Watch This Double Amputee Control Two Robotic Arms At Once.
An excellent post with a couple of truly amazing videos. And the point about ‘distribution’ is a whole other subject…
Monthly Archives: December 2014
Lenin: Empirio-criticism and historical materialism – part fifteen
Georges Braque, Violin and Pitcher, 1910, oil on canvas, Kunstmuseum Basel, Basel, Switzerland
Conclusion
…The vast majority of scientists, both generally and in this special branch of science in question, viz., physics, are invariably on the side of materialism. A minority of new physicists, however, influenced by the break-down of old theories brought about by the great discoveries of recent years, influenced by the crisis in the new physics, which has very clearly revealed the relativity of our knowledge, have, owing to their ignorance of dialectics, slipped into idealism by way of relativism. The physical idealism in vogue today is as reactionary and transitory an infatuation as was the fashionable physiological idealism of the recent past.
…behind the epistemological scholasticism of empirio-criticism one must not fail to see the struggle of parties in philosophy, a struggle which in the last analysis reflects the tendencies and ideology of the antagonistic classes in modern society. Recent philosophy is as partisan as was philosophy two thousand years ago. The contending parties are essentially, although this is concealed by a pseudo-erudite quackery of new terms or by a weak-minded non-partisanship – materialism and idealism. The latter is merely a subtle, refined form of fideism, which stands fully armed, commands vast organisations and steadily continues to exercise influence on the masses, turning the slightest vacillation in philosophical thought to its own advantage. The objective, class role of empirio-criticism consists entirely in rendering faithful service to the fideists in their struggle against materialism in general and historical materialism in particular.
V.I.Lenin, Materialism and Empirio-criticism: Critical Comments on a Reactionary Philosophy, Progress Publishers, Moscow, 1975, 335-336
Full text at Marxists Internet Archive
NASA astronomy pictures of the day – 9
1. Light Deposits Indicate Water Flowing on Mars
2. Reflecting Merope
3. Wind from a Black Hole
4. Huygens on Titan Illustrated
5. M51: The Whirlpool Galaxy in Dust and Stars
6. The Great Basin on Tethys
7. The N44 Superbubble
8. An Alaskan Volcano Erupts
9. IC 2118: The Witch Head Nebula
10. IC 1396 H-Alpha Close-Up
Image sources and information: 1./2./3./4./5./6./7./8./9./10.
Lenin: Empirio-criticism and historical materialism – part fourteen
Democritus, Johannes Moreelse, oil on canvas, c. 1630, Centraal Museum, Utrecht
Ernst Haeckel and Ernst Mach (continued)
Imagine the bitter lot of a Machist when his favourite subtle constructions, which reduce the categories of natural science to mere working hypotheses, are laughed at by the scientists on both sides of the ocean as sheer nonsense! Is it to be wondered at that Rudolf Willy, in 1905, combats Democritus as though he were a living enemy, thereby providing an excellent illustration of the partisan character of philosophy and once more exposing the real position he himself takes up in this partisan struggle? He writes: “Of course, Democritus was not conscious of the fact that atoms and the void are only fictitious concepts which perform mere accessory services (blosse Handlangerdienste), and maintain their existence only by grace of expediency, just as long as they prove useful. Democritus was not free enough for this; but neither are our modern natural scientists, with few exceptions. The faith of old Democritus is the also the faith of our natural scientists” (op. cit., S. 57).
Ernst Haeckel (1834-1919)
And there is good reason for despair! The “empirio-criticists” have proved in quite a “new way” that both space and atoms are “working hypotheses”; and yet the natural scientists deride this Berkeleianism and follow Haeckel! We are by no means idealists, this is a slander; we are only striving (together with the idealists) to refute the epistemological line of Democritus; we have been striving to do so for more than 2,000 years, but all in vain! And it only remains for our leader Ernst Mach to dedicate his last work, the outcome of his life and philosophy, Knowledge and Error, to Wilhelm Schuppe and to remark ruefully in the text that the majority of natural scientists are materialists and that “we also” sympathise with Haeckel… for his “free-thinking” (S. 14).
Ernst Haeckel with Nicholai Miklukho-Maklai, his assistant, in the Canary Islands, 1866
And there he completely betrays himself, this ideologist of reactionary philistinism who follows the arch-reactionary Schuppe and “sympathises” with Haeckel’s free-thinking. They are all like this, these humanitarian philistines in Europe, with their freedom-loving sympathies and their ideological (as well as political and economic) captivity to the Wilhelm Schuppes. Non-partisanship in philosophy is only wretchedly masked servility to idealism and fideism.
V.I.Lenin, Materialism and Empirio-criticism: Critical Comments on a Reactionary Philosophy, Progress Publishers, Moscow, 1975, 333-334
Part fourteen/to be continued…
Full text at Marxists Internet Archive
NASA astronomy pictures of the day – 8
1. Water Claimed in Evaporating Planet HD 209458b
2. A Beautiful Boomerang Nebula
3. The Trifid Nebula in Stars and Dust
4. The Dotted Dunes of Mars
5. Io: The Prometheus Plume
6. MWC 922: The Red Square Nebula
7. The Arms of NGC 4258
8. Earth from Saturn
9. NGC 2440: Cocoon of a New White Dwarf
10. The Cat’s Paw (or Bear Claw) Nebula
Image sources and information: 1./2./3./4./5./6./7./8./9./10.
NASA astronomy pictures of the day – 7
1. Miranda calling all BASE jumpers! Verona Rupes: tallest known cliff in the solar system (20km deep)! It’s waiting!
2. Dust Sculptures in the Rosette Nebula
3. Into pastel? IC 4603: Reflection Nebula in Ophiuchius
4. How about some pale blue wash – or is it scumble and glaze? The Merope Reflection Nebula
5. Thor’s Helmet from CFHT
6. Kepler’s Supernova Remnant in X-Rays
7. Complimentaries: The Eagle Nebula in Infrared
8. NGC 6960: The Witch’s Broom Nebula
9. Stars, Dust and Nebula in NGC 2170
10. Vela Supernova Remnant in Visible Light
Image sources and information: 1./2./3./4./5./6./7./8./9./10.
NASA astronomy pictures of the day – 6
To Fly Free in Space: Bruce McCandless II about 100 metres from space shuttle Challenger, 1984
W5: Pillars of Star Formation
A Hole in Mars
Moon and Earth from Chang’e 5-T1
Potentially Habitable Moons
A Galactic Star Forming Region in Infrared
A Blue Crescent Moon from Space
Persistent Saturnian Auroras
Expansive Comet Holmes
In the Centre of Reflection Nebula NGC 1333
NASA astronomy pictures of the day – 5
Heavy Black Hole Jets in 4U1630-47
The Antikythera Mechanism
The Eskimo Nebula from Hubble and Chandra
Star Size Comparisons
Saturn Hurricane
Gravitational Tractor
Saturn from Above
M2-9: Wings of a Butterfly Nebula
Collapse in Hebes Chasma on Mars
Orion Launch 05.12.14
Tim Wise on “Nice”
An excellent article. And I am glad to have read it on the same day the Australian media is choked with hypocrisy and ‘niceness’ after the Lindt cafe hostage-taking in central Sydney.
‘Niceness’ and the narrowest understanding of ‘decency’ are basic ideological tools.
This hostage-taking has lifted the lid on an immensely powerful lie of the dominant class in Australia – that ‘we’ in Australia are one nice, decent, happy, inclusive community (the Melbourne Cup, ‘the race that stops a nationTM’, proves this!) with the great good fortune of being distinct, because of Australia’s geography, and, dare I say it – affluence for the great majority, from a deeply troubled world.
The ideologues of capital have gone into overdrive with voices at times soothing, at others emotional or resonant and knowing, to silence comments such as I heard on the radio this morning from a ‘decent’ Aussie gentleman – ‘I thought Australia was far away from all this. It’s a wake-up call.’
No, No, No – back to sleep all you nice and decent people. Who could forget The Chaser skit (which they repeated) in which nice and decent Australians descend on an escalator and are directed by a person in the modicum of a uniform at the bottom to go back on the ‘up’ escalator. Each time I saw that skit the people all behaved the same, nicely and decently, without question, doing as they were told.
The ideologues of capital are using the hostage-taking, initiated by one who was ‘mad’ and ‘bad’ (so often the ‘analysis’), from a nation and region exploited, brutalised, betrayed and ripped apart, particularly over the last century, by activity engaged in, supported and condoned by Australia, to reinforce the self-centredness of ‘niceness’ (the capitalist ideology of ‘nice’ consumerism) and the most myopic, nationalist ‘decency’.
Dorothy, over the rainbow, would be pleased with the purity and simplicity of the message.
Not only the complicit and servile Australian media, but the world’s media will be all over this. I look forward to what will inevitably come out.
* * *
From the Twittersphere
Murderous, uncivilised Islamic State terrorist:
* ‘The world must stand for the news of 13 Australian hostages but it would sleep for the news of over 130000 Muslims killed in Syria’
* ‘Gaza is under siege, Homs and Damascus are under siege the café in Sydney is Not.’
Tender-hearted, civilised Rupert Murdoch:
* ‘AUST gets wake-call with Sydney terror. Only Daily Telegraph caught the bloody outcome at 2.00 am. Congrats’
_____________________________
Nice people change nothing. They never have and they never will. Those who are nice are so invested in their niceness, in their sense of propriety and civility, that they rarely raise their voices above a whisper, even in the face of sweltering oppression. Nice white people were the ones who didn’t own black folks during the period of enslavement, but also didn’t raise their voices against the ones who did. Nice white people are the ones who didn’t spit on sit-in demonstrators, but also had no problem spending money with businesses that had remained segregated all those years.
To be nice is to have an emotional stake in the prevention of one’s own pain. Nice people don’t like to look at the ugly. It’s upsetting, most of all because it puts us on the hook and calls forth our humanity to actually put an end to that pain…
View original post 267 more words
NASA astronomy pictures of the day – 4
Dry Ice Pits on Mars
Bright Planetary Nebula NGC 7027 from Hubble
NGC 3132: The Southern Ring Nebula
The Bubble Nebula
Inside the Eagle Nebula
Venus and the Triply Ultraviolet Sun
M51: The Whirlpool Galaxy
The Sombrero Galaxy in Infrared
NGC 7293: The Helix Nebula
A Solar Filament Erupts
materialism, mysticism and art 
