Marxist Philosophy Quiz

Study Notes

Feuerbach wants sensuous objects, really distinct from the thought objects, but he does not conceive human activity itself as objective activity.
Hence, in contradistinction to materialism, the active side was developed abstractly by idealism – which, of course, does not know real, sensuous activity as such.
Feuerbach does not grasp the significance of “revolutionary”, of “practical-critical”, activity.
The question whether objective truth can be attributed to human thinking is not a question of theory but is a practical question.
Man must prove the truth – i.e. the reality and power, the this-sidedness of his thinking in practice.
The dispute over the reality or non-reality of thinking that is isolated from practice is a purely scholastic question.
In its reality it is the ensemble of the social relations.
Feuerbach, who does not enter upon a criticism of this real essence, is consequently compelled:
To abstract from the historical process and to fix the religious sentiment as something by itself and to presuppose an abstract – isolated – human individual.
Essence, therefore, can be comprehended only as “genus”, as an internal, dumb generality which naturally unites the many individuals.
All social life is essentially practical.
All mysteries which lead theory to mysticism find their rational solution in human practice and in the comprehension of this practice.
The standpoint of the new is human society, or social humanity.
The philosophers have only interpreted the world, in various ways; the point is to change it.
The new standpoint is based on the belief that humans are the center of the universe and that our understanding of the world is the most important thing.
This new standpoint is based on the idea that humans are the only species that can change their environment, and that we have the ability to do so if we work together.
The new standpoint is based on the belief that humans are the only species that can create their own destiny.