1
1
CONVERSATIONS IN WARSAW
277
foresee considerable philosophical difficulty.
An
"active" view of
semantics involves a theory of mind and consciousness. One can
propose either an idealist theory of mind or a behaviorist one based
on the socio-biological approach of Dewey and George Herbert
Mead. The orthodox Marxist view, as outlined in Lenin's work, is
a "copy theory" of knowledge, in which thought "reflects" material
movement. And this is extremely crude philosophy.) "What about
Lenin's
Materialism and Empirio-Criticism?"
I asked Urban. "I
ignore it," he replied. It was evident that, as he outlined them, his
own
views were close to pragmatism-the views, say, of Charles W.
Morris. "What will you do if the Russian philosophers attack you
as
a pragmatist?" I asked. "Oh, that would
be
vulgar Marxism,"
he replied jocularly.
We went into the dining room, where we were joined by Mme.
Urban,
a small, pleasant-looking woman. Our conversation ranged
over the American elections, the Berlin crisis and China. Caplan–
sky had just finished Isaac Deutscher's most recent book, and
expressed
approval of it. He argued that Russia was moving into a
new
historical stage, in which the maturity of the working class
would force changes in the social structure. I replied that domina–
tion does not always derive from an economic cause, that the new
privileged groups in the Soviet Union would want to pass on their
privileges to 'their children, and that the party would not easily
relinquish its role as the arbiter of the country's policy.
The discussion of Deutscher led directly into a discussion of
the Polish situation. I asked Urban to explain the increasing pres–
sure against the intellectuals and the tightening of controls. "You
are enough of a Marxist," he said, to "realize that these problems
have an economic foundation." The initial reason, he said, is demo–
graphic. The economy wasn't moving fast enough to absorb the
1arge
number of young people, born after the end of the war, who
would be coming into the labor market in the next few years. It is
true, he said, answering a question I put to him, that there had
been discussions in the party's economic commission about the de–
sirability of introducing a larger measure of unemployment into the
economy, in order to frighten the workers into increasing produc–
tivity.
"I know what you are probably thinking," he said, "but the
lituation
is
not the same as in capitalist society. There, unemploy-
