You might be more well equipped for Marx than you think. The Tao the Ching, and the I Ching are both works of dialectical philosophy. Marxism, when applied correctly, is a fusion of empirical materialism and dialectics. Whenever people new to Marxism struggle with his method, I always recommend the Tao te Ching. People raised with western rational model, like us, struggle with contradiction in our reasoning. Except when it affects our lives directly, our minds reject it. The Tao teaches us to stay with the contradictions, which is what is needed to perform a dialectical analysis, since dialectics is the logic of change, progression, and synthesis, relation and contradiction.
This along with the mention of Marcus Aurelius reminds me of when I first started trying to educate myself, and came across the work of Nick Taleb. Its a bit pitched to the right for my taste these days (although his sterling advice, “don’t be a sucker” is as good advice as you’ll ever get,) but at the time it is what got me into studying philosophy, Meditations was the second philosophy book I ever read. I don’t consider myself a stoic, but I loved that book at one time, as well as the Enchirideon by Epictetus.
Your claim of an imbalance in power between the workers and owners is at least an acknowledgement of Marx’s theories. Maybe you like that balance, lots of people have a fetish for “balance of powers” and maybe there’s something to that. Except the balance can’t be achieved, it always prefers the owners and requires historical amounts of civil unrest to make any reluctant progressive change at all.
I don’t appreciate being told that I’m in a cult, a cult that never existed, and certainly Marx never started one. Its dishonest, but I guess you picked it up somewhere. I def didn’t know what Marx was about before I studied him. Buy now if I don’t know an author, I don’t have to pretend I’m smart or know something I don’t, I just say I don’t know and if I am interested then I study them. Very simple and honest.
Here’s the thing they won’t tell you about Marx: when you’re a worker and you learn to read him, because he’s difficult, you realize that he confirms your experience as a worker and goes deeper. He proves what we suspect but that everyone tells us isn’t true. He removes doubt and provides a way forward –
– and then you study the history of the USSR and other 20th century socialist experiments and the doubt comes back. But Marx was, hands down, the greatest intellectual of the 19th century and should be read and studied by all. Not to indoctrinate into a cult, but to actually open peoples minds to what is possible, and how class rule, throughout history, has worked tirelessly to alienate us from our selves and each other. Capitalism is just the latest and greatest form of class rule.
Thank you for the considerate response.
You might be more well equipped for Marx than you think. The Tao the Ching, and the I Ching are both works of dialectical philosophy. Marxism, when applied correctly, is a fusion of empirical materialism and dialectics. Whenever people new to Marxism struggle with his method, I always recommend the Tao te Ching. People raised with western rational model, like us, struggle with contradiction in our reasoning. Except when it affects our lives directly, our minds reject it. The Tao teaches us to stay with the contradictions, which is what is needed to perform a dialectical analysis, since dialectics is the logic of change, progression, and synthesis, relation and contradiction.
This along with the mention of Marcus Aurelius reminds me of when I first started trying to educate myself, and came across the work of Nick Taleb. Its a bit pitched to the right for my taste these days (although his sterling advice, “don’t be a sucker” is as good advice as you’ll ever get,) but at the time it is what got me into studying philosophy, Meditations was the second philosophy book I ever read. I don’t consider myself a stoic, but I loved that book at one time, as well as the Enchirideon by Epictetus.
Your claim of an imbalance in power between the workers and owners is at least an acknowledgement of Marx’s theories. Maybe you like that balance, lots of people have a fetish for “balance of powers” and maybe there’s something to that. Except the balance can’t be achieved, it always prefers the owners and requires historical amounts of civil unrest to make any reluctant progressive change at all.
I don’t appreciate being told that I’m in a cult, a cult that never existed, and certainly Marx never started one. Its dishonest, but I guess you picked it up somewhere. I def didn’t know what Marx was about before I studied him. Buy now if I don’t know an author, I don’t have to pretend I’m smart or know something I don’t, I just say I don’t know and if I am interested then I study them. Very simple and honest.
Here’s the thing they won’t tell you about Marx: when you’re a worker and you learn to read him, because he’s difficult, you realize that he confirms your experience as a worker and goes deeper. He proves what we suspect but that everyone tells us isn’t true. He removes doubt and provides a way forward –
– and then you study the history of the USSR and other 20th century socialist experiments and the doubt comes back. But Marx was, hands down, the greatest intellectual of the 19th century and should be read and studied by all. Not to indoctrinate into a cult, but to actually open peoples minds to what is possible, and how class rule, throughout history, has worked tirelessly to alienate us from our selves and each other. Capitalism is just the latest and greatest form of class rule.
But a better world is possible!