WEBVTT 00:01.610 --> 00:03.810 Prof: Well I would like to get started. 00:03.810 --> 00:04.280 Good morning. 00:04.280 --> 00:09.790 In the discussion section I realized I sort of screwed my 00:09.785 --> 00:11.255 last lecture. 00:11.260 --> 00:14.420 It didn't come quite clearly through; 00:14.420 --> 00:19.270 either Hegel or Marx's theory of alienation. 00:19.270 --> 00:27.390 So I would like to come back to the theory of alienation and how 00:27.388 --> 00:34.088 Marx gets to The Paris Manuscripts, 00:34.090 --> 00:37.980 before we get into historical materialism. 00:37.980 --> 00:43.850 And let me just make two introductory comments about 00:43.853 --> 00:44.663 this. 00:44.660 --> 00:53.570 One important point I tried to make is you have to be-- 00:53.570 --> 00:57.990 I think one purpose of my lectures in Marx is to alert you 00:57.992 --> 01:01.342 that there were two Marx's, not just one, 01:01.344 --> 01:04.974 and you are likely to know only about one Marx. 01:04.969 --> 01:05.679 Right? 01:05.680 --> 01:08.830 This is Marx, who had the theory of class 01:08.831 --> 01:13.171 struggle and the theory of exploitation--right?--and who 01:13.167 --> 01:15.687 was a theorist of Communism. 01:15.688 --> 01:20.528 But you may know very little about Marx, the idealist, 01:20.531 --> 01:22.911 the Hegelian, the humanist, 01:22.908 --> 01:27.198 whose central idea was the notion of alienation. 01:27.203 --> 01:28.303 Right? 01:28.299 --> 01:32.909 Whose major concern was about the human conditions under 01:32.906 --> 01:36.086 modernity and wanted to overcome it. 01:36.090 --> 01:39.000 And, you know, these two very different Marx's 01:38.998 --> 01:41.388 appeal to very different audiences. 01:41.390 --> 01:45.660 In fact, the first Marx--the humanist, 01:45.660 --> 01:48.860 the Hegelian, the idealist--was almost 01:48.864 --> 01:54.814 forgotten for a very long time, and was rediscovered by the 01:54.805 --> 01:58.245 1960s onwards, generally. 01:58.250 --> 02:02.510 So it's very important to see that most likely that what you 02:02.506 --> 02:06.126 heard about Marx-- and I suppose most of you have 02:06.126 --> 02:10.086 never read any text from Marx-- is a biased view. 02:10.090 --> 02:12.980 You only know one Marx and not both. 02:12.979 --> 02:18.209 And my point is to try to introduce you to the complexity, 02:18.211 --> 02:20.871 that you meet both Karl Marx. 02:20.872 --> 02:21.702 Right? 02:21.699 --> 02:27.659 The second point is that--what I found frustrating in the 02:27.662 --> 02:32.842 discussion section yesterday, which was one of the worst I 02:32.835 --> 02:34.975 did in the last couple of years-- 02:34.979 --> 02:38.169 not ever in my life I did even worse discussion sections, 02:38.169 --> 02:41.309 but this was real bad--that, you know, 02:41.310 --> 02:44.350 the importance and the significance of Marx's theory of 02:44.353 --> 02:46.273 alienation did not come through. 02:46.270 --> 02:48.750 And I obviously did a very bad job, 02:48.750 --> 02:51.840 because there are very few texts, written in the 02:51.842 --> 02:53.652 seventeenth, eighteenth and nineteenth 02:53.654 --> 02:56.534 centuries, which are so powerful and so 02:56.530 --> 02:59.790 influential, and so broadly influential, 02:59.789 --> 03:02.709 on theories of the twentieth century, 03:02.710 --> 03:05.530 than exactly this text on alienation. 03:05.530 --> 03:09.690 You can think about literature--right?--and you can 03:09.694 --> 03:14.364 see the extraordinary impact of the idea of alienation in 03:14.360 --> 03:15.610 literature. 03:15.610 --> 03:19.210 Some of you may have read Albert Camus, 03:19.211 --> 03:23.291 the French novelist--The Stranger. 03:23.288 --> 03:27.128 This is right out of the theory of alienation. 03:27.128 --> 03:31.368 You may be familiar with Franz Kafka, right? 03:31.370 --> 03:33.810 There you go. 03:33.810 --> 03:35.890 That's the sense of alienation. 03:35.889 --> 03:40.599 You may have watched ever the play, wonderful play, 03:40.604 --> 03:44.004 of Henrik Ibsen, Peer Gynt. 03:44.000 --> 03:47.040 That's about alienation. Right? 03:47.038 --> 03:51.328 So in the twentieth century literature, we are full with the 03:51.328 --> 03:52.998 senses of alienation. 03:53.000 --> 03:56.470 And so is twentieth century social theory. 03:56.470 --> 04:01.060 There is no twentieth century social theory without the theory 04:01.063 --> 04:02.273 of alienation. 04:02.270 --> 04:05.570 By the way, it's interesting, because The Paris 04:05.566 --> 04:07.846 Manuscript, for the first time, 04:07.854 --> 04:09.944 was published only in 1931. 04:09.938 --> 04:13.458 Nevertheless, the idea was already beginning 04:13.459 --> 04:15.259 to creep in earlier. 04:15.258 --> 04:20.258 Smart people read the theory of alienation in Marx earlier; 04:22.310 --> 04:24.280 And then the Frankfurt School. 04:24.278 --> 04:27.498 There is no Adorno, there is no Horkheimer, 04:27.497 --> 04:30.637 there is no Marcuse, without the theory of 04:30.639 --> 04:31.789 alienation. 04:31.790 --> 04:34.190 And I can go even further. 04:34.190 --> 04:37.320 There is no cultural theory without the theory of 04:37.321 --> 04:38.171 alienation. 04:38.170 --> 04:41.210 There is no Bauman, there is no Kolakowski, 04:41.213 --> 04:43.753 without the theory of alienation. 04:43.750 --> 04:46.440 This is a very important idea. 04:46.440 --> 04:51.420 So I have to come back to this and to try to show you how he 04:51.420 --> 04:55.900 arrives at this point, and why he abandons it--why the 04:55.896 --> 04:58.256 second Marx is emerging. 04:58.259 --> 05:01.159 And then we get, starting with the second Marx, 05:01.160 --> 05:05.010 the first step towards the second Marx is the "Theses 05:05.009 --> 05:09.129 on Feuerbach," what I want to talk about today. 05:09.129 --> 05:11.969 And I'll try to economize with my time, right? 05:11.973 --> 05:12.483 Right? 05:12.480 --> 05:16.640 I have to learn from Adam Smith--right?--to be more 05:16.641 --> 05:21.301 utilitarian and to make sure that means and ends do match 05:21.303 --> 05:22.973 with each other. 05:22.970 --> 05:26.910 Okay, let's come back to Hegel and Hegel's theory of 05:26.913 --> 05:27.923 alienation. 05:27.920 --> 05:32.050 Because I don't think--from the discussion section my sense was 05:32.050 --> 05:35.850 I did not make it clear enough, what Hegel's theory is. 05:35.850 --> 05:42.190 And well let me try to labor on this. 05:42.190 --> 05:45.370 As I said, you know, he was an idealist, 05:45.370 --> 05:50.100 and I hope I explained it to the extent it is necessary. 05:50.100 --> 05:53.220 I will come back to this when I will be talking about the 05:53.218 --> 05:56.838 "Theses on Feuerbach" and The German Ideology. 05:56.839 --> 06:01.989 But he really thought that somehow consciousness precedes 06:01.992 --> 06:06.412 material existence, and that's what made him into 06:06.408 --> 06:07.878 an idealist. 06:07.879 --> 06:11.669 How religious he was I actually don't know. 06:11.670 --> 06:14.330 This is not a religious, not a theological proposition. 06:14.326 --> 06:14.716 Right? 06:14.720 --> 06:18.940 The idea is that before the physical world existed, 06:18.944 --> 06:21.734 there has been an absolute spirit. 06:21.733 --> 06:22.583 Right? 06:22.579 --> 06:27.039 At the origin of the world, there is an absolute spirit 06:27.038 --> 06:31.828 existing, and that exists in the material world as such. 06:31.829 --> 06:37.749 And then his central idea is that you can describe the 06:37.754 --> 06:43.794 history of the universe as a problem of alienation, 06:43.790 --> 06:47.020 as a problem of gradual separation, 06:47.019 --> 06:50.899 as I said, from subject and object. 06:50.899 --> 06:55.249 This is a very important idea, and we will have to deal with 06:55.252 --> 06:56.362 this in Marx. 06:56.360 --> 07:01.430 And even if you are dealing with twentieth century theories, 07:01.427 --> 07:05.197 critical theory, this is a central notion of, 07:05.204 --> 07:08.044 you know, subject and object. 07:08.040 --> 07:10.660 Let me try to labor on this a minute. 07:10.660 --> 07:12.750 And I have to do it on the blackboard. 07:12.750 --> 07:22.750 So Hegel's fundamental idea is that when you have the absolute 07:22.752 --> 07:32.262 spirit--right?--and this is not a personal God but just the 07:32.264 --> 07:33.744 idea. 07:33.740 --> 07:37.630 Here this is a situation of totality. 07:37.629 --> 07:44.269 The absolute spirit is at the same time subject and object, 07:44.271 --> 07:46.221 united in itself. 07:46.218 --> 07:47.248 Right? 07:47.250 --> 07:50.020 And that's what Hegel calls totality. 07:50.019 --> 07:54.779 And there's the term totality being used later on in critical 07:54.776 --> 07:55.486 theory. 07:55.490 --> 07:58.880 And we are saying we are searching for totality, 07:58.884 --> 08:02.864 we are searching for the unity of subject and object. 08:02.860 --> 08:05.930 Well in Hegel's, the second stage is that 08:05.925 --> 08:09.675 subject and object are divided from each other. 08:09.680 --> 08:16.750 <> 08:16.750 --> 08:22.120 There is the material world without consciousness, 08:22.120 --> 08:26.020 and consciousness becomes absolute consciousness because 08:26.019 --> 08:29.919 it's kind of projected the material world out of itself. 08:29.920 --> 08:30.630 Right? 08:30.629 --> 08:34.699 And this is the--this is the situation of alienation. 08:34.700 --> 08:43.970 Object becomes separate. 08:43.970 --> 08:48.870 Then, as human beings emerge, subject and object beginning to 08:48.865 --> 08:49.355 merge. 08:49.355 --> 08:50.085 Right? 08:50.090 --> 08:52.570 Consciousness emerges. Right? 08:52.570 --> 08:56.200 Consciousness--right? 08:56.200 --> 09:00.380 These are subject--this is you--and object are the 09:00.375 --> 09:02.415 conditions of your life. 09:02.422 --> 09:03.192 Right? 09:03.190 --> 09:07.660 Another person you are interacting with is an object of 09:07.657 --> 09:09.227 your interaction. 09:09.230 --> 09:11.900 Or the conditions of your life. 09:11.904 --> 09:12.514 Right? 09:12.509 --> 09:13.969 The objective conditions. 09:13.970 --> 09:15.040 This room. 09:15.038 --> 09:18.198 At Yale University the construction which is going out 09:18.203 --> 09:20.713 there--right?--is our objective conditions. 09:20.711 --> 09:21.311 Right? 09:21.308 --> 09:24.508 And you are the subject who are reflecting on it. 09:24.509 --> 09:28.269 But because you are gaining some consciousness, 09:28.274 --> 09:33.184 you are beginning to conquer the objective conditions of your 09:33.182 --> 09:33.922 life. 09:33.918 --> 09:38.188 And what he's suggesting, that alienation will overcome 09:38.187 --> 09:42.447 when your subject will be able to control the objective 09:42.453 --> 09:44.353 conditions of your life. 09:44.350 --> 09:45.220 Right? 09:45.220 --> 09:50.780 Where your consciousness is adequate to your existence. 09:50.784 --> 09:51.614 Right? 09:51.610 --> 09:55.430 When you are the master of your life, you are a master of your 09:55.433 --> 09:56.253 conditions. 09:56.250 --> 10:00.950 It is not the conditions which rule you, but you are the master 10:00.951 --> 10:02.321 of the conditions. 10:02.317 --> 10:02.997 Right? 10:03.000 --> 10:08.270 That is the key idea in Hegel. 10:08.269 --> 10:11.689 And Marx is very much following this idea. 10:11.690 --> 10:15.820 I mean, he of course eliminates the whole idea of absolute 10:15.820 --> 10:16.330 spirit. 10:16.326 --> 10:16.976 Right? 10:16.980 --> 10:22.440 He doesn't want to deal with the idea of absolute spirit. 10:22.440 --> 10:24.710 For him this is too speculative. 10:24.710 --> 10:29.170 He's also bothered by the idea that you can overcome the 10:29.173 --> 10:32.343 problem of alienation simply by thought. 10:32.337 --> 10:33.147 Right? 10:33.149 --> 10:39.759 Marx's project is to bring this whole idea of alienation down to 10:39.755 --> 10:42.635 earth, to everyday experience, 10:42.635 --> 10:46.335 to your experience and your experience of, 10:46.340 --> 10:51.840 I would use the term, modernity, until 1944. 10:51.840 --> 10:56.850 Marx does not have a concept of capitalism or capitalist mode of 10:56.849 --> 10:57.719 production. 10:57.724 --> 10:58.444 Right? 10:58.440 --> 11:01.780 He even just vaguely thinks about private ownership. 11:01.778 --> 11:06.128 He's really trying to conceptualize modernity, 11:06.129 --> 11:11.409 modern industrial urban life, as distinct from earlier 11:11.407 --> 11:15.217 communal life-- the life what we had in more 11:15.224 --> 11:19.064 intimate communities, peasants of the villages or 11:19.062 --> 11:19.762 whatever. 11:19.759 --> 11:20.379 Right? 11:20.379 --> 11:22.249 He tries to conceptualize this. 11:22.250 --> 11:25.940 He sees this as a progress, modernity as a progress. 11:25.940 --> 11:29.410 But we have to pay a heavy price for it, 11:29.413 --> 11:34.853 and the price what we pay for this modernity is the separation 11:34.849 --> 11:36.809 of subject and object. 11:36.808 --> 11:37.788 Right? 11:37.788 --> 11:42.098 The peasant in a village was not separated from the objective 11:42.096 --> 11:44.246 conditions of his existence. 11:44.250 --> 11:47.530 It was united with the objective conditions. 11:47.529 --> 11:49.889 It was bound to the earth. 11:49.893 --> 11:50.533 Right? 11:50.529 --> 11:54.529 Even the slaves were not separated from the objective 11:54.534 --> 11:57.004 conditions of their existence. 11:57.000 --> 11:59.010 They were treated as objects. 11:59.013 --> 11:59.503 Right? 11:59.500 --> 12:02.410 There was no subject separated from the object. 12:02.408 --> 12:06.998 So the unique--this is Marx, this is not Hegel anymore-- 12:07.000 --> 12:11.110 the unique feature of alienation, that you have this 12:11.114 --> 12:14.184 separation from subject and object, 12:14.179 --> 12:16.619 in modern conditions. Right? 12:16.620 --> 12:22.290 And I think this is why Marx's theory of alienation survived 12:22.285 --> 12:25.355 Marx's theory of exploitation. 12:25.360 --> 12:29.230 That the young Marx survived the old Marx; 12:29.230 --> 12:32.640 the first Marx survived the second Marx. 12:32.639 --> 12:37.989 Because we can all relate more if you have a good lecturer, 12:37.990 --> 12:43.710 and who brings more effectively to you what he's getting at. 12:43.710 --> 12:46.680 You can relate more, you can say much more, 12:46.678 --> 12:49.358 "Oh yeah, I feel alienated in this 12:49.364 --> 12:50.994 class." Right? 12:50.990 --> 12:53.390 "That makes no sense to me." Right? 12:53.389 --> 12:56.319 "This doesn't make any sense to my life, 12:56.320 --> 12:59.410 and I have to sit there because I'm a sociology major and I have 12:59.408 --> 13:00.978 to take this bloody class." 13:00.977 --> 13:01.417 Right? 13:01.419 --> 13:03.489 Then you are alienated. Right? 13:03.490 --> 13:07.500 And this is when you will--that's what you will say. 13:07.500 --> 13:08.130 Right? 13:08.129 --> 13:12.559 "I am alienated because I have to do this nonsense because 13:12.562 --> 13:14.782 they force me to do so." 13:14.779 --> 13:16.249 Then you are alienated. 13:16.250 --> 13:18.820 This is exactly what Marx is getting at. 13:18.822 --> 13:19.352 Right? 13:19.350 --> 13:21.280 Well in a way it is your choice. 13:21.280 --> 13:21.780 Right? 13:21.778 --> 13:23.918 You declared a sociology major. 13:23.917 --> 13:24.397 Right? 13:24.399 --> 13:27.909 But then you are forced to do stuff what you don't really want 13:27.908 --> 13:28.368 to do. 13:28.370 --> 13:30.830 So it doesn't mean that you are not free. 13:30.830 --> 13:33.520 You are free, but within your freedom you are 13:33.518 --> 13:36.878 alienated because you don't control your conditions, 13:36.879 --> 13:39.849 and it looks like that within your freedom, 13:39.850 --> 13:43.000 within your free choice, you are forced to do stuff. 13:43.004 --> 13:43.504 Right? 13:43.500 --> 13:46.920 This is what Marx is trying to get at. 13:46.918 --> 13:50.218 You think you are free, you think you are equal with 13:50.220 --> 13:52.680 others, and you are really not free. 13:52.678 --> 13:56.588 Because the objective conditions, what you created for 13:56.591 --> 13:57.921 yourself--right? 13:57.919 --> 13:59.989 You got into trouble. Right? 13:59.990 --> 14:02.800 Who forced you to be a sociology major? 14:02.799 --> 14:04.159 Nobody. 14:04.158 --> 14:07.228 And then you are in the trouble that you have to do-- take 14:07.230 --> 14:08.200 certain hurdles. 14:08.200 --> 14:11.540 But you feel alienated and you don't feel that your whole 14:11.535 --> 14:13.375 personality is being developed. 14:13.383 --> 14:13.923 Right? 14:13.918 --> 14:17.278 To put it with John Stuart Mill, you don't feel 14:17.280 --> 14:18.670 self-development. 14:18.668 --> 14:21.968 Then you are alienated, unduly so. 14:21.970 --> 14:22.770 Right? 14:22.769 --> 14:25.919 Is that a bit coming closer to it? 14:25.919 --> 14:27.819 Makes more sense? 14:27.820 --> 14:29.680 All right. 14:29.678 --> 14:34.028 Now let me therefore also show you how Marx gets to it. 14:34.029 --> 14:35.329 I think this is very important. 14:35.330 --> 14:40.110 And I skipped all of this stuff because I was trying to get very 14:40.109 --> 14:44.279 quickly--I was trying to get too quickly--to the notion, 14:44.282 --> 14:46.712 Marx's theory of alienation. 14:46.710 --> 14:48.610 And now I would like to correct this. 14:48.610 --> 14:55.170 And I already foreshadowed in my last lecture that these are 14:55.174 --> 14:59.964 formidable years for Marx, 1843 and 1844. 14:59.960 --> 15:04.840 In two years his intellectual development is quite 15:04.844 --> 15:06.444 extraordinary. 15:06.440 --> 15:10.970 Let me follow you through of these intellectual developments. 15:10.970 --> 15:15.390 In the summer of 1843, he writes this book, 15:15.386 --> 15:22.116 Contributions to a Critique of Hegel's Philosophy of Right; 15:22.120 --> 15:23.810 or Hegel's Philosophy of Law. 15:23.808 --> 15:37.628 Well Hegel has gone through a long development intellectually. 15:37.629 --> 15:41.249 He started out as a radical, an admirer of the French 15:41.254 --> 15:44.414 Revolution, and as he was getting older he 15:44.408 --> 15:48.398 was becoming more and more conservative and was becoming 15:48.400 --> 15:52.830 concerned about the consequences of the French Revolution. 15:52.830 --> 15:59.680 And as he became, you know, more conservative, 15:59.678 --> 16:02.268 he was--he said, "Well what is happening 16:02.267 --> 16:05.967 with the French after the French Revolution is not really what I 16:05.972 --> 16:06.622 wanted. 16:06.620 --> 16:11.960 Because now the French Revolution is actually splitting 16:11.960 --> 16:17.300 the society in two classes, capital and labor." 16:17.298 --> 16:19.488 It's not exactly the terminology what he means, 16:19.493 --> 16:21.783 but that's what Hegel is getting at in The 16:21.780 --> 16:23.260 Philosophy of Right. 16:23.259 --> 16:26.469 "And who can tell who is right and who is wrong? 16:26.470 --> 16:28.920 They are in conflict with each other. 16:28.918 --> 16:32.508 The employers or the owners want something, 16:32.509 --> 16:35.759 and the workers want something else. 16:35.759 --> 16:41.309 They both represent particularistic interests. 16:41.308 --> 16:44.318 But where is the universalistic interests?" 16:44.320 --> 16:45.980 So asked Hegel. 16:45.980 --> 16:48.770 There must be some universal justice. 16:48.769 --> 16:53.059 To put it in the terminology we used in this course before, 16:53.062 --> 16:56.992 there must be something like common good, which brings 16:56.985 --> 16:59.275 capital and labor together. 16:59.279 --> 17:02.469 Where will this common good come from? 17:02.470 --> 17:06.570 And in The Philosophy of Right he offers an 17:06.565 --> 17:08.315 interesting theory. 17:08.318 --> 17:13.298 He said it will come from the government, it comes from the 17:13.301 --> 17:13.991 state. 17:13.990 --> 17:17.790 The state should represent the universal instance. 17:17.789 --> 17:22.479 And then he said, "Well, you know, the society, 17:22.482 --> 17:27.462 modern bourgeois society which emerged as a result of the 17:27.455 --> 17:31.285 French Revolution, is divided into these 17:31.286 --> 17:33.516 particularistic classes. 17:33.519 --> 17:39.039 But we need a universal agent, a universal class, 17:39.038 --> 17:43.268 which represents the common good, and this must be the 17:43.271 --> 17:47.111 government, this must be the class of civil 17:47.114 --> 17:48.524 servants." 17:48.519 --> 17:51.519 And in the book, Philosophy of Right-- 17:51.519 --> 17:54.229 which is his kind of last major book, 17:54.230 --> 17:59.470 writes it not long before he dies--he argues these are the 17:59.469 --> 18:04.249 civil servants who constitute the universal class. 18:04.250 --> 18:07.050 Now this is not a silly idea. 18:07.049 --> 18:09.829 We do think about it this way. 18:09.828 --> 18:13.708 And yes, I mean, he builds in many respects, 18:13.710 --> 18:18.780 in a more sophisticated way, on Locke and Rousseau and the 18:18.776 --> 18:22.856 idea of general will, particularly in Rousseau. Right? 18:22.858 --> 18:25.818 And this is the state which should represent the general 18:25.817 --> 18:26.087 will. 18:26.086 --> 18:26.566 Right? 18:26.568 --> 18:31.338 And we also occasionally think about it this way. 18:31.335 --> 18:32.125 Right? 18:32.130 --> 18:36.120 There are all these conflicts around this country, 18:36.124 --> 18:41.184 and we expect the government to express the universal interest, 18:41.178 --> 18:43.948 to innervate the general will. 18:43.950 --> 18:47.850 We expect occasionally the federal government to do that, 18:47.847 --> 18:51.327 and the federal government occasionally does it. 18:51.328 --> 18:55.018 You have read about the Civil Rights Movement. 18:55.019 --> 19:02.169 I mean, who was the agency which made sure that the states 19:02.167 --> 19:08.687 actually obey the laws and integrates the schools? 19:08.690 --> 19:11.190 It was the federal government. 19:11.194 --> 19:11.784 Right? 19:11.778 --> 19:15.628 It was Bobby Kennedy who went down and made sure that the 19:15.626 --> 19:18.026 southern states do follow the rules. 19:18.031 --> 19:18.721 Right? 19:18.720 --> 19:25.050 We expected the government to express the universal interest. 19:25.046 --> 19:25.886 Right? 19:25.890 --> 19:27.920 So it's not silly. 19:27.920 --> 19:30.360 But Marx, in a way, said, "Well, 19:30.363 --> 19:32.063 that's not that simple. 19:36.910 --> 19:40.390 And he said, "Well the government is 19:40.387 --> 19:44.907 not that non-partial as we would like it to be." 19:44.910 --> 19:45.780 Right? 19:45.779 --> 19:51.279 If you are rich, you have more influence on what 19:51.280 --> 19:56.550 the government does, rather when you are poor. 19:56.548 --> 19:57.718 Right? 19:57.720 --> 20:03.120 There are lobbyists in Washington DC, 20:03.123 --> 20:10.633 and you probably have very little leverage on these 20:10.627 --> 20:12.727 lobbyists. 20:12.730 --> 20:17.920 Big business has a lot of leverage on these lobbyists. 20:17.916 --> 20:18.696 Right? 20:18.700 --> 20:22.290 And they, of course, have a great deal of pressure 20:22.288 --> 20:24.778 on what the legislature will do. 20:24.778 --> 20:31.008 Just follow what is happening with the healthcare legislation. 20:31.009 --> 20:35.579 Well you can call your congressman and you can send 20:35.579 --> 20:39.049 emails, you know, and can send letters, 20:39.053 --> 20:42.073 and ask them to do something. 20:42.068 --> 20:44.908 But believe me, when the pharmaceutical 20:44.911 --> 20:48.951 industry spends a lot of money and tells a senator, 20:48.950 --> 20:51.860 you know, "Unless you vote this way or that way, 20:51.858 --> 20:56.258 we probably may not be able to support your next electoral 20:56.259 --> 20:59.819 campaign"-- right?--then it will make more 20:59.816 --> 21:02.196 impact than your individual email. 21:02.200 --> 21:02.850 Right? 21:02.848 --> 21:06.488 Not that you should not send individual emails. 21:06.490 --> 21:07.860 Send it. Right? 21:07.859 --> 21:08.499 Be involved. 21:08.500 --> 21:12.720 But be aware that the government is sent to be more 21:12.715 --> 21:15.325 responsible for big business. 21:15.328 --> 21:17.108 "So", he said, "How can it be 21:17.106 --> 21:18.096 universal class?" 21:18.098 --> 21:22.688 That's really the point what he's making in The Philosophy 21:22.686 --> 21:23.676 of Right. 21:23.681 --> 21:24.371 Right? 21:24.369 --> 21:26.559 The state is not universal. 21:26.559 --> 21:29.149 It pretends to be universal. 21:29.150 --> 21:32.210 It has to pretend to be universal in order to be 21:32.214 --> 21:35.154 legitimate, but really it is not universal. 21:35.150 --> 21:39.320 And the civil servants are, of course, not a universal 21:39.319 --> 21:39.949 class. 21:39.950 --> 21:42.240 Occasionally they are quite corrupt. 21:42.244 --> 21:42.774 Right? 21:42.769 --> 21:45.449 Not in the United States, of course, but in some 21:45.450 --> 21:48.360 countries I can think of civil servants are corrupt. 21:48.358 --> 21:48.928 Right? 21:48.930 --> 21:52.430 You know, and then they are offered, you know, 21:52.432 --> 21:55.472 a free seat, you know, on a private jet, 21:55.470 --> 21:56.950 they accept it. 21:56.950 --> 22:00.210 And then they accepted it, they do something for the owner 22:00.210 --> 22:01.360 of that private jet. 22:01.355 --> 22:01.865 Right? 22:01.868 --> 22:05.418 So there are some civil servants who are not all that 22:05.424 --> 22:08.644 innocent--right?--and they can be influenced. 22:08.640 --> 22:11.340 So it is not all that universal class. 22:11.338 --> 22:15.538 They are--not all civil servants are angels. 22:15.538 --> 22:16.318 Right? 22:16.318 --> 22:20.018 Some of them are, some of them are not. 22:20.019 --> 22:23.539 In fact, he concludes the unfinished book, 22:23.535 --> 22:28.675 "that really the problem is that we don't have universal 22:28.680 --> 22:32.880 suffrage"; writes he in 1843. 22:32.880 --> 22:35.590 And he said, "Let's have universal 22:35.593 --> 22:38.233 suffrage, and then if we in free 22:38.230 --> 22:42.280 elections universally elect the representatives, 22:42.279 --> 22:43.889 the problem will be gone." 22:43.890 --> 22:47.270 As we know, he was not quite right. 22:47.265 --> 22:48.055 Right? 22:48.058 --> 22:53.228 We have all equal vote but we do not have all equal voice. 22:53.232 --> 22:53.962 Right? 22:53.960 --> 23:01.120 I think that's--but Marx here is still a bourgeois liberal; 23:01.118 --> 23:06.538 as of the summer of 1843 believes the problem will be 23:06.540 --> 23:07.480 solved. 23:07.480 --> 23:10.960 Now let me rush through and show you the kind of 23:10.963 --> 23:15.563 intellectual development--and I briefly pointed out to this. 23:15.558 --> 23:20.258 These are the three important steps which follows this 23:20.259 --> 23:22.299 abandoned manuscript. 23:22.298 --> 23:25.978 He now enters the road of radicalization, 23:25.984 --> 23:30.784 moves away from Hegel, and tries to carve out his own 23:30.776 --> 23:34.366 intellectual and political project. 23:34.368 --> 23:37.828 And he writes the paper "On the Jewish 23:37.827 --> 23:40.377 Question" in which he says, 23:40.380 --> 23:42.850 "Well Hegel is right. 23:42.849 --> 23:45.009 We need something universal. 23:45.009 --> 23:49.089 We should not allow society just to be the struggle of 23:49.092 --> 23:51.562 particularistic interests." 23:51.556 --> 23:52.246 Right? 23:52.250 --> 23:57.120 This is in a way against Adam Smith's utilitarianism. 23:57.118 --> 24:00.418 It's not enough that individuals fight each others' 24:00.424 --> 24:03.004 interests out, and that will end up to a 24:03.002 --> 24:04.262 universal good. 24:04.259 --> 24:08.919 We need some universal good to be achieved, and it will not 24:08.924 --> 24:12.384 simply achieved by particularistic interests 24:12.384 --> 24:13.434 followed. 24:13.430 --> 24:15.980 That is Marx's point. 24:15.980 --> 24:19.120 But then he writes an introduction to the 24:19.123 --> 24:22.973 Critique-- Contributions to the Critique 24:22.973 --> 24:26.043 of Hegel's Philosophy of Right. 24:26.038 --> 24:28.798 And in this introduction he said, "Well, 24:28.796 --> 24:31.986 we need something; universal emancipation. 24:31.990 --> 24:36.270 But who will bring universal emancipation to humankind?" 24:36.269 --> 24:36.839 Right? 24:36.838 --> 24:40.728 He's looking for an agent who can carry this out. 24:40.730 --> 24:44.050 And in the introduction, he said, "This will be the 24:44.050 --> 24:45.260 proletariat." 24:45.259 --> 24:49.539 Well you may say now he's entering the wrong road-- 24:49.538 --> 24:54.128 right?--and he's entering a very--he's basically painting 24:54.130 --> 24:57.560 himself in the corner, where he will be for the rest 24:57.561 --> 25:00.211 of his life, trying to show that indeed the 25:00.212 --> 25:02.662 proletariat will emancipate us all, 25:02.660 --> 25:05.620 and will create a good society as such. 25:05.618 --> 25:08.858 But people, when they are reading the introduction--and I 25:08.858 --> 25:12.388 will give you a few citations from it because it's a beautiful 25:12.387 --> 25:13.427 piece of work. 25:13.430 --> 25:16.900 In many ways it is wonderful poetry. 25:16.900 --> 25:21.080 He has some extraordinary framing of the problem. 25:21.078 --> 25:23.348 But then, you know, his critics said, 25:23.348 --> 25:25.238 "What a nonsense." 25:25.240 --> 25:27.160 You know? 25:27.160 --> 25:29.060 "Why on earth the proletariat? 25:29.058 --> 25:31.878 As we all know, the workers are dumb. 25:31.880 --> 25:36.640 I mean, you are saying that we, the critical philosophers, 25:36.635 --> 25:39.385 we cannot emancipate humankind? 25:39.390 --> 25:43.170 But you think that these ordinary workers, 25:43.166 --> 25:47.766 with alienated consciousness, they will bring us an 25:47.772 --> 25:49.802 unalienated world? 25:49.799 --> 25:51.099 How comes? 25:51.099 --> 25:52.699 What nonsense is this?" 25:52.700 --> 25:55.200 So that's when he writes The Paris Manuscripts, 25:55.200 --> 25:59.460 and tries to now bring the whole idea of alienation down to 25:59.459 --> 26:03.349 earth, to fill it with some economic 26:03.347 --> 26:04.347 content. 26:04.348 --> 26:07.678 That's why now he tries to relate it to commodity 26:07.679 --> 26:11.029 production, and make the claim that though 26:11.032 --> 26:14.372 in modern society everybody's alienated, 26:14.368 --> 26:18.728 but they are only the workers who are fully alienated, 26:18.730 --> 26:21.870 and their interest is to overcome the alienation. 26:21.868 --> 26:26.448 That's what--this is why he tries to argue that alienation 26:26.450 --> 26:30.870 will bring the working class to emancipate humankind; 26:30.869 --> 26:33.109 that is the project. 26:33.108 --> 26:36.488 Of course, he never publishes the book, 26:36.490 --> 26:39.490 because after he wrote it down, he said, 26:39.490 --> 26:41.700 "Well"-- I suppose he said, "Well, 26:41.700 --> 26:43.430 this is quite nicely written. 26:43.430 --> 26:45.030 I have a couple of good ideas. 26:45.029 --> 26:47.819 But nobody will believe me." Right? 26:47.818 --> 26:51.128 "The working class will not go on the barricades and die 26:51.126 --> 26:54.156 because I am telling them that they are alienated." 26:54.157 --> 26:54.707 Right? 26:54.710 --> 26:58.100 "They don't care about alienation. 26:58.098 --> 27:00.998 I have to come up some-- some better reason, 27:00.996 --> 27:04.496 you know, why the working class will revolt." 27:04.500 --> 27:06.920 And that's the end of the young Marx. 27:06.920 --> 27:11.060 And now he's beginning to read Adam Smith and Ricardo and 27:11.055 --> 27:12.375 political economy. 27:12.384 --> 27:13.054 Right? 27:13.048 --> 27:16.918 And he's beginning to develop his theory of exploitation. 27:16.920 --> 27:21.420 This is the young or mature Marx, and we will talk about him 27:21.415 --> 27:22.555 very briefly. 27:22.558 --> 27:26.488 Now just a couple of ideas here. 27:26.493 --> 27:27.513 Right? 27:27.509 --> 27:29.879 What about "On the Jewish Question", 27:29.878 --> 27:30.878 what is at stake? 27:30.880 --> 27:35.760 Bruno Bauer wrote a paper on the origins of anti-Semitism, 27:35.759 --> 27:39.199 and he said, "We have anti-Semitism in 27:39.203 --> 27:42.653 Germany because the state is Christian, 27:42.650 --> 27:46.070 and as long as the state is Christian it will discriminate 27:46.068 --> 27:47.208 against the Jews. 27:47.210 --> 27:50.980 So the solution is to separate the state and the church, 27:50.978 --> 27:53.098 to have political emancipation. 27:53.103 --> 27:53.723 Right? 27:53.720 --> 27:56.600 And if we have political emancipation, 27:56.595 --> 27:59.155 we abolish anti-Semitism." 27:59.160 --> 28:03.860 Now Marx takes his point here and he said, "Look, 28:03.859 --> 28:06.609 this guy is completely wrong. 28:06.608 --> 28:10.528 Look at the United States, the church and the state are 28:10.527 --> 28:13.197 separated, and in the nineteenth century 28:13.202 --> 28:16.252 there was quite a bit of anti-Semitism in the United 28:16.252 --> 28:17.212 States." 28:17.210 --> 28:20.200 Not only in the nineteenth century. 28:20.200 --> 28:24.830 In this very institution, in the 1920s and '30s, 28:24.830 --> 28:28.280 there was a lot of anti-Semitism. 28:28.278 --> 28:31.968 There's a wonderful sociologist, Jeremy Karabel, 28:31.970 --> 28:36.860 who wrote a great book about admission policies of Ivy League 28:36.856 --> 28:41.606 universities in the 1920s, and he was able to prove that 28:41.607 --> 28:45.087 Ivy League universities, including Yale, 28:45.092 --> 28:47.422 actually applied a quota. 28:47.420 --> 28:52.240 They never admitted more Jews to Yale than the average Jewish 28:52.244 --> 28:54.984 population in the United States. 28:54.980 --> 28:57.300 Believe it or not. 28:57.298 --> 29:00.978 It was never official policy but it was practiced all the 29:00.980 --> 29:01.440 time. 29:01.440 --> 29:04.850 So, I mean, there was anti-Semitism. 29:04.848 --> 29:09.628 Anti-Semitism can exist if the state and church are separated, 29:09.634 --> 29:12.854 if the state is supposed to be secular. 29:12.848 --> 29:17.208 And Marx said, "Where does come like 29:17.212 --> 29:19.942 racism come from?" 29:19.940 --> 29:23.400 He said it comes from, what he said, 29:23.397 --> 29:24.977 civil society. 29:24.980 --> 29:27.720 He doesn't have the notion of capitalism. 29:27.720 --> 29:32.100 He said this is rooted in people's everyday experience and 29:32.096 --> 29:32.786 interest. 29:32.788 --> 29:33.478 Right? 29:33.480 --> 29:39.220 Anti-Semitism comes from civil society because some people feel 29:39.215 --> 29:41.525 threatened by the Jews. 29:41.529 --> 29:46.259 Why is there, you know, anti-African American 29:46.258 --> 29:47.438 feelings? 29:47.440 --> 29:52.300 Because some people feel threatened by African Americans. 29:52.296 --> 29:52.986 Right? 29:52.990 --> 29:56.310 And this is why there is racism. 29:56.308 --> 30:00.148 So you have to fix the problems in civil society. 30:00.150 --> 30:04.350 The problem is in civil society, not in the state. 30:04.348 --> 30:09.088 Therefore what you need is universal emancipation. 30:09.088 --> 30:11.668 That's the bottom line of "On the Jewish 30:11.672 --> 30:12.672 Question." 30:12.670 --> 30:15.610 Is that reasonably clear? 30:15.609 --> 30:19.299 Okay, then let's go further. 30:19.299 --> 30:22.479 And this is the Introduction. 30:22.480 --> 30:29.390 Well there are some wonderful stuff in this. 30:29.390 --> 30:34.380 It's more poetry than--it is certainly not social science. 30:34.380 --> 30:37.730 I would say more poetry, but very forcefully done. 30:37.730 --> 30:42.540 Well he said, "What we have to do is to 30:42.538 --> 30:48.468 move beyond Feuerbach, who simply sort of contemplated 30:48.468 --> 30:51.598 on the situations." 30:51.598 --> 30:54.888 And he said, "Once the holy form of 30:54.894 --> 30:59.884 human self-estrangement has been unmasked"--that's what 30:59.877 --> 31:01.057 Feuerbach did. 31:01.059 --> 31:01.989 Right? 31:01.990 --> 31:07.890 He did show that alienation is our--we're projecting our 31:07.894 --> 31:10.794 alienation by creating God. 31:10.792 --> 31:11.762 Right? 31:11.759 --> 31:18.069 He said, "Now the task is to unmask self-estrangement or 31:18.067 --> 31:22.797 alienation in its unholy form." Right? 31:22.798 --> 31:26.998 In the everyday life--in your everyday experience--especially 31:27.000 --> 31:29.100 in your economic activities. 31:29.098 --> 31:32.248 That is the point what he tries to make. 31:32.250 --> 31:36.710 Then he goes further and he says, "Well the Young 31:36.708 --> 31:39.988 Hegelians said 'Be a critical critic; 31:39.990 --> 31:42.350 criticize the Hegelian theory'." 31:42.348 --> 31:46.218 And I think this is a fantastic sentence; 31:46.220 --> 31:48.390 again, it's beautiful poetry. 31:48.390 --> 31:53.330 Very dangerous and let a lot of trouble in history. 31:53.328 --> 31:56.538 In a way I wish he would not have written it down. 31:56.538 --> 32:00.938 But I love that he did write it down, because it's a beautiful 32:00.944 --> 32:01.744 sentence. 32:01.740 --> 32:06.080 "The weapon of criticism cannot replace the criticism by 32:06.084 --> 32:07.104 weapons." 32:07.097 --> 32:07.747 Right? 32:07.750 --> 32:13.610 Well it's not enough to be critical in thought. 32:13.608 --> 32:16.508 You have to be critical in action. 32:16.507 --> 32:17.207 Right? 32:17.210 --> 32:18.720 You have to act on it. 32:18.720 --> 32:21.610 Just do not just talk. 32:21.609 --> 32:23.659 Do something about it. 32:23.660 --> 32:25.370 That's what it says. 32:25.368 --> 32:28.318 Well I think this is, you know, one of the strongest 32:28.324 --> 32:31.224 sentences I have read in social science literature. 32:31.220 --> 32:31.800 Right? 32:31.798 --> 32:35.598 "The weapon of criticism cannot replace the criticism by 32:35.596 --> 32:36.606 weapons." 32:36.608 --> 32:40.338 Well this is also a great sentence. 32:40.338 --> 32:46.668 "Theory becomes a material force as soon as it has grabbed 32:46.670 --> 32:50.040 the masses--gripped the masses. 32:50.038 --> 32:55.268 Theory is capable of gripping the masses as soon as it 32:55.270 --> 32:58.430 demonstrates ad hominem." 32:58.430 --> 33:01.240 Woo. 33:01.240 --> 33:03.200 That's quite something. Right? 33:03.200 --> 33:05.630 What he--right? 33:05.630 --> 33:09.120 He said, "Well the question is what is a good 33:09.118 --> 33:12.608 theory, what will help you emancipate yourself? 33:12.608 --> 33:17.518 Good, the essence of good theory, that it grabs you, 33:17.521 --> 33:19.351 it grips you." 33:19.353 --> 33:20.223 Right? 33:20.220 --> 33:21.230 When you say, "Uh-huh, 33:21.227 --> 33:22.077 it did hit me." 33:22.079 --> 33:24.689 This is theory. Right? 33:24.690 --> 33:30.420 But it can only be when it is ad hominem, when it addresses 33:30.424 --> 33:31.814 your problems. 33:31.808 --> 33:32.698 Right? 33:32.700 --> 33:36.350 A theory, what you are lost, you don't know why it is 33:36.345 --> 33:38.935 relevant for your life, is no good. 33:38.940 --> 33:43.800 I would even go as far, the theory which is boring is 33:43.804 --> 33:45.024 bad theory. 33:45.019 --> 33:47.889 What you need is fascinating theory. 33:47.890 --> 33:49.580 You have to be fascinated. 33:49.579 --> 33:52.379 You have to be shocked. Right? 33:52.380 --> 33:55.780 You have to say, "Yes, now I will live 33:55.779 --> 33:59.909 differently after I--this theory I understood." 33:59.910 --> 34:00.720 Right? 34:00.720 --> 34:02.630 It has to move you. 34:02.630 --> 34:04.000 That's the good theory. 34:04.000 --> 34:09.130 I think that's a wonderful point, and very powerfully done. 34:09.130 --> 34:12.610 And then he said, "Well, what--well we say 34:12.608 --> 34:17.598 that the theory has to grab the masses, but what kind of masses? 34:17.599 --> 34:19.319 Whom? 34:19.320 --> 34:20.680 Who is our audience?" 34:20.679 --> 34:24.619 Well, and he says, "In order to carry out a 34:24.619 --> 34:27.049 revolutionary change." 34:27.050 --> 34:30.380 It's not enough to have a theory, not enough to have 34:30.376 --> 34:30.896 ideas. 34:30.900 --> 34:35.930 "You may need", he said--it's very problematic 34:35.934 --> 34:39.794 but very crucial to understand the downside, 34:39.789 --> 34:42.649 the bad side of Marxism--"a passive 34:42.652 --> 34:47.942 element, a material base." Right? 34:47.940 --> 34:52.430 As you see, no matter how much Marx glorifies the working 34:52.434 --> 34:56.294 class, he thinks about them as a passive element. 34:56.286 --> 34:57.086 Right? 34:57.090 --> 34:59.890 Simply as a material base. 34:59.889 --> 35:03.449 And that is--who is that? 35:03.449 --> 35:04.499 The proletariat. 35:04.500 --> 35:06.180 And why? 35:06.179 --> 35:08.829 "Because it has nothing to lose but its chains. 35:08.829 --> 35:12.979 It has a universal character, and this is why it is a 35:12.983 --> 35:14.903 universal class." 35:14.900 --> 35:19.770 And, you know, in 1843, it may have been quite 35:19.773 --> 35:20.643 right. 35:20.639 --> 35:24.169 The working class probably had little else to lose but its 35:24.172 --> 35:24.732 chains. 35:24.730 --> 35:29.910 Certainly in 2009 it's usually not true. 35:29.909 --> 35:32.849 The working class has much more to lose than its chains. 35:32.851 --> 35:33.281 Right? 35:33.280 --> 35:37.320 It has probably its own nice suburban house. 35:37.320 --> 35:39.750 They probably own two cars. 35:39.750 --> 35:42.660 They probably even have some pension fund, 35:42.657 --> 35:44.357 on the stock exchange. 35:44.360 --> 35:48.410 Even ordinary workers check out what the Dow Jones did 35:48.411 --> 35:51.701 yesterday, because it affects the impact. 35:51.699 --> 35:54.809 But in his times it was probably true. 35:54.809 --> 35:56.819 So this is how he gets to the problem. 35:56.820 --> 36:01.280 It is the proletariat which will be the universal class. 36:01.280 --> 36:03.930 And now you are already familiar with The Paris 36:03.934 --> 36:06.594 Manuscript, and I will not talk about this. 36:06.590 --> 36:10.550 That's why he wants to show that the proletariat is the most 36:10.552 --> 36:11.362 alienated. 36:11.360 --> 36:14.230 And that makes--follows logically. 36:14.230 --> 36:16.710 I think it damages, to some extent, 36:16.713 --> 36:20.733 the theory of alienation, because it narrows it too much 36:20.731 --> 36:21.391 down. 36:21.389 --> 36:24.959 The focus is too much down on the working class, 36:24.956 --> 36:28.216 and in a way too much down on working class, 36:28.219 --> 36:31.709 working on industrial production in firms. 36:31.710 --> 36:36.110 But really, the message of alienation is much broader. 36:36.110 --> 36:41.590 It tries to convey you some general experience of modern 36:41.590 --> 36:45.180 life where we do not feel at home. 36:45.179 --> 36:53.019 This is the big framing of the problem in the early twentieth 36:53.021 --> 36:54.331 century. 36:54.329 --> 37:01.549 Homelessness, the homeless mind; that we feel homeless in this 37:01.550 --> 37:04.540 world, searching for a home. 37:04.539 --> 37:06.759 That's the sense of alienation. 37:06.760 --> 37:08.560 That's what Marx tried to capture here; 37:08.559 --> 37:11.279 in a way, unfortunately, mis-specified. 37:11.280 --> 37:15.030 Too much emphasis on workers, just because he's beginning to 37:15.030 --> 37:18.840 have this political project and wants to find a revolutionary 37:18.844 --> 37:19.484 class. 37:19.480 --> 37:22.300 And, you know, he abandons it. 37:22.300 --> 37:24.120 "This is ridiculous, you know. 37:24.119 --> 37:26.439 I have to put my show together." 37:26.440 --> 37:31.880 And then he does; beginning to develop what he 37:31.876 --> 37:35.106 calls historical materialism. 37:35.110 --> 37:37.200 So let's get into that one. 37:37.199 --> 37:46.559 And I have ten minutes to do it, and that's all right. 37:46.559 --> 37:50.319 If necessary I will come back to this. 37:50.320 --> 37:55.220 So Marx is developing what he calls historical materialism. 37:55.219 --> 37:59.599 And I will suggest it is making--it is done in two steps. 37:59.599 --> 38:05.039 First, he's emphasizing dialectics in his criticism of 38:05.038 --> 38:06.268 Feuerbach. 38:06.268 --> 38:11.788 Feuerbach is a materialist all right, but he's a mechanical 38:11.786 --> 38:16.636 materialist, and Marx wants to bring dynamics in his 38:16.637 --> 38:18.157 materialism. 38:18.159 --> 38:23.379 And he will argue that this has to--he historically specified 38:23.380 --> 38:24.860 material force. 38:24.860 --> 38:30.930 And this is what he will do in The German Ideology. 38:30.929 --> 38:34.529 But what is dialectical? 38:34.530 --> 38:37.160 I don't want to waste time on this. 38:37.159 --> 38:40.499 I want to get straight into "The Theses on 38:40.496 --> 38:43.606 Feuerbach", which is a very short text, 38:43.614 --> 38:44.924 but very deep. 38:44.920 --> 38:48.780 So here are the eleven Theses of Feuerbach, 38:48.784 --> 38:52.194 on "Theses on Feuerbach." 38:52.190 --> 38:58.450 He tries to carve out what his new approach will be. 38:58.449 --> 39:03.059 And these are the eleven pieces--very short. 39:03.059 --> 39:06.699 He said Feuerbach's materialism was simply reflective. 39:06.699 --> 39:11.009 It actually meant subject and object remained separated, 39:11.010 --> 39:15.070 and the subject reflected on the object outside of the 39:15.067 --> 39:17.977 subject, dominating the actions of the 39:17.978 --> 39:18.618 subject. 39:18.619 --> 39:22.059 But it is assumed that there are objective conditions 39:22.059 --> 39:25.829 irrespective from the subject, and you only reflect on the 39:25.829 --> 39:27.549 subjective conditions. 39:27.550 --> 39:30.420 And he said, "Well in the new 39:30.416 --> 39:34.756 materialism truth is a practical question." 39:34.760 --> 39:37.160 And I will talk about this in a minute. 39:37.159 --> 39:40.359 It means you have to bring, by human practice, 39:40.364 --> 39:42.504 subject and object together. 39:42.500 --> 39:45.740 You have to change the objective conditions of your 39:45.744 --> 39:46.204 life. 39:46.199 --> 39:48.999 That's, you know, not a passive agent, 39:49.003 --> 39:50.903 not over-determination. 39:50.900 --> 39:54.420 Marx is always read as a determinist. 39:54.420 --> 39:54.910 No. 39:54.909 --> 39:57.689 As I will say, Marx's philosophy is a 39:57.686 --> 40:02.476 philosophy of praxis; praxis, practical activity is a 40:02.478 --> 40:04.618 key of Marx's theory. 40:04.619 --> 40:07.829 Man- man changes circumstances. 40:07.829 --> 40:09.389 And how? 40:09.389 --> 40:10.889 We will elaborate on this. 40:10.889 --> 40:12.819 But, you know, we get--you know, 40:12.820 --> 40:16.060 we were born in certain conditions, but we can change 40:16.057 --> 40:16.237 it. 40:16.244 --> 40:16.934 Right? 40:16.929 --> 40:24.569 Then, but in order to change really the--we can't act alone. 40:24.570 --> 40:25.840 We have to cooperate. 40:25.840 --> 40:27.680 That's thesis four. 40:27.679 --> 40:31.699 He said that Hegel, he thought it can be done in 40:31.697 --> 40:32.467 thinking. 40:32.467 --> 40:32.977 No. 40:32.980 --> 40:38.320 Feuerbach thought we can do it in contemplation. 40:38.320 --> 40:42.420 Marx said, "No, it can be only done by social 40:42.422 --> 40:43.932 practices." 40:43.929 --> 40:44.489 V, VI. 40:44.489 --> 40:49.159 Well old materialism was looking at the individual. 40:49.159 --> 40:49.999 Right? 40:50.000 --> 40:53.140 Now I will look at the collective, social 40:53.143 --> 40:56.603 relations--relational, what I'm suggesting is 40:56.601 --> 40:57.781 relational. 40:57.780 --> 41:01.050 Well religion is also a social product; 41:01.050 --> 41:02.540 this is a kind of by the way. 41:02.539 --> 41:06.479 Social life is practical, follows from what we have said. 41:06.480 --> 41:13.200 Well contemplation implies isolated individuals in society. 41:13.199 --> 41:17.109 Well we offer a view of socialized humanity, 41:17.108 --> 41:22.018 that we all act together and there's collective action, 41:22.018 --> 41:24.198 which brings change. 41:24.199 --> 41:28.479 And then the most controversial and most important one. 41:28.480 --> 41:33.060 So far the philosophers have interpreted the world. 41:33.059 --> 41:36.549 Now the point is to change it. 41:36.554 --> 41:37.374 Right? 41:37.369 --> 41:41.039 Good theory is not just describes, it gives you a 41:41.043 --> 41:44.263 prescription what to do about your life. 41:44.260 --> 41:47.120 That's the kind of theory what we want. 41:47.119 --> 41:49.099 That's the "Theses on Feuerbach." 41:49.099 --> 41:52.499 Just eleven sentences basically. 41:52.500 --> 41:54.240 Great sentences. 41:54.239 --> 41:58.159 Sort of all materialism is reflective. 41:58.161 --> 41:59.011 Right? 41:59.010 --> 42:05.110 "The chief defect of Feuerbach is that things", 42:05.110 --> 42:08.910 he said--the German term is Gegenstand-- 42:08.909 --> 42:14.779 "is reality, sensuousness"-- 42:14.780 --> 42:18.750 feeling through our senses, right?-- 42:18.750 --> 42:22.490 "is considered only in the form of the object"; 42:22.489 --> 42:26.759 that we sense the objects outside of our contemplation. 42:26.760 --> 42:31.020 But sensuousness is not perceived as human action, 42:31.016 --> 42:31.796 activity. 42:31.797 --> 42:32.577 Right? 42:32.579 --> 42:37.619 We simply feel the stuff but we don't do anything about that. 42:37.619 --> 42:40.529 He said, "Sensuous activity is what I 42:40.530 --> 42:41.810 emphasize." 42:41.809 --> 42:44.949 Well new materialism. 42:44.949 --> 42:48.299 This is, you know, one of the most important 42:48.304 --> 42:50.494 sentences Marx wrote down. 42:50.489 --> 42:55.169 "Well the question whether objective truths can be 42:55.170 --> 43:00.370 attributed to human thinking is not a question of theory, 43:00.369 --> 43:02.969 but it is a practical question. 43:02.969 --> 43:09.879 Man must prove truth that this worldliness of his thinking in 43:09.884 --> 43:11.614 practice." 43:11.612 --> 43:12.652 Right? 43:12.650 --> 43:17.460 It's not a speculative thing, whether a question of truth. 43:17.460 --> 43:22.460 "The test of the pudding is in the eating"; 43:22.460 --> 43:24.370 he says elsewhere. 43:24.369 --> 43:31.899 The Italian Marxist philosopher, Antonio Gramsci, 43:31.900 --> 43:35.110 who died in the prison of Mussolini, 43:35.110 --> 43:40.880 called Marxism "the philosophy of praxis." 43:40.880 --> 43:45.970 That's the essence of Marxism, that the truth is not the 43:45.971 --> 43:51.061 subject reflecting on the object, but the interaction of 43:51.061 --> 43:53.931 the subject between the object. 43:53.931 --> 43:54.951 Right? 43:54.949 --> 44:00.879 That the subject changes the object in order to meet the need 44:00.878 --> 44:02.558 of the subject. 44:02.559 --> 44:05.919 That's the major point--the separation of subject and 44:05.918 --> 44:06.498 object. 44:06.500 --> 44:10.970 The assumption that there are objective conditions which are 44:10.974 --> 44:15.374 outside of our possible action, is what later Marxists will 44:15.373 --> 44:16.893 call positivism. 44:16.889 --> 44:20.409 Marxism is not positivist. 44:20.409 --> 44:24.879 It believes that we can change the world, rather than just to 44:24.875 --> 44:26.135 accept the world. 44:26.139 --> 44:26.809 Right? 44:26.809 --> 44:31.349 Well I don't have to talk-- don't have enough time to talk 44:31.346 --> 44:32.616 about Gramsci. 44:32.619 --> 44:35.129 Just one word: in fact he called Marxism as a 44:35.130 --> 44:38.410 philosophy of praxis, because he was writing his 44:38.405 --> 44:41.335 major work in the prison of Mussolini, 44:41.340 --> 44:45.630 and was smuggling this book out they called The Prison 44:45.625 --> 44:46.845 Notebooks. 44:46.849 --> 44:50.209 It was smuggled out before he died. 44:50.210 --> 44:52.880 And he knew that, you know, the prison guards 44:52.878 --> 44:53.788 will read it. 44:53.789 --> 44:56.779 So he did not want to write down the term Marxism. 44:56.780 --> 45:01.170 When he meant Marxism, he wrote it 'the philosophy of 45:01.173 --> 45:02.023 praxis'. 45:02.018 --> 45:08.218 And of course the stupid Fascist guards did not know what 45:08.222 --> 45:12.102 on earth philosophy of praxis is. 45:12.099 --> 45:15.969 So they did not know he was writing about Marxism. 45:15.969 --> 45:19.369 But I think he got a very important point. 45:19.369 --> 45:22.779 This is indeed an important feature of Marxism. 45:22.780 --> 45:25.340 Well man changes circumstances. 45:25.340 --> 45:30.250 Well circumstances are changed by man. 45:30.250 --> 45:32.350 And this is again an important sentence. 45:32.349 --> 45:36.349 "The educator must himself be educated." 45:36.349 --> 45:39.349 And those of you in my discussion section yesterday, 45:39.353 --> 45:42.303 this is what you did: you educated the educator. 45:42.300 --> 45:45.410 I realized I did not get, you know, the theory of 45:45.405 --> 45:47.925 alienation through quite effectively. 45:47.929 --> 45:51.009 So I went back and corrected my course. 45:51.010 --> 45:51.660 Right? 45:51.659 --> 45:54.559 "The educators must be educated." 45:54.556 --> 45:55.106 Right? 45:55.110 --> 45:57.510 I think it's a great sentence. 45:57.510 --> 46:01.110 Well, and one needs to discover the role of the masses. 46:01.110 --> 46:04.870 Now that's very much Marx's political project, 46:04.867 --> 46:05.867 coming in. 46:05.869 --> 46:07.999 But an important project. Right? 46:08.000 --> 46:09.680 That you cannot do by yourself. 46:09.679 --> 46:10.059 Right? 46:10.059 --> 46:13.469 If you want to achieve something, you have to 46:13.469 --> 46:14.399 cooperate. 46:14.400 --> 46:15.320 You know? 46:15.320 --> 46:17.650 You need cooperation with others. 46:17.648 --> 46:18.228 Right? 46:18.230 --> 46:21.620 Otherwise nothing can be achieved. 46:21.619 --> 46:28.249 Well Hegel's starting point was abstract thinking. 46:28.250 --> 46:33.540 Feuerbach, he's a materialist, he thinks what is real is what 46:33.543 --> 46:36.283 we can grasp with our senses. 46:36.280 --> 46:37.880 Marx said, "No. 46:37.880 --> 46:41.320 This is sensuous practical activity." 46:41.320 --> 46:44.260 It has to be sensuous, but it has to be practical. 46:47.768 --> 46:49.558 the German philosopher. 46:49.559 --> 46:54.339 He said, "This is the real Marx, who sees the essence of 46:54.342 --> 46:58.412 all sensuous human activity being the core." 46:58.409 --> 47:02.409 Later Marx is a reductionist, because he reduces sensuous 47:02.405 --> 47:04.685 activity to economic activity. 47:04.690 --> 47:08.460 Here Marx perceives all sensuous activity, 47:08.463 --> 47:13.533 including human interaction between us, including sexual 47:13.525 --> 47:17.565 interaction among us, as a sensuous activity. 47:17.574 --> 47:18.684 Right? 47:18.679 --> 47:19.909 As a material reality. 47:19.909 --> 47:25.799 There is not so much conflict between Marx and Freud as it 47:25.804 --> 47:26.844 appears. 47:26.840 --> 47:32.900 Now let me go further. 47:32.900 --> 47:33.090 VI. 47:33.085 --> 47:35.495 Old materialism looks at the individual. 47:35.501 --> 47:36.061 Right? 47:36.059 --> 47:38.579 And this is Marx's big obsession. 47:38.579 --> 47:42.249 The problem with modernity is the isolated bourgeois 47:42.251 --> 47:45.401 individual, and we have to overcome this 47:45.398 --> 47:49.078 isolated individual, and we have to engage each 47:49.077 --> 47:51.227 other in human interaction. 47:51.230 --> 47:54.020 He is a communitarian, right? 47:54.019 --> 47:55.919 He is a communist, right? 47:55.920 --> 47:58.670 He does not want to have isolated individuals, 47:58.670 --> 47:59.160 right? 47:59.159 --> 48:02.029 He wants human interaction. 48:02.030 --> 48:06.410 Well I'll skip this one: religion is also a social 48:06.405 --> 48:07.295 product. 48:07.300 --> 48:12.980 Social life is practical; this is again quite obvious, 48:12.980 --> 48:15.520 and I can probably skip this one. 48:15.518 --> 48:18.348 And here again, you know, the isolated 48:18.353 --> 48:20.693 individual; that's the problem, 48:20.690 --> 48:24.930 that you do not see that really what we can achieve is always 48:24.927 --> 48:28.807 interacting with each other, building on each other. 48:28.809 --> 48:32.629 A single individual will not change anything. 48:32.630 --> 48:37.480 Well, and therefore we stand for socialized humanity. 48:37.480 --> 48:41.900 The standpoint of old materialism is civil society, 48:41.900 --> 48:46.820 and the isolated bourgeois individual in civil society, 48:46.820 --> 48:49.570 and we are talking about a human society, 48:49.570 --> 48:53.620 where we are brothers and sisters, where we have 48:53.621 --> 48:57.351 solidarity, where we act in concert and in 48:57.351 --> 48:58.361 solidarity. 48:58.360 --> 49:05.180 And now comes the most controversial pieces, 49:05.181 --> 49:09.941 what I hate and what I love. 49:09.940 --> 49:13.840 I love because again I think it is wonderfully done, 49:13.838 --> 49:16.508 hate because it's desperately wrong. 49:16.514 --> 49:17.284 Right? 49:17.280 --> 49:21.790 Philosophers have only interpreted the world in various 49:21.793 --> 49:22.383 ways. 49:22.380 --> 49:24.090 The point is to change it. 49:24.090 --> 49:27.770 In some ways, this follows from the earlier 49:27.766 --> 49:29.776 ideas, namely praxis. 49:29.780 --> 49:32.920 Truth is a practical question. 49:32.920 --> 49:37.530 Philosophy only makes sense if it changes your life. 49:37.530 --> 49:40.530 If you just read the philosophy text, 49:40.530 --> 49:45.190 or the theoretical text, for Foundations of Modern 49:45.188 --> 49:49.498 Social Thought, to make sure that we will fall 49:49.500 --> 49:52.220 asleep, then the text did something 49:52.224 --> 49:54.534 wrong, and I did something wrong. 49:54.530 --> 49:55.180 Right? 49:55.179 --> 50:01.409 If the texts are right, and if my lectures are right, 50:01.409 --> 50:04.689 if you start reading "The Theses on Feuerbach", 50:04.690 --> 50:08.090 you cannot fall asleep. Right? 50:08.090 --> 50:12.530 You may have to take a sleeping pill to quiet down and to sleep 50:12.534 --> 50:17.184 because the idea disturbs you, because you feel now you have 50:17.184 --> 50:20.814 to change the world rather than to accept it. 50:20.809 --> 50:22.679 All right. 50:22.679 --> 50:23.059 Thank you. 50:23.059 --> 50:27.999