[OPE-L:3509] Re: Re: Marxism and 19th century materialism

From: Paul Cockshott (wpc@dcs.gla.ac.uk)
Date: Mon Jun 19 2000 - 05:45:07 EDT


[ show plain text ]

At 21:43 18/06/00 -0400, you wrote:
>I don't believe that Niels Bohr had any such "delivery" in mind
>when he formulated his philosophical gloss on the scientific
>discoveries in which he played so large a part. He was
>struggling honestly with the implications of the new quantum
>findings, without any prior commitment to philosophical
>idealism. (I do agree, however, that later commentators --
>lacking Bohr's intimate knowledge of the actual physics -- have
>taken the "Copenhagen interpretation" as a springboard for
>instrumentalist and idealist musings.)

I would not accuse him of that, though I do believe that he
was influenced by the instrumentalist philosophies current
at the time.

The blessed delivery that I spoke of was how it has been seen
by numerous New Age, spiritualist and reactionary commentators
since.

Beyond that I regard the Copenhagen interpretation as itself being
an idealist interpretation of the subject matter.



This archive was generated by hypermail 2b29 : Fri Jun 30 2000 - 00:00:04 EDT