From: Rakesh Bhandari (bhandari@BERKELEY.EDU)
Date: Mon Nov 15 2004 - 11:32:54 EST
At 6:17 PM -0500 11/13/04, Howard Engelskirchen wrote: >Hi Rakesh, > >You write: > >"In his chapter on Marxism is not a Historicism, Althusser fights >above all else against the subsumption of science to the >superstructure . .. . " > >I don't remember Althusser's argument on this, but what else could it be? By above I meant Althusser attempted to articulate the difference between science and ideology, not dissolve it. Althusser insisted that Marxism was politically useful because it was true, not that it was true because it was politically useful. In terms of epistemology, Althusser was not a pragmatist (at least if I follow Lecourt). So what would Althusser have thought of Bhaskar's criticism of Rorty? Althusser's criticism of Gramsci in said chapter elicted a Gramscian response by Joseph Femia in his book on Gramsci. >The concept of a dog doesn't bite. Yes influence of Spinoza was real on Althusser. > The understandings we form of things are >the product of consciousness. Without doubt scientific practice may take >place in the course of e.g. the struggle for production, say experimenting >with variations of intercropping, but the science of it? Sorry not following. > >Howard >
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