How I view Marxism

Marx and Engels wrote a lot, and on all sorts of topics. What they had to say about science, metaphysics, epistemology, ethics, etc., may be interesting, but, to me, none of this is Marxism. Marxism, to me, is a definition and analysis of what Marx understands as “capitalism.” Moreover, it is not a characterization of capitalism under government control, but an analysis of “laissez faire capitalism” or what currently goes by the name of “anarcho-capitalism.” Capitalism is the market system composed of two classes — the bourgeoisie (his name for entrepreneurs and business owners) and the proletariat (workers or people who do not have access to subsistence other than selling their labor services). There are in some countries and regions of the world people who are neither bourgeois-es nor proletarians (i.e., people who do not live under capitalism). These are indigenous people and free peasants. By a “free peasant” I mean one who is not renting, who does not have a mortgage, and does not pay taxes. Are there such people? James Scott wrote a study of such people (look here)

What does Marxism say about these people? Nothing. Why? Because they are not part of the capitalist economy, and Marxism is an analysis of the capitalist economy. And what does Marx say about the capitalist economy? That it has the seeds of its own destruction. And that is all that Marxism means to me. Mind you, what Marx wrote about was a model of pure capitalism, i.e., anarcho-capitalism, as we may call it today. He was not writing about capitalism with government intervention (i.e., the welfare state or crony capitalism).

Marx anticipated a classless state which he called communism. But such anticipations or predictions are not essential to the claim that pure capitalism will self-destruct. This prognosis is the “scientific” socialism of Marxism, as contrasted with a moral ideal of a classless society espoused by so-called “utopian” or libertarian socialists.

After the Russian Revolution in 1917, people seized land from large estates — creating a country of relatively free peasants. What would Marx say about such peasants? I suppose he would congratulate them for their freedom; and if they organized themselves by regional councils — still more congratulations. [See the Marx-Zasulich Correspondence (1881)]

Now what did the Bolsheviks in Russia, who called themselves “Marxists” do? Under Stalin, they liquidated the peasants in Ukraine by the millions. I ask: by what diabolical train of reasoning can you get such a policy from Marx?

Is Tribalism an evil?

Desmond Morris, a zoologist, in the book, The Human Zoo (1969), writes: “Man is a tribal animal, and the great super-tribes will always be in competition with one another.” p. 117 of chapter 4: “In-groups and Out-groups.”  

Watch below the BBC six-part series “The Human Animal,” presented by Desmond Morris in 1994.  Tribalism is covered in the 3rd part.

Nationalism is one form of expression of tribalism. It is the desire to have your nation or tribe be a State.  The trouble arises when your tribe or nation is believed to be superior to other tribes or nations.  This is what happened in Nazi Germany, especially when the tribe or nation is seen as a Nordic warrior nation, with an exaggerated image of self-importance.

Sebastian Junger – Why Tribalism Is Critical

Amy Chua on tribal politics

Problems for Humanity: the views of Yuval Noah Harari

Yuval Noah Harari is author of Sapiens (2014), Homo Deus (2016), and 21 Lessons for the 21st Century (2018).

Nationalism vs. globalism: the new political divide

I have watched a few talks and interviews with Yuval Harari, and at this point I will say that what he says is partly true, but also misleading. I will mention some things which struck me as misleading. His general view of history from the point of view of “authority” is given as a three part progression. First, man finds authority in external gods. Second, man shifts authority to himself (he calls this humanism). Third, we are moving in the direction of giving authority to computer algorithms. This is misleading. Why? Because when we moved away from religious superstitions, we did not replace this with a criterion — which he says we use — of how we “feel.” No, we moved to science, using the criteria of logic and testing. The use of computers is a further extension of the use of science. But he is right that computers and artificial intelligence in the form of expert system are being used more extensively.

Another misleading matter was how he referred to such things as “nations” as “fictions.” This is misleading. Jeremy Bentham also used the word “fiction” to refer to such abstract entities as “nations” and “justice.” But this use of the word “fiction” is not the same as when we talk about “science fiction.” For the creatures of mythology and science fiction, Bentham used the word “fable.” And fictions, in this sense, are not fables. One should consult John Searle on this matter. These so-called fictions are, according to Searle, institutional facts. [Look here]

The other thing that struck me about Harari was his claim that free will does not exist. Again this is a misleading claim. In our ordinary way of talking, we contrast those occasions when someone did something without being compelled to do it and when he was compelled to do something. For example, you are mugged and are forced to surrender your wallet. We will say that you did not do this of your free will. But if you did so without compulsion of any sort, we would say that you did it freely — out of a free will. What Harari is after is the question: did you have any choice in having the desires that you have. But that is another, and different matter.



The World of the “Intelligentsia” and the World of the Common Person

I am reading Karl Popper’s “Open Society and Its Enemies” (1943), which is a critical examination of views on politics and history, and I am overwhelmed by his scholarship.  Reading him, and checking on some of his sources, makes me realize how “unread” I am.  I keep learning from authors like him, of various great books which were never mentioned in any list of “great books” which I am familiar with. So, I keep learning.  But I also reflect on the following.  Suppose Popper has — say — a “solution.”  Who will read his book? What difference will it make, and to who?  OK, so I read it, and write something about it, as here. Who will read me, and follow up by reading Popper?  The circle of people who I will influence — in even a miniscule way — is very small.    
There is a European term for the reading public, and it doesn’t mean someone who has mastered literacy and reads fiction, but a reader who has cultural and political interests. The term is “intelligentsia” and is broader than the term “intellectual.” So, there is this class of readers and writers who feed off each other.  But, I think, the circle of this class is small and closed.  I mean that the impact or influence of this class on the wider public is, practically speaking, near zero.

Six Kinds of Bullshit


I wrote that there are six areas which one can find things which are unacceptable, i.e., which are  “bullshit.”  Expressed in neutral terms, they are —  without being exhaustive — the following:

1. Appraise importance, relevancy, and genuineness.

2. Appraise the truth value: factual falsity or logical inconsistency.

3. Appraise the worth of an argument.

4. Appraise the worth of an excuse or justification.

5. Appraise the meaningfulness of a piece of prose.

6. Appraise actions, practices, and institutions.

Let me illustrate each of these.

1.  What is and what isn’t important is, of course, relative to our goals and interests.  And since our goals and interests vary, so will the importance and relevancy of the means to achieve these goals.  But let’s be realistic. To do anything, you have to be alive and healthy; so, staying alive and healthy has an importance and priority over other goals and interests.  Now, consider a person who has to be self-sufficient — as an extreme, consider a person stranded on an island.  He can stay alive and healthy by using the resources available to him on the island.  What is important and relevant in his case is survival techniques, the sort Boy Scouts learn and Bear Grylls exhibits.  The city-dweller, by contrast, can buy everything he needs and desires, if he has the money. So, it is important for him to get money — to make a living.  

2.  To make his way either on the island or in the city, a person has to have knowledge, and knowledge is of the what is true.  If he is living in fictions, he will not survive either on the island or in the city. Take note of what Bear Grylls knows, and also knows how to do.

3.  Many things are known indirectly, either by hearsay, by induction, and by deduction — by circumstantial evidence, as lawyers say.  You should be able to judge accurately the worth of each.  If you don’t, you may wind up with fictions — with falsehoods. Since almost everything we know about the changing world comes by way of the news and editorials, it is important to have a keen sense of bullshit detection.

4.  People you rely on may not pan out.  And when confronted, they will offer a justification or an excuse for why they failed.  Some excuses may be genuine; others, not.  Can you distinguish between a genuine person and a bullshitter?   

5. I can’t tell you how many times I listened to lectures or tried reading articles and books, without being able to understand.  At first, I put the onus on myself, thinking that I was not familiar enough with the topic, or did not have a clear command of the English language, or that the topic was, as they say, “too deep” for me.  As I grew older, and more read, I realized that now I could make a distinction between what was intrinsically incomprehensible (or relatively so), and where I lacked the background knowledge.  There are such things as nonsense or meaningless sentences, contradictions, and a whole slew of unclarities due to ambiguity, vagueness, sloppy sentence constructions, highfalutin language, pomposity, needless verbiage and double talk.

6.  As to human institutions, this is like a garbage heap.  There are superstitions, religions, pseudo-science, stereotypes, prejudices, but most importantly bad political institutions, which control the nature of economics, i.e., the way one survives.  Here there is a division between those who want to preserve the status quo — the Conservatives or the Right; and those who want to change things for the benefit of the common people — the Left.  The conservatives are those who are successful in their economic status, or who have religious tribal allegiance. The left are mostly teachers and writers, but also those who are not economically successful.  Conservative like capitalism; leftists do not.

Dictatorial Mass Representative Democracies: Ukraine and the United States

What passes for “democracy” in most of the world is better expressed by the phrase “dictatorial mass representative democracy.” Why? Because through universal suffrage, people are obliged to elect individuals with discretionary powers, which in the ancient Roman republic were called “dictators.” And these individuals are not chosen from within a small “community,” but from a region of several thousand or millions of people. Such a practice I call “mass democracy.”

I consider both dictators and mass democracy to be evils, which should be done away with.

Any country which has an elected President, Governor, or Mayor (of a large city) qualifies as a “dictatorial mass representative democracy.” A lesser dictatorship exists where there is a Prime Minister, elected by a Parliament. Why? Because, as in England, the Prime Minister has to be responsible to Parliament and can easily be dismissed.

Let me compare three countries which can be ranked as the worst to the best of representative mass democracies. These are Ukraine, the United States, and Switzerland.

Ukraine is the worst for the single reason that it is not federated nor well decentralized. Federation means that there are relatively autonomous regions in the country as in the United States, which is divided into semi-autonomous states, counties, and municipalities; or, as in Switzerland, into cantons and municipalities. The states and cantons have their own constitutions, and elect their governors and mayors locally. Ukraine, by contrast, is not constituted by states or cantons, but rather by bureaucratic regions, called Oblasts, governed by governors, who are not elected by the people, but are appointed by the President. The only relative autonomy in Ukraine is exercised on the municipal level by the local election of a mayor and city council. However, the local prosecutor, the police, and the judges are appointed by the national ministries, rather than by the mayor, the council, or by elections. The result: a very centralized dictatorship.

I may add that Ukraine also suffers from a dictatorial judicial system. Instead of a jury of one’s peers, Ukraine uses a single judge to determine guilt or innocence. There is no option for a jury.

All three countries have a parliament. Ukraine has a unicameral one; while the United States and Switzerland have bicameral parliaments.

Of the three mass representative democracies, only Switzerland is not a dictatorship. Why? Because Switzerland does not have an executive branch run by a single individual — a President or a Prime Minister; instead, it has a Federal Council, composed of seven individuals. These are nominated by the four majority parties of the parliament, and elected by the joint bicameral parliament. The Federal Council deliberates and votes in secret, and presents its results as a joint decision. Thus their individual voting patterns are not known to anyone outside the Federal Council itself. It is extremely difficult to bribe or threaten them, unlike the ease of doing so in Ukraine and the United States.

Ukraine — like the United States — elects its President by a national election. However, in Ukraine the President nominates the Prime Minister, four ministry heads, and appoints all the governors. Since the Prime Minister is confirmed by the Parliament, he or she must be acceptable to the ruling party in Parliament. The Prime Minister, in turn, nominates the remaining heads of the ministries. By contrast, in the United States, the President nominates all the cabinet heads, as well as the Supreme Court Justices.

In Switzerland, the seven executives constitute the cabinet, and decide jointly; rather than by dictatorial decisions of a President as in Ukraine and the United States.

I must also mention the peculiarity of Swiss mass democracy which forms a check on their government, that is the mandatory national referendum for altering their constitution, and their optional national initiatives and referendums for challenging or introducing laws. Although the national referendums and initiatives are better to have than not to have, they have the drawback of any mass democracy: they are prone to being swayed by propaganda and mass media which, of course, are controlled by money. Incidentally, that is also the reason why the elected representatives in any parliament tend to be rich or the friends of the rich. It takes money to win mass elections.

One last caveat. All democratic countries of the world are top-down (mass) democracies. A better form of government would be bottom-up democracy consisting of communities of about 150 families forming a nested council democracy, sometimes referred to as anarchism.

Here us a link to a diagram of the Executive Branch of Government of Ukraine

Humpty Dumpty Bullshit

I am still trying to recover from Jordan Peterson’s condemnation of Marxism because of what Stalin did.

Jordan Peterson by rejecting Marxism, contextually implied that he knows what Marxism is. But he can’t because the term “Marxism” is ambiguous and vague. If we try to clarify, here are some of the issues which will face us.

Someone may say that Marxism is the view of Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels. Such a claim would assume that their views were if not identical, at least so close as to be equivalent. Now, to determine whether this is so, requires doing scholarship — reading all of the writings of Marx and Engels. Someone who does such a thing may be called a Marx and Engels scholar, and this does not make them Marxists unless they also agree with what they read.

Now, in reading any text, there is an element of interpretation. And if there is any inconsistency in the texts, the interpretation, in order to restore consistency, must take a stand. I suppose a systematization of the writings of Marx and Engels will be akin to something akin to a systematized theology. But formulating a coherent system — even if one agrees with it — will not be Marxism, unless some of the claims are peculiar only
to Marx, and are adhered to.

In short, there are as many “Marxisms” as there are interpretations of Marx. Furthermore there may be some who, like Humpty Dumpty, call themselves “Marxists” (like Stalin) by sheer prescription or fiat.

Jordan Peterson, an example of a sincere bullshitter

What is a sincere bullshitter? It is someone who says things in an irresponsible manner. And what is it to say things in an irresponsible manner? Basically it is to repeat something that one has heard without any attempt at criticism. In this sense, we are all born into the “original sin” of assimilating and constructing a world-view, and repeating things without criticism. What do I mean by this? I have in mind the idea that the mind hates a vacuum of beliefs, and fills it with whatever information is at hand. The result is that in many cases when people are asked to express an opinion, they will pull out of their mental repository anything which is remotely relevant. A good example of this is the result of asking for directions when trying to get to some destination. There were times when I was sent in opposite directions by two helpful direction givers. What does this indicate? For one, it indicates the reluctance of people to say that they don’t know, or that they are not certain; instead they are ready to blurt out whatever comes to their head, which may or may not be bullshit. In any case, the tendency to bullshit is there.

Mind you, I am not saying that most of a person’s world-view is mistaken; not at all. If that were the case, the person would not survive. If you consider the world-view of a primitive “savage,” it is composed of a functioning realism and superstition. Superstition is the result of filling the mental vacuum with beliefs which transcends experience.

Now, combine the idea that everyone has a world-view and the fact that a particular person, such as Jordan Peterson, is in fact very knowledgeable in some field of knowledge, and with the fact that this person has achieved some kind of fame. The result will be what Ortega-y-Gasset calls the “mass man.” He is a scientist who knows his field, and because of this, claims (without warrant) to be knowledgeable in other fields as well.

As Richard Wolff has pointed out, Jordan Peterson is a psychologist, but he is neither an economist nor someone who knows Marxism. Yet, because he has achieved a great amount of internet recognition, has a sense of privilege to express irresponsible bullshit.

His argument against Marxism — and I am not exaggerating — is this:

Stalin was evil.
Stalin was a Marxist.
Therfore, Marxism is evil.

This is an invalid — even a silly argument. It has the same form as:

Stalin was evil.
Stalin was a man.
Therefore, men are evil.

or,

Stalin was evil.
Stalin was a vegetarian.
Therefore, vegetarians are evil.

Listening to Peterson, it is clear to me that he is blurting out stuff about Marxism from the windmills of his mind.

Below are three videos. The first two compare what Peterson says about Marxism with what Noam Chomsky says. [Incidentally, it is always wise to check what Chomsky has to say.] The third is a response by Richard Wolff to Peterson. [Richard Wolff is a self-proclaimed Marxist economist.]

The Nature of a Cynic

George Carlin, in one of his skits [see below], concluded with “fuck hope,” and went on to explain: “And please don’t confuse my point of view with cynicism -– the real cynics are the ones who tell you everything’s gonna be all right.”

Although Carlin was careful and precise about the use of language, I think he was wrong about cynicism.

Cynicism is in the ball park of pessimism and skepticism, so we must distinguish them. A skeptic is someone who expresses doubt about the truth of some claim. Let us say the claim is that everything will be all right. His attitude is one of uncertainty one way or the other; whereas the optimist is confident that everything will be all right, and the pessimist is equally confident that it will not. So, where does the cynic fit in?

It has to do with what one believes about human nature. There is a position believed by some called “psychological egoism.” This is the position that humans, by nature, are selfish and do everything with their personal interest in mind. If this position is correct, then so-called altruistic actions are only apparently so.  If now everything turning out all right depends on genuinely altruistic actions, then the cynic denied this possibility, and therefore is a convinced pessimist.

We must, in view of this, view the normal pessimist and optimist as both subscribing to the view that genuine altruistic actions are possible; with the pessimist saying that they are not probable in the situation; whereas the optimist saying that they are probable. And the cynic saying that real altruistic actions will not occur — not because they are improbable, but because they are impossible.

If the cynic then tells you that things will be all right, he is speaking ironically or sarcastically.  So, what Carlin is calling a real cynic, is an ironic or a sarcastic cynic.

George Carlin was both ironic and sarcastic at times, but he was never an ironic or sarcastic cynic. He did not believe that human doom was inevitable, only that it was probable.