epistemological break

is the radical break with the whole pattern and frame of reference of a hegelian marx toward the historical materialism of his later work.

A concept introduced by Gaston Bachelard in his La Formation de l'esprit scientifique, and related to uses of the term in studies in the history of ideas by Canguilhem and Foucault (see Althusser's Letter to the Translator). It describes the leap from the pre-scientific world of ideas to the scientific world... this leap involves a radical break with the whole pattern and frame of reference of the pre-scientific (ideological) notions, and the construction of a new pattern (problematic q.v.). Althusser applies it to Marx's rejection of the Hegelian and Feuerbachian ideology of his youth and the construction of the basic concepts of dialectical and historical materialism in his later works.'

epistemological break, n.Definitions

epistemological break