Marxism and Lacan - Incompatible Theories

[cactusflower]

"To Hegel the process of thinking, which under the name of "the Idea" he even transforms into an independent subject, is the demiurgos (the creator, the maker) of the real world..With me, on the contrary, the ideal is nothing else than the material world reflected in the human mind, and translated into forms of thought" - (From Capital - Volume 1)
Is your "neumenal raw nature" the same as Marx's "material world" ? Thoughts are the products of the brain and the brain is part of nature: our thoughts can't go beyond, or extend nature, they reflect it.

[cactusflower]

"Ceci n'est pas une pipe" - Duchamp. He wanted to make it clear that a picture of a pipe was not a pipe. I don't agree with your interpretation of the Fountain, but as you say, its late.

Btw - I didn't say "numbers count material objects" - although they most certainly do. I said

Number only has any meaning because it is a form that can be filled with content that reflects material reality. It's a conceptual tool that describes quantity of things

[Cael]

"To Hegel the process of thinking, which under the name of "the Idea" he even transforms into an independent subject, is the demiurgos (the creator, the maker) of the real world..With me, on the contrary, the ideal is nothing else than the material world reflected in the human mind, and translated into forms of thought" - (From Capital - Volume 1)
Is your "neumenal raw nature" the same as Marx's "material world" ? Thoughts are the products of the brain and the brain is part of nature: our thoughts can't go beyond, or extend nature, they reflect it.

Yes, Marx is saying that our thoughts are reflections of the neumenal world, rather than, as the idealists would have it, that the neumenal world is, in effect, moulded in the image of our thoughts - that what we see, i.e. the phenomenon, is a phantom of the neumenon, generated by neumenon certainly, but percieved not as it actually is, but as our thoughts will have it. In contradiction to idealism, Marx and Engels say that we dont have an inborn thought system - our thought system is the result of our encounter with the neumenon. That is not to say that they believed that we could really know the neumenon. We are still at the mercy of language, and language is limited. This is the essence of the concept of the Real - what is beyond language.

[Cael]

"Ceci n'est pas une pipe" - Duchamp. He wanted to make it clear that a picture of a pipe was not a pipe.

That would be a rather redundant statement, wouldn't it? To go further with what I said on Duchamp, he showed that it is the space itself that determines what the object inside it will be counted as. A urinal would not be considered a work of art, but if a celebrated artist puts it on a pedestal in an art gallery, then it has filled a space reserved for works of art, and so, it becomes a work of art.

[cactusflower]

I think it would help if you clarified what you mean by neumenal. I have just looked it up, and found a number of different definitions.

[cactusflower]

[QUOTE=Cael;1578160]Yes, Marx is saying that our thoughts are reflections of the neumenal world, rather than, as the idealists would have it, that the neumenal world is, in effect, moulded in the image of our thoughts - that what we see, i.e. the phenomenon, is a phantom of the neumenon, generated by neumenon certainly, but percieved not as it actually is, but as our thoughts will have it. In contradiction to idealism, Marx and Engels say that we dont have an inborn thought system - our thought system is the result of our encounter with the neumenon. That is not to say that they believed that we could really know the neumenon. We are still at the mercy of language, and language is limited. This is the essence of the concept of the Real - what is beyond language.[/QUOTE]

That isn't at all what Marx and Engels say. Lenin encapsulates it well here:

"Materialism in general recognises objectively real being (matter) as independent of the conciousness, sensation, experience etc. of humanity. Historical materialism recognises social being as independent of the social conciousness of humanity.

In both cases conciousness is only the reflection of being, at best an approximately true (adequate, perfectly exact) reflection of it."

The material world is knowable through our senses/brains. It is to a baby with no language at all.

[Cael]

I think it would help if you clarified what you mean by neumenal. I have just looked it up, and found a number of different definitions.

I mean the thing as it is, independent of our perception of it. Like a rock, for example. We only percieve it according to certain categories such as weight, hardness, colour, heat, etc. or according to scientific concepts such as atoms and molecules. Even to think of it as a rock at all is entirely based on our own system of categorisation. The thing, as we percieve and categorise it, is called the phenomenon.

[Cael]

[quote=cactusflower;1578188]

Yes, Marx is saying that our thoughts are reflections of the neumenal world, rather than, as the idealists would have it, that the neumenal world is, in effect, moulded in the image of our thoughts - that what we see, i.e. the phenomenon, is a phantom of the neumenon, generated by neumenon certainly, but percieved not as it actually is, but as our thoughts will have it. In contradiction to idealism, Marx and Engels say that we dont have an inborn thought system - our thought system is the result of our encounter with the neumenon. That is not to say that they believed that we could really know the neumenon. We are still at the mercy of language, and language is limited. This is the essence of the concept of the Real - what is beyond language.[/QUOTE]

That isn't at all what Marx and Engels say. Lenin encapsulates it well here:

"Materialism in general recognises objectively real being (matter) as independent of the conciousness, sensation, experience etc. of humanity. Historical materialism recognises social being as independent of the social conciousness of humanity.

In both cases conciousness is only the reflection of being, at best an approximately true (adequate, perfectly exact) reflection of it."

The material world is knowable through our senses/brains. It is to a baby with no language at all.

I dont see that this quote contradicts what I have said at all. Both idealism and dialectical materialism recognises matter as being independent of thought - thats why its refered to as neumenal. The phenomenon, on the other hand, in not independent of our thoughts.

Explain what you mean by "knowable" for a baby?

[cactusflower]

That's starting from thought, Cael. Why not try it the other way around? The stone exists independently of us. Our senses receive an "imprint" from the stone. Our brains process that imprint through thought (which is a complex process)
The rock of course has all the physical qualities of a rock and we get a partial and incomplete but accurate reflection of it through our senses.

[cactusflower]

[quote=Cael;1578210]

I dont see that this quote contradicts what I have said at all. Both idealism and dialectical materialism recognises matter as being independent of thought - thats why its refered to as neumenal. The phenomenon, on the other hand, in not independent of our thoughts.

Explain what you mean by "knowable" for a baby?

They did believe - and so do I - that the material world is knowable.