Lukacs, Althusser, Science and Revolution

[YKTMX]

There's been a bit of discussion recently about Althusser, the dialectic, Marxist approaches to epistemological questions. So I'm going to post this excerpt (one chapter) from my undergraduate dissertation.

Anybody who wants a full copy can PM me and I'll discuss it with them.

Cheers,

Callum

__________________________________________________ __________

The relationship between Marxism and epistemology is necessarily a fraught one. Marxism likes to claim for itself a theoretical rigour approaching ‘scientific objectivity’. However, Marxism, before it is anything else, is a social and political doctrine aimed at bringing about a complete transformation of existing society. Marxism is caught in the trap between a desire to ‘interpret the world’ through ‘scientific methods’ and an ethical-political commitment to ‘changing the world’ through revolutionary praxis.[1] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=33#_ftn1) Now, clearly, we cannot hope to traverse the whole of Marxism’s interaction with epistemological problems! What we intend to do, however, is pull out a particular stand and relate it to the discussions we’ve been relaying above. Our discussion will have three parts. Firstly, we will deal with the critique of “bourgeois” epistemology offered by Lukács. Secondly, we will consider his attempts to overcome the problems of epistemology by way of an investigation into the nature of the subject-object of History. Lastly, we will consider Althusser’s objections to this endeavour and his concept of the ‘epistemological break’ in Marx. The purpose of all this is to identify a theory of knowledge that can help us support the ‘critique of ideology’ in contemporary capitalism.

“The Antinomies of Bourgeois Thought”

The chapter on ‘The Reification and the Class Consciousness of the Proletariat’ in History and Class Consciousness synthesises two seemingly separate intellectual undertakings. It serves both as a history of classical philosophy and its problems and a social history of the bourgeoisie.


For Lukács, the development of a philosophical system cannot be separated from the historical moment from which it emerges. For this reason, he quite explicitly links the problems of bourgeois philosophy with the crisis of the bourgeois class as a whole. Thus, he notices in the failure of philosophy to overcome the ‘irrationality’ of the Kantian thing-in-itself the failure of the bourgeois class to fully comprehend the society that is has created. The inability of the subject to make the whole of objective reality conform to his knowledge - to make the passage from the merely formal world to the world of content - is a product of a particular standpoint necessary to the development of capitalism: ‘Man in capitalist society confronts reality ‘made’ by himself which appears to him to be a natural phenomenon alien to himself’.[2] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=33#_ftn2)
For this reason, the “rules” of capitalist society appear to take the form of “natural laws”. The capitalist is not, as he likes to think, an ‘active’ subject, making the way in the world as a result of his own genius, but a mere object through which the natural laws governing society ‘work’.[3] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=33#_ftn3)

The inability to overcome the irrationality of the thing-in-itself in all the formal, rationalistic systems results from this merely ‘contemplative’ stance towards the object of knowledge (society). In order to overcome this ‘reification of consciousness’, it was deemed necessary by the most perceptive philosophers to go beyond contemplation into the field of action. In praxis, the antinomy of subject and object could be resolved to unity, since every product would become an identical “subject-object”. The search was then on to identify this ‘subject of the creator’.[4] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=33#_ftn4)


It is self-evident why the bourgeoisie cannot fulfil this historical task. Their ‘ideal of knowledge’ consisted in the ‘mathematical organization’ of the ‘necessary natural laws’, and the ‘purely formal’ connections between them. This necessarily yielded a conception of the objective reality that functioned ‘without the intervention of the subject’.[5] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=33#_ftn5)

This subjective stance assumed by bourgeois man, this alienation from the social order it had in fact created was the source of the ‘antinomies of bourgeois thought’ (the distinction between “is” and “ought”, “form” and “content”) and the irrationality of the thing-in-itself. It denied human knowledge access to the “Totality” structuring social reality by reifying that social reality, naturalizing it and breaking it down it into a series of constituent elements that were said to operate independently and be governed by their own “partial laws”.


It was in history, or rather in the process of history, that this ‘immediate’ relation to the given empirical reality could be exposed as an error. History itself had created a force aimed at overcoming the distinctions between judgements of fact and judgements of value – the proletariat. In the proletariat, a force exists that can transcend the given empirical reality; it can remake the world precisely because it is both a product and a producer of this world. Only it can ‘see the social reality as a concrete historical reality’ and expose the ‘reifying’ concepts both of the bourgeoisie and social democracy.[6] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=33#_ftn6) It alone has access to the forms of mediation with the ‘immediate’ reality that allows the naïve distinctions between “fact” and “value” to be overcome. It is, in other words, the subject-object of the historical process. Its class consciousness is the “self-knowledge” of the historical process.


For this reason, we can see why Lichtheim is too quick to link Lukács with a ‘rejection of subjectivism’.[7] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=33#_ftn7) What Lukács is rejecting is an undialectical, “unmediated” subjectivism, because such a stance does nothing to change the given, empirical reality of the world. It merely “immortalizes” in philosophical form the given social reality.[8] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=33#_ftn8) What he identifies in the proletariat is a subjective stance from where it is ‘possible in the first place for an ‘ought’ to modify existence’.[9] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=33#_ftn9) Lukács is expressing in the language of an epistemology what Marx did in the Theses when he critiqued the “one-sidedness” of Feuerbach’s materialism. What Lukács is “rejecting”, in other words, is not only “utopian subjectivism” but also the uncritical materialism that “reifies” society and transforms into a mere ‘object’ to be reflected upon.
It should be clear then that Lukács is not committing himself either to a ‘scientific objectivity’ (a purely contemplative attitude) or a pure ‘relativism’. Instead, Lukács creates a theory of knowledge that is subjective, but rooted in the objective processes of history. Now, this is not to suggest that Lukács’ theory is merely a brilliant exposition of Marxist “orthodoxy” – the hostility with which History and Class Consciousness was greeted will obviously attest that this was not the case. It is clearly heavily imbued with Hegelianism. In particular, Lukács’ identification of the ‘Totality’ as the primary category of knowledge marks a departure from ‘historical materialist’ orthodoxy that identifies the economic process as the crucial factor. The claim crucial to Lukács’ epistemology, that one can use the Hegelian dialectic but apply it to “different objects”, is one that, as we will see, was also not unproblematic.


“The Epistemological Break”: Althusser, Science and Marxism

If Marxist accounts of epistemology could be rendered as a continuum, Lukács would be at one end and Althusser at the other. Why? Althusser’s account of Marxism, his attempt to base Marxism on a sound ‘scientific’ foundation by creating a structural account of human history, declared itself opposed both to the Hegelian-Marxist ‘method’ (this is Lukács) and the objects to which it was applied. Althusser wants to separate Marx both from his Hegelian roots and, even more radically, from his “young” self.[10] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=33#_ftn10) Althusser rejects the notion that we can see Marx’s thought as a logical ‘progression’ from the ‘humanism’ of the early works to the ‘science’ of Capital. Instead, he argues that the ‘young Marx’ was still working within ideology and had not yet developed the science that was to come later. So: “we cannot say that Marx’s youth is part of Marxism…of course, Marx’s youth did lead to Marxism, but at the price of a prodigious break with his origins”.[11] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=33#_ftn11) The nature of this ‘break’ with ideology into the field of science, as conceived by Althusser at least, will concern us for the remainder of the chapter.


At the level of theory, Althusser argues that we can identify an ‘ideology’ (as opposed to a science) by the fact that ‘its own problematic is not conscious of itself’.[12] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=33#_ftn12) In ideology, there are a series of theoretical presuppositions that remain unconscious and are accepted uncritically. The ‘young Marx’ can be seen as still within ideology precisely because he had not broken with the ‘problematic’ of German idealism. He was still submerged in a theoretical universe that was unscientific and alien to the “proper” Marxism that was to come. Of course, the greatest philosophical influence on the ‘young Marx’ was Hegel, and it is Hegelianism in particular that has continued to function as an ideology within Marxism even after Marx himself broke with it.


The ‘hangover’ from Hegelianism within the ‘science of the development of social formations’ can be observed most clearly in the way in which the dialectic operates in each. According to Althusser, the illusion of Hegelian-Marxism is that a ‘method’ can be separated from the objects to which it is applied in practice without altering its fundamental structures. We should note that that is explicitly what Lukács claims is possible.
The usual Marxist formula is that the Hegelian dialectic is ‘extracted’ from Hegel’s idealistic system and applied to the new, materialist concepts of Marxism (classes, modes and relations of production instead of “World Spirit” etc.). But this, it appears to Althusser, is quite a curious assumption. What he argues is that it is not simply the objects to which the Hegelian dialectic is applied that have been altered by Marx, but its ‘specific structures’.[13] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=33#_ftn13) In particular, he recognises a shift from the ‘simple’ contradiction of the Hegelian system to the ‘overdetermined contradiction’ of the materialist dialectic. The materialist dialectic involves a complex ‘overdetermination’ of the ‘simple’ contradiction between Labour and Capital. Though the economy ‘distributes effectivity between the elements of the superstructure’, and is their unifying principle, the superstructures still have autonomy.[14] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=33#_ftn14) We can wait for the great moment when the contradictions in the economy will ‘save us’ from capitalism but, alas, ‘that lonely hour never comes’. So while, like Gramsci, Althusser attributes ‘economism’ with an important ideological function ‘for the masses’, it is another expression of unscientific Marxism.


But Althusser’s attempts to place Marxism on a scientific footing are no less problematic. Being influenced by the structuralism of figures like Levi-Strauss and Bachelard obliges Althusser to ‘repudiate lived experience’ as ideological and confine his science to a world of pure theory.[15] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=33#_ftn15) Marxism is transformed from a form of social and historical praxis to a question of the gradual refinement of concepts leading to ‘scientific knowledge’ of society. In particular, this repudiation of ‘lived experience’ meant that ‘there can be no discrepancy between the empirical implications of a theory and the actual course of events’.[16] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=33#_ftn16) We are committed in other words to a total abandonment of the field of praxis, except to the extent that we “know” that ideology is necessary “for the masses” but not its philosophers.

The consequences for Marxist politics are drastic. The consequences of such theoreticism for Althusser’s own politics were quite appalling. For instance, it led him to a rejection of the ‘Prague Spring’ on the basis that its ‘humanism’ was an ideological deviation – although he was quite critical of Stalinism in general. But by insisting upon such a sharp distinction between ideology and science within Marxism, Althusser revives a notion we tried to reject when we critiqued Lukács’ concept of ‘imputed’ class consciousness – the notion of the ‘pure externality’ of Marxism to the subject of social transformation: the working class.[17] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=33#_ftn17) If science is on an epistemologically higher plane than the ideological, then the ‘scientists’ will always be split from the masses that they “lead”.


There is an even greater danger resulting from an emphasis on the difference between Marxism’s scientific aspects and its ideological ones. If Marxism is a science, it must be, first of all, a science of critique with an “interest in liberation, interest in emancipation”.[18] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=33#_ftn18) It must not ‘repudiate the lived experience’ of the oppressed and exploited. It must, instead, critique the existing order and conceptualise a different order on the very basis of this ‘lived experience’. If not, we slip back into a pure ‘interpretation of the world’ and neglect to ‘change it’. Thus, while we recognise something noble and necessary in Althusser’s struggle with the relationship between Marxism and Science, we balk at the political implications of his findings. Indeed, as has been noted, even Althusser became disconcerted with his own writings in their aftermath.[19] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=33#_ftn19)
In light of all this, we now move on to our final, brief, chapter, where we will discuss the possibilities for a critique of ideology in contemporary capitalism.

[1] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=33#_ftnref1) This tension is presumably the reason why Marx’s writings have inspired visions ranging from the mechanistic materialism of the Second International to Sorelian irrationalism.

[2] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=33#_ftnref2) Lukaćs, History and Class Consciousness, p. 135

[3] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=33#_ftnref3) Ibid. p. 133

[4] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=33#_ftnref4) Ibid, p. 140

[5] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=33#_ftnref5) Ibid, p. 128

[6] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=33#_ftnref6) Ibid, p. 197

[7] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=33#_ftnref7) Lichtheim, George, From Marx to Hegel (Orbach and Chamber, London, 1971) p. 15

[8] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=33#_ftnref8) Lukaćs, History and Class Consciousness, p. 160

[9] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=33#_ftnref9) Ibid, p. 161

[10] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=33#_ftnref10) Note that Lukaćs explicitly rejects that such a distinction can or should be drawn in Lukaćs, Georg, The Ontology of Social Being 2. Marx (Merlin Press, London, 1978) p. 11

[11] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=33#_ftnref11) Althusser, For Marx, p. 84

[12] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=33#_ftnref12) Ibid, p. 69

[13] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=33#_ftnref13) Ibid, p. 93

[14] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=33#_ftnref14) Ibid, p. 111

[15] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=33#_ftnref15) Dews, Peter, Structuralism and the French Epistemological Tradition, in Elliot, Gregory (ed), Althusser: A Critical Reader (Blackwell, Oxford, 1994) p. 119

[16] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=33#_ftnref16) Ibid, p. 129

[17] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=33#_ftnref17) It may well be the case, empirically, that Marxism is alien to the working class, but the point is that this should not be a feature of Marxist theory.

[18] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=33#_ftnref18) Ibid, p. 67

[19] (http://www.revleft.com/vb/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=33#_ftnref19) Callinicos, Althusser’s Marxism, pp. 107-114

[KC]

I just skimmed this but I think you hit the nail on the head in the summarizing of Lukacs' and Althusser's positions and their relation as pretty much polar opposites; however, I would have gone into more detail in criticizing the Hegelianism in Lukacs' work and the mistakes resulting from it. Based on a quick skim it seems that, while you've criticized Lukacs regarding these issues, you went into a more detailed and damning criticism of Althusser's, which seemed to minimize your criticism of Lukacs by comparison.

I guess that doesn't really offer anything to a philisophical discussion of what you've posted. :(

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

That's a well-written essay, comrade; it's just a pity you had to study such obscure traditional theorists whose ideas make very little sense.

I'll not comment on the content, except to quote Marx:


The philosophers have only to dissolve their language into the ordinary language, from which it is abstracted, in order to recognise it, as the distorted language of the actual world, and to realise that neither thoughts nor language in themselves form a realm of their own, that they are only manifestations of actual life." [Marx and Engels (1970) German Ideology; bold added.]

The same applies to these two 'theorists'; their work is based solely on the use of 'distorted' language -- as Wittgenstein also noted.

[YKTMX]

To KC:

That's a fair point, I'd say. I'd just note that my word limit on the essay restricted me. I could extend it now, of course.

To Rosa:

I think parts of Lukacs are obscure but I've never really understood the claim that Althusser was obscure. For Marx seems like one of the clearest (and best) contributions to Marxist one could imagine. What exactly is it you think is obscure in Althusser?

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

YKTMX:


I think parts of Lukacs are obscure but I've never really understood the claim that Althusser was obscure. For Marx seems like one of the clearest (and best) contributions to Marxist one could imagine. What exactly is it you think is obscure in Althusser?

My main concern is in fact the traditional nature of his work -- he is just as much an a priori dogmatist as Hegel is (against whom he rails).

His use of 'contradiction' is obscure, for example, -- but then so is its use by every Marxist I have ever read.

[YKTMX]

His use of 'contradiction' is obscure, for example, -- but then so is its use by every Marxist I have ever read.

I find the article 'On the Materialist Dialectic' in For Marx clear and quite pedagogical, to be honest. His thesis is that the "principal" (or primary) contradiction between the forces and the relations of production (between Labour and Capital, on other words) is "overdetermined" and itself "overdetermines" the other contradictions (or antagonisms) in a social formation.

It (the real "material" contradiction") "distributes effectivity" between various elements of the structure of superstructures, "choosing" which element will be dominant at a particular conjucture. Although the "principal contradiction" is ontologically prior to the others, and ultimately determines "in the last instance", the nature of the "complex of superstructures" (i.e. politics, religion, the international context etc.) means that the "lonely hour of the last instance never comes".

Nothing too complicated or obscure in that, I don't think. I think Lukacs on "mediation" is much more difficult to penetrate.

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

YKTMX:


I find the article 'On the Materialist Dialectic' in For Marx clear and quite pedagogical, to be honest. His thesis is that the "principal" (or primary) contradiction between the forces and the relations of production (between Labour and Capital, on other words) is "overdetermined" and itself "overdetermines" the other contradictions (or antagonisms) in a social formation.

And yet he has uncritically appropriated this word ('contradiction') from Hegel when that term was itself based both on mystical ideas about change, and some egregiously poor logic:

http://anti-dialectics.co.uk/Outline_of_errors_Hegel_committed_01.htm

In that case, his liberal use of this term is eminently obscure.

And so is this:


It (the real "material" contradiction") "distributes effectivity" between various elements of the structure of superstructures, "choosing" which element will be dominant at a particular conjucture. Although the "principal contradiction" is ontologically prior to the others, and ultimately determines "in the last instance", the nature of the "complex of superstructures" (i.e. politics, religion, the international context etc.) means that the "lonely hour of the last instance never comes".

Since it contains at least one term (i.e., 'contradiction') that has yet to be explained.

[YKTMX]

Since it contains at least one term (i.e., 'contradiction') that has yet to be explained.

I don't think it's use in dialectics is very different from its "everyday" use.

Except, of course, in dialectics, every apparent "isolated" contradiction forms part of a greater whole in which the "isolated" contradiction is overcome (or "negated"). It's the "negation" that one can find good cause for finding "obscure", but I'm not sure why we need to worry about the nature of the term "contradiction". If we say, there is a contradiction between the continued existence of capitalism and the long-term survival of the species, I think it's clear what we mean. Similarly, if we say there is a contradiction between the forces of production and the relations of the production, it's clear what we mean, I think. If one continues to exist in its present form, the other cannot, and vice versa.

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

YKTMX:


I don't think it's use in dialectics is very different from its "everyday" use.

Well, in everyday use, to contradict someone is just to 'gainsay' them. That cannot be what dialecticians mean by this word.

And it certainly wasn't what Hegel meant.


Except, of course, in dialectics, every apparent "isolated" contradiction forms part of a greater whole in which the "isolated" contradiction is overcome (or "negated"). It's the "negation" that one can find good cause for finding "obscure", but I'm not sure why we need to worry about the nature of the term "contradiction". If we say, there is a contradiction between the continued existence of capitalism and the long-term survival of the species, I think it's clear what we mean. Similarly, if we say there is a contradiction between the forces of production and the relations of the production, it's clear what we mean, I think. If one continues to exist in its present form, the other cannot, and vice versa.

But there is no contradiction here; if there were, it would be something like this:

"Capitalism continues to exist and it doesn't."

Or:

"Our species will survive in the longterm, and it won't."

There is no contradiction therefore in what you say, howsever much we believe the survival of our species is threatened by capitalism (as I too believe it is).

Moreover, there cannot be a contradiction between the forces and relations of production, since they are not lingusitic terms (which is what the word 'contradiction' in logic and ordinary language implicates).

In other words, dialecticians are using this word in a new and as yet unspecified sense.

But what is it?

[I have been asking this here and of SWP comrades now for over 25 years, and have yet to receive a satisfactory reply.]

Until this is clarifed, the use of this term is indeed obscure.

[And so is your use of 'negation', another obscure term lifted from mystical Hegelianism.]

[YKTMX]

Well, in everyday use, to contradict someone is just to 'gainsay' them. That cannot be what dialecticians mean by this word.

And it certainly wasn't what Hegel meant.


Well, "contradict" is a different word from "contradiction", obviously. Dictionary.com offers a range of definitions of contradiction, one of which includes "direct opposition between things compared; inconsistency". I don't think that's too far of a "dialectical" definition of the term. I mean, it isn't perfect, but to describle the use of the word in dialectics as being "obscure", I think is unfair in the extreme.


But there is no contradiction here; if there were, it would be something like this:

No, there is. The "contradiction" would arise in a statement like: "Our species wishes to survive, and yet capitalism is the dominant mode of production". Assuming, as we must, that one goal of a species is to reproduce itself (a species would not have established itself as a species if it lacked this goal) then our commitment to capitalism (a mode of production antagonistic with our drive for survival) is a contradiction. And one that must be resolved: in socialism or barbarism, obviously. There is a "direct opposition", in other words, between the "things compared": the species' desire for reproduction and means it uses to assure that survival.

Of course, the true worth of a dialectical analysis is that only it can grasp the irony (the "ruse", ahem) at the heart of this contradiction: namely, that capitalism, before it was a threat to our survival, was our only means of survival! Capitalism, before it killed millions and threatened our very existence, supported a massive expansion of the species all across the Globe.


Moreover, there cannot be a contradiction between the forces and relations of production, since they are not lingusitic terms (which is what the word 'contradiction' in logic and ordinary language implicates).


Perhaps. I'm not particularly interested in the what "contradiction" means in to linguists and logicians. I'm not a linguist or a logician. I am, on the other hand, a historical materialist and I think the term "contradiction" perfect to explain the relationship between the forces and mode of production. Meaning is determined by use, as I'm sure you agree.

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

YKTMX:


Well, "contradict" is a different word from "contradiction", obviously. Dictionary.com offers a range of definitions of contradiction, one of which includes "direct opposition between things compared; inconsistency". I don't think that's too far of a "dialectical" definition of the term. I mean, it isn't perfect, but to describe the use of the word in dialectics as being "obscure", I think is unfair in the extreme.

Indeed, but the active/verb form (which I gave) must surely come first for those of us who are interested in accounting for change.

Anyway, contradiction in ordinary language is not far removed from the characterisation I gave. Instead, therefore being a gainsaying of what another might say (active form), it's the state of having gain-said someone (nominal and passive form).

Literally 'Contradiction' = 'against-sayer', or 'against-talker'.


Dictionary.com offers a range of definitions of contradiction, one of which includes "direct opposition between things compared; inconsistency". I don't think that's too far of a "dialectical" definition of the term. I mean, it isn't perfect, but to describe the use of the word in dialectics as being "obscure", I think is unfair in the extreme.

Well as I have pointed out here several times, dictionaries are repositories of use and information about words, not all of which appear in ordinary discourse. So, just as they record specialist scientific, religious, racist and homophobic language, they also record mythical and philosophical uses of words.

So, the 'definition' you mention is a clear record of the use to which dialecticians have put this word over the last 200 years, and thus begs the question.

But it is clearly not related to the literal meaning of the word, which I gave above. In fact, it is related to a mystical use of this word, wherein nature is regarded as mind, and thus can engage in an argument with itself. Indeed, ancient mystics saw conflict in the world in just such terms, as personifications of conflicts between intelligent forces (good/evil) or arguments between angry gods.

However, the materialist-dialectical use of this word derived directly from Hegel's use, which is demonstrably not derived from ordinary speech, but from his lame-brained criticism of Aristotle.

And that is why dialecticians argue that dialectical logic transcends the allegedly static logic of Aristotle, because of his defective/limited comprehension of real contradiction -- derived now from Hegel's attempt to show that a negative form of the so-called 'law of identity' [LOI] implies a contradiction.

But it doesn't. The LOI concerns the alleged relation between an object and itself. The 'law of non-contradiction' [LOC], by way of contrast, is not about the relation between objects, but concerns the true-false connection between a proposition and its negation. It is not about identity at all.

From this basic error, the Hegelian dialectic flowed.

In short, the derivation is flawed, and so is the entire 'dialectic method'.

Marxist classicists copied this error (mainly because they were as ignorant of logic as Hegel was, or worse), and thought that by attaching the word 'material' to it they could repair the damage.

But it can't; so no wonder the dialectical use of this word is obscure, and has yet to be explained.

Indeed, and quite independently of the above, this use of 'contradiction' cannot explain change, as I have shown in several other threads here:

Quotes:

http://www.revleft.com/vb/showpost.php?p=1401000&postcount=76

Argument:

http://www.revleft.com/vb/showpost.php?p=1401001&postcount=77

Again, this not the least bit surprising since the word itself originates in mystical Hermeticism and defective logic.


No, there is. The "contradiction" would arise in a statement like: "Our species wishes to survive, and yet capitalism is the dominant mode of production". Assuming, as we must, that one goal of a species is to reproduce itself (a species would not have established itself as a species if it lacked this goal) then our commitment to capitalism (a mode of production antagonistic with our drive for survival) is a contradiction. And one that must be resolved: in socialism or barbarism, obviously. There is a "direct opposition", in other words, between the "things compared": the species' desire for reproduction and means it uses to assure that survival.

You keep saying this is a contradiction, but apart from merely repeating the traditional line, you have yet to show it is one.

Moreover, according to the dialectical classicists (Hegel, Engels, Plekhanov, Lenin, etc.) dialectically-united opposites not only struggle with one another (as part of an alleged contradiction), they also change into one another (you can find the quotations to this effect in the first of the two links above).

Well, this just leads to absurd consequences. For example, to take your own examples, it would imply that the forces of production change into the relations of production (and vice versa) and the continuing existence of capitalism would change into the existence of our species on the planet (and vice versa)!

So, once again, it is not the least bit surprising to see a mystical theory, the product of some lame-brained 'logic', coming unstuck when we think through its consequences -- something comrades seem reluctant to do.


Of course, the true worth of a dialectical analysis is that only it can grasp the irony (the "ruse", ahem) at the heart of this contradiction: namely, that capitalism, before it was a threat to our survival, was our only means of survival! Capitalism, before it killed millions and threatened our very existence, supported a massive expansion of the species all across the Globe.

Well, as we can now see, the irony is that this is a misguided way of viewing change.


Perhaps. I'm not particularly interested in the what "contradiction" means in to linguists and logicians. I'm not a linguist or a logician. I am, on the other hand, a historical materialist and I think the term "contradiction" perfect to explain the relationship between the forces and mode of production. Meaning is determined by use, as I'm sure you agree.

Then all you have left is the mystical version of this word.

And meaning is not determined by use -- not even Wittgenstein believed that.

[YKTMX]

You keep saying this is a contradiction, but apart from merely repeating the traditional line, you have yet to show it is one.

Well, as far as I can tell, the "traditional line" is completely capable of explaining the nature of "contradiction". It involves, as I said, an antagonism, a conflict, a negative precondition...however one would like to put it.

Your disagreement with this point seems quite obscure. On the one hand, you seem to be rejecting the use of the term contradiction on the basis that it's "obscure". Yet, when I (I think fairly) broaden its meaning so that it means in dialectics the things it is taken to mean in "everyday discourse", you reject its usage on equally obscure "linguistic" grounds.

There seems to be then, if I may say so, a bit of "metatheoretical" bad faith in that you rage against "obscurantism" in the dialectical system and yet resort to it when "analysing" your own concepts.


For example, to take your own examples, it would imply that the forces of production change into the relations of production (and vice versa) and the continuing existence of capitalism would change into the existence of our species on the planet (and vice versa)!


Well, the forces and relations of production could hardly be described as "opposites". I don't think the materialist conception of history would make sense if that were the case. At some point, the two must converge, be "congruent", if development is to take place. If they were "opposites" then no progress would be possible. Indeed, dialectics would not make sense if some things were always "oppositional". When I mentioned them in my post, I suggested that at this particular moment of social development, they were antagonistic (just as they were antagonistic in 17th century England, 18th century France, 20th century Western Europe etc.) or in contradiction. The point of capitalism is that this contradiction is resolved in a "higher unity" of a mode of production whose very existence depends on the existence of instability, flux and change.

Nonetheless, taking on your challenge on this point doesn't appear too difficult. It's clear that in capitalism, there is a social production (the forces of production) and individual appropriation (the relations of production). One of the very easy ways to explain socialism would be to say that appropriation is "socialized", and the alienation of man in social production is overcome and human individuality is liberated in the field of production (or production is "humanized"). What was immediately "social" is humanized and rescued for the individual and what is "individual" is socialized and rescued for humanity. A rather neat dialectical "unity", I might suggest.

These games are obviously fun to play. I've always thought it a strength of the dialectic that it encourages our natural human inclination to playfulness.

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

YKTMX:


Well, as far as I can tell, the "traditional line" is completely capable of explaining the nature of "contradiction". It involves, as I said, an antagonism, a conflict, a negative precondition...however one would like to put it.

But, the only rationale for doing this is Hegel's odd use of this word, and, as I noted, that itself was based on two things:

1) A mystical, Hermetic view of conflict (whereby conflict in the material word was seen in conceptual, and thus interpreted in linguistic terms -- based itself on the Platonic idea that the world has a soul, and that everything that happens is a result of the development of mind, and the application of the 'divine will'), and these ideas were in turn based on the idea that conflict in nature and society was in effect a reflection of conflict between the (Greek) gods, but more importantly,

2) A confusion between the so-called 'law of identity' stated negatively and the co-called 'law of non-contradiction' (which confusion I outlined in an earlier post).

This means that there is no rational foundation for this use of this word, and since it originates in mystical theology, every reason to avoid it.

Especially since this theory cannot account for social or natural change, as I have shown here:

Quotes:

http://www.revleft.com/vb/showpost.php?p=1401000&postcount=76

Argument:

http://www.revleft.com/vb/showpost.php?p=1401001&postcount=77

Which is not the least bit surprising given the provenance of this theory.


Your disagreement with this point seems quite obscure. On the one hand, you seem to be rejecting the use of the term contradiction on the basis that it's "obscure". Yet, when I (I think fairly) broaden its meaning so that it means in dialectics the things it is taken to mean in "everyday discourse", you reject its usage on equally obscure "linguistic" grounds.

Indeed, it is obscure, since comrades cannot explain the odd use of this word (except they point to a definition given in some dictionaries which was itself culled from the technical use this word assumes in dialectics -- so this is a circular justification).

And, this word is not used in every day discourse in the way you suggest* -- except in the discourse of those in the grip of this theory. But, that no more justifies its use that it would justify the use of 'kaffir', say.

[*Unless, of course, you can list a few everyday examples of its use in the way you suggest.]


There seems to be then, if I may say so, a bit of "metatheoretical" bad faith in that you rage against "obscurantism" in the dialectical system and yet resort to it when "analysing" your own concepts.

Where do I do this?

And, recall, I am not alleging 'obscurantism', but that the use of this term is obscure -- these are not at all the same.


Well, the forces and relations of production could hardly be described as "opposites". I don't think the materialist conception of history would make sense if that were the case. At some point, the two must converge, be "congruent", if development is to take place. If they were "opposites" then no progress would be possible. Indeed, dialectics would not make sense if some things were always "oppositional". When I mentioned them in my post, I suggested that at this particular moment of social development, they were antagonistic (just as they were antagonistic in 17th century England, 18th century France, 20th century Western Europe etc.) or in contradiction. The point of capitalism is that this contradiction is resolved in a "higher unity" of a mode of production whose very existence depends on the existence of instability, flux and change.

The Lenin was wrong when he said:


"[Among the elements of dialectics are the following:] [I]nternally contradictory tendencies…in [a thing]…as the sum and unity of opposites…. [This involves] not only the unity of opposites, but the transitions of every determination, quality, feature, side, property into every other [into its opposite?]….

"In brief, dialectics can be defined as the doctrine of the unity of opposites. This embodies the essence of dialectics….

"The splitting of the whole and the cognition of its contradictory parts…is the essence (one of the 'essentials', one of the principal, if not the principal, characteristic features) of dialectics….

"The identity of opposites…is the recognition…of the contradictory, mutually exclusive, opposite tendencies in all phenomena and processes of nature…. The condition for the knowledge of all processes of the world in their 'self-movement', in their spontaneous development, in their real life, is the knowledge of them as a unity of opposites. Development is the 'struggle' of opposites…. [This] alone furnishes the key to the self-movement of everything existing….

"The unity…of opposites is conditional, temporary, transitory, relative. The struggle of mutually exclusive opposites is absolute, just as development and motion are absolute…." [Lenin (1961) Philosophical Notebooks, pp.221-22, 357-58. Bold added.]

Other quotations from the dialectical classicists to the same effect can be found in the first of the above links.

Now, the problem you have, if you deny that the forces and relations of production are not (dialectically-linked) opposites, is explaining how they are 'contradictory'. Hegel introduced these notions (as Lenin well knew) in order to account for causation, and in order to blunt Hume's attack on rationalist theories in this regard.

So, he (Hegel) postulated a conceptual link between a cause and its effect, and he managed to do this through his theory of dialectical opposites, and thus 'contradictions'. These govern all forms of change (as Lenin also attests).

Without this, you have no theory of change, or not one that can respond to Hume's criticisms.


The point of capitalism is that this contradiction is resolved in a "higher unity" of a mode of production whose very existence depends on the existence of instability, flux and change

But you agree that capitalist society and socialist society are opposites? Or that capitalist and proletarian are opposites?

If so, then according to the dialectical classicists (quotations can be found in the first of the two links above), these must not only struggle with one another, they must change into each other. [This was crucial corollary of Hegel's response to Hume, which the dialectical classicists accepted.]

Unfortunately, this means that capitalists must change into proletarians, and proletarians must change into capitalists!

And it also means that capitalism must change into socialism, and socialism into capitalism!

Such absurdities should not surprise us; as I noted above, given the mystical and sub-logical provenance of this theory, no wonder it falls apart so readily.


Nonetheless, taking on your challenge on this point doesn't appear too difficult. It's clear that in capitalism, there is a social production (the forces of production) and individual appropriation (the relations of production). One of the very easy ways to explain socialism would be to say that appropriation is "socialized", and the alienation of man in social production is overcome and human individuality is liberated in the field of production (or production is "humanized"). What was immediately "social" is humanized and rescued for the individual and what is "individual" is socialized and rescued for humanity. A rather neat dialectical "unity", I might suggest.

But, these do not 'struggle' with one another, as Lenin said they should.

A neat dialectical conundrum, in fact.


These games are obviously fun to play. I've always thought it a strength of the dialectic that it encourages our natural human inclination to playfulness.

1) I'm not playing; I am deadly serious.

2) In fact, the 'dialectic' merely encourages confusion -- as my remarks above well attest.