The full text consists of 1 1 outline, all of which focus on "practice" and emphasize the decisive role of practice. Feuerbach does not understand the concept and significance of practice, so his humanistic materialism is intuitive and non-practical, which leads to his inability to get rid of idealism in the field of social history. Marx sublated Feuerbach and mainly mentioned the following points in the outline: the old materialism did not regard things and reality as practical perceptual activities; Whether people's thinking has objective truth is a realistic problem; The change of environment is consistent with human activities, both of which are practice; Man is the sum of all social relations, and social life is essentially practical. From this, we can see the embryonic form of the theory of practice, which is widely quoted now.
The brief outline outlines such a "person" that is different from the previous philosophers: the connection between this person and everything around him is one thing-practice. This kind of practice is in the broadest sense, covering all the activities of "socialized people", including the role of natural human body on the surrounding environment, the role of environment on people and people's thinking. From here, we can see that practice itself represents a concept of dialectical materialism: all human activities are an objective existence, which can act on others as external factors, and at the same time have subjective initiative and special sensibility and emotion. Therefore, the objective truth of mankind still needs to be proved by practice. Marx clearly wrote: "Whether people's thinking has objective truth is not a theoretical issue, but a practical issue". As an empirical thing of human thinking, truth must be proved by practice.
Marx believes that all human activities can be regarded as practice, and practice is the only existence or reality. Practice is existence, and there is nothing but practice. Practice is by no means a rhetoric that stays in books and theories, nor is it like young hegelians's obsession with speculative philosophy. Therefore, practice is the only way and the only key for us to understand Marx's general thought. Some people directly call Marx's philosophy "Pragmatism". The so-called "-ism" is a theory or belief; The so-called "pragmatism" is a philosophical theory about practice and a theoretical belief about practice (Marx and Engels once called their own philosophy "practical materialism" in German Ideology), but today, "practical materialism" has actually become the title of a specific school in the study of Marxist philosophical principles in China since the 1980s.
In Marx's view, practice is defined as "human perceptual activity" with the connotation of "subjectivity" and "initiative", that is, human objectification activity. Objectification means that people achieve their expected goals on their existing objects, that is, humanization. Since practice has the objectification of human beings, it also has the significance of subjectivity, so practice is not only about theory and speculative philosophy, but also about sociality and human subjective activities. Different from Feuerbach, he did not evade the activities and functions of the subject, but brought the problem back to the dynamic aspect of the subject. He realized that knowledge can only happen with the participation of subjective sensibility, otherwise it is impossible to construct any epistemology. Therefore, Marx regarded human activities as human perceptual activities and understood them as practice. On the other hand, Marx never bound the subject's sensibility within the scope determined by ideas and concepts like Hegel, but understood the subject's human activities as perceptual material activities, that is, objective activities. He said: "Feuerbach wants to study perceptual objects that are really different from ideological objects, but he does not understand human activities as rights, images and sexual activities." In this way, according to the way of thinking provided by Marx, practical activities are endowed with the character of one person with two functions, which not only embodies the subjective principle of cognitive activities, but also embodies the objective principle of cognitive activities, so that subjective sensibility realizes its own perfect unity in practice.
This generalized practice is closely related to sociality, because any "objective object" people face in any cognitive activity is actually in the "domain" of practice, so there is always someone's "subjective initiative" involved. We can indeed try our best to eliminate the interference of subjective consciousness of different cognitive subjects in the cognitive process, strive for "subjective conformity with objective" and grasp objective laws; But we can't exclude people's existence and activities to meet their needs from the object, because any object can only be presented in the background of people's existence. Therefore, when we talk about any objective object, its so-called "objectivity" is only relative to our "present" consciousness, that is, it exists independently of the "present" consciousness and before the "present" cognition; But it is still in the field of practice. Consciousness is also the internal factor of practice, so the objective object is still in the previous domain of consciousness, that is, it is impossible to be independent of consciousness and out of consciousness in the end. So in any case, in a sense, the objective law we are looking for has the meaning of "the law of practice" or even "the law of consciousness itself".
Society is made up of individuals, and individuals are members of society, so individual activities should and must be socialized. To some extent, our individual activities are social, which is its essential attribute, although we still live a relatively isolated life. As a single person, the space and time for activities, people and things in contact are relatively cramped and narrow. This kind of life will become rigid if it is not deliberately broadened. People are in society, but their activities are confined to a tiny corner of society. Obviously, compared with the Spring and Autumn Period, people are just a drop in the ocean.
This paper emphasizes the inseparability between human cognitive object and human existence, which will not affect the objective reality and its laws of the object. On the contrary, we return "objective reality" from the pure and comfortable field imagined by the old philosophy to people's practice. Human existence and its practical activities are the most fundamental and the only "reality". Since it is "reality", there is a question that needs to be understood and grasped, and there is also a question of whether understanding conforms to the object and correctly presents the object. Therefore, the law as the object of "seeking truth" also has the characteristics of essential characteristics and objective relations. , but also universal and inevitable. But the "essence" here is the inherent characteristic of human existence and human practical activities; The inevitability and regularity here are the inherent and inevitable relations within human activities and between different activities. In China's philosophy, there is a so-called "reason lies in things", which emphasizes that law is the "reason" in man's "practical things".
To this end, we need to focus on the universe with lofty vision and put our activities into a broader reality. The indirect way is to obtain massive information through various media. The direct way is to practice and taste the taste of pears. The former is mainly about "reading thousands of books", and of course it is not only about studying in today's rapidly changing world. The latter is mainly "walking on the road of Wan Li", which is naturally not just a way to go. By complementing each other, promoting each other and developing together, we can make our thinking more comprehensive, flexible and profound, and our practice more scientific and revolutionary.
Marx mentioned in his article that practice is revolutionary. And the final outline aroused my loudest voice: "Philosophers only explain the world in different ways, and the problem is to change the world." Practice is an activity in which people can actively transform the world. Practice connects the subject living in initiative and dominance with the object living in foundation, forms the relationship between transformation and transformation, and transforms the relationship between nature, society and people themselves. The history of human development shows that without practice, there will be no historical progress and human progress.
All Marx's thoughts revolve around "changing the world", that is, "practice", rather than logically deducing a certain problem in the history of thought. Therefore, all understanding and thinking must be centered on the practice needed to achieve the goal. The debate about whether thinking without practice is realistic is pure scholasticism. Marx made it clear in this sentence a long time ago that he was not interested in "thinking without practice" This is a natural and inevitable thinking tendency of a person who shoulders the mission of "changing the world".
I think our practice should take "application" as the ultimate goal and final destination, that is, it must be aimed at being able to act on the original practical achievements and benefit real life and all mankind from both material and spiritual aspects. "The ideal of life is for the ideal life", and any change that does not help the real life to move forward should not be regarded as an effective practice. For example, "perpetual motion machine" is just a spark of genius and naivety, which will eventually burst in front of reality. In the process of transforming the world, the cognitive relationship between subject and object will inevitably occur. Cognitive relationship is produced on the basis of transformational relationship, and it also acts on transformational relationship. We choose all kinds of information from the outside world, internalize it into our own knowledge, thinking and even theory, and then know our own behavior, practice, feedback and reaction in the living reality environment. The former is a revolution in one's own thinking and spirit, that is, "explaining the world", while the latter is a practical action in one's own thinking, which I understand as changing the world; Only by combining "subjective initiative" with "realistic operability" can practice be said to be complete and have revolutionary significance to truly change reality.