MOSCOW, 1908
[5-10] In intellectual circles, a traditional attitude towards philosophy has been established... Philosophical ideas are seen as too little and too weakly connected with any class substructure...
Many, indeed very many, Marxists also hold this view. They are convinced that in the ranks of the proletarian vanguard, a colorful diversity of philosophical views is permissible, and it does not matter much whether the ideologues of the proletariat confess materialism or energetics, neo-Kantianism or Machism...
To adhere to this view means to fall into a naive, deplorable error... All without exception, the philosophical terms and formulas with which *philosophy* operates, ... serve |it| to denote social classes, groups, cells, and their interrelations. When dealing with the philosophical system of one or another bourgeois thinker, we are dealing with a picture of the class structure of society, drawn with conventional signs and reproducing the social profession de foi of a certain bourgeois group...
These pictures cannot be taken as something that could be utilized and reconciled with the proletarian worldview. This would mean falling into opportunism, attempting to combine the incompatible...
C:\Program Files\Far\... The first, brilliant attempt at such a revaluation took place several years ago.
Article sic!
. incorrect incorrect!

* philosophy. Ed.
+
212

Comrade A. Bogdanov's article "Authoritarian Thinking"* undoubtedly opens a new era in the history of philosophy: after the appearance of this article, speculative philosophy lost the right to operate with its two main concepts, "spirit" and "body"; it was established that these concepts were formed against the backdrop of authoritarian relations, and the antithesis between them reflected the social antithesis - the antithesis of organizing "tops" and executing "bottoms." With astonishing consistency, bourgeois criticism has hushed up the work of the Russian Marxist...
Under such conditions, the socio-genetic analysis of philosophical concepts and systems is not only desirable but absolutely necessary. The task is very difficult and complex. ... Modern fashionable systems, for example, neo-Kantianism or Machism...
Our sketch is intended not for a limited circle of specialists... The demos shows an interest in philosophy... Our exposition has a somewhat elementary character... The point of view we defend... can be more easily assimilated if illustrated not by cumbersome, but by judiciously selected material...
I
ORGANIZING AND ORGANIZED "BEGINNINGS"
[11-14] Economic inequality emerged: organizers gradually turned into owners of the means of production**, which once belonged to society...
The production relations of the "authoritarian" society... The primitive ||savage|| begins to see everywhere the manifestation of the organizing will.
"... The executor is accessible
!!
such nonsense!
??
now it's clear nonsense!!

* Published in his collection of articles "From the Psychology of Society."
** Here, we somewhat deviate from the explanation proposed by Comrade Bogdanov: Comrade Bogdanov does not attach to this circumstance the significance it undoubtedly had, even does not bring it forward. We have had occasion to discuss this question elsewhere: "from the history and practice of class struggle" (in the chapters devoted to the genesis of commanding classes). Pub. S. Dorovatsky and A. Charushnikov.

NOTES ON V. SHULYATIKOV'S BOOK to the external senses - this is the physiological organism, the body; the organizer is inaccessible to them, he is assumed to be inside the body; this is the spiritual personality"...
Very "general"!! Phrases. The savage and primitive communism are blurred. Materialism and idealism in Greece are also.
The concept of spirit becomes increasingly abstract.
When in the history of Greek philosophy, the famous question was posed:
how is it possible for a pure, unchanging, non-material substance to give rise to the multiplicity of transient phenomena of the material world? what is the relationship between "being" and "becoming"? - this was not, contrary to the assurances of all sorts of historians of philosophy, the highest flight of noble human thought, the most disinterested effort aimed at solving the greatest mystery of the universe and thus eternally blessing the human race. The matter was much simpler! Such a formulation of the question spoke of nothing other than the fact that in the Greek cities, the process of social stratification had gone far, that the abyss between the social "tops" and "bottoms" had become deeper, and the old ideology of the organizers, which corresponded to less differentiated social relations, had lost its right to exist. Previously, despite the difference between substance and the world of phenomena, the immediate connection between them did not arouse doubts. Now, the existence of this connection is denied. Substance and the world of phenomena are declared incommensurable quantities. The relationship between them is possible only through a series of intermediate links. Or, expressed in more philosophical language, we cannot establish their interrelations either through the senses or through ordinary thinking: for this, the assistance of some special "idea," some special intuition, is required.
Fiction and bare phrase.
only idealism!
yes, yes.
And Greek materialism?
and the skeptics??

II
ORGANIZING AND ORGANIZED "PRINCIPLES" IN THE PERIOD OF MANUFACTURE PRODUCTION
[15-17] The same question—the question of the incommensurability of spiritual and material "principles," and the absence of a direct connection between them—was raised and addressed by the founders of the new philosophy...
The spiritual sympathies of the Renaissance and subsequent epochs are usually mentioned in passing, but they are very characteristic*...
The medieval craftsman, being an organizer, also performed executive functions—working alongside his apprentices. The bourgeois manufacturer knows only one type of function: he is a pure organizer. In the first case, the ground for the dualistic "way of representing facts," which Comrade Bogdanov clarified, is indeed given, but the antithesis between the organizer and the executor is somewhat veiled, and therefore the corresponding antithesis in the realm of ideology, between the spiritual and the corporeal, the active and the passive principle, could not take on a sharp form... In the workshop of the medieval craftsman, there was no place for representatives of so-called untrained, unskilled labor. In the manufacturing workshop, such work is found. They form the "lower stratum." Above them are other strata, other groups of workers, distinguished from one another by their degree of qualification. Within their ranks, some organizing layers already form. Moving up the ascending ladder of links, we see groups of technical managers and administrators. The owner of the enterprise is thus "liberated" not only from all physical labor but also from many purely organizational duties...
[19] In contrast to medieval thinkers, the "fathers" of the new philosophy pay a great deal of attention in their systems to the world of transient phenomena, studying its structure, development, and the laws of the relationship of its parts, creating a natural philosophy. The same "elevated" position of the leaders of manufacturing enterprises, which inspired the "fathers" of the new philosophy with the "pure" idea of organizing will, also suggested to them a mechanical explanation of the processes of material reality, i.e., processes occurring in the organized mass.
The point is that the leader of the manufacturing enterprise is merely the final link in a rather long chain of organizing links. In relation to him, the other organizers are subordinates and, in turn, stand opposed to him as the organized. ... But since their role differs from that of the chief leader, since it is reduced to participation in the technical work from which the chief leader is "liberated," their "spiritual" character fades, and their activity is assessed as the activity of "matter"...
[21-24] The bourgeois system is generally a two-faced Janus... Indeed, a decisive formulation of dualism is found only in Cartesianism—a system created precisely at the dawn of the new economic era; indeed, subsequent philosophical systems, starting with Spinoza's, declare the Cartesian opposition of God and the world, spirit and body, to be contradictory. ... The materialist and positivist systems of bourgeois philosophy do not, in turn, testify to the triumph over the dualistic viewpoint. The difference between bourgeois metaphysics and bourgeois "positive worldview" is not as great as it might seem at first glance. ... The attack from the side of materialism is not directed against the fundamental premise put forward by metaphysics: the concept of organizing will is not erased by materialism. It appears under different names: for example, "spirit" is replaced by "force"...
In the 17th century, during its "stormy aspirations," the English bourgeoisie preached a doctrine according to which everything in the world should be explained as the movement of material particles, occurring with mechanical necessity. The English bourgeoisie was then laying the foundation for large-scale capitalist production... The whole world was depicted by them as an organization of material particles, combining according to immanent laws...
Similar treatises flooded the book market by the French bourgeoisie in the second half of the 18th century... And what is the internal structure of enterprises, we know: it is the kingdom of matter and mechanical processes. From this comes the generalization: man is a machine, nature is a machine...
The movement of matter is determined by itself, more precisely, by its own force (Holbach). The organizing will, as you can see, has again been transformed, but its presence is confirmed and recognized as absolutely necessary.
... The manufacturers did not act as revolutionary "Sturm und Drang" figures...
And what about their struggle with the clergy? Shulyatikov has distorted history!
III
CARTESIANISM
[25-29] The organized need an organizer...
Intermediate organizing links—"individual souls"—can perform their organizing role only in the presence of a supreme organizing center. Only the latter brings them into contact with the proletariat—"matter"—within the framework of the organized whole, the manufacturing workshop...
Descartes' concept of man is nothing more than the further extension of a certain form of thinking, "a certain way of representing facts, a certain type of their combination in the psyche." We have seen that, in Descartes' system, the world is organized according to the model of a manufacturing enterprise...
We are dealing with the cult of intellectual labor...
I am an organizer, and as such, I can exist only by performing organizing functions, not executive ones: this is what the Cartesian concept means.

* Let us recall that Marx in the first volume of "Capital" and K. Kautsky note the dependence of abstract religious views on the development of commodity production.

NB
This vulgarization of the history of philosophy completely forgets the struggle of the bourgeoisie with feudalism.

What is the internal structure of enterprises, we know: it is the kingdom of matter and mechanical processes. From this comes the generalization: man is a machine, nature is a machine...

NB
Such nonsense!
proletariat = matter nonsense

NOTES ON V. SHULYATIKOV'S BOOK

This assertion, if translated into the language of class relations...
The ordinary, naive view represents the external world as it appears through the prism of the senses...
The concept of a worker merely as a cobbler or as an upholsterer gives way to the concept of the worker in general. The profession no longer constitutes the "essence" of labor power...
[31-33] Time, Descartes explains, cannot be considered a property of matter: it is a "mode of thought," a generic concept created by the latter...
Philosophy from now on is the faithful handmaiden of capital. ... The revaluation of philosophical values was determined by movements among the organizing upper echelons and the organized lower ranks. New organizers, new organized - new concepts of God and soul, new concepts of matter...

IV
SPINOZA
[37] Any relation between soul and body only through God. Any relation between intermediate organizing links and the organized mass only with the sanction of the supreme organizer! ...
... The movement of matter and the activity of the soul are but two sides of the same process. There can be no talk of any interaction between the soul and matter.
[41-42] Experience, sensory perception for him is an indispensable condition for the cognition of things...
But... when Spinoza died, as is well known, his remains were carried in a funeral carriage, accompanied with great pomp by the fine fleur of the Dutch bourgeoisie. And if we become more closely acquainted with his circle of acquaintances and correspondents, we will again meet with the fine fleur - not only of the Dutch, but also of the world - bourgeoisie. ... The bourgeoisie honored Spinoza as their bard.
Spinoza's worldview is the song of triumphant capital, - capital that absorbs everything, centralizes everything. Outside of the single substance, there is no being, no things: outside of the large, manufactural enterprise, producers cannot exist...
childishness and "ideas" of Plato

V
LEIBNIZ
[45] Leibniz's God is the owner of a model-run enterprise and a superb organizer himself...
VI
BERKELEY
[51] The period of Sturm und Drang of the English capitalist bourgeoisie corresponded to Hobbes' materialism. The ground for the manufactory was cleared, and calmer times came for the manufacturers: Hobbes' materialism was replaced by the half-system of Locke. Further consolidation of the manufactory's position made possible anti-materialist outbursts.
[56] "The attraction and repulsion of workers must occur without any obstacles": in the perceived complexes, there are absolutely no absolute elements. Everything is relative.
VII
HUME
[61] His kinship with all the thinkers who have appeared in the previous chapters is undeniable...
The position of philosophical skepticism taken by Hume corresponds precisely to such a conception of the capitalist organism.
Lump together! both idealism and skepticism, all "corresponds" to the manufactory! Simple, very simple Mr. Shulyatikov.
bombast explained!
Materialism primitive à la Loria and relativism among the Greeks
1)
2)
3)
obscure and inaccurate
.

NOTES ON V. SHULYATIKOV'S BOOK
IX
FICHTE, SCHELLING, HEGEL
[81] Systems of so-called objective idealism arise...
[88] Objective idealists...
[94] But we know that in all systems of bourgeois worldview "matter" is considered a subordinate principle (even by materialists, who, we repeat, note its subordinate position, introducing the concept of "force")...
[98-99] From Fichte's antithetical method and Schelling's doctrine of potentiation, it is but one step to Hegelian dialectics. In light of what has been said in this chapter about the antithetical method, we have a few additional remarks to make. The "real background" of dialectics has already been clarified by us.
Hegel merely more fully substantiated the theory of development through "opposites," outlined by the other two objective idealists...
The innovation introduced by Hegel underscores the following fact from the realm of "real" relations. The differentiation of functions and roles in the manufactory reaches its maximum. Each individual performing and each individual organizing group undergoes stratification. Functions that belonged to a certain specific group are distributed among various newly forming groups. Each group fragments, giving rise to new ones. And the ideologist of the manufacturers takes into account this process of fragmentation as a process of internal development of one or another "principle"...
X
THE RENAISSANCE OF "MANUFACTURING" PHILOSOPHY
[100-102] Speculative philosophy loses credibility in bourgeois society.
True, this does not happen immediately. But neither did the machine immediately conquer the territory of industry...
? Fichte?
. Fichte?
nonsense and the concept of "movement"?
such nonsense
Fichte - an objective idealist!!!
(such nonsense!
such nonsense!

What explains the positive character of the new ideological systems? Is it simply the law of contrasts, the simple desire to "do the opposite" of what constituted the "creed" of yesterday?..
Individualized "complexes" - Ivan, Peter, Jacob disappear. In their place, the worker in general appears in the workshops. "Matter" regains the "qualities" that were expropriated from it...
Matter is rehabilitated. Bourgeois society introduces the cult of a new idol - "the environment"... Indeed, it is not overlooked that, after all, matter remains matter, i.e., an organized mass, and as such, it cannot exist without a "leader." And to matter, "force" is attached as a specialist in organizational duties. Treatises are written on Stoff und Kraft (on "matter and force")...
[104] A comparison of the latest organization of factories with the internal structure of the manufactory already a priori dictates the answer: the new variety of bourgeois worldview must reproduce the essential features of the worldview of the manufactory era...
[106] Neo-Kantianism is replaced by a "turn" to systems of "pre-Kantian" thinking.
XI
WILHELM WUNDT
[108] "... the object can never be separated from the representation, and the representation - from the object"...
[113-114] The arguments presented sufficiently vividly outline Wundt as a philosopher who sets himself the task of combating materialism or, using a fashionable term, "Überwindung des Materialismus," "overcoming materialism," - and yet does not declare himself on the side of the school that is traditionally considered the opponent of the latter...
In the field of philosophy, the desire to equate intermediate organizing links with representatives of "physical" labor, "lower executors," is precisely expressed in the effort to characterize the "subject" and "object," the "psychical" and the "physical" as something that constitutes an "indivisible" whole, the effort to reduce the antithesis between the named phenomena to a cognitive fiction. The doctrine of
Avenarius such nonsense!
such nonsense
NB
nonsense

NOTES ON THE BOOK BY V. SHULYATIKOV
on the principle of coordination, Ernst Mach's doctrine on the relation of the psychical to the physical, Wundt's doctrine on representations-objects - all these are doctrines of the same order...
[116] Up to now, Wundt's monistic views could not be denied a certain consistency. Equally, he cannot be suspected of idealistic sympathies...
[118] It is precisely this kind of leap that Wundt makes, advancing his arguments about "psychophysical parallelism" after his doctrine of "representations-objects"...
[121] "Attributes" transform into "series," but this is a reform that is essentially more verbal in nature...
[123-124] Primacy is asserted for the spiritual principle...
Everything physical necessarily has its psychical correlate. No worker, no matter how simple a function he performs, can produce any products, find application for his labor power, or exist without being under the immediate, detailed "guidance" of a certain organizer...
... But the psychical series is the "organizers," and the "accompaniment" of the latter means for the "physical series" - for the workers - nothing other than dependence...
[128-131] Thus, according to Wundt, philosophy should transcend the boundaries of experience, "supplement" the latter. It is necessary to continue the philosophical analysis until we obtain the idea of unity embracing both independent series. Having expressed such a view, Wundt immediately hastens to make an important reservation for him: he declares that the unity of the world can be conceived by us either as material unity or as spiritual unity: there is no third solution to the problem...
Wundt refuses to call his idea of universal unity a substance. He defines it as an idea of pure reason, i.e., in the Kantian spirit. Just as Kant's God is the idea of the highest "formative," non-substantial beginning, so Wundt's all-unity is the idea of a non-substantial whole, thanks to which all phenomena acquire a vital meaning, an unshakable value. In the light of this idea, the "empty and cheerless"
this is true, but not so said ha-ha!
eclectic true false worldview, which sees the true essence of phenomena in their external order, in their mechanical connection, disappears. Instead, we adopt the view of the cosmic mechanism as the external shell of spiritual activity and creativity...
Here, Wundt strongly emphasizes the element of actuality. The idea of universal unity,
"the foundation of the world," is reduced by him to the idea of universal will...
We will allow ourselves not to go into the analysis of the formulation he proposed, nor to clarify his theory of "voluntarism"...
... Therefore, the ideologues of the modern vanguard of capitalist bourgeoisie cannot speak of any "constant" organizing principles, but, on the contrary, must characterize the latter as something extremely changeable, something that is always in a state of movement...
XII
EMPIRIOCRITICISM
[133-142] Wundt's critique did not have a devastating force, it struck at an imaginary target. Wundt's appearance and the subsequent response from the camp of Avenarius' students* did not signify a clash of worldviews belonging to two different classes or two major groups of the same class. The socio-economic background of the indicated philosophical contest, in this case, was a relatively insignificant difference between the most advanced and somewhat less advanced types of the latest capitalist organizations...
We must say more: the empiriocritical philosophy should be understood, first of all, as an apology for the mentioned idea. The concept of functional dependence is the negation of causal dependence...
nonsense!
And Schopenhauer?
inaccurate *.
true!
correct that's right oh really??
Then Willy, Petzoldt (twice), Kleinpeter 214

* Carstanjen responded first.

REMARKS ON V. SHULYATIKOV'S BOOK

Höffding's conclusion, in general, must be recognized as correct. Only his reference to "motives of expediency" is unfortunate: these motives are vague and indefinite.
In this case, Avenarius was merely making a concession to materialist phraseology, a concession conditioned by his social position. ...
Compared to vulgar spiritualism, the views of the "parallelists" could seem materialistic to many. The same applies to the views of empirio-criticism. The possibility of their rapprochement with materialism is especially great... Among the broad reading public, the opinion has formed that empirio-criticism is a materialist school. Moreover, even specialist philosophers judge it incorrectly: the patriarch of modern philosophy, Wilhelm Wundt, called it "materialism." Finally, what is most interesting, the empirio-critics themselves, while distancing themselves from materialism, sometimes use its terminology, and at times even begin to waver in their anti-materialist views...
This is the real background that suggested to empirio-criticism the idea of classifying human cognition based on the principle of "biological" classification. But, we repeat, such "biology" has nothing in common with materialism...
Dualism - Avenarius teaches - is the fruit of a certain process of our abstract thinking - "introjection"...
But the antithesis of the "external" and "internal" worlds is pure fiction.
The analysis of this antithesis is extremely important; it should lead to the justification of a monistic worldview. Commentators on Avenarius' philosophical system emphasize this point. "By revealing the impermissibility of introjection - one of them* states - two goals are achieved..."
Of course, but from this it does not follow that functionality cannot
be a form of causality.
right?
wrong!
hmm?
why?
you did not understand!
aha!

* Rudolf Vlassak; cited by Mach in "Analysis of Sensations," p. 52.

... The subordinate organizer, if viewed from his "absolute" standpoint, i.e., if seen as an organizer independent of the "will" that governs him, in the form of workers, faces only a "thing" or "body." But let us take the second case: the subordinate organizer, for the supreme "will," is not only organized but also organizing... The former "object," now transformed into a
"subject," "organizes" matter: man contains the tree, but the tree is transformed, a "representation" of the tree...
"The fullness of human experience" is also demonstrated by Avenarius' doctrine of principled coordination...
For both Avenarius and Wundt, the "series" turn out, in essence, to be "incommensurable." Instead of the materialist understanding of the world, which one would expect given the categorical statements about the "fullness of experience," views come to the fore that testify to the idealist sympathies of empirio-criticism...
However, on the path of idealist constructions, Wundt and Avenarius diverge. The author of the "System of Philosophy" shows a preference for "Kantian" motifs.
The author of "Human Concept of the World" expresses views that bring him closer to the position once occupied by Berkeley.
Let us hasten to add. We do not at all intend to assert that the works of the Bishop of Cloyne determined Avenarius' point of view, or that they had a direct influence on him. But the similarity of the idealist positions of both philosophers is undeniable. This similarity is already evident in the doctrine of principled coordination, taken as a whole.
With the same straightforwardness as Berkeley, Avenarius puts forward the thesis: there are no objects outside the subject. Every "thing" must necessarily "relate" to the central nervous system, which plays the role of a functional center...
[144-149] The supreme "director" does not even appear in the form of a Kantian idea of reason, a Kantian "form," or in the form of Wundt's "universal unity." However, he still exists, still being the main element
oh, suspicious! Cheap explanations without analysis of the essence!
right!
right!
Here Shulyatikov has a misunderstanding.

REMARKS ON V. SHULYATIKOV'S BOOK philosophical system. All phenomena are considered precisely from his point of view. His "invisible" presence is postulated by an unusually high evaluation of the organizing principle, advanced alongside the concept of organized organizers.
In the general picture of the world provided by Avenarius' philosophical reflections, the organizing character of the organizing factors comes to the fore...
For Avenarius, the world is an agglomeration of central nervous systems. "Matter" is completely devoid of any "qualities," whether "primary" or "secondary," once considered its inherent attributes. Everything in matter is determined by "spirit," or, in the terminology of the author of "Critique of Pure Experience," the central nervous system...
The viewpoint of idealism in the style of Berkeley is carried out by the author of "Critique of Pure Experience" with great consistency...
... Mach's doctrine of the "self" as a logical symbol...
Like Avenarius, Mach recognizes two "series" - the psychic and the physical (two types of combinations of elements). As with Avenarius, these series are incommensurable and, at the same time, are nothing more than a fiction of our thinking. Alternately, a monistic or dualistic viewpoint is advanced: alternately, intermediate organizing links are characterized as either the organized or the organizing principle. And, as with Avenarius, in the final analysis, the dictatorship of the "organizing will" is proclaimed. An idealistic picture of the world is drawn: the world is a complex of "sensations."
Mach's objection cannot be called successful. The central concept of his philosophical system, the famous "sensation," is not a denial of not only the organizing, but also
bien!* hmm? hmm?
misunderstanding
NB
misunderstanding aha!
misunderstanding

* - well! Ed.

Alongside the speculative constructions of Wundt, Avenarius, and Mach, we could, for example, subject to analysis the views of such prominent representatives of the latest West European philosophy as Renouvier, Bradley, or Bergson...
The field of philosophy is a veritable "Bastille" of bourgeois ideology... It must be borne in mind that, on their part, the bourgeois ideologues are not idle and are fortifying their position. They are even currently imbued with the confidence that their position is entirely impregnable. The "idealist" sympathies of certain literateurs under the banner of Marxism, in turn, create particularly fertile ground for such confidence...
TABLE OF CONTENTS
XI. Wundt. Ostwald . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 107 [not in the book]
The entire book is an example of the immeasurable vulgarization of materialism. Instead of a concrete analysis of periods, formations, and ideologies, there is only a bare phrase about "organizers" and ridiculously forced, absurdly incorrect comparisons.
A caricature of materialism in history.
It is a pity, for there is a striving towards materialism.
Notes written no earlier than
1908
First published in 1937 in the journal "Proletarian Revolution" No. 8
Printed from the original nonsense!
NB