: I seem to have mentioned a thousand times the idea of maximizing majorities, rather than taking the simple majority on a vote, and trying to reach consensus, however, if I take part in a vote, it is beholden of me to accept the result if I lose, otherwise I must behave in a dictatorial and hierarchical manner myself.I once asked you what constituted a majority---51%, 75%, or 90%. You responded (in post 2673): '[t]he vast majority will do nicely, enough people to sustain socialism, and to ignore the threats of the state and side-line reactionary minorities.' In post 2693, you stated that 'finicking about exact numbers is pointless...everyone will have free access, only those that wish to retain property and exploitation will find themselves denied.' You have (a thousand times) dodged the issue about 'majorities'---or, to put it more to the point, the issue about minorities. What happens to the minority? Your assumption that a global minority will acquiesce to the decisions reached by a global majority seems to be predicated upon your own (theoretical) willingness---'beholden' is the word you use---to acquiesce. Why do you assume everyone else will view (and act upon) 'fairness' as you do? This is where, I believe, your argument---and W.S.M.'s idealistic 'plan'---falters. You mention (global) consensus; is this before or after the revolution 'ignores' the 'side-line reactionary minorities'?
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: Why cannot the workers of the world organize democratically to attain their revolution...
I applaud your vision of the entire world cooperating. I do not consider it readily practical, however---religious, nationalistic, and gender differences come to mind. I anticipate that you will assert (the orthodox Marxist line) that once class differences are dissolved that these other differences will sort themselves out. You state, '[w]ithout class there cannot be marginalised perpetually ignored sections of society, merely differences of opinion on specific issues...' Let us consider nationalism. May we agree that many nationalistic differences have come about by the (uneven and arbitrary) geographic distribution of resources?* This is a very cogent reason why struggles between different nations (ideologically expressed as 'ethnic' or 'racial' nationalistic differences) come about. If, as Marxists would have it, all means of production would be shared (go into the hands of the 'proletariat'), would this significantly change the original, uneven, and arbitrary geographic distributions that often determine the economic fortunes of different nations?
(These geographic differences are what I consider when I ask: will poor countries wage revolution to achieve a level of abundance equal to the West, or will Western countries wage revolution to lower their level of abundance in order to share with the poor countries?)
You say: '[I]t is through ideologies of otherness that injustices of society can by carried on...'
Again: what about vote-minority 'otherness'? Or are you presuming (without any empirical evidence) that once class is abolished everyone in the world will have a similar perspective (except for presumably minor disagreements on mere 'specific issues') and therefore vote similarly? This is the strain of absolutism (mixed with idealism) in your thinking that I refute---the idea that perspectives (on such a grand scale as 'global socialism') can become so uniform. Again: you mention 'the idea of humanism, of a innate value in single human biological entities.' One value? A single, fixed value? Or, put to a vote, what makes a minority 'beholden' if there is no (centralized) authority, as W.S.M. claims?
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Chomsky (again).
Consider Marx: '[L]anguage is practical consciousness that exists also for other men, and for that reason alone it really exists for me personally as well; language, like consciousness, only arises from the need, the necessity, of intercourse with other men.'(1)
Now, Skinner: Verbal behavior is 'behavior reinforced through the mediation of other persons.'(2)
And, finally, Wittgenstein: 'Suppose you came as an explorer into an unknown country with a language quite strange to you. In what circumstances would you say that the people there gave orders, understood them, obeyed them, rebelled against them, and so on? The common behavior of mankind is the system of reference by means of which we interpret an unknown language.'(3)
Simple statements, profound conclusions. Now, Chomsky is clearly on the other side. His pan of Skinner is well known; his lesser known (and less renown) pan of Wittgenstein furthers his stance.** And what is Chomsky's stance? Briefly put, it is that (a) grammar is universal, (b) grammar is hereditary, and (c) grammar is rule-governed instead of contingency-shaped. Chomsky, as 'radical' as his political beliefs may be, is a mentalist in the field of language.*** And mentalism, if I may be so bold, is simply another form of creationism, replacing religious deities with 'subconscious drives' that are equally magical and subjective...
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: The, your terminology 'reinforcement' comes through widespread cultural values (which is something you often ignore, IMNSHO)- re-inforcement comes through people being in an environment from birth or in most of their daily lives, where a specific set of values are held- it does not require any specific agency of enforcement for said values.
???
This may be a good place to cite an authoritative definition of reinforcement. 'A reinforcement is defined as an event which increases the rate of a response which it follows.'(4) This is how I use the term. Are there 'values' attached to the word?---Not when we use this rigorous usage (which tends to remove 'reward' from the meaning).
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* 'Many...national differences in productivity are due to geography, rather than human beings.' Forbes, 17 November 1997, p. 72.** See Chomsky, 'Some Empirical Assumptions in Modern Philosophy of Language,' Philosophy, Science, and Method: Essays in Honor of Ernest Nagel (St. Martin’s Press, 1969).
*** See Waller, 'Chomsky, Wittgenstein, and the Behaviorist Perspective on Language,' Behaviorism 5: 1, Spring 1977.
Notes:
1. Marx and Engels, The German Ideology, part 1 (International, 1970), p. 51.
2. Skinner, Verbal Behavior (Appleton-Century-Crofts, 1957), p. 14.
3. Wittgenstein, Philosophical Investigations (Blackwell, 1958), § 206.
4. Holland and Skinner, The Analysis of Behavior (McGraw-Hill, 1961), § 37-11 (p. 247).
