- Capitalism and Alternatives -

Reality principle is my yardstick

In Reply to: Factions posted by bill on August 18, 1998 at 12:58:07:

: There are Marxists, and there are Marxists. But of course you knew that.. As it happens there has been a bit of debate about what a Marxist position 'should' be regarding environmentalism. It has generated some heat with the "Vulgar" Marxists (& Maoists) falling on one side while the "Revisionary Malthusian Romanticists" falling on the other.

I would hope that the Marxists of various types would adjust their positions according to some sort of reality principle, where particular technologies are measured against their embeddedness in an actually-existing world. Marxists should be attuned to particular technologies and measurable effects in order to create theories with explanatory capacity, rather than just sitting back in smug certainty and waiting for the cognitive dissonance between dogmatic faith and real experience to come crashing home.

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