> If you take their communist ideas out of the equation
For crying out loud, that was the point of the whole ball of wax.
They came up with "scientific materialism" so they could "demonstrate" that the inexorable progress of history would lead from the original primitive communism to the final advanced communism.
(All other believers in communism that did not adhere to the doctrine were to be shunned because their "unscientific" approach would make them bad guides.)
For crying out loud, that was the point of the whole ball of wax.
They came up with "scientific materialism" so they could "demonstrate" that the inexorable progress of history would lead from the original primitive communism to the final advanced communism.
(All other believers in communism that did not adhere to the doctrine were to be shunned because their "unscientific" approach would make them bad guides.)