Diet Soap Update: Abstractions Brendan Cooney Hegel Law of Value Marxism Robots Star Trek Value Theory
by douglaslain
3 comments
Diet Soap Podcast #157: Real Abstract Robots?
The guest this week is Brendan Cooney and we discuss his Law of Value youtube video series (I play the soundtrack for his second video), and discuss real abstractions as explained in Marx’s bestselling book Capital. We start off discussing whether Data from the television show Star Trek the Next Generation would generate value if he time traveled to this current Capitalist economy.
I am still planning on canceling the Podomatic feed for Diet Soap and moving the podcast to douglaslain.com. If you subscribe to podcast through podomatic you’ll need to change over to the new feed by the end of the month, that means that the next podcast will be the last podcast on the podomatic website. In that episode I’ll try to explain just how to find the Diet Soap RSS feed from Blubrry. When I make the switch I’m also going to restart the Diet Soap philosophy workshop and that workshop will continue weekly, or at least it will be a part of every episode. That means that while I’ll continue on discussing Hegel once a month, I’ve decided to expand the workshop to a weekly format. After each Diet Soap episode subscribers to the podcast will get a chance to participate in a conversation about that episode. So, yes, there will be regular Hegel episodes, but subscribers will also get a chance to discuss all the different subjects that we cover or bring up their own ideas. Finally, I am also going to start a monthly podcast with C. Derick Varn called Pop the Left. We’ll take a critical look at the politics of the Left from a Leftist perspective and, at first, that’ll be hosted through the same RSS feed as Diet Soap, but if a few more people donate or subscribe I’ll start a second feed for Pop the Left on its own. So, you can help me start a new podcast by donating today.
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I loved the answer to Brendan’s orthodox view on Hegel, ie Zizek’s explanation which I think is spot on. This is crucial, and why I think theory is important, as both Marx and Lenin understood. I hope the next poscasts get’s into a conversation about this issues. I’m at the beginning of ‘Theory’ but I know Hegel is not something I can ignore if I’m serious about understanding Marx. Keep up the good work. P.S. I’d love a podcast on Humanism.
Hegel does in fact find social practice that embodies an abstract pattern. It’s in Philosophy of History; the process of Spirit unfolding into the world and eventually finding its ultimate expression of Freedom (the ability to do, not merely caprice) in the German monarchy.