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This 5 page paper looks at Marx's assumption that it is not the consciousness of men that determines their existence, but their social existence that determines their consciousness. Kant's theories are used to refute the Marxian premise. Bibliography lists 5 sources.
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5 pages (~225 words per page)
File: RT13_SA218mat.rtf
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determines their existence, but their social existence that determines their consciousness. In other words, it is not as if they are born with a blank slate, and that they grow
and develop cerebrally, deciding what political institutions are valid, but rather, their fate determines what they think. For example, someone is born into a poor family and grows up and
is still struggling. He may then vote for liberal candidates who promise him a better life. He might even join the communist party, believing that it is more fair to
share the wealth than to hoard money and goods. What this means is that Marx has a notion that knowledge is really not created by will, but it comes from
ones surroundings. In other words, the mode of production of material life conditions the general process of intellectual life in addition to social and political views. His concept of alienation
helps to illustrate this point, reinforcing the notion that people are not free to think, and feel, and be happy, but rather that their experiences create who they are. Marx
essentially contends that ones occupation determines who people are, and that their status in life has to do with whether or not they are wage laborers or business owners. To
some extent, Marx has a point, but only to an extent. Kant has a different take on this concept. Kants ideas about knowledge and transcendence may be compared
with the Marxian notion. It is interesting to note that when Kant pursued transcendence, he saw it as knowledge beyond the scope of human understanding. He saw the concept as
being equated with something that exceeds ones understanding. Transcendence by definition does exceed all human capacity. This concept is not foreign to the religious sort who see God as omnipotent
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