Cyril, I think I agree with every point you make in your last response, except that I don't know what is referred to in relation to Lenin wanting to "bring consciousness from without". Perhaps you could elaborate?

However, I think the issue is the "the habit of putting things as provocatively as possible".

As I mentioned earlier, I am trying to come to grips with post-1841 bourgeois philosophy at the moment. I see three basic trends (prior to Sartre and Althusser) (a) Positivism, (b) Irrationalism and (c) Natural scientific "groping" after truth.

When I look at Irrationalism I see Schopenhauer, Schelling and Kierkegaard in the beginning. All three harbour a deep and passionate hatred of Hegel, the latter two at least are deeply Christian and psychotic (I don't know about Schopenhauer but at the very least he has some big chips on his shoulder and places the Will in lieu of Descartes "special organ"), certainly "alienated from themselves" in a big way! and Kierekgaard is openly anti-scientific.

Then Nietzsche who substitutes psychology for philosophy, and although he is still endeavouring to be "scientific" about what he is doing, he is like the others utterly individualistic and rejects truth as either valued or valid.

After this we see with people like Heidegger and Jaspers (whom I haven't read first-hand, I may not!! from what I read second-hand) who deliberately LIE and write not only provocatively but deliberately to defy understanding and in the end contribute absolutely nothing, despite being repsonsible for the massacre of millions of trees in evading analysis. And these together with Husserl, despite their protestations to the contrary, substitute psychological introspection for philosophy.

So, like someone who has just discoivered through reading that the Labor Party was always as treacherous as it is today, I am discovering that the postmodern love of falsehood and obfuscation is not new!

Now, there is no doubt that doing anything with philosophy (other than guiding our private thoughts) requires us to shock, outrage and provoke, and probably also amuse, challenge and excite. But we also have to mobilise, educate and lead. And we have a very difficult environment to do those things in!

You remarked earlier that your current tasks require a "division of labour", in other words a collective effort. There are some huge tasks waiting to be done: we have to solve some of the tasks around psychology and organisation that we foundered on in the last period, we have to liberate the younger generation of intellectuals from the plague of postmodern bullshit; I think complexity theory opens the way a new stage in the critique of political economy. The word is that a "turn to Marx" is underway in academia. Heaven help us!!! if these professional liars are let loose on the "rediscovery of the real Marx"!

The most powerful and accessible chapter in your book is the first (giving a picture of today's world), the most original and striking the description of how Marx's work was transmitted via Kautsky/Plekhanov to Lenin et al and thus to us ... and to the next generation! The last chapter is however the weakest. [I've lent my copy to Bill Deller, so I can't elaborate on that judgment just now, till I get the book back from Bill]. Who can criticise nowadays for having a problem with the "What is to be Done?" chapter! But of course Marx did not just "set himself the task of making a critique of bourgeois thought" but of revolutionising practice, of changing conditions. The "what is to be done?" is a theoretical-practical task? We have to use our theoretical activity as levers of change. Our theoretical activity is not individual but social activity.

I don't know "what is to be done?" either, in a sense, but I do know that I need to understand Marx better (in particular the heritage of Hegel in Marx, and that's even more true of every other person I know calling themselves a Marxist - and until recently I would have had to say "except Cyril Smith") and that I need help in doing it (I'm probably not alone there) and that one of the main purposes for understanding Marx is to share that understanding with others ("division of labour"), to propagate it, and one of the main means of understanding Marx is to mobilise assistance. I know that the academic bullshit being fed to today's young intellectuals is a product of the times, and that we cannot destroy it without first destroying postmodern society. But we have to open up its contradictions, drive in some wedges, "expose" it and grasp exactly how and what it reflects in today's alienated world in the process. A big task, and we need help! But there're lots wanting to help!

A lot of the work is bringing out of the cellar the old concepts which we have all heard of but maybe don't properly understand. We shake off the dust and put them up where they can be clearly seen, and discuss it with everyone who comes around, explaining and criticising. People are very open to the idea that "Marx has been misrepresented", too open! in fact. If Marx's works are a fortress containing the necessary weapons for the destruction of capitalism, I would be careful about pulling down the walls without first erecting some new defences, and paying attention to the disposition of forces.

Marx calls himself a materialist in a specific context. Of Course. And calls himself a supporter or opponent of Hegel according to the times. But what is the position with "materialism" and "Hegel" today? I think in a sense we are living in the "Ruins of a Lost Civilisation". The meaning of these words has been lost. The writing is on the wall, but no-one knows how to read the hyroglyphs. We huddle aournd our camp-fire in the shelter of the ruins built by people whose identity we have long forgotten and only know of by our myths and fairy-stories.