Marxism and Karl Popper's criticism about its prediction with scientific character

• Author: Fjolentina Kllogjeri
• Position: Aleksandër Xhuvani' University, Elbasan
• Pages: 70-73

70

Vol. 4 No.3

January, 2019

Balkan Journal of Interdisciplinary Research

IIPCCL Publishing, Graz-Austria

ISSN 2410-759X

Acces online at www.iipccl.org

Marxism and Karl Popper’s criticism about its prediction with scientifi c

character

PhD (C.) Fjolentina Kllogjeri

"Aleksandër Xhuvani" University, Elbasan

Abstract

The Marxist interpretation of history is known di erently as 'historical materialism'1 or as a

'materialistic understanding' of history. Two defi nitions that are directly related to the names

of Karl Marks and Frederik Engels. History, on the basis of this understanding, is related with

class struggle, a concept that derives from Hegel's philosophical understanding of history.

Engels a ributes to Hegel's greatest merit the fact that "he introduced for the fi rst time the

entire natural, historical and spiritual world as a process, in motion, in change, in constant

transformation and development, and endeavored to discover the internal connection of this

movement and this development."2

The materialist meaning of history

Historical materialism is essentially an a empt to explain the origins and development

of human society based on the materialistic perspective. Dealing with the general laws

of social development in the historical course, he only points out the role of material

forces in the formation and evolution of human societies. Marx's understanding of

the materialistic concept of history is contrary to the idealistic concept of history, and

he even tried to put this concept into a scientifi c understanding. He was stimulated

from the theory of evolution created by Charles Darwin who explained the evolution

of the species through the process of natural selection. The meaning he gave to the

world as a whole and to things and phenomena that compose it, which comes as

a result of its uninterrupted movement and development, by merging dialectics

with materialism and by linking it to nature and society, Marx and Engels created

materialistic dialectics. Marx predicts the collapse of many of the theories of history

which they consider to be important in determining the course of history and human

destiny, free consciousness, people's will, their ideas, etc. Marks says that human

societies are developed in accordance with several laws that are independent of

people's desires and wills. He argues that the development of society can be seen as

a result of the social production process where people come together and enter into

defi ned relationships which he considers indispensable and independent of their will

and desires. At this point, he sees the decisive role of work, as in human origins from

the ape, as well as in the evolution of social forms. So Karl Marx saw the Darwinian

theory of developing the most complex forms of living by the simplest organisms, in

parallelism with the development of the society towards complex systems.

1 Historical materialism sums up itself: conscience problems, where matter is considered primary and

consciousness is secondary; the theory of recognition, that the world can be recognized; and the categories

and laws of dialectics (the law of qualitative changes, the law of denial, the law of unity and the law of the

existence of opposites).

2 Marks, Karl ; Engels, Frederik, “Vepra të zgjedhura”, Vëllim II, 1975, pg 136.