Marxist IQ: Back to basics

 
BY:Communist Party USA| January 8, 2019
Marxist IQ: Back to basics

 

1. Marx first formulated his analysis of ideas in response to what older philosopher?

a. Kierkegaard;
b. Schopenhauer;
c. Hegel;
d. Kant.

 

2. Historical materialism includes the following idea:

a. The course of history is dependent on our ideas about the material world;
b. The spirit of any age represents the universal interests of humanity;
c. Consciousness arises from the way that humans produce their material life;
d. The sphere of civil society (the economy) is secondary to spiritual life in importance.

 

3. Marx and Engels had the following to say about the idealist philosophers, except:

a. They are like bleating, middle class sheep;
b. They have innocent, childlike fantasies;
c. They fail to recognize the importance of ideas;
d. They embrace the illusions of their historical time.
e. The phantoms of their brains have got out of their hands.

 

4. In any class-based society, the ruling class asserts that certain concepts are eternal and universal.  When the bourgeoisie is in control, these concepts include:

a. Honor and loyalty;
b. Freedom and equality;
c. Altruism and kinship;
d. Internationalism and religiosity.

 

5. What distinguishes humans from animals?

a. Humans produce their own means of subsistence and hence their actual material life;
b. Humans think of the best ideas;
c. Only humans can avoid “herd consciousness;”
d. Humanity represents the telos of evolution.

 

6. The bourgeois concept of freedom means that:

a. All individuals would have personal freedom;
b. Industrialists are free to exploit workers;
c. All prisoners will be set free;
d. All people are free to access social services.

7. For Marx and Engels, ideology is:

a. A set of ideas that serves to bolster and simultaneously mask the power of the ruling class;
b. A list of tenets which all communists espouse;
c. An empirical, self-critical scientific approach;
d. A mode of production.

 

8. What does Historical Materialism help us understand about today’s political situation?

a. Why rural areas vote differently than urban areas;
b. How easy it is for false “information” to get promulgated;
c. Why there are distinct political areas like the southern U.S. compared with New England;
d. Why the U.S. Supreme Court thinks corporations are people;
e. All of the above.

Get your answers here.

 

 

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