From: Lau Kam To <ktlau127-at-netvigator.com>

To: Andy Blunden <andy-at-mira.net

Dear Andy,

I'm still enlisted in the 'Industrial Reserve Army'. There seems to be no easy way out at the moment given the economic downturn in Asia. While I should have made good use of my 'leisure' by doing some readings or discussions but somehow could not get myself to have the mood to do so. As you know, job hunting in a time like this can be very frustrating. But, capitalism despite all its internal ups and downs, is going to survive after this crisis (I heard Marx was turning in his grave again). If not, I may get into deeper water when it breaks down! Well, life is a dilemma to the working class.

Sorry for self-grumbling. Back to business.

1) After some browsings on evolution, my impression is that Hegel is more a Darwinian than what many people thought about Darwin: evolution necessary = progress, advance etc. are more suitable to Hegel than to Darwin himself. Marx cited Darwin somewhere in Capital as further support of his economic theory and Marxists used to follow the practice. Now given Engel's Dialectics of Nature, I don't quite get how Marxists treated the relation between the two: D of N and evolution are separated doctrines? or related in a certain way? or one subsumed the other?

2) "Rather than endlessly disputing the Hegel-Marx relation, at the moment, I want to test out the ideas in tackling 20th Century philosophy. In the course of doing this, I will doubltless be driven constantly to revisit the Hegel-Marx question again and again."

Yes, it is necessary to tackle the era we're now living. No doubt, in your project I think you will come back again to that Hegel-Marx relation which is of pivotal importance not only in understanding Hegel but in clarifying Marx's position as well as the whole development of contemporary philosophy (Nietzsche, Heidegger, Derrida, etc.) which to a great extent is a reaction to the demise of the Hegelian system. As Habermas remarked somewhere (forgot where at the moment): "In the philosophical discourse of modernity, we are still contemporaries of the Young Hegelians."

I shall have a look at your flyer which turned out 19 pages (long stuff, comrade!) from my printer.

Alex