2009/6/4 Paul Cockshott <wpc@dcs.gla.ac.uk>
> Dave Zachariah wrote:
>
>> I think Jerry is pointing to a real problem in the Marxian tradition. Its
>> scientific content should be possible develop without references to some
>> initial founding texts. That is a characteristic in most mature sciences.
>> There is no need for Darwinists to constantly go back to Darwin.
>>
> Reading Gould and Dawkins, they do often go back to Darwin and argue about
> just what Darwin's view of natural selection was.
>
You are right. But what Darwin thought is no longer crucial for the progress
of the Darwinian research program. A new researcher can enter and contribute
to it without ever having read Darwin or Huxley in the original.
I should be more precise by "going back". There is certainly nothing wrong
in going back to foundational texts in order to consider the original
questions raised. That may indeed be necessary at certain points in the
development of the research program. The problem is if no developments can
be made beyond the foundational texts without constantly finding
justifications in them.
//Dave Z
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Received on Thu Jun 4 06:33:04 2009
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