather than a single narrow one.
I second the earlier post, pointing to the work of Lev Vygotsky (1920s and 30s). Some of his work has been translated into English, and he is the ongoing reference point for specialists working in various branches of social science.
Vygotsky’s pioneering studies show how cognition and knowledge are socially formed, how sybolization and cognition are integrally connected, as well as suggest new directions for early childhood development and learning.
The volume (in English) Though and Language describes major themes and also contains a critique of Jean Piaget, which indicates how the two differ on several key questions of cognition and development. Also recommended is Vygotsky and the Social Formation of Mind, written by James Wertsch, who cites his own extended translations of otherwise unavailable (in English) papers by Vygotsky. (see amazon.com)
As noted above, a small selection of writing is available here: http://www.marxists.org/archive/vygotsky/index.htm
and L.V.’s work is cited by scores of contemporary papers in anthropology, brain science, sociology, learning theory, and linguistics. (various authors, various journals)
Nando said
eddy writes:
This is of course not on the question of psychology, but on larger methodology:
If you assume, Eddy, as a starting point that the dividing line is “ultimately” between a materialist and dialectial approach and an idealist/metaphysical one….. I have some questions for you:
a) are those the only two possibilities (i.e. does that dividing line define in a sharp ultimate and binary way the way all ideas in this sphere (all spheres?) divide out?
b) If this is true where would CORRECT criticisms of dialectical materialism come from?
Let’s say that some profound and correct challenge to existing dialectical materialism arises, where would it appear on your binary grid — and wouldn’t you be pulled (by virtue of your starting point) to assume that such a challenge “must be” idealist and/or metaphysical?
Aren’t you assuming that previous discoveries (of dialectics and materialism) are sufficiently complete (and absolute) that they will define all current (and future?) debates that emerge? How is this scientific? Don’t you exclude the possibility of some new and profound AND CORRECT challenge to your current views?
Carl Davidson said
First, ask what the problem is.
That sounds simple, but it’s very necessary.
Different problems require different solutions.
How can the children of the oppressed learn better? Start with Freire and Dewey.
Why does Dallas, Texas have so many topless bars right next to rightwing churches? Read Reich on the Mass Psychology of Fascism.
How can I get my friend away from addiction? AA, the 12 steps, and the Big Book is your best bet, and don’t accept the excuse about God.
I’m always fighting with my kids and partner, who drive me into rages? Ellis is a good start.
Whats a good general theory of the self and consciousness, to help my need to know more? Try George Herbert Mead or Thich Nhat Hanh’s commentaries on the Heart and Diamond Sutra.
Eddy said
Nado wrote:
By materialism, I mean that ‘reality’ (the world, society, the universe, the brain, etc.) is objective and that our knowledge of it is also based on that objectivity. This objective reality is potentially observable and testable. It does not mean that the universe is finite (or infinite), nor does it mean that everything that can be observed has been, or that everything that can be interacted with has been so.
This is distinguished from earlier worldviews, most notably that of idealism (c.f. Plato, Berkeley), which imagines that there is a supra-reality (an ideal) that is a priori the physical world we know and is beyond our knowing.
Materialist dialectics posits that this ‘objective reality’ is not comprised by static ‘things’ but by processes (of which the things are specific instances) in continual transformation.
The ‘discovery’ of a reality objective to ourselves does not exhaust either it or our understanding of it. However, it does enable us to (generally speaking) comprehend it through an iterative and open-ended process of practice and reflection.
I will posit further (with Vygotsky, and as suggested by Marx & Engels) that the iterative process of practice and reflection is social, and that knowledge proceeds from the group to the individual.
The argument that there is a transcendent ‘whatever’ (as it is definitionally not ‘real’) has been around for a few thousand years (although perhaps not stated in so many words). For example, what we consider as ‘religion’ typically includes such a transcendent ‘whatever’. As we know, those world views are based on faith and not on experimental observation.
Likewise, there are contemporary examples of analysis that treat phenomenon or events as static or fixed or timeless (ahistorical). These types of analysis are sometimes described as mechanistic or metaphysical, but may also be termed empirical, pragmatic or positivistic (as those are based on the primacy of isolated, observable instances of a phenomenon or event).
Materialist dialectics surely does relate to psychology (and any experimental science) in that it provides a general framework for considering hypotheses, organizing experiment or fieldwork, and for analysis (constructing theory). However, such a framework does not replace the actual (real) work of experimentation and analysis, nor does it replace the specific theory that summarizes specific phenomenon or behavior in that field (for example, cognitive psychology).
Knowing that ‘everything’ is objective to us and in process or flux is important in that it suggests to us how to observe, but it doesn’t tell us anything about what we might observe or even if we will.
Vygotsky’s proof (based on his observational studies of children and other real people) that cognitive ability and knowledge are socially formed, result from specific interpersonal interactions, rely on symbolizing activity, and are internalized from those processes, was (and remains) ground breaking. And it has been expanded upon with further experimentation and observation, of people and of other primates, by other psychologists, anthropologists, linguists, etc.
That challenge would have to either show that reality is not objective to us, or that it is fixed in time and space.
yes, it would rock my world.
Nando said
You posit it a lot of things…. I am quite familiar with the various ideas you repeat as your conception of dialectical materialism. On one level, I don’t have issues with any part of what you say. But on another level, your presentation is a bit facile.
For example, the RCP has had a bit of difficulty philosophically dealing with the forms of materialism common among mainstream scientists. These people don’t apply materialist dialectics (with a few exceptions). Sometimes the RCP claims that they are applying important elements of materialist dialectics without knowing it These scientists are (in fact) applying their OWN methodology (and philosophies) which are often rather coherent. Those methodologies and philosophies may have overlap with the RCP’s version of materialist dialectics (but it is rather patronizing to imply that the RCP has the coherent philosophy and those other folks are stumbling in the dark because they don’t it yet.)
In other words, the world was rather crudely divided into idealist and materialist philosophies when Feuerbach and company were going up against religion. But the world has moved quite a bit since then, and there are quite a spectrum of philosophies (positivism and others) operating in the realm of science that may not as simply break down in your dicotomy. And when a movement’s sense of philosophy stops with Lenin’s Empirio-criticism (which is generally viewed more as a political polemic around philosophy than an actual cutting edge work of philosophy, even by its biggest admirers in the field) then you may end up with a simplified view of how things present themselves.
But let’s get to the heart of our exchange:
Eddy writes:
Well, actually not. You assume that only dialectics can discuss and explain a world in motion and change… and that a thousand years from now, the philosophical understanding of such motion and change will (necessarily) still be rooted in dialectics.
But it is quite conceivable that new philosophies could arise that deal with dynamic change and transformation (in space and time) in ways that are quite different from dialectics.
Let’s say that Marx, Engels and Dietzgen had not developed a socialist dialectics out of the mix of Feuerbach and Hegel…. and the European socialist movement had not “gone there.” And lets say that a philosophy of dynamic change had arisen under other conditions (not in Europe, not in the context of those concrete debates and struggles), out of other philosophical traditions (say in a Buddhist country, not a Hegelian one) — can you imagine a scientific worldview that in important ways looked different from the dialectical materialism you have memorized, and yet could still (in important, and perhaps even superior ways) comprehend reality and dynamic change?
Or let me take another example: Badiou has a theory of change and contradiction that calls “multiple of multiples.” He has created it in conscious opposition to dialectics (which as a student of Althusser and then a Maoist he once studied and upheld). This is a theory of change that is not rooted in assuming things are fixed in time and space (and yet is not a dialectical theory) — it thinks (among other things) that the “one divide into two” is two constrictive a conception, and that the breakdowns of things are often more complex than this allows. (Mao deals with this philosophical difficulty by having a particular theory of multiple contradictions within most complex real world processes, one or another of which is principle and defining, while within each one aspect or another is defining, and so on… but is that really the only way to bring an analytical structure to bear on dynamic change?
To be clear: I am not calling for a rejection of materialist dialectics. (though there are many versions of dialectical materialism that have proven quite mechanical, dogmatic and religious in their own right — and should be rejected, or rather revolutionized!) But I am suggesting that you look at your method — which is not a “scientific approach to science” or a dynamic view of your own theory of dynamics.
You say that something that successfully challenged your philosophy would “rock your world.” Well gee brother, which should communists be immune to having their world rocked.
I am arguing ( as the 9 Letters does) for a different and less onesided approach to our own knowledge and theories — to grasp the relative nature of relative truths (as well as their absolute aspects).
Unlike you, I think the philosophies we have learned within the communist movement are still a bit primitive: both because we have often been taught the popularizations instead of the real theory, and also because we are at an early stage in our world process of revolution (and at an early stage of humanity’s grasp of objective reality). I for one would not be at all surprised to have my world rocked (it happens pretty regularly these days) — especially as I strain to understand and assimilate the many things (insights, discoveries and innovations) in the wider world that had often been closed to me (because of a degree of self-satisfaction that came with the religious aura rapped around our own theories.)
In fact, i think having your world rocked is pretty much part of being alive — and actually straining to understand things. Why should communist philosophy (alone!) be a placid pool, an end product, a settled matter, a fixed framework….? When did that happen? Who can take that seriously? And if they take it seriously, what room has been left of critical thinking and innovation? Is our task really only to apply the principles laid down (as if they are done, complete and simply correct) — or isn’t it to develop our theory in radical ways, even as we use it to transform the world in radical ways?
an hero said
There seems to be an ill defined distinction between psychology and psychoanalysis in a clinical and theoretical sense. Freud and Lacan are considered, generally, outside the scope of an organization like the American Psychological Association, while they are embraced by the American Psychoanalytic Association.
Psychology puts an emphasis on chemical, biological and genetic issues and treatments. They see the source of mental disorders as being directly related to and traceable back to physical abnormalities or pathologies of the brain. Psychoanalysis emphasizes “the talking cure”, the plastic nature of the mind, its ability to change itself and the centrality of the unconcsious. Or at least this is my understanding.
Here are some relevant links:
http://www.apsa.org/ (American Psychoanalytic Association)
http://www.apa.org/ (American Psychological Association)
http://www.division39.org/ (psychoanalytic division within the APA)
http://www.wapol.org/ (Lacanians)
Paul said
The initial request for a “take” on psychology, but the discussion has led to the subject of psychoanalysis. It’s important to emphasize that many psychoanalysts resist the annexation of psychoanalysis onto psychology or philosophy. Instead, psychoanalysis is the (however provisional) science of the unconscious.
Althusser was especially eloquent in defending this idea:
“What is the object of psycho-analysis? It is what analytical technique deals with in the analytical practice of the cure, i.e. not the cure itself, not that supposedly dual system which is tailor-made for any phenomenology or morality but the ‘effects ‘, prolonged into the surviving adult, of the extraordinary adventure which from birth to the liquidation of the Oedipal phase transforms a small animal conceived by a man and a woman into a small human child.
“One of the ‘effects’ of the humanization of the small biological creature that results from human parturition: there in its place is the object of psycho-analysis, an object which has a simple name: ‘the unconscious ‘.
“That this small biological being survives, and not as a ‘wolf-child’, that has become a little wolf or bear (as displayed in the princely courts of the eighteenth century), but as a human child (having escaped all childhood deaths, many of which are human deaths, deaths punishing the failure of humanization), that is the test all adult men have passed: they are the never forgetful witnesses, and very often the victims, of this victory, bearing in their most hidden, i.e. in their most clamorous parts, the wounds, weaknesses and stiffnesses that result from this struggle for human life or death. Some, the majority, have emerged more or less unscathed — or at least, give this out to be the case; many of these veterans bear the marks throughout their lives; some will die from their fight, though at some remove, the old wounds suddenly opening again in psychotic explosion, in madness, the ultimate compulsion of a ‘negative therapeutic reaction’; others, more numerous, as ‘normally’ as you like, in the guise of an ‘organic’ decay. Humanity only inscribes its official deaths on its war memorials: those who were able to die on time, i.e. late, as men, in human wars in which only human wolves and gods tear and sacrifice one another. In its sole survivors, psycho-analysis is concerned with another struggle, with the only war without memoirs or memorials, the war humanity pretends it has never declared, the war it always thinks it has won in advance, simply because humanity is nothing but surviving this war, living and bearing children as culture in human culture: a war which is continually declared in each of its sons, who, projected, deformed and rejected, are required, each by himself in solitude and against death, to take the long forced march which makes mammiferous larvae into human children, masculine or feminine subjects.
“This object is no business of the biologist’s: this story is certainly not biological! — since from the beginning it is completely dominated by the constraint of the sexed human order that each mother engraves on the small human animal in maternal ‘love’ or hatred, starting from its alimentary rhythm and training. History, ‘sociology’ or anthropology have no business here, and this is no surprise for they deal with society and therefore with culture, i.e. with what is no longer this small animal — which only becomes human-sexual by crossing the infinite divide that separates life from humanity, the biological from the historical, ‘nature’ from ‘culture’. Psychology is lost here, and this is hardly strange for it thinks that in its ‘object’ it is dealing with some human ‘nature’ or ‘non-nature’, with the genesis of this existent, identified and certified by culture itself (by the human) — when the object of psycho-analysis is the question with absolute priority, whether to be born or not to be (naître ou n’être pas ), the aleatory abyss of the human-sexual itself in every human scion. Here ‘philosophy’ loses its bearings and its cover (‘repères ‘ and ‘repaires ‘), naturally! — for these unique origins rob it of the only origins it renders homage to for its existence: God, reason, consciousness, history and culture. It is clear that the object of psycho-analysis may be specific and that the modality of its material as well as the specificity of its ‘mechanisms’ (to use one of Freud’s terms) are of quite another kind than the material and ‘mechanisms’ which are known to the biologist, the neurologist, the anthropologist, the sociologist, the psychologist and the philosopher. We need only recognize this specificity and hence the distinctness of the object that it derives from, in order to recognize the radical right of psycho-analysis to a specificity of its concepts in line with the specificity of its object: the unconscious and its effects.”
Eddy said
Nando says:
We will set aside what the RCP does or doesn’t, as that is not germane to this discussion. (Unless you are speaking for them, but it doesn’t sound like you are.)
The important point is the question regarding the methodology used by ‘scientists’. Since you don’t define who that might be, I will take an expansive view and consider anyone who specializes in natural, physical or social sciences.
Not all scientists are materialists. Not all scientists are dialectical in their approach. Both of these statements ought to be taken as given; science is a cultural practice and is enmeshed in the same social relationships as every other practice in society. In class society, those relationships tend to be unequal and weighed upon by reactionary traditions.
So, what’s your point? That because they are ‘doing’ science within some other cognitive framework (positivism, empiricism, deism, etc.), a dialectical and materialist frmework is superfluous or inadequeate or unnecessary?
Certainly, one does not need to understand materialist dialectics to perform experimental work, and certainly there are reams of papers published every quarter than demonstrate that one can keep to a very narrow, empirical focus in performing one’s analysis. Thus — I think plainly – a lot of that work is crippled by the limitations of the outlook of the practitioner. (There are also plenty of examples where the work is consciously in the service of reaction; further examples of the cultural quality of ‘science’.)
Perhaps you can point me to a normative example in the sciences that contradicts materialist dialectics?
On the other hand, I can think of many breakthroughs in benchwork/fieldwork and analysis that support a materialist and dialectic perspective. In those instances, it is not a philosophical conclusion, it is a matter of fact and analysis.
Are you looking for ‘scientists’ to sign a pledge affirming dialectical materialism? It’s not that uncommon to encounter references to Marx and especially Engels in the social sciences. Bruce Trigger used to cite Lenin (positively) in some of his papers. Is that the significance you’re looking for?
(an aside: I think a great deal can be learned from Trigger, both in regard his practice and his methodology. that doesn’t mean we should all cite Lenin in our journal articles.)
You are quick to move back and forth between the objective and the subjective, which makes me wonder if you recognize the distinction. It is a complex relationship, to be sure.
So you are suggesting that at some point in future the dialectical materialist framework will be supplanted by some other, more valid, framework.
I was pointing out that materialist dialectics proceeds from an objective reality, rather than a subjective one.
That seems to summarize your idealism. Do you seriously think that the world demonstrates dialectical materialism because somebody said it must?
Conjecture is not the same as proof, nor is it a theory.
Your condescension (and red-baiting) clouds your argument. My understanding of dialectical materialism is a product of several decades of practice and analysis in the social sciences. I don’t doubt that my explanation did not exhaust the topic; I was defining my terms, as you requested.
However, the real world is rife with evidence, you ought to sample some of it.
Paul said
Materialism is a methodology we must accept a priori. One can doubt
or reject materialism as a metaphysics, but it must form part of our
scientific research, since affirming “the objective reality which is
given to man by his sensations… while existing independently of
them” is a prerequisite for scientific investigation of the world. Similar
conceptual considerations can allow one to doubt any ontological claims
made by dialectics, but nonetheless admit that dialectics is necessary to
our epistemology: the laws of dialectics, “the science of universal
interconnectedness,” are necessary attributes of any valid description and
explanation of reality. For example the explanation of social phenomena in
general cannot be reduced to the explanation of individuals’ behavior.
Dialectical materialism argues this occurs because each level of matter
has its own emergent laws, but it is not necessary to make this assumption;
instead it may reflect that no conceptual scheme is adequate to the multiple
levels. In either case, as Sahotra Sarkar points out, “eliminativism” is
rejected: the social is not “nothing but” the sum of individuals.
Specific claims need to be evaluated individually. A general enthusiasm
for what’s interesting and novel, “new and quite radical,” often mistakes
what’s interesting for what’s true. Moreover, keep in mind that descriptions
of research in the popular media, as well in some scholarly sources, are
often exaggerated or distorted.
A general principle for evaluating a reductionist explanation of a higher
level into a lower level, for example the social in terms of psychology,
or psychology in terms of biology, is that it should identify material
causes that act between levels. Sahotra Sarkar for example recommends
restricting the usage of “genetic” to those traits in which the biochemical
products of the particular genes are part of the description of the trait;
that is, predictions concerning the genetic basis of a trait are based on
a physical system instead of a correlation. In a similar manner, following
Symons, biological explanations of psychology, at least as a first
approximation, are limited to the explanation of psychological mechanisms,
not of behavior generally, since the former alone is a material property
of the organism.
Some of the basic problems with the reductionist explanations
of behavior and society, both among humans and other animals, include
fundamental errors of description, confusion about heritability studies,
and adaptive story-telling. Problems with description include arbitrary
agglomeration (what should be studied), reification (whether what we give
a name is a real thing), anthropomorphism and conflation (whether behaviors
that we assign the same name are in fact linked), and reductionism and
confusion of levels (whether social behavior is the sum of individual behavior).
For example sociobiologists confuse ideological constructions
like slavery and tribalism with material objects. This is an error of
reification, since selection acts on material objects, not mental constructs.
Sociobiologists conflate unrelated phenomena, with different functions and
causes, named by the same word – conflating political aggression, which has
political and economic causes, with instinctual aggression in animals,
or, as Barash did, conflating, coercive sexual reproduction in ducks with
rape in humans. Adaptive story-telling is flawed, as Richard Lewontin writes,
by “progressive ad-hoc optimization.” The premise that a trait is an optimal
solution to some problem is protected from falsification because a trait is
examined essentially in isolation, and if one adaptive story fails, another takes
its place without the overall premise of optimality being questioned.
In general skepticism about individualism and reductionism is warranted.
I’ll list several online sources in the next post that argue the case.
These should refute the claim that opposition to biological determinism is
a “reductionist denial of both biochemistry and genetics,” as if “all is
nurture. i.e. socialization.” Socialization is only a part of environment,
and the crude concept of “nature/nurture” is more productively replaced
with the concept of developmental systems. I’ve included studies of
gender differences and addiction.
Paul said
http://www.human-nature.com/nibbs/02/lewontin.html
Lewontin’s Living Legacy: Levels of Selection and Organismic Construction of the Environment, by
Val Dusek.
internalism.blip.tv/file/812402/ Richard Lewontin – Internalism and Externalism in Biology.
Richard Lewontin – Internalism and Externalism in Biology
books.google.com/books?id=skDdtFB09-cC
Evolution’s Eye: A Systems View of the Biology-culture Divide
by Susan Oyama.
books.google.com/books?
id=E3O83dh96uEC&printsec=frontcover&dq=inauthor:Susan+inauthor:Oyama&ei=JfwwSNjqGYPUzASXoY3QAw&sig=
ApHWiMHUehwalg7bt4ztZqp75Yo
The Ontogeny of Information: Developmental Systems and Evolution,
by Susan Oyama.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Not_in_Our_Genes Not in Our Genes
Not in Our Genes,
by Richard Lewontin, Steven Rose, and Leon J. Kamin.
books.google.com/books?id=dQ5MGDvn8eIC
Adapting Minds: Evolutionary Psychology and the Persistent Quest for Human Nature,
by David J. Buller.
groups.google.com/group/alt.society.anarchy/msg/dd54fa248e3cb346
A short description I wrote of sociobiology and evolutionary psychology
books.google.com/books?id=U63K8U4k6ZgC
Genetics and Reductionism: Past, Present and Into the 21st Century, by Sahotra Sarkar.
eprints.bbk.ac.uk/185/1/segal12.pdf
Gender, Genes and Genetics: From Darwin to the Human Genome, by Lynne Segal.
gender.eserver.org/exploding-the-gene-myth.html
Exploding the Gene Myth: A Conversation with Ruth Hubbard.
http://www.embl.org/aboutus/news/publications/report/report02/report02_51.pdf
A Conversation with Steven Rose.
raceandgenomics.ssrc.org/Lancaster/
Sex and Race in the Long Shadow of the Human Genome Project, by Roger N. Lancaster.
Paul said
http://gender.eserver.org/exploding-the-gene-myth.html
Exploding the Gene Myth: A Conversation with Ruth Hubbard.
http://www.embl.org/aboutus/news/publications/report/report02/report02_51.pdf
A Conversation with Steven Rose.
http://raceandgenomics.ssrc.org/Lancaster/
Sex and Race in the Long Shadow of the Human Genome Project, by Roger N. Lancaster.
http://www.metanexus.net/magazine/ArticleDetail/tabid/68/id/9167/Default.aspx
Evolutionary Social Constructivism: Narrowing (but not yet bridging) the gap
A reflection on Christian Smith’s Moral Believing Animals, by David Sloane Wilson.
http://www.anth.uconn.edu/faculty/sosis/publications/wilson_review.pdf
Book review: Darwin’s Cathedral: Evolution, Religion, and the Nature of Society.
http://www.discourseunit.com/publications_pages/parker_papers/1999%20ISTP%20Book%20Marxism%20and%
20Psychology.doc
Psychology and Marxism: Dialectical Opposites?, by Ian Parker.
http://www.personalityresearch.org/evolutionary/ladder.html
Wilson’s Ladder
http://philsci-archive.pitt.edu/archive/00000652/00/vampire_slayer_final.pdf
The Fearless Vampire Conservator: Phillip Kitcher and Genetic Determinism, by Paul E. Griffiths.
http://www.drugpolicy.org/docUploads/DAAT_Reinarman_1205.pdf
Between genes and addiction: a critique of genetic determinism, by Craig Reinarman.
http://flowstate.homestead.com/files/dawkinevil.html
So-So Biology
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Mismeasure_of_Man
The Mismeasure of Man, by Stephen Jay Gould.
http://www.nybooks.com/articles/1070
Reply by Steven Jay Gould to Steven Pinker.
http://books.google.com/books?id=jJ0aID8V3xgC
Frantz Fanon And The Psychology Of Oppression, by Hussein Abdilahi Bulhan.
http://www.mindbrainworld.com/2008/01/psychology-of-racism-martin-luther-king.html
The psychology of racism: Martin Luther King and Franz Fanon
http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/sartre/#3
Jean-Paul Sartre: Psychology
Paul said
http://raceandgenomics.ssrc.org/Lancaster/
Sex and Race in the Long Shadow of the Human Genome Project, by Roger N. Lancaster.
http://www.metanexus.net/magazine/ArticleDetail/tabid/68/id/9167/Default.aspx
Evolutionary Social Constructivism: Narrowing (but not yet bridging) the gap
A reflection on Christian Smith’s Moral Believing Animals, by David Sloane Wilson.
http://www.anth.uconn.edu/faculty/sosis/publications/wilson_review.pdf
Book review: Darwin’s Cathedral: Evolution, Religion, and the Nature of Society.
http://www.discourseunit.com/publications_pages/parker_papers/1999%20ISTP%20Book%20Marxism%20and%
20Psychology.doc
Psychology and Marxism: Dialectical Opposites?, by Ian Parker.
http://www.personalityresearch.org/evolutionary/ladder.html
Wilson’s Ladder
http://philsci-archive.pitt.edu/archive/00000652/00/vampire_slayer_final.pdf
The Fearless Vampire Conservator: Phillip Kitcher and Genetic Determinism, by Paul E. Griffiths.
http://www.drugpolicy.org/docUploads/DAAT_Reinarman_1205.pdf
Between genes and addiction: a critique of genetic determinism, by Craig Reinarman.
Paul said
http://philsci-archive.pitt.edu/archive/00000652/00/vampire_slayer_final.pdf
The Fearless Vampire Conservator: Phillip Kitcher and Genetic Determinism, by Paul E. Griffiths.
http://www.drugpolicy.org/docUploads/DAAT_Reinarman_1205.pdf
Between genes and addiction: a critique of genetic determinism, by Craig Reinarman.
http://flowstate.homestead.com/files/dawkinevil.html
So-So Biology
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Mismeasure_of_Man
The Mismeasure of Man, by Stephen Jay Gould.
http://www.nybooks.com/articles/1070
Reply by Steven Jay Gould to Steven Pinker.
http://books.google.com/books?id=jJ0aID8V3xgC
Frantz Fanon And The Psychology Of Oppression, by Hussein Abdilahi Bulhan.
http://www.mindbrainworld.com/2008/01/psychology-of-racism-martin-luther-king.html
The psychology of racism: Martin Luther King and Franz Fanon
http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/sartre/#3
Jean-Paul Sartre: Psychology
Paul said
http://raceandgenomics.ssrc.org/Lancaster/
Sex and Race in the Long Shadow of the Human Genome Project, by Roger N. Lancaster.
http://www.metanexus.net/magazine/ArticleDetail/tabid/68/id/9167/Default.aspx
Evolutionary Social Constructivism: Narrowing (but not yet bridging) the gap
A reflection on Christian Smith’s Moral Believing Animals, by David Sloane Wilson.
http://www.anth.uconn.edu/faculty/sosis/publications/wilson_review.pdf
Book review: Darwin’s Cathedral: Evolution, Religion, and the Nature of Society.
http://www.discourseunit.com/publications_pages/parker_papers/1999%20ISTP%20Book%20Marxism%20and%
20Psychology.doc
Psychology and Marxism: Dialectical Opposites?, by Ian Parker.
http://www.personalityresearch.org/evolutionary/ladder.html
Wilson’s Ladder
Paul said
http://www.discourseunit.com/publications_pages/parker_papers/1999%20ISTP%20Book%20Marxism%20and%
20Psychology.doc
Psychology and Marxism: Dialectical Opposites?, by Ian Parker.
http://www.personalityresearch.org/evolutionary/ladder.html
Wilson’s Ladder
philsci-archive.pitt.edu/archive/00000652/00/vampire_slayer_final.pdf
The Fearless Vampire Conservator: Phillip Kitcher and Genetic Determinism, by Paul E. Griffiths.
http://www.drugpolicy.org/docUploads/DAAT_Reinarman_1205.pdf
Between genes and addiction: a critique of genetic determinism, by Craig Reinarman.
flowstate.homestead.com/files/dawkinevil.html
So-So Biology
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Mismeasure_of_Man
The Mismeasure of Man, by Stephen Jay Gould.
http://www.nybooks.com/articles/1070
Reply by Steven Jay Gould to Steven Pinker.
books.google.com/books?id=jJ0aID8V3xgC
Frantz Fanon And The Psychology Of Oppression, by Hussein Abdilahi Bulhan.
http://www.mindbrainworld.com/2008/01/psychology-of-racism-martin-luther-king.html
The psychology of racism: Martin Luther King and Franz Fanon
plato.stanford.edu/entries/sartre/#3
Jean-Paul Sartre: Psychology
Paul said
http://www.metanexus.net/magazine/ArticleDetail/tabid/68/id/9167/Default.aspx
Evolutionary Social Constructivism: Narrowing (but not yet bridging) the gap
A reflection on Christian Smith’s Moral Believing Animals, by David Sloane Wilson.
http://www.anth.uconn.edu/faculty/sosis/publications/wilson_review.pdf
Book review: Darwin’s Cathedral: Evolution, Religion, and the Nature of Society.
http://www.discourseunit.com/publications_pages/parker_papers/1999%20ISTP%20Book%20Marxism%20and%20Psychology.doc
Psychology and Marxism: Dialectical Opposites?, by Ian Parker.
http://www.books.google.com/books?id=E3O83dh96uEC&printsec=frontcover&dq=inauthor:Susan+inauthor:Oyama&ei=JfwwSNjqGYPUzASXoY3QAw&sig=ApHWiMHUehwalg7bt4ztZqp75Yo
The Ontogeny of Information: Developmental Systems and Evolution,
by Susan Oyama.
Mike E said
moderator notes to paul:
1) it would help if you would make the titles of these articles clickable… Look over what you have posted… it is a little hard to make sense of parts of it. If you post them again (in a cleaned up, elaborated form, with clickable titles, I will gladly just remove these first attempts).
2) also if you would discuss the material you are linking to, that would be helpful… Some discussion of content and concepts is more useful than a collection of links (which we can all get raw from google). Why are you linking to these particular articles and books? What did you find valuable in them? why not pick one or two and get into it (in the context of this thread)?
chegitz guevara said
I’m surprised no one has yet mentioned Douglas Hofstadter, and his two works, Gödel, Escher, Bach and I Am a Strange Loop.
These don’t deal with psychology directly, but how thought arises from the thoughtless, how inanimate matter gives rise to animate, conscious, creative beings.
Paul said
I first tried using html tags, as the little note above suggested “You can use these tags…”
But my posts didn’t show up. I thought tags might be blocked for some reason.
I’ll try it again.
I recommend the interviews with Ruth Hubbard and Steven Rose, and Reinarman and Segal’s papers,
since they specifically address the claims Mike Ely makes regarding genetic explanations of the
mind, gender differences, homosexuality, and addiction.
Paul Griffith’s review is an accessible discussion of “nature/nurture,” genetic determinism,
and developmental systems. If you’re interested in going into greater detail, you can
look at the links to Val Dusek, Susan Oyama, and Lewontin.
Wilson’s Ladder is Kitcher’s summary and criticism of the conservative implications of
evolutionary determinism.
Parker’s “Psychology and Marxism” is a nice introduction to critical psychology.
I included a review by D.S. Wilson and a review of his book, “Darwin’s Cathedral”. Not that I’d endorse
everything he writes, but rather if human society is to be the object of inquiry by evolutionary biology,
this is how to it. “Unto Others,” which he wrote with Elliott Sober, on the evolution of altruism, is also
interesting. Sober is a leading philosopher of biology. He’s also made contributions to analytical Marxism
(but don’t hold that against him).
Sarkar provides an excellent discussion and clarification of reductionism. We don’t preclude
particular reductionist research programs, but there’s no necessary reason to expect them to succeed.
Stephen Gould should be familiar to everybody and is a good source.
Paul said
Lewontin’s Living Legacy: Levels of Selection and Organismic Construction of the Environment, by Val Dusek.
Richard Lewontin – Internalism and Externalism in Biology
Evolution’s Eye: A Systems View of the Biology-culture Divide,
by Susan Oyama.
The Ontogeny of Information: Developmental Systems and Evolution,
by Susan Oyama.
Not in Our Genes,
by Richard Lewontin, Steven Rose, and Leon J. Kamin.
Adapting Minds: Evolutionary Psychology and the Persistent Quest for Human Nature,
by David J. Buller.
Genetics and Reductionism: Past, Present and Into the 21st Century, by Sahotra Sarkar.
Gender, Genes and Genetics: From Darwin to the Human Genome, by Lynne Segal.
Exploding the Gene Myth: A Conversation with Ruth Hubbard
A Conversation with Steven Rose
Sex and Race in the Long Shadow of the Human Genome Project, by Roger N. Lancaster.
Evolutionary Social Constructivism: Narrowing (but not yet bridging) the gap
A reflection on Christian Smith’s Moral Believing Animals, by David Sloane Wilson.
Book review: Darwin’s Cathedral: Evolution, Religion, and the Nature of Society
Psychology and Marxism: Dialectical Opposites?, by Ian Parker.
Wilson’s Ladder
,
The Fearless Vampire Conservator: Phillip Kitcher and Genetic Determinism, by Paul E. Griffiths.
,
Between genes and addiction: a critique of genetic determinism, by Craig Reinarman.
So-So Biology
,
The Mismeasure of Man, by Stephen Jay Gould.
Frantz Fanon And The Psychology Of Oppression, by Hussein Abdilahi Bulhan.
The psychology of racism: Martin Luther King and Franz Fanon
A short description I wrote of sociobiology and evolutionary psychology
Paul said
http://www.human-nature.com/nibbs/02/lewontin.html
Lewontin’s Living Legacy: Levels of Selection and Organismic Construction of the Environment, by Val Dusek.
http://internalism.blip.tv/file/812402/ title=Richard Lewontin – Internalism and Externalism in Biology.
Richard Lewontin – Internalism and Externalism in Biology
http://books.google.com/books?id=skDdtFB09-cC
Evolution’s Eye: A Systems View of the Biology-culture Divide, by Susan Oyama.
http://books.google.com/books?id=E3O83dh96uEC
The Ontogeny of Information: Developmental Systems and Evolution, by Susan Oyama.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Not_in_Our_Genes
Not in Our Genes, by Richard Lewontin, Steven Rose, and Leon J. Kamin.
http://books.google.com/books?id=dQ5MGDvn8eIC
Adapting Minds: Evolutionary Psychology and the Persistent Quest for Human Nature, by David J. Buller.
http://books.google.com/books?id=U63K8U4k6ZgC
Genetics and Reductionism: Past, Present and Into the 21st Century, by Sahotra Sarkar.
http://eprints.bbk.ac.uk/185/1/segal12.pdf
Gender, Genes and Genetics: From Darwin to the Human Genome, by Lynne Segal.
http://gender.eserver.org/exploding-the-gene-myth.html
Exploding the Gene Myth: A Conversation with Ruth Hubbard
http://www.embl.org/aboutus/news/publications/report/report02/report02_51.pdf
A Conversation with Steven Rose
http://raceandgenomics.ssrc.org/Lancaster/
Sex and Race in the Long Shadow of the Human Genome Project, by Roger N. Lancaster.
http://www.metanexus.net/magazine/ArticleDetail/tabid/68/id/9167/Default.aspx
A reflection on Christian Smith’s Moral Believing Animals>
Evolutionary Social Constructivism: Narrowing (but not yet bridging) the gap
A reflection on Christian Smith’s Moral Believing Animals, by David Sloane Wilson.
http://www.anth.uconn.edu/faculty/sosis/publications/wilson_review.pdf
Book review: Darwin’s Cathedral: Evolution, Religion, and the Nature of Society
http://www.discourseunit.com/publications_pages/parker_papers/1999%20ISTP%20Book%20Marxism%20and%20Psychology.doc
Psychology and Marxism: Dialectical Opposites?, by Ian Parker.
http://www.personalityresearch.org/evolutionary/ladder.html
Wilson’s Ladder
http://philsci-archive.pitt.edu/archive/00000652/00/vampire_slayer_final.pdf
The Fearless Vampire Conservator: Phillip Kitcher and Genetic Determinism, by Paul E. Griffiths.
http://www.drugpolicy.org/docUploads/DAAT_Reinarman_1205.pdf
Between genes and addiction: a critique of genetic determinism, by Craig Reinarman.
http://flowstate.homestead.com/files/dawkinevil.html
So-So Biology
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Mismeasure_of_Man
The Mismeasure of Man, by Stephen Jay Gould.
http://books.google.com/books?id=jJ0aID8V3xgC
Frantz Fanon And The Psychology Of Oppression, by Hussein Abdilahi Bulhan.
http://www.mindbrainworld.com/2008/01/psychology-of-racism-martin-luther-king.html
The psychology of racism: Martin Luther King and Franz Fanon
http://groups.google.com/group/alt.society.anarchy/msg/dd54fa248e3cb346
A short description I wrote of sociobiology and evolutionary psychology
Nando said
Posts with many tags are simply held automatically for the moderator to approve (i.e. in case they are spam). They then appear.
Eddy said
Here are several papers (with abstracts) published over the past 15 years by authors who IMNSHO contribute to a materialist and dialectical description of ‘mind’, individual and society. You may find them in large public or university libraries. Academic libraries may also provide registered users with e-access to the respective journals.
Fernyhough, C. (2008). “Getting Vygotskian about theory of mind: Mediation, dialogue, and the development of social understanding.” Developmental Review 28(2): 225-262.
The ideas of Vygotsky [Vygotsky, L. S. (1987). Thinking and speech. In The collected works of L. S. Vygotsky, (Vol. 1). New York: Plenum. (Original work published 1934.)] have been increasingly influential in accounting for social-environmental influences on the development of social understanding (SU). In the first part of this article, I examine how Vygotskian ideas have to date been recruited to explanations of the development of SU. Next, I present a model of SU development which draws on two implications of Vygotsky’s ideas: the importance of semiotic mediation for mental functioning, and the dialogic nature of the higher mental functions. I then consider the value of the proposed model in accounting for evidence from three areas of enquiry: the typical development of SU in infancy and early childhood, relations between individual differences in SU and social-environmental variables, and atypical development. The model is suggested to be particularly helpful in understanding the transition from intentional-agent to mental-agent understanding, and the role of language in SU. Remaining challenges include a need to specify further the cognitive processes underlying internalization, and to gather more extensive evidence on the roles of typical and atypical social experience in SU development.
Fernyhough, C., K. Bland, et al. (2007). “Imaginary companions and young children’s responses to ambiguous auditory stimuli: implications for typical and atypical development.” Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry Published article online: 9-Aug-2007.
Background: Previous research has reported a link between imaginary companions (ICs) in middle childhood and the perception of verbal material in ambiguous auditory stimuli. These findings have been interpreted in terms of commonalities in the cognitive processes underlying children’s engagement with ICs and adults reporting of imaginary verbal experiences such as auditory verbal hallucinations. The aim of the present study was to examine these relations using improved methodology and a younger sample of children for whom engagement with ICs would be expected to be particularly salient. Method: Data on young children’s (age range: 4-8 years) reporting of ICs were gathered in two studies (total N = 80). Responses to ambiguous auditory stimuli were investigated using the new Jumbled Speech task, which measures participants likelihood of perceiving words in meaningless but speech-like auditory stimuli. Results: Reporting hearing words in the Jumbled Speech task was associated with having a parentally corroborated IC. Hearing words on the task and having an IC were unrelated to age, gender, verbal ability, and understanding of the stream of consciousness. Conclusions: Findings are consistent with the hypothesis that engaging with ICs is one aspect of a general susceptibility to imaginary verbal experiences. We consider the implications for the assumption of continuity in psychopathological experiences between childhood and adulthood.
Tomasello, M., M. Carpenter, et al. (2005). “Understanding and sharing intentions: The origins of cultural cognition.” Behavioral and Brain Sciences 28(05): 675-691.
We propose that the crucial difference between human cognition and that of other species is the ability to participate with others in collaborative activities with shared goals and intentions: shared intentionality. Participation in such activities requires not only especially powerful forms of intention reading and cultural learning, but also a unique motivation to share psychological states with others and unique forms of cognitive representation for doing so. The result of participating in these activities is species-unique forms of cultural cognition and evolution, enabling everything from the creation and use of linguistic symbols to the construction of social norms and individual beliefs to the establishment of social institutions. In support of this proposal we argue and present evidence that great apes (and some children with autism) understand the basics of intentional action, but they still do not participate in activities involving joint intentions and attention (shared intentionality). Human children’s skills of shared intentionality develop gradually during the first 14 months of life as two ontogenetic pathways intertwine: (1) the general ape line of understanding others as animate, goal-directed, and intentional agents; and (2) a species-unique motivation to share emotions, experience, and activities with other persons. The developmental outcome is children’s ability to construct dialogic cognitive representations, which enable them to participate in earnest in the collectivity that is human cognition.
Tomasello, M. and H. Rakoczy (2003). “What Makes Human Cognition Unique? From Individual to Shared to Collective Intentionality.” Mind & Language 18(2): 121-147.
It is widely believed that what distinguishes the social cognition of humans from that of other animals is the belief-desire psychology of four-year-old children and adults (so-called theory of mind). We argue here that this is actually the second ontogenetic step in uniquely human social cognition. The first step is one year old children’s understanding of persons as intentional agents, which enables skills of cultural learning and shared intentionality. This initial step is ‘the real thing’ in the sense that it enables young children to participate in cultural activities using shared, perspectival symbols with a conventional/normative/reflective dimension-for example, linguistic communication and pretend play-thus inaugurating children’s understanding of things mental. Understanding beliefs and participating in collective intentionality at four years of age-enabling the comprehension of such things as money and marriage-results from several years of engagement with other persons in perspective-shifting and reflective discourse containing propositional attitude constructions.
Hauser, M. D., N. Chomsky, et al. (2002). “The Faculty of Language: What Is It, Who Has It, and How Did It Evolve?” Science 298(5598): 1569-1579.
We argue that an understanding of the faculty of language requires substantial interdisciplinary cooperation. We suggest how current developments in linguistics can be profitably wedded to work in evolutionary biology, anthropology, psychology, and neuroscience. We submit that a distinction should be made between the faculty of language in the broad sense (FLB) and in the narrow sense (FLN). FLB includes a sensory-motor system, a conceptual-intentional system, and the computational mechanisms for recursion, providing the capacity to generate an infinite range of expressions from a finite set of elements. We hypothesize that FLN only includes recursion and is the only uniquely human component of the faculty of language. We further argue that FLN may have evolved for reasons other than language, hence comparative studies might look for evidence of such computations outside of the domain of communication (for example, number, navigation, and social relations).
Trigger, B. G. (1998). “Archaeology and Epistemology: Dialoguing across the Darwinian Chasm.” American Journal of Archaeology 102(1): 1-34.
Archaeological theorists employ rival epistemologies (theories of knowledge) borrowed from philosophy to justify and help implement alternative programs for interpreting archaeological data. Epistemological idealism has been used to validate cognitive studies of the past, positivism to privilege behaviorist and processual approaches, and realism to promote a combination of both while at the same time noting the constraints exerted by external reality. It is argued that, viewed from the perspective of biological evolution, these three approaches are complementary rather than competing. All human adaptation to the social and natural environments is cognitively and culturally mediated, while, contrary to the claims of extreme idealists, discrepancies between expectations and observed happenings facilitate more effective adaptive behavior. Any rounded interpretation of archaeological data must take account of mental concepts, sensory perceptions, and conditions external to the individual. Positivist methods and humanistic forms of analysis that focus on subjectivity, agency, and the historical transmission of knowledge are complementary to one another. To understand better what has happened in the past, archaeologists must produce scenarios that are radically different from what has previously been conceived. But these speculations in turn must be subjected to rigorous appraisal if genuine progress is to be achieved. Because of its greater inclusiveness and specific postulates, a realist epistemology, combined with a materialist view of reality, offers the most satisfactory general framework for integrating the best features of all three epistemologies and interpreting archaeological data.
Fernyhough, C. (1996). “The dialogic mind: A dialogic approach to the higher mental functions.” New Ideas in Psychology 14(1): 47-62.
Drawing on the work of Vygotsky, Bakhtin, Wertsch and others, I outline a framework for the study of the higher mental functions that views them as dialogic processes derived from interpersonal activity. According to this view, the higher mental functions develop through the progressive internalization of semiotically manifested perspectives on reality, such that mature functioning involves the simultaneous coming-into-conflict of differing internalized perspectives. I suggest that such an approach goes some way to account for the open-ended and unconstrained nature of higher mental functioning. I also consider some implications of this approach for current research in developmental psychology, with particular reference to the role of care-givers in mental development, the emergence of perspective-taking and mentalizing abilities in early childhood, and the deficits associated with early childhood autism.
Eddy said
Addendum:
The NY Times carries a short essay “How Are Humans Unique?” by Michael Tomasello dated May 25, 2008 here: http://www.nytimes.com/2008/05/25/magazine/25wwln-essay-t.html
Eddy said
Addendum:
A brief essay by Michael Tomasello, “How Are Humans Unique?”, that summarizes some key findings on human cognition is in the May 25 NY Times on line. The essay begins:
“Human beings do not like to think of themselves as animals. It is thus with decidedly mixed feelings that we regard the frequent reports that activities once thought to be uniquely human are also performed by other species: chimpanzees who make and use tools, parrots who use language, ants who teach. Is there anything left?
“You might think that human beings at least enjoy the advantage of being more generally intelligent. To test this idea, my colleagues and I recently administered an array of cognitive tests — the equivalent of nonverbal I.Q. tests — to adult chimpanzees and orangutans (two of our closest primate relatives) and to 2-year-old human children. As it turned out, the children were not more skillful overall. They performed about the same as the apes on the tests that measured how well they understood the physical world of space, quantities and causality. The children performed better only on tests that measured social skills: social learning, communicating and reading the intentions of others.”
How are Humans Unique?
Mike E said
eddy: I put instructions on how to make an article title clickable. The instructions are here: http://mikeely.wordpress.com/2008/05/16/a-true-us-war-hero/#comment-4176
If you insert links in your comments they may not appear immediately, because over three links, the program holds them for approval (to prevent/discourage spam postings).
Paul said
Please delete 10, 11, 12, 13, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32, and 33 (and this post). They are all redundant. I didn’t
understand that the posting of articles with tags was delayed, so I posted the same information multiple times by mistake.
Cultural Animal said
Otto Rank was the founder of Humanist psychology, broke away from Freud before Jung did, and did not have any associations with any Nazis.
note bene said
There is a recent talk by Bob Avakian that captures a whole method which combines a vague call for ‘digging into things” with a glib, uninformed, curt, dismissive set of pre-existing verdicts.
Freud write almost a century ago. He has been dissected, critiqued etc. by literally generations of theorists (including Marxists…) And yet Avakian announces that this is something that needs ”
“needs to be dug into and criticized much more thoroughly…”
Sure. Who can deny that? But is there no discussion of why (a century later) Avakian’s Marxism has said so little? Do any of his followers know what Althusser said on these matters, or Deleuse? Or Foucault? Is it possible to breeze past such things (and such theories) and pose as the synthesizer of world-historic proportions?
Avakian is not alone in all this (or else this would not be worth mentioning). He is merely a local and current (and particularly obvious) variant of a more general problem.
How long can we communists tolerate this approach — where we are asked to put on blinders, and then told to pretend that the world is just a narrow slice? This is not just a matter of a rather outrageous approach to psychology, but a crippled approach to theory in general.