Why are people so against Dialectical Materialism?

[Lyev]

With Dialectical Materialism as I see it I don't understand why people are opposed to it. I see it like this-

First off, Dialectical Materialism is the theory that nothing stays the same for more than a fleeting moment in time, in other words, nothing is constant. As the Greek philosopher, Heraclitus, puts it- 'No one steps twice into the same river, for what occurs in the next instant is never the same as the first'. Or as Engels finds it: "All nature, from the smallest thing to the biggest, from a grain of sand to the sun, from the protista to man, is in a constant state of coming into being and going out of being, in a constant flux, in a ceaseless state of movement and change." Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel was a dialectician, only he was an dialectical idealist, unlike Marx who was a materialist. Idealism is the theory that reality is based on the mind and thoughts within. It is the theory that 'the essence of reality isn't material, but spiritual (or mental) and is therefore independent and thus free'.

Some of Hegel's thoughts on human development, to me, seem very relevant to Marxism: 'Each thing is a combination of contraries because it is made up of elements which, although linked together, at the same time eliminate one another'. This can be applied to class struggle, and therefore Marxism, because Hegel realised that this struggle between contraries is what leads to change by one prevailing against the other, ie. the revolution of the proletariat. As far as I know, Hegel never applied this 'struggle between contraries' to anything physical because he was an Idealist. From my perspective- Idealism = thought and Materialism = matter. This is where Marx comes in because he applied the idea of nothing being constant (dialectics) to matter, not thought, thus creating Dialectical Materialism. So, here's how Wikipedia interprets Engels 3 laws of dialectics:


1. The law of the unity and conflict of opposites;
2. The law of the passage of quantitative changes into qualitative changes;
3. The law of the negation of the negation.I see number 1 as being class struggle, or the 'struggle between contraries'. Secondly, I'm not to sure, but I think, in the case of number 2 'quantitative' is capitalism and 'qualitative' is communism? I think I might be wrong on this so any corrections or clarifications are welcomed. Lastly I think number 3 is a communist revolution 'negating' the 'negation' of capitalism. This is how I see dialectics linking in with communist theory.

With the above as my perception of Dialectical Materialism, I don't see why people are against this theory. defined simply all I see it as is the constant physical changing of the world. So, please may someone explain why people don't agree that the physical world is constantly changing? (Bearing in mind some of the previous might need correcting.) Thanks for replies, corrections and interest. :)

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

In a word: because the theory makes no sense at all.

There are many pages here at RevLeft wherein I and others have demolished this theory (including the 'laws' you mention); you can find them all collated here:

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

I have summarised the core objections here:

http://www.revleft.com/vb/nti-dialectics-made-t103349/index.html


First off, Dialectical Materialism is the theory that nothing stays the same for more than a fleeting moment in time, in other words, nothing is constant. As the Greek philosopher, Heraclitus, puts it- 'No one steps twice into the same river, for what occurs in the next instant is never the same as the first'. Or as Engels finds it: "All nature, from the smallest thing to the biggest, from a grain of sand to the sun, from the protista to man, is in a constant state of coming into being and going out of being, in a constant flux, in a ceaseless state of movement and change." Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel was a dialectician, only he was an dialectical idealist, unlike Marx who was a materialist. Idealism is the theory that reality is based on the mind and thoughts within. It is the theory that 'the essence of reality isn't material, but spiritual (or mental) and is therefore independent and thus free'.

And yet it is quite easy to show that this cannot work:

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

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


Some of Hegel's thoughts on human development, to me, seem very relevant to Marxism: 'Each thing is a combination of contraries because it is made up of elements which, although linked together, at the same time eliminate one another'. This can be applied to class struggle, and therefore Marxism, because Hegel realised that this struggle between contraries is what leads to change by one prevailing against the other, ie. the revolution of the proletariat. As far as I know, Hegel never applied this 'struggle between contraries' to anything physical because he was an Idealist. From my perspective- Idealism = thought and Materialism = matter. This is where Marx comes in because he applied the idea of nothing being constant (dialectics) to matter, not thought, thus creating Dialectical Materialism. So, here's how Wikipedia interprets Engels 3 laws of dialectics:

Well, Hegel was a mystic (all mystics believe the sorts of things you list above), who copied these off earlier mystics, who in turn dreamt this odd set of views up, and then dogmatically imposed them on nature. The same comment applies whether these ideas are the 'right way up' or 'upside down'.

These theses, among others, have been demolished here:

http://anti-dialectics.co.uk/page%2007.htm


I see number 1 as being class struggle, or the 'struggle between contraries'. Secondly, I'm not to sure, but I think, in the case of number 2 'quantitative' is capitalism and 'qualitative' is communism? I think I might be wrong on this so any corrections or clarifications are welcomed. Lastly I think number 3 is a communist revolution 'negating' the 'negation' of capitalism. This is how I see dialectics linking in with communist theory.

Well, according to the dialectical classics (you can see dozens of quotations to this effect in the links above), things change because of a struggle of opposites, and they also change into those opposites.

In that case, the proletariat should change into the bourgeoisie, and vice versa! Capitalism should change into communism, and communism into capitalism!

This makes no sense, as I said.


With the above as my perception of Dialectical Materialism, I don't see why people are against this theory. defined simply all I see it as is the constant physical changing of the world. So, please may someone explain why people don't agree that the physical world is constantly changing? (Bearing in mind some of the previous might need correcting.) Thanks for replies, corrections and interest.

Well, I for one can't see why anyone should accept such a flawed theory.

And, one can agree that the world is changing without accepting dialectical materialism [DM]. In fact, if we were looking for a theory of change, DM is so poor that it would not even make the bottom of the reserve list of viable candidates.

Historical materialism (minus the 'dialectics') is all we need.

[mikelepore]

In another topic (http://www.revleft.com/vb/materialist-dialectics-t109116/index.html) in May I tried to persuade Rosa to accept as useful some statements that are sometimes true, but she wanted to focus on the fact that they aren't always true. I kept saying look here are several examples of where quantity is transformed into quality, and she kept finding more examples where such a generalization doesn't make any sense. I wanted to show that Engels had a point, and I knew what he meant, even though it was never expressed it in a form that modern people would consider scientific, and Rosa wanted to show that what Engels said was so vague that it was useless.

[mikelepore]

Secondly, I'm not to sure, but I think, in the case of number 2 'quantitative' is capitalism and 'qualitative' is communism?

The transformation of quantity into quality can refer to any situation in which something may be considered to be something in general, but after actual numbers are applied it may be recognized as the opposite of what it had seemed. An example I like is how "freedom of the press" is a right to self-expression, but it came to mean a freedom for the those people who happen to own the press, and a denial of that freedom for those who are not owners, therefore "freedom of the press" has become the major source of censorship.

Many people like to give physical examples of the transformation of quantity into quality, such as a phase change -- you can add heat to a solid for a long time and see nothing happening, but at some point a small additional amount of heat causes a rapid change of the solid into a liquid. However, I believe AGW's original intent for this topic was to consider history, and I have become skeptical of analogies between physical processes and historical processes. Therefore, in my first paragraph above, I gave an example of a historical process.

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

Mike:


In another topic in May I tried to persuade Rosa to accept as useful some statements that are sometimes true, but she wanted to focus on the fact that they aren't always true. I kept saying look here are several examples of where quantity is transformed into quality, and she kept finding more examples where such a generalization doesn't make any sense. I wanted to show that Engels had a point, and I knew what he meant, even though it was never expressed it in a form that modern people would consider scientific, and Rosa wanted to show that what Engels said was so vague that it was useless.

Well if we are honest, you found it impossible to tell us what a 'quality' is -- in fact, you kept changing your mind. Nor could you tell us how long a 'node' or a 'leap' was supposed to last. In that case, this 'law' is well past being vague, it is totally useless.

Moreover, the endless list of counter-examples to this 'law' (even if we knew what 'quality' meant, or how long a 'node' is) means that you can't rely on this 'law' to make predictions about the future, especially in relation to social change, as you wanted to do.


The transformation of quantity into quality can refer to any situation in which something may be considered to be something in general, but after actual numbers are applied it may be recognized as the opposite of what it had seemed. An example I like is how "freedom of the press" is a right to self-expression, but it came to mean a freedom for the those people who happen to own the press, and a denial of that freedom for those who are not owners, therefore "freedom of the press" has become the major source of censorship.

How is that an example of this 'law'?

[mikelepore]

Mike:Well if we are honest, you found it impossible to tell us what a 'quality' is -- in fact, you kept changing your mind.

I would say that a "quality" is any characteristic of something that is of interest to a particular writer, and which is also a dependent variable that changes very nonlinearly with the "quantity", which is the independent variable and is also a magnitude along a scale.


Nor could you tell us how long a 'node' or a 'leap' was supposed to last. In that case, this 'law' is well past being vague, it is totally useless.

I'm not the one to ask about that. I can't explain the meaning of terms that I have never used before, and which I have never heard of before.


Moreover, the endless list of counter-examples to this 'law' (even if we knew what 'quality' meant, or how long a 'node' is) means that you can't rely on this 'law' to make predictions about the future, especially in relation to social change, as you wanted to do.

I'm the one who argues that it's not a law. I say that Engels had a point, and I can tell what he's refering to, although I have never seen it expressed with a definition. Sometimes I know what people mean even if they only provide examples to illustrate what they're talking about and they never express it exactly.

It cannot predict the future. The only usefulness for it that I know of is that it's the only possible way to answer to people who claim that a quantitative difference cannot make two situations qualitatively unlike, for example, the private property absolutists who say "You Marxists are hypocrites, because you want to steal the capitalist's $20 billion factory, but you wouldn't want someone to steal your $20 wristwatch." Any effective answer to them has to include the explanation that the two kinds of "private property" are qualitatively different because of their quantitative differences.

[mikelepore]

The transformation of quantity into quality can refer to any situation in which something may be considered to be something in general, but after actual numbers are applied it may be recognized as the opposite of what it had seemed. An example I like is how "freedom of the press" is a right to self-expression, but it came to mean a freedom for the those people who happen to own the press, and a denial of that freedom for those who are not owners, therefore "freedom of the press" has become the major source of censorship.

How is that an example of this 'law'?

The simple printing presses available to people like Benjamin Franklin and Thomas Paine (picture) (http://sln.fi.edu/franklin/printer/images/press.jpg) were relatively easily available to the average person. After the passage of time, there has been a large increase in the amount of capital required to be part of "the media" and reach the people effectively with your message, for example, the Clear Channel corporation that owns a thousand radio stations. This change in the amount of capital required is quantitative. Let that be the independent variable. The sociological fact of censorship implicit in the observation "Freedom of the press is guaranteed only to those who own one" (A.J. Liebling) may be taken as the dependent variable. Some number moving along a sliding scale has made an essential difference in an observed outcome. It is, to use Engels' expression, "the transformation of quantity into quality."

If you want me to put this point into the form of an exact scientific theorem, sorry, I don't know how to do that. Regardless, most people here know what I mean.

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

Mike:


I would say that a "quality" is any characteristic of something that is of interest to a particular writer, and which is also a dependent variable that changes very nonlinearly with the "quantity", which is the independent variable and is also a magnitude along a scale.

This is a subjective 'definition', and so cannot form part of an allegedly objective law. Plus, you have changed your mind yet again.

Moreover, this subjective definition will allow in more counter-examples, making this 'law' even less reliable.


I'm not the one to ask about that. I can't explain the meaning of terms that I have never used before, and which I have never heard of before.

Then you haven't read the dialectical classics. Hegel, Engels, Plekhanov, Lenin, etc all use these terms. Indeed, I have quoted them for you several times.

However, you are aware of the 'rapid change' synonym:


Many people like to give physical examples of the transformation of quantity into quality, such as a phase change -- you can add heat to a solid for a long time and see nothing happening, but at some point a small additional amount of heat causes a rapid change of the solid into a liquid. However, I believe AGW's original intent for this topic was to consider history, and I have become skeptical of analogies between physical processes and historical processes. Therefore, in my first paragraph above, I gave an example of a historical process.

In that case, we have yet to be told how long this period of 'rapid change' is supposed to be.

[In fact, in the example you give of the freedom of the press, this 'rapid' change was slow and protracted. So, it doesn't apply even to your own example!]


I'm the one who argues that it's not a law. I say that Engels had a point, and I can tell what he's referring to, although I have never seen it expressed with a definition. Sometimes I know what people mean even if they only provide examples to illustrate what they're talking about and they never express it exactly.

If it's not a 'law' then on what basis can you extrapolate this into new areas, such as social change? The fact that you try to do this suggests you implicitly regard this as a 'law'.


It cannot predict the future. The only usefulness for it that I know of is that it's the only possible way to answer to people who claim that a quantitative difference cannot make two situations qualitatively unlike, for example, the private property absolutists who say "You Marxists are hypocrites, because you want to steal the capitalist's $20 billion factory, but you wouldn't want someone to steal your $20 wristwatch." Any effective answer to them has to include the explanation that the two kinds of "private property" are qualitatively different because of their quantitative differences.

If so, all that such a critic has to do is point to your 'subjective definition' of 'quality' and retort that you have loaded the dice in your favour. You are not going to convince anyone with this approach to argument'.

We certainly would not accept such a critic subjectively re-defining, say, capitalism as 'a just and fair system'.


The simple printing presses available to people like Benjamin Franklin and Thomas Paine (picture) were relatively easily available to the average person. After the passage of time, there has been a large increase in the amount of capital required to be part of "the media" and reach the people effectively with your message, for example, the Clear Channel corporation that owns a thousand radio stations. This change in the amount of capital required is quantitative. Let that be the dependent variable. The sociological fact of censorship implicit in the observation "Freedom of the press is guaranteed only to those who own one" (A.J. Liebling) may be taken as the dependent variable. Some number moving along a sliding scale has made an essential difference in an observed outcome. It is, to use Engels' expression, "the transformation of quantity into quality."

But, what is the 'quality' here? Moreover, socialists still have printing presses. So, despite the alleged increase in 'quantity', the freedom of the press still applies to socialists.


If you want me to put this point into the form of an exact scientific theorem, sorry, I don't know how to do that.

I sympathise with you floundering about, trying to make an unworkable 'law' or 'principle' work. But, if it's not a exact scientific theorem, what is it doing in Marxism?

In other words, in order to rescue a 'principle' invented by a mystic (Hegel), based on an ancient and unworkable definition of 'quality' dreamt up by Aristotle 2400 years ago, you are prepared to compromise the scientific nature of historical materialism.

And you think this is some sort of gain?


Regardless, most people here know what I mean.

Well, this is unlikely, since not even you can say what you mean!

And the other supporters of this 'principle' are oddly silent in its defence.

And we both know why...

[Lyev]

Well, Hegel was a mystic (all mystics believe the sorts of things you list above), who copied these off earlier mystics, who in turn dreamt this odd set of views up, and then dogmatically imposed them on nature. The same comment applies whether these ideas are the 'right way up' or 'upside down'.
I wasn't really defending Hegel, I was just getting things clear because Marx got some of his idea's from him.

Well, according to the dialectical classics (you can see dozens of quotations to this effect in the links above), things change because of a struggle of opposites, and they also change into those opposites.

In that case, the proletariat should change into the bourgeoisie, and vice versa! Capitalism should change into communism, and communism into capitalism!

This makes no sense, as I said.

I agree that sometimes 'things change because of struggle of opposites'. It's not exactly a solid law though and how can things change into those opposites?


Well, I for one can't see why anyone should accept such a flawed theory.

And, one can agree that the world is changing without accepting dialectical materialism [DM]. In fact, if we were looking for a theory of change, DM is so poor that it would not even make the bottom of the reserve list of viable candidates.

Historical materialism (minus the 'dialectics') is all we need.

I don't really accept it anymore. I think Marx and Engels sometimes wrote things that maybe contradicting themselves and then later generations interpreted them and then just got confused again. For example Mao seems a bit confused, he's an advocate of the law that things always change into their opposites.
Why is it that '...the human mind should take these opposites not as dead, rigid, but as living, conditional, mobile, transforming themselves into one another'? Because that is just how things are in objective reality. The fact is that the unity or identity of opposites in objective things is not dead or rigid, but is living, conditional, mobile, temporary and relative; in given conditions, every contradictory aspect transforms itself into its opposite.... Why should this 'every contradictory aspect transforms itself into its opposite....' be a unquestionable law that can applied to everything?

To add, I found this on a thread which is just above this one at the moment. '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]'

I think there needs to be a clear distinction between 'interpretation of the world' and 'commitment to changing the world’. Although despite me now realising the inconsistency of Dialectical Materialism I still think there are some useful things to be taken from Marxist 'interpretation of the world' before Engels turned this interpretation of Marx's into a 'theory', ie. Dialectical Materialism. I found this quote of mikelpore's on another thread.
To Marx the dialectical approach meant realization that social systems are not universal truths, but forms that appear and then pass away. There is also some notice of the fact that future institutions selectively borrow forms from past institutions. It was after Marx was dead that other tried to make a "theory" out if it. The same year that Marx died, Engels suddenly began writing (IMO, gibberish) about "the interpenetration of opposites" and "the negation of the negation."

I totally agree that sometimes institutions borrow various things from past institutions. This is what the 'The Eigtheenth Brumaire of Loius Bonaparte' is about, isn't it? Marx talks about Bonaparte copying things from the Roman Empire; 'they borrow names, slogans, costumes so as to stage the new world-historical scene in this venerable disguise and borrowed language'. I agree with this certain observation, but I totally disagree that a single observation like this can be turned into a law and applied to everything else, which I think is what happened, to an extent, with the 'negation of negations' and some of the more refutable 'laws' and observations made by material dialectians.

[Durruti's Ghost]

If I might interject, what is the difference between historical materialism and dialectical materialism? I had thought they were the same thing; however, this thread makes it clear that they are not. It seems that historical materialism is based on observations and is the idea that society must pass through stages (primitive communism, slave society, feudalism, capitalism, socialism, communism), whereas dialectical materialism is based on (rather fuzzy) philosophy and attempts to explain the reasons why society must pass through stages. Is this correct?

[Philosophical Materialist]

If I might interject, what is the difference between historical materialism and dialectical materialism? I had thought they were the same thing; however, this thread makes it clear that they are not. It seems that historical materialism is based on observations and is the idea that society must pass through stages (primitive communism, slave society, feudalism, capitalism, socialism, communism), whereas dialectical materialism is based on (rather fuzzy) philosophy and attempts to explain the reasons why society must pass through stages. Is this correct?

The former is derived from the latter. Historical materialism is a Marxian dialectical analysis applied to history from the vantage point of materialism. Dialectical materialism is the Marxist dialectical method itself.

The "Analytical Marxist" school rejects the dialectical method and considers dialectics to be a mystical overhang from Hegelianism. Most Marxists uphold dialectical materialism however and don't consider it at all "mystical".

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

AGW:


I wasn't really defending Hegel, I was just getting things clear because Marx got some of his idea's from him.

Yes, I am aware of that, but the ideas Marx allegedly derived from Hegel are just as confused/misguided (I don't use the word 'false' since they are far too confused to make it that far) as they were in Hegel.


I agree that sometimes 'things change because of struggle of opposites'. It's not exactly a solid law though and how can things change into those opposites?

Well, if things 'struggle' with their opposites, they can hardly change into them too. And if they do not change into them, then Hume's criticisms of causation have yet to be answered by dialecticians. [Hegel introduced this idea precisely to blunt Hume's arguments.] So, your half-way house theory is not viable.


I think Marx and Engels sometimes wrote things that maybe contradicting themselves and then later generations interpreted them and then just got confused again. For example Mao seems a bit confused, he's an advocate of the law that things always change into their opposites.

And yet Marx never claimed that things struggle with their opposites and then change into them. The idea belongs to Engels, and was then copied by later dialectical-classicists.


I think there needs to be a clear distinction between 'interpretation of the world' and 'commitment to changing the world’. Although despite me now realising the inconsistency of Dialectical Materialism I still think there are some useful things to be taken from Marxist 'interpretation of the world' before Engels turned this interpretation of Marx's into a 'theory', ie. Dialectical Materialism. I found this quote of mikelpore's on another thread.


To Marx the dialectical approach meant realization that social systems are not universal truths, but forms that appear and then pass away. There is also some notice of the fact that future institutions selectively borrow forms from past institutions. It was after Marx was dead that other tried to make a "theory" out if it. The same year that Marx died, Engels suddenly began writing (IMO, gibberish) about "the interpenetration of opposites" and "the negation of the negation."

I totally agree that sometimes institutions borrow various things from past institutions. This is what the 'The Eigtheenth Brumaire of Loius Bonaparte' is about, isn't it? Marx talks about Bonaparte copying things from the Roman Empire; 'they borrow names, slogans, costumes so as to stage the new world-historical scene in this venerable disguise and borrowed language'. I agree with this certain observation, but I totally disagree that a single observation like this can be turned into a law and applied to everything else, which I think is what happened, to an extent, with the 'negation of negations' and some of the more refutable 'laws' and observations made by material dialectians.

Well, we do not need dialectics to tell us that: "social systems are not universal truths, but forms that appear and then pass away." Historical materialism does this quite well on its own. Moreover, this idea is available to us via ordinary language and common understanding -- in fact, anyone who looks at history and who thinks social formations do not change is probably in need of professional help.

The ideas that Marxists lifted from Hegel merely mystified and confused the whole process.

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

Durruti's Ghost:


If I might interject, what is the difference between historical materialism and dialectical materialism? I had thought they were the same thing; however, this thread makes it clear that they are not. It seems that historical materialism is based on observations and is the idea that society must pass through stages (primitive communism, slave society, feudalism, capitalism, socialism, communism), whereas dialectical materialism is based on (rather fuzzy) philosophy and attempts to explain the reasons why society must pass through stages. Is this correct?

Historical materialism is Marx's theory of social change minus the useless Hegelian jargon.

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

Philosophical Materialist:


The former is derived from the latter. Historical materialism is a Marxian dialectical analysis applied to history from the vantage point of materialism. Dialectical materialism is the Marxist dialectical method itself.

The former cannot be derived from the latter, since the latter makes no sesne at all.

And you must know that dialectical materialism was unknown to Marx, since it was invented by Plekhanov long after Marx had died.


The "Analytical Marxist" school rejects the dialectical method and considers dialectics to be a mystical overhang from Hegelianism. Most Marxists uphold dialectical materialism however and don't consider it at all "mystical".

And the latter are mistaken.

[Philosophical Materialist]

And you must know that dialectical materialism was unknown to Marx, since it was invented by Plekhanov long after Marx had died.

The term "dialectical materialism" was coined after Marx yes to distinguish Marx's dialectical method from Hegel's dialectical idealism.

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

PM:


The term "dialectical materialism" was coined after Marx yes to distinguish Marx's dialectical method from Hegel's dialectical idealism.

Except, in Marx's most mature published comments on 'his method' (in Das Kapital no less), his verson of the 'diialcetic method' contains not one ounce of Hegel, 'upside down' or the 'right way up':


"After a quotation from the preface to my 'Criticism of Political Economy,' Berlin, 1859, pp. IV-VII, where I discuss the materialistic basis of my method, the writer goes on:*

'The one thing which is of moment to Marx, is to find the law of the phenomena with whose investigation he is concerned; and not only is that law of moment to him, which governs these phenomena, in so far as they have a definite form and mutual connexion within a given historical period. Of still greater moment to him is the law of their variation, of their development, i.e., of their transition from one form into another, from one series of connexions into a different one. This law once discovered, he investigates in detail the effects in which it manifests itself in social life. Consequently, Marx only troubles himself about one thing: to show, by rigid scientific investigation, the necessity of successive determinate orders of social conditions, and to establish, as impartially as possible, the facts that serve him for fundamental starting-points. For this it is quite enough, if he proves, at the same time, both the necessity of the present order of things, and the necessity of another order into which the first must inevitably pass over; and this all the same, whether men believe or do not believe it, whether they are conscious or unconscious of it. Marx treats the social movement as a process of natural history, governed by laws not only independent of human will, consciousness and intelligence, but rather, on the contrary, determining that will, consciousness and intelligence. ... If in the history of civilisation the conscious element plays a part so subordinate, then it is self-evident that a critical inquiry whose subject-matter is civilisation, can, less than anything else, have for its basis any form of, or any result of, consciousness. That is to say, that not the idea, but the material phenomenon alone can serve as its starting-point. Such an inquiry will confine itself to the confrontation and the comparison of a fact, not with ideas, but with another fact. For this inquiry, the one thing of moment is, that both facts be investigated as accurately as possible, and that they actually form, each with respect to the other, different momenta of an evolution; but most important of all is the rigid analysis of the series of successions, of the sequences and concatenations in which the different stages of such an evolution present themselves. But it will be said, the general laws of economic life are one and the same, no matter whether they are applied to the present or the past. This Marx directly denies. According to him, such abstract laws do not exist. On the contrary, in his opinion every historical period has laws of its own.... As soon as society has outlived a given period of development, and is passing over from one given stage to another, it begins to be subject also to other laws. In a word, economic life offers us a phenomenon analogous to the history of evolution in other branches of biology. The old economists misunderstood the nature of economic laws when they likened them to the laws of physics and chemistry. A more thorough analysis of phenomena shows that social organisms differ among themselves as fundamentally as plants or animals. Nay, one and the same phenomenon falls under quite different laws in consequence of the different structure of those organisms as a whole, of the variations of their individual organs, of the different conditions in which those organs function, &c. Marx, e.g., denies that the law of population is the same at all times and in all places. He asserts, on the contrary, that every stage of development has its own law of population. ... With the varying degree of development of productive power, social conditions and the laws governing them vary too. Whilst Marx sets himself the task of following and explaining from this point of view the economic system established by the sway of capital, he is only formulating, in a strictly scientific manner, the aim that every accurate investigation into economic life must have. The scientific value of such an inquiry lies in the disclosing of the special laws that regulate the origin, existence, development, death of a given social organism and its replacement by another and higher one. And it is this value that, in point of fact, Marx's book has.'

"Whilst the writer pictures what he takes to be actually my method, in this striking and [as far as concerns my own application of it] generous way, what else is he picturing but the dialectic method?" [Marx (1976), pp.101-02. Bold emphases added.]

You will note that Marx calls this the 'dialectic method', and 'his method', but it is also clear that it bears no relation to the sort of dialectics you have had forced down your throat, for in it there is not one atom of Hegel -- no 'quantity turning into quality', no 'contradictions', no 'negation of the negation', no 'unity of opposites', no 'totality'...

So, Marx's method has had Hegel totally extirpated. For Marx, putting Hegel on 'his feet' is to crush his head.

And of the few Hegelian terms that Marx uses in Das Kapital, he tells us this:


"and even, here and there in the chapter on the theory of value, coquetted with the mode of expression peculiar to him."

So, the 'rational core' of the dialectic has not one microgram of Hegel in it, and Marx merely 'coquetted' with a few examples of Hegelian jargon in Das Kapital -- that is, he used it in a non-serious way, rather like we use 'scare quotes'.

That is hardly a ringing endorsement of this mystical theory.

In that case, Marx's 'dialectic method' more closely resembles that of Aristotle and Kant.

[mikelepore]

In that case, we have yet to be told how long this period of 'rapid change' is supposed to be. [In fact, in the example you give of the freedom of the press, this 'rapid' change was slow and protracted. So, it doesn't apply even to your own example!]

I don't mean rapid as a function of time. I mean a large gradient in some property with respect to another property. Sometimes a variable has a large partial derivative with respect to another variable, or it may be nondifferentiable.

[mikelepore]

If it's not a 'law' then on what basis can you extrapolate this into new areas, such as social change? The fact that you try to do this suggests you implicitly regard this as a 'law'.

It's one of those things that we can sometimes recognize after the fact, and yet no one who didn't already know about it would be able to predict it. Like recognizing that the giraffe has a long neck because of the selection involved in eating leaves, and yet a panda also eats leaves and it has a short neck. Such relationships may be recognized when they are seen, but they can't be expected.

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

Mike:


I don't mean rapid as a function of time. I mean a large gradient in some property with respect to another property. Sometimes a variable has a large partial derivative with respect to another variable, or it may be nondifferentiable.

The more you try, the vaguer this non-law of yours seems to become. It's a bit like a dialectical version of the Cheshire Cat from Alice in Wonderland:

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/07/Cheshire_Cat_Tenniel.jpg

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cheshire_Cat

Indeed, this non-law of yours should totally disappear any day soon.

What is there left of it to defend/explain?


It's one of those things that we can sometimes recognize after the fact, and yet no one who didn't already know about it would be able to predict it. Like recognizing that the giraffe has a long neck because of the selection involved in eating leaves, and yet a panda also eats leaves and it has a short neck. Such relationships may be recognized when they are seen, but they can't be expected.

Except, your 'principle' is so vague and imprecise (and revised continually on the hoof as you try to patch it up) that no scientist worth his or her salt would touch it with someone else's barge pole!

[mikelepore]

Here's a similar "sometimes it happens...." observation about nature that can't be so generalized that it might be called a scientific law. It sometimes happens in physics that "through variables" are caused by "across variables." Electrical current flows due to a potential gradient, a fluid flows due to a pressure gradient, heat is conducted due to a temperature gradient, and gas diffuses due to a concentration gradient. But suddenly the range of application for this analogy stops, and what we then find throughout nature are counterexamples that can't be explained in such terms. To attempt to cite additional examples of this pattern would produce only nonsense.

The problem with writers promoting dialectics is that they have found some interesting patterns but then they they don't know when to stop trying to generalize. This tendency to overreach with a limited pattern is the cause of Engels' Taoist yin-yang style of thought in his manuscript "The Dialectics of Nature."

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

Mike:


Here's a similar "sometimes it happens...." observation about nature that can't be so generalized that it might be called a scientific law. It sometimes happens in physics that "through variables" are caused by "across variables." Electrical current flows due to a potential gradient, a fluid flows due to a pressure gradient, heat is conducted due to a temperature gradient, and gas diffuses due to a concentration gradient. But suddenly the range of application for this analogy stops, and what we then find throughout nature are counterexamples that can't be explained in such terms. To attempt to cite additional examples of this pattern would produce only nonsense.

The problem with writers promoting dialectics is that they have found some interesting patterns but then they they don't know when to stop trying to generalize. This tendency to overreach with a limited pattern is the cause of Engels' Taoist yin-yang style of thought in his manuscript "The Dialectics of Nature."


Full marks for trying to flog this dead Cheshire Cat, but I fail to see how the above helps your interpretation of this 'quantity/quality non-law.

[mikelepore]

The point about "contradictions" and "the interpenetration of opposites" is another observation about the way events sometimes happen, but very often do not, and perhaps they usually do not.

For example, capitalism develops in a way that the basis for socialism can be seen already within it. The Carnegie-like proprietor gets replaced by management by committee, large number of workers work side-by-side and continuously share information, and production so automated that there is no longer any excuse for the poverty of a single person. The obsolete system contains signs of the unborn system that will have to replace it. This is similar to the way feudalism foreshadowed capitalism, with its uprooted peasants gradually migrating to cities to form a dispossessed proletariat, the merchant class increasingly relying on sea navigation for trade, the monarchy increasing recognized to be an anachronism, etc. One may see the pattern that Marx wrote about in chapter 2 of his book 'The Poverty of Philosophy', "... position, opposition, composition, or, to speak Greek, we have thesis, antithesis, and synthesis."

The problem is that things don't always change that way. It's illuminating to note it when it does happen, but then we must try to understand many developments where such a pattern is nowhere to be found. This makes it impossible to apply any dialectical formula to distinguish between any true statements and a false one, and if we can't do that then it's not a branch of logic or science. All we can do is recognize it after the fact, for whatever that may be worth.

Therefore, for Marxism to include dialectics puts it in a weakened position similar to Supreme Court Justice Potter Stewart, writing in Jacobellis v. Ohio in 1964, trying to discuss "obscene pornography" when he can't define what the term means. Stewart wrote: "I shall not today attempt further to define the kinds of material I understand to be embraced in that shorthand description, and perhaps I could never succeed in intelligibly doing so. But I know it when I see it."

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

Mike:


The point about "contradictions" and "the interpenetration of opposites" is another observation about the way events sometimes happen, but very often do not, and perhaps they usually do not.

But, these are not contradictions, they are 'contradictions', about which we have been kept permanently in the dark for 200 years or more.


For example, capitalism develops in a way that the basis for socialism can be seen already within it. The Carnegie-like proprietor gets replaced by management by committee, large number of workers work side-by-side and continuously share information, and production so automated that there is no longer any excuse for the poverty of a single person. The obsolete system contains signs of the unborn system that will have to replace it. This is similar to the way feudalism foreshadowed capitalism, with its uprooted peasants gradually migrating to cities to form a dispossessed proletariat, the merchant class increasingly relying on sea navigation for trade, the monarchy increasing recognized to be an anachronism, etc. One may see the pattern that Marx wrote about in chapter 2 of his book 'The Poverty of Philosophy', "... position, opposition, composition, or, to speak Greek, we have thesis, antithesis, and synthesis."

Well, I fail to see the contradictions in here anywhere. And you must surely know that the triad, 'thesis/anti-thesis/synthesis' is a bastardisation of Fichte and Kant, not Hegel:

http://www.revleft.com/vb/showpost.php?p=707195&postcount=7


The problem is that things don't always change that way. It's illuminating to note it when it does happen, but then we must try to understand many developments where such a pattern is nowhere to be found. This makes it impossible to apply any dialectical formula to distinguish between any true statements and a false one, and if we can't do that then it's not a branch of logic or science. All we can do is recognize it after the fact, for whatever that may be worth.

Therefore, for Marxism to include dialectics puts it in a weakened position similar to Supreme Court Justice Potter Stewart, writing in Jacobellis v. Ohio in 1964, trying to discuss "obscene pornography" when he can't define what the term means. Stewart wrote: "I shall not today attempt further to define the kinds of material I understand to be embraced in that shorthand description, and perhaps I could never succeed in intelligibly doing so. But I know it when I see it."

Once more, Mike, I am sorry, but I still do not see how this helps makes sense of your non-law!

[ZeroNowhere]

One may see the pattern that Marx wrote about in chapter 2 of his book 'The Poverty of Philosophy', "... position, opposition, composition, or, to speak Greek, we have thesis, antithesis, and synthesis."Wait, wasn't he criticizing it?
Also, as far as I can see, he was either comparing the TAS to the Hegelian affirmation, negation and negation of the negation, or just criticizing idealist philosophy in general. It may have also been a reference to Greek philosophy, as Marx starts off the chapter like this:

"Here we are, right in Germany! We shall now have to talk metaphysics while talking political economy. And in this again we shall but follow M. Proudhon's “contradictions.” Just now he forced us to speak English, to become pretty well English ourselves. Now the scene is changing. M. Proudhon is transporting us to our dear fatherland and is forcing us, whether we like it or not, to become German again.

"If the Englishman transforms men into hats, the German transforms hats into ideas. The Englishman is Ricardo, rich banker and distinguished economist; the German is Hegel, simple professor at the University of Berlin."

Though TAS is no more silly than this, "The legend was spread by Karl Marx whose interpretation of Hegel is distorted. It is Marxism superimposed on Hegel. Thesis, antithesis, synthesis, Marx says in Das Elend der Philosophie, is Hegel's purely logical formula for the movement of pure reason, and the whole system is engendered by this dialectical movement of thesis, antithesis, synthesis of all categories. This pure reason, he continues, is Mr. Hegel's own reason, and history becomes the history of his own philosophy, whereas in reality, thesis, antithesis, synthesis are the categories of economic movements. (Summary of Chapter II, Paragraph 1.) The few passages in Marx' writings that resemble philosophy are not his own. He practices the communistic habit of expropriation without compensation." Not to mention that Marx was probably aware of Hegel's preface to the Phenomenology of Mind. Though if it contributed to people not reading Hegel, then good for them, I suppose.


The problem is that things don't always change that way. It's illuminating to note it when it does happen, but then we must try to understand many developments where such a pattern is nowhere to be found.To be honest, I don't see how things are any more illuminating if they match what dialectics would predict than if not.

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

For those who might not know, Zero here is quoting from this post:

http://www.revleft.com/vb/showpost.php?p=707195&postcount=7

[Lyev]

Thanks for your patience in your replies, Rosa, you probably get bored about explaining Dialectics to everyone.

You've provoked me into challenging my thoughts. I used to agree with Dialectical Materialism; sometimes I have the bad habit of agreeing with what I'm reading simply because it's Marxist theory.

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

AGW:


Thanks for your patience in your replies, Rosa, you probably get bored about explaining Dialectics to everyone.

Not at all; with comrades like you, I always have an infinite amount of patience to spare.


You've provoked me into challenging my thoughts. I used to agree with Dialectical Materialism; sometimes I have the bad habit of agreeing with what I'm reading simply because it's Marxist theory.

Well you are to be congratulated; most of the dialecticians here (and elsewhere, too) refuse to think, and are more content to throw abuse at those who try.

[PRC-UTE]

Philosophical Materialist:

The former cannot be derived from the latter, since the latter makes no sesne at all.



Yeah, you say this all the time yet you uphold revolutionaries who relied on and defended dialectics, such as Lenin. What is so bad about dialectics if it didn't stop Lenin and others from playing a leading role in a revolutionary struggle.

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

PRC:


Yeah, you say this all the time yet you uphold revolutionaries who relied on and defended dialectics, such as Lenin. What is so bad about dialectics if it didn't stop Lenin and others from playing a leading role in a revolutionary struggle.

But it didn't:


When confronted with the above unwelcome facts, DM-fans sometimes respond with a "Well if dialectics is so dire, how come the Bolsheviks were able to win power in 1917?"

[Non-Leninist DM-fans, of course, do not have even this to point to as a 'success'!]

Oddly enough, as a Leninist myself, I find this 'objection' remarkably easy to answer: the Bolsheviks were successful because they could not and did not use dialectics (either in its DM- or in its 'Materialist Dialectics'-form). To be sure, this claim is controversial, but only because no one has thought to question the role of dialectics before.

[DM = Dialectical Materialism; HM = Historical Materialism.]

In fact, the material counterweight provided by working class soviets prevented the Bolsheviks from employing this useless theory. Had they tried to propagandise/organise Russian workers with slogans such as: "Being is identical with but at the same time different from Nothing...", "The whole is greater than the sum of the parts...", or "Matter without motion is unthinkable" (and the like), they'd have been regarded as complete lunatics, and rightly so.

On the other hand, they could and did use ideas drawn from HM to help organise the soviets. [All this was covered in detail Part One (http://anti-dialectics.co.uk/page%2009_01.htm) of this Essay.]

And it is no use arguing that dialectical concepts were used 'implicitly' (or that they 'informed' the tactics that Lenin and his party adopted, somehow operating 'behind the scenes'). As we will see below, since dialectical concepts can be employed to justify anything and everything (being inherently and proudly contradictory), had they been employed, they could only have been used subjectively since there is no objective way to tell these incompatible applications apart.

Anyone who takes exception to the above will need to show precisely how Lenin and the Bolsheviks explicitly used dialectical-concepts --, as opposed to their actual employment of HM-concepts (the latter based on a concrete class analysis of events in 1917, and on years of experience relating to the working class). They will thus need to produce documented evidence of the Bolshevik's use of dialectical ideas/theses, and then show how they could possibly have been of any practical benefit to workers in revolutionary struggle --, or even how they could have helped the Bolsheviks comprehend what was going on and know how to intervene successfully.

Now, I have carefully trawled through the available minutes and decrees of the Central Committee of the Bolshevik Party (from August 1917 to February 1918), and have so far failed to find a single DM-thesis, let alone one drawn from 'Materialist Dialectics', put to any use, or even referred to abstractly! [Bone (1974).] To be sure, it is always possible I have missed a minor entry, but even if I have, this Hermetic creed hardly forms a prominent part of the day-to-day discussions of active revolutionaries.

Added later: I have now gone though the available documents line by line twice -- still no sign of this Hermetic virus!

In fact, it is conspicuous by its absence.

Hence, the evidence suggests that active revolutionaries made no use of this 'theory'.

Moreover, I have now checked the Theses, Resolutions and Manifestos of the First Four Congresses of The Third International [Holt and Holland (1983)], and the only sign of dialectics is a couple of dozen occurrences of the word "contradiction" in relation to capitalism (etc.) in over 400 pages. No other examples of dialectical jargon appear in the entire volume, and even then this word is not used to explain anything, nor does it seem to do any work. Furthermore, most of the uses of this word were made by Zinoviev; as far as I can tell, Lenin does not use the term anywhere in this book.

Moreover, in Trotsky's The Third International After Lenin [Trotsky (1974)], dialectics is mentioned only fourteen times in nearly 300 pages, and then only in passing. The theory does no work there either.

And it is even less use someone requiring of me to produce proof that Lenin and the Bolsheviks did not use dialectical ideas, since there is no written evidence that he/they did, as the above indicates. Hence, the contrary case goes by default. Of course, all this is quite independent of the proof offered in these Essays that not one single dialectical concept is in fact useable, nor is the alleged 'method'; after all, as we saw earlier in this Essay, even Lenin got into a serious muddle when he tried to play around with such ideas (in 1908), let alone when he attempted to apply them.

As we will soon find out, when dialectical ideas are in fact deployed, they can be made to justify anything whatsoever (no matter how contradictory that "anything whatsoever" might otherwise appear to be; in fact the more contradictory it is, the more 'dialectical' it seems to be!) -- and it can be, and has been used to rationalise any course of action, and its opposite, including those that are both counter-revolutionary and anti-Marxist.

In fact, shortly after the revolution, many younger comrades and Russian scientists began to argue at length that all of Philosophy (and not just dialectics) is part of ruling-class ideology (which is in fact a crude version of my own thesis!). It was not until the Deborinites won a factional battle in 1925/26 that this trend was defeated (and this was clearly engineered to help pave the way for the further destruction of the gains of October). More about this later.

[On this, see Bakhurst (1991), Joravsky (1961), Graham (1971), Wetter (1958).]

So, 1917 cannot be chalked-up as a success for this strain of Hermetic Mysticism.

However, we will see that the disintegration of the results of 1917 can partly be put down to dialectics.

And, even better, I have the evidence to prove it.

Bakhurst, D. (1991), Consciousness And Revolution In Soviet Philosophy. From The Bolsheviks To Evald Ilyenkov (Cambridge University Press).

Bone, A. (1974), The Bolsheviks And The October Revolution. Central Committee Minutes Of The Russian Social-Democratic Labour Party (Bolshevik) August 1917-February 1918 (Pluto Press).

Graham, L. (1971), Science And Philosophy In The Soviet Union (Allen Lane).

Holt, A., and Holland, B. (1983), Theses, Resolutions and Manifestos of the First Four Congresses of The Third International (Ink Links).

Joravsky, D. (1961), Soviet Marxism And Natural Science 1917-1932 (Routledge).

Wetter, G. (1958), Dialectical Materialism (Routledge).

Trotsky, L. (1974), The Third International After Lenin (New Park).

The above has been taken from my Essay Nine Part Two: The Damage Inflicted On Marxsim By 'Materialist Dialectics'.

You can find the evidence and argument that this mystical theory helped destroy the gains of October 1917 in that essay, ie., here:

http://anti-dialectics.co.uk/page%2009_02.htm

And no wonder this 'theory' is impossible to put into practice, helped destroy the Bolshevik Party, and makes no sense -- it was derived from, and contains little other than ruling-class ideology.

It's also why you lot can't defend it...

[PRC-UTE]

LOL I guess Lenin was a pretty big liar than. Thanks for clearing that up. :rolleyes:

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

PRC:


LOL I guess Lenin was a pretty big liar than. Thanks for clearing that up.

Well, when it came to philosophy, he was certainly seriouly misguided, but why call him a liar?

And, I thought you were a Leninist..

[Pirate turtle the 11th]

With Dialectical Materialism as I see it I don't understand why people are opposed to it.

Wana know why?



First off, Dialectical Materialism is the theory that nothing stays the same for more than a fleeting moment in time, in other words, nothing is constant. As the Greek philosopher, Heraclitus, puts it- 'No one steps twice into the same river, for what occurs in the next instant is never the same as the first'. Or as Engels finds it: "All nature, from the smallest thing to the biggest, from a grain of sand to the sun, from the protista to man, is in a constant state of coming into being and going out of being, in a constant flux, in a ceaseless state of movement and change." Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel was a dialectician, only he was an dialectical idealist, unlike Marx who was a materialist. Idealism is the theory that reality is based on the mind and thoughts within. It is the theory that 'the essence of reality isn't material, but spiritual (or mental) and is therefore independent and thus free'.

Some of Hegel's thoughts on human development, to me, seem very relevant to Marxism: 'Each thing is a combination of contraries because it is made up of elements which, although linked together, at the same time eliminate one another'. This can be applied to class struggle, and therefore Marxism, because Hegel realised that this struggle between contraries is what leads to change by one prevailing against the other, ie. the revolution of the proletariat. As far as I know, Hegel never applied this 'struggle between contraries' to anything physical because he was an Idealist. From my perspective- Idealism = thought and Materialism = matter. This is where Marx comes in because he applied the idea of nothing being constant (dialectics) to matter, not thought, thus creating Dialectical Materialism. So, here's how Wikipedia interprets Engels 3 laws of dialectics:


Is why , its really boring and seemingly useless.

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

Hey Joe, he's already agreed that this theory is a load of rubbish:

http://www.revleft.com/vb/showpost.php?p=1520282&postcount=26

[PRC-UTE]

PRC:



Well, when it came to philosophy, he was certainly seriouly misguided, but why call him a liar?

And, I thought you were a Leninist..

Considering that Lenin wrote a defence of dialectics in 1915, I find that a bit hard to believe that he was either philosophically misguided, (since after all, philosophy informs our actions) or the man was dishonest or stupid enough to claim one philosophical position while not really adhering to it.

[mel]

Considering that Lenin wrote a defence of dialectics in 1915, I find that a bit hard to believe that he was either philosophically misguided, (since after all, philosophy informs our actions) or the man was dishonest or stupid enough to claim one philosophical position while not really adhering to it.

What practical effect did "adhering" to dialectical materialism have on Lenin? I see no point at which that analysis of history would have influenced bolshevik organization, revolutionary practice, or propaganda. It's an unnecessary metaphysical backdrop, of limited utility.

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

PRC:


Considering that Lenin wrote a defence of dialectics in 1915, I find that a bit hard to believe that he was either philosophically misguided, (since after all, philosophy informs our actions) or the man was dishonest or stupid enough to claim one philosophical position while not really adhering to it.

But, when it came to the actual revolution, faced with revolutionary workers, neither he nor anyone else in the Bolshevik party found they could use this theory to agitate and propagandise. And that's why this theory appears nowhere in the debates at the time. It only began to appear when the revolution was going backward --, and as I have shown, it helped accelerate that decline.

Now, if you think that 'philosophy informs actions' perhaps you can give us an example where a thesis drawn from dialectical materialism actually does this.

We have been asking this of you lot now for several years, and, in response all we get is silence. You lot do not even debate this in the 'Dialecical Materialism' group!

Louise Michel was the last one to ask for a practical example a few months ago -- she got no response at all, and she was geuinely interested in the answer.

http://www.revleft.com/vb/dialectics-anti-dialectics-t105184/index.html?t=105184

But many others have tried (like Melbicimni above is doing).

This indicates that not even you lot believe what you say here.

Of course, it's easy to prove me wrong -- so let's see an example...

[spiltteeth]

This is intersesting. For clarity sake, could you give an example of this:

"As we will soon find out, when dialectical ideas are in fact deployed, they can be made to justify anything whatsoever (no matter how contradictory that "anything whatsoever" might otherwise appear to be; in fact the more contradictory it is, the more 'dialectical' it seems to be!) -- and it can be, and has been used to rationalise any course of action, and its opposite, including those that are both counter-revolutionary and anti-Marxist."


It'd help me better grasp how it actually functions.
Thanks

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

Spiltteeth:


"As we will soon find out, when dialectical ideas are in fact deployed, they can be made to justify anything whatsoever (no matter how contradictory that "anything whatsoever" might otherwise appear to be; in fact the more contradictory it is, the more 'dialectical' it seems to be!) -- and it can be, and has been used to rationalise any course of action, and its opposite, including those that are both counter-revolutionary and anti-Marxist."

Here's a few examples:

Stalin:


"It may be said that such a presentation of the question is 'contradictory.' But is there not the same 'contradictoriness' in our presentation of the question of the state? We stand for the withering away of the state. At the same time we stand for the strengthening of the dictatorship of the proletariat, which is the mightiest and strongest state power that has ever existed. The highest development of state power with the object of preparing the conditions for the withering away of state power -- such is the Marxist formula. Is this 'contradictory'? Yes, it is 'contradictory.' But this contradiction us bound up with life, and it fully reflects Marx's dialectics." [Political Report of the Central Committee to the Sixteenth Congress of the CPSU(B), June 27,1930. Bold emphasis added; quotation marks altered to conform to the conventions adopted at my site.]

Chinese dialectician, Ai Ssu-ch'i (whose work was highly influential on Mao):


"The law of identity is a rule of the abstract, absolute unity; it sees in identical things only the aspect of absolute identity, recognising this aspect alone and disregarding its own contradictory and antagonistic aspects. Since an object can only be absolutely identical to itself, it therefore cannot be identical to another aspect. One expresses this with the formula: A is not Not-A, or A is B and simultaneously it cannot be Not-B.... For example, 'retreat is not attack' (A is Not-A (sic)), concentration is limitation of democracy (A is B), one cannot in this case develop democracy (simultaneously 'not is Not-B' (sic)). In this definition, an object (concept, thing, etc.) is confronted absolutely with another object, which lies beyond the actual object, a consequence of which is that an object (A) and the others (Not-A) have no relations at all with each other.... The law of identity thus only recognises abstract identity, and the law of contradiction only recognises an absolute opposite....

"The law of the excluded third specifies: either there is an absolute identity (A is B) or an absolute opposition (A is not B); an object cannot be simultaneously identical and at the same time be antagonistic. For example 'concentration' is either limited democracy or unlimited democracy; it cannot at the same time be limited and a developed democracy. A government in which the people participate is either a democratic organ or it is not a democratic organ. It cannot be simultaneously democratic and insufficiently democratic. Therefore the law of the excluded third only recognises opposition or unity, and struggles against the 'unity of opposites'. This meant that it ['formal logic'] and the dialectic are diametrically opposed." [Ibid. Bold emphases added.]" [Ai Ssu-ch'i, 'Formal Logic And Dialectic', quoted in Meissner (1990), p.107.]

Meissner summarises the rest of his tortured argument:


"1. What is the meaning of 'Retreat is not attack'? As we will see in more detail below, this formulation referred to the strategic principles of the long-protracted war....

"For Mao Tse-Tung...the defence of Wuhan had no special meaning. Instead he advocated surrendering the city and building up the resistance in the countryside. Ai Ssu-ch'i thus defended Mao's tactics, in that he dismissed the phrase 'Retreat is not attack' as 'formal logically'. To consider the 'retreat' from Wuhan solely as a retreat or non-attack corresponded, according to Ai, to the first law of 'formal logic' and was in no way seen as 'dialectical'. On the other hand, Ai wanted to show that the retreat was at one and the same time both a retreat and not a retreat.... The retreat thus contained an attack.

"2. The explanations of 'democratisation' and 'concentration' were also a criticism of Wang Ming's concepts of setting back 'democratisation' in favour of the 'concentration' of all political and military forces, and of attempting to commit the CCP exclusively to the support of the national government. Behind this was hidden the consideration that a possible 'democratisation' of Kuomintang control could lead to an impairment of the military effectiveness of the United Front. Ai criticised this view a 'formal logically', because 'democratisation' and 'concentration' were seen as mutually exclusive contradictions....

"3. However, Ai Ssu-ch'i' made a further observation concerning the relationship between the CCP and the Kuomintang by speaking of the 'unification of several objects identical to themselves' and by characterising them as a 'formal-logical' combination of independent, mutually unrelated objects, which thus represented a state of rest. The 'formal-logical identity' served him as an example of how the relationship between the two parties should not be constituted....

"Through the example of the 'law of identity', Ai also grappled with the question of how far the CCP should acquiesce in the Kuomintang's demand to base itself on the 'Three principles of the people', without endangering the independence of the CCP....


'Since the law of identity only recognises the absolute aspect of identity, one can maintain in the United Front that all parties and factions have now already given up their independence and have only one goal; consequently, many people say that the CP has given up Marxism. Since, on the other hand, the law of contradiction only recognises the absolute opposite, some people advocate the view that every party and faction must retain its own independent programme and organisation'. [Ibid.]

"Ai characterised the adherents of the first view as 'right deviationists' and those of the second as 'left deviationists'.... Both groups...are, according to Ai, 'formal-logical' in their thought; they consider one aspect of the whole and make it absolute.... 'Formal logic' recognises only attack and/or retreat, only concentration and/or democracy, only the 'three principles of the people' and/or communism. However, it is not capable of comprehending the existing relationships between those respective pairs of objects....

"Thus, in concrete terms, 'dialectical logic' can be explained thus: the United Front is accepted and at the same time rejected, in that the struggle against the Kuomintang is to be continued within the United Front." [Meissner (1990), pp.107-110.]

There are literally scores of other examples in Meissner's book.

Here is Mao:


"The contradictory aspects in every process exclude each other, struggle with each other and are in opposition to each other. Without exception, they are contained in the process of development of all things and in all human thought. A simple process contains only a single pair of opposites, while a complex process contains more. And in turn, the pairs of opposites are in contradiction to one another.)

"That is how all things in the objective world and all human thought are constituted and how they are set in motion.

"This being so, there is an utter lack of identity or unity. How then can one speak of identity or unity?

"The fact is that no contradictory aspect can exist in isolation. Without its opposite aspect, each loses the condition for its existence. Just think, can any one contradictory aspect of a thing or of a concept in the human mind exist independently? Without life, there would be no death; without death, there would be no life. Without 'above', there would be no 'below').... Without landlords, there would be no tenant-peasants; without tenant-peasants, there would be no landlords. Without the bourgeoisie, there would be no proletariat; without the proletariat, there would be no bourgeoisie. Without imperialist oppression of nations, there would be no colonies or semi-colonies; without colonies or semicolonies, there would be no imperialist oppression of nations. It is so with all opposites; in given conditions, on the one hand they are opposed to each other, and on the other they are interconnected, interpenetrating, interpermeating and interdependent, and this character is described as identity. In given conditions, all contradictory aspects possess the character of non-identity and hence are described as being in contradiction. But they also possess the character of identity and hence are interconnected. This is what Lenin means when he says that dialectics studies 'how opposites can be ... identical'. How then can they be identical? Because each is the condition for the other's existence. This is the first meaning of identity.

"But is it enough to say merely that each of the contradictory aspects is the condition for the other's existence, that there is identity between them and that consequently they can coexist in a single entity? No, it is not. The matter does not end with their dependence on each other for their existence; what is more important is their transformation into each other. That is to say, in given conditions, each of the contradictory aspects within a thing transforms itself into its opposite, changes its position to that of its opposite. This is the second meaning of the identity of contradiction.

"Why is there identity here, too? You see, by means of revolution the proletariat, at one time the ruled, is transformed into the ruler, while the bourgeoisie, the erstwhile ruler, is transformed into the ruled and changes its position to that originally occupied by its opposite. This has already taken place in the Soviet Union, as it will take place throughout the world. If there were no interconnection and identity of opposites in given conditions, how could such a change take place?

"The Kuomintang, which played a certain positive role at a certain stage in modern Chinese history, became a counter-revolutionary party after 1927 because of its inherent class nature and because of imperialist blandishments (these being the conditions); but it has been compelled to agree to resist Japan because of the sharpening of the contradiction between China and Japan and because of the Communist Party's policy of the united front (these being the conditions). Things in contradiction change into one another, and herein lies a definite identity....

"To consolidate the dictatorship of the proletariat or the dictatorship of the people is in fact to prepare the conditions for abolishing this dictatorship and advancing to the higher stage when all state systems are eliminated. To establish and build the Communist Party is in fact to prepare the conditions for the elimination of the Communist Party and all political parties. To build a revolutionary army under the leadership of the Communist Party and to carry on revolutionary war is in fact to prepare the conditions for the permanent elimination of war. These opposites are at the same time complementary....

"All contradictory things are interconnected; not only do they coexist in a single entity in given conditions, but in other given conditions, they also transform themselves into each other. This is the full meaning of the identity of opposites. This is what Lenin meant when he discussed 'how they happen to be (how they become) identical--under what conditions they are identical, transforming themselves into one another'." [Mao (1961) 'On Contradiction', pp.337-40.]

Meissner, W. (1990), Philosophy And Politics In China. The Controversy Over Dialectical Materialism In The 1930s (Hurst & Company).

There is plenty more of this in my Essay Nine Part Two (from Stalinism, Maoism and Trotskyism):

http://anti-dialectics.co.uk/page%2009_02.htm

Use the 'Quick Links' at the top to go to section 7.

As I show, this theory is so 'contradiction-friendly' it can be , and has been used to justify practically anything at all and its opposite, often in the same breath.

So, the abandonment of any and all Marxist principles can be, and has been 'justified' by the 'dialectical method'.

Because of this, Marxism in effect comes to stand for nothing at all.

That is just one of the reasons why I despise this 'theory'.

[PRC-UTE]

What practical effect did "adhering" to dialectical materialism have on Lenin? I see no point at which that analysis of history would have influenced bolshevik organization, revolutionary practice, or propaganda. It's an unnecessary metaphysical backdrop, of limited utility.

I'm sure I could dig up some quotes from Lenin discussing the contradictions in capitalism maturing...which is of course an idea that comes from dialectics.

anyway, it doesn't matter either way- what I'd like to know is why Lenin and his comrades were able to play a leading role in a revolution, despite the fact that they upheld dialectics...doesn't seem like dialectics is really an obstacle to being an effective revolutionary, which is what Rosa claims again and again.

[DeLeonist]

I've recently been trying to make some sense of Hegel and Dialectics, and have found Andy Blunden's work (http://home.mira.net/~andy/works/on-hegel.htm) to be very useful, in particular, his "Introduction to Hegel's Logic". He maintains the Marxist Internet Archive section on Hegel. (http://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/hegel/)

Anyone else read much of Blunden's stuff?

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

PRC:


I'm sure I could dig up some quotes from Lenin discussing the contradictions in capitalism maturing...which is of course an idea that comes from dialectics.

And so did Stalin in order to 'justify' the imposition of a terror state on the USSR all the while arguing that it was more democratic as a result, on the grounds that this was contradictory, and fully conformed to the contradictory nature of Marxist dialectics (quotation given earlier) -- and so did the CPSU in order to 'justify' the ultra-left turn and the 'social fascist' stage, and the fight against the socialists and the Nazis in Germany (while Hitler laughed all the way into power, thanks partly to the operation of 'scientific dialectics), and the rest of Europe in the early 1930s, and then again, to 'justify' the exact opposite a few years later, in the 'Popular Front' stage, and then again in order to 'justify' the next 180 degree about-turn, and the pact with Hitler, and then again a few years later when the Nazis invaded the USSR.

And so did the Maoists, in order to 'justify' their United Front with the Guomindang, and then again later in order to 'justify' the fight against them, and then again in order to 'justify' the imposition of an undemocratic and centralised state on the Chinese people on the grounds that since the dialectic is 'contradictory' the state should be, and so greater central control meant more democracy (quotation given earlier)!

And so did Trotsky, in order to 'justify' the belief that although the working class was the ruling-class in the former USSR, it was also oppressed by the degenerated Bolshevik Party, but the contradictory nature of the State meant it was still a workers' state, albeit degenerated, and only needed a political revolution -- while the Stalinists and the Maoists used dialectics to arrive at the exact opposite conclusion.

Trotsky declared that only those who did not 'understand' dialectics would disagree, and the Maoists and Stalinists said the same about their diametrically opposite conclusions.

Trotsky even used dialectics to 'justify' his support for Stalin's murderous invasion of Finland!

Since then, dialectics has helped split the Trotskyist movement from top to bottom,, with the followers of Tony Cliff using dialectics to 'justify' the State Capitalist interpretation of the former USSR, while 'Orthodox Trotskyists' use it to 'justify' the opposite conclusion, that the former USSR was a degenerated workers' state -- each declaring that the other does not 'understand' dialectics.

Scores of quotations substantiating these allegations can be found here:

http://anti-dialectics.co.uk/page%2009_02.htm

In Section 7: Case Studies.

So, it's not the case that we can find only a few quotations, the entire movement is riddled with theoretical and political arguments, the conclusions to which, and their opposites were 'justified' by the use of this contradiction-friendly theory.

Small wonder then that Dialectical Marxism has been a long-term failure since the 192s, at least, with comrades using this theory to 'justify' anything they liked and its opposite.

No Marxist principle was safe from being compromised by this 'theory' -- small wonder, too, that workers everywhere no longer trust is, and we find that few listen to us anymore -- while we continue to fragment (often 'justified' by yet more dialectics -- those other guys do not 'understand' the dialectic, you see), and continually lose both credibility and political impact.

This 'theory' unites all strands of Dialectical Marxism, so that, even though there are Maoists, Stalinists, left communists, Trotskyists, etc., at RevLeft who all disagree with each other politically, they can all belong to the Dialectical Materialism group.

It is also why, in that group, you never really discuss anything, except the evil thought-crimes of little old me, since if you did you'd soon find you could concoct dialectical arguments to 'justify' each and every belief you have, while using the same arguments to condemn every other Marxist tendency (and thus most of the other members of that sad group) for their failure to 'understand' and/or apply the Marxist dialectic!


anyway, it doesn't matter either way- what I'd like to know is why Lenin and his comrades were able to play a leading role in a revolution, despite the fact that they upheld dialectics...doesn't seem like dialectics is really an obstacle to being an effective revolutionary, which is what Rosa claims again and again.

But, you have already had it proven to you that they did not use dialectics in 1917, nor could they -- I have even challenged you to show how this theory could be so used (and you replied with the usual deafening dialectical silence) -- so, the fact that you have retreated into comforting fantasy here is no big surprise.

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

DeLeonist:


Anyone else read much of Blunden's stuff?

Yes, and he makes all the usual mistakes.

But, why on earth do you want to understand Hegel (an impossible task anyway)?

[ZeroNowhere]

But, why on earth do you want to understand Hegel (an impossible task anyway)?
Well, technically, I recall Wittgenstein stating that some texts are valuable if only for their errors (was it Kant he was referring to? Possibly, though I'm not sure). He had also appreciated fascist literature on that basis, IIRC. So that is a possible reason, if one feels it worth the effort.

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

ZeroNowhere:


Well, technically, I recall Wittgenstein stating that some texts are valuable if only for their errors (was it Kant he was referring to? Possibly, though I'm not sure). He had also appreciated fascist literature on that basis, IIRC. So that is a possible reason, if one feels it worth the effort.

Indeed, but he was referring to important and/or deep errors (like those that Plato or Frege made), not the crass errors one finds in Hegel.

And, I like to see where he said he liked fascist literature on that basis, or any other.

[mel]

I'm sure I could dig up some quotes from Lenin discussing the contradictions in capitalism maturing...which is of course an idea that comes from dialectics.

In what sense did they "come from dialectics"? Unless dialectics describes something so vague (that sometimes composites which are made up of parts have conflicting interests [contradictions] which can spur change) that it is useless, it doesn't take much to see that capitalism is a system which creates classes of individuals which have conflicting interests, and these contradictions can "mature".

Either way, what does "discussing the contradictions in capitalism maturing" have to do with winning a revolution? Did Lenin win over the russian masses with long-winded treatises filled with dialectical analysis? Was party organization heavily influenced by dialectics? I don't think you've really answered what practical effect dialectics had on the revolution.

I think the only case you can really make is that dialectics influenced Lenin's theory regarding capitalism, which led him to his belief, unpopular with the rest of the world at the time, that the time was ripe for revolution, which caused him to act in the first place...but dialectical analysis of the "maturing contradictions in capitalism" could have easily led to the other position, meaning dialectics was just the tool used to justify what position was already held, that led to no new beliefs, just a supposed "scientific" reinforcement of the beliefs that already existed.


anyway, it doesn't matter either way- what I'd like to know is why Lenin and his comrades were able to play a leading role in a revolution, despite the fact that they upheld dialectics...doesn't seem like dialectics is really an obstacle to being an effective revolutionary, which is what Rosa claims again and again.

I think the point being made repeatedly here, is that dialectics had almost literally nothing to do with the way the revolution was carried out. The reason dialectics did not hinder Lenin and his comrades in playing a leading role in revolution is because dialectics did not significantly enter into their revolutionary practice at any stage.

Even if it did, it's hardly an endorsement of your cause to be making the claim that "Hey, <insert name> managed to do great things even though their head was filled with nonsense!", it's a bit pathetic that is what a defense of dialectics has come down to. Poor hegel :crying:

[ZeroNowhere]

And, I like to see where he said he liked fascist literature on that basis, or any other.
Hm, in fact, I was mistaken, due to the fact that somebody had tried to argue W was 'fascistic' based on recommending Otto Weininger to people, and referred to him as a 'fascist', which rather got stuck in my mind for some odd reason despite the fact that I had checked back then as well, and it would seem he was just pretty much a non-fascist reactionary. On him, W had wrote, "It isn't necessary or rather not possible to agree with him but the greatness lies in that with which we disagree. It is his enormous mistake which is great." Though you're probably aware of this. Interestingly, the Wikipedia article on W seems to imply that he accepted W2's ideas.

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

ZeroNoWhere:


Hm, in fact, I was mistaken, due to the fact that somebody had tried to argue W was 'fascistic' based on recommending Otto Weininger to people, and referred to him as a 'fascist', which rather got stuck in my mind for some odd reason despite the fact that I had checked back then as well, and it would seem he was just pretty much a non-fascist reactionary. On him, W had wrote, "It isn't necessary or rather not possible to agree with him but the greatness lies in that with which we disagree. It is his enormous mistake which is great." Though you're probably aware of this. Interestingly, the Wikipedia article on W seems to imply that he accepted W2's ideas.

Well Weininger's writings that Wittgenstein read, was written long before fascism was invented (indeed, he shot himslef in 1903).

And, in this case, he was not learning from a fascist.

Indeed, as Wikipedia points out:


Isolated parts of Weininger's writings were used by Nazi propaganda, despite the fact that Weininger actively argued against the ideas of race that came to be identified with the Nazis...

Nevertheless, Weininger's books were denounced by the Nazis, most probably because Weininger encouraged women to think for themselves, and to determine their own future, which went directly against the Nazi idea of the role of women in society.


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Otto_Weininger

See also here:

http://books.google.co.uk/books?id=Tdn6FFZklkcC&pg=RA1-PA762&lpg=RA1-PA762&dq=Weininger+and+the+Nazis&source=bl&ots=qJ_myczJXK&sig=-M4EdjDipNVvZhJEzlSl2Q-Nwzc&hl=en&ei=BdmOSpCVO8ahjAfx8JnbDQ&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=7#v=onepage&q=&f=false

But who is W2?

[ZeroNowhere]

I was just using that to refer to Weininger, sorry about that. And yeah, pretty much, I suppose that the use of Weininger by the Nazis may have been why he was associated with fascism, or it could just be that the person was confusing 'reactionary' with 'fascist'. Though the last Wikipedia quote wasn't cited, so I would have no idea as to its validity. Also, the W2 thing was a reference to this:


Although some commentators have assumed that Wittgenstein's political sympathies lay on the left, and while, despite being entirely contemptuous of Lenin's philosophical work, he once described himself as a "communist at heart" and romanticized the life of laborers, in many ways he was a reactionary. He abhorred the idea of scientific progress (for the traditional Romantic reason that it was meaningless without moral progress), was conservative in his musical tastes, and was ambivalent about the invention of nuclear weapons, stating that "the people making speeches against producing the bomb are undoubtedly the scum of the intellectuals, although even this does not prove beyond question that what they abominate is to be welcomed". He particularly admired the philosophy of the Austrian Otto Weininger. Wittgenstein distributed copies of Weininger's theories to bemused colleagues at CambridgeThat does imply, since it's in the context of Wittgenstein's 'reactionary beliefs' (such as his taste in music, and thinking that the fact that the people speaking out against the bomb happened to also be scum did not mean that it was to be welcomed), that he was promoting Weininger's philosophy. I also have no idea about the whole 'scientific progresss' thing, it does not seem to be cited.

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

This Wiki comment is completely wrong; I have addressed this issue (in extensive detail) here:

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

Wittgenstein was against scientism, not scientific progress -- in fact he began his university career trying to invent a jet engine (in 1909!) -- check this book out:

http://www.amazon.com/Wittgenstein-Flies-Kite-Story-Models/dp/0131499971

[ZeroNowhere]

Yes, if I recall correctly, Bouwsma had said that he called science, electronics, as well as reflection (in this case talking about why he quit teaching and so on) aseptic. Though not philosophy, of course.
Also, that book sounds like a pretty (well, more than that) interesting idea, and quite unique so far as I know. I'll probably pick it up sometime. Anything learnt about the history of physics and such would be a plus too (I saw a review comment on it being overly complex at times, which means that at least it goes into it). Did it actually deliver on what it had promised to do? Also, does it have to do with both the early and late W, or just one? As far as I can tell, it's only the former, which I don't really mind, it could be that it stopped influencing his philosophy that much after that, or his interest decreased, or so on.

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

The book I mentioned in fact breaks new ground on the early Wittgenstein, and -- since he never repudiated his earlier work, he just said it was rather one-sided and ignored how we actually use language, and thus it was like a clock that told the wrong time --, thus the later Wittgenstein, too.

[DeLeonist]

But, why on earth do you want to understand Hegel (an impossible task anyway)?

Well enough professional philosophers and revolutionaries respect him to suggest to me that Hegel is worth having a look at.

The fact that he is nonsensical to some schools of English analytical philosophy (whose narrow conventionality is perhaps mirrored in the relative passivity of the English working class) does not sway me that much. They tend to say that about all continental philosophy, from phenomenology to existentialism to deconstructionism.

In any case, how is one supposed to come to grips with "Anti Dialectics" without having first having some knowledge of dialectics?

[ZeroNowhere]

In any case, how is one supposed to come to grips with "Anti Dialectics" without having first having some knowledge of dialectics?I'd say Marcuse's 'R&R' would be better for this, it's a pretty great introduction to Hegelian Marxism. Shitty book, though.


Well enough professional philosophers and revolutionaries respect him to suggest to me that Hegel is worth having a look at.To be honest, the only ones that come to mind that could possibly make him seem worthwhile through their respect for Hegel are Marx (well, to the extent which he respected him. Colletti investigated that in 'Marxism and Hegel'), Engels, Sayer, and Kliman.

Anyways, when it comes to disliking dialectics, another reason is how it seems to be used as a 'deus ex machina' to justify positions (and chide people for their 'misunderstanding of revolutionary dialectics', and such. Or 'dialectical logic', for people who have even less of an idea what they're talking about). For example, a text I recall about dialectics which attempts to discuss De Leon. Along with misrepresentations of De Leon (such as him apparently being 'patriotic', and numerous implications that he was born in the US rather than Curaçao, etc), which are present in pretty much any text on the guy, he then brings dialectics into it, as one would expect in a text on dialectics, especially in a discussion on De Leon (who never even mentions dialectics, as far as I remember, let alone the 'negation of the negation', 'interpenetration of opposites' and so on. It's quite refreshing, really). He starts off with accusing him of taking Lewis Henry Morgan on faith while not being critical enough of him. I, personally, would say that (unlike Marx and Engels), he didn't really write anything long enough on Morgan for one to determine if he were completely uncritical (he praised the guy often, but Morgan also played an important part in Marx's Ethnological Notebooks, and, well, Engels' attempt to make that into a published work, which was highly uncritical of it, unlike Marx's original notebooks). Now, he then goes on to accuse De Leon of not taking it in the dialectical manner which M+E had taken it in. I mean, no explanation, justification, or anything, just 'De Leon wasn't dialectical enough to understand it'. It's rather silly, but nevertheless it's hardly the first time it's been used in that way, in fact, it's done quite often. After that, he accuses De Leon's views of reformism as being based on his lack of dialectics (again, an assertion), as well as misrepresenting them somewhat (he seems to be implying that De Leon's position was that socialism should be an 'immediate demand' (DL called it a 'constant demand' as distinguished from 'immediate demands', and he was also quite clear that the industrial organization could and would fight for 'immediate demands', he just did not see it as a viable tactic for a revolutionary political organization, which is more prone to simply 'resting satisfied' and going over to reformism), and this determined whether something was revolutionary or reformist.) Again, no justification, or anything, really. He then goes on to attribute the lack of dialectics to De Leon's apparent view that revolution would come 'automatically' when a majority were socialist (if he viewed it as automatic, why would he debate about what would be the best means of carrying out revolution if a majority were to be socialist in the foreseeable future?), again with no explanation or justification, and then for De Leon's "disguised social-pacifism" (really? (http://www.slp.org/pdf/de_leon/eds1909/1909_aug03.pdf)) by his implication that revolution was possible in some places without insurrection. So yeah, one very valid reason for disliking dialectics is that people like to claim it can give them certain 'positions', and just invoke it to claim that they're right (like 'the subtlety of Marx's analysis' allowed Lenin to justify a rather nonsensical reading of Marx). Therefore, one can determine which tactics are best by somehow looking at things 'dialectically', rather than investigating society in a certain area and determining what tactic would be most effective (Engels put it, "In my opinion those tactics are the best in each country that lead to the goal most certainly and in the shortest time.") Of course, there's also statements that De Leon's theory was just a priori and dogmatic (ha!), made by quoting Engels on the pre-De Leon SLP and such, whereas it was actually based on the struggle within the KoL, the left-turn in the ALU (eventually going further than the SPA) which lead to the IWW and a shift in DL's position, and so on, as well as statements that he 'made phrases and otherwise did nothing', which is hilarious. But then again, back to the point. He also uses this to argue that anti-Leninist Marxisms are all flawed due to their lack of dialectics, and the existence of anti-Leninist groups is a "negative proof" of the indispensability of diamat.

The invocation of dialectics to justify one's own political positions (generally, it's used to justify insurrection being necessary for revolution and such, as in this text), also generally involves the invoking of M+E as an example of dialectical thought, and thus the ascribing of said positions to them. This often serves to impoverish the political thought of the later Engels, which was probably the most interesting part of him, IMO. For example, the founder of dialectics himself shared some of these views which apparently arose through 'lack of dialectics'. Here (http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1893/letters/93_03_18.htm) he says that the advocacy of the ballot as a destructive force is not everywhere against revolutionary principle, here (http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1895/03/06.htm) he pretty much completely contradicts the view of the author of that text (Tommy Jackson, 'Communist Party' founder), here (http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1881/05/28.htm#p2), well, yeah. Now, the sheer frequency of this kind of thing means that it's not rare to hear about how Marx and Engels advocated a position which they didn't due to their 'revolutionary dialectics'. There's also the way it's been used by some of the 'anti-political economy' people (I generally give Cyril Smith as an example of members of this school), which occasionally replaces Marx's economics with philosophy, which is never good.

And, of course, it also is quite boring. For example, Sayer precedes his argument in 'The Violence of Abstraction' with some very dull passages on Hegel and the importance of dialectics which don't help one understand the book in the slightest, or do anything, really, except waste one's time. Tommy Jackson's book, previously discussed, is, well, I would agree with the SPGB when discussing Jackson's works as a 'CP' member, "Quite the worst was a long turgid book on Dialectics". Though I do find the sentence on how Marxism stripped of its materialism relapses into "bastard Hegelianism" quite amusing.

So, for example, imagine that there was some crappy pop song which got played everywhere, and practically everybody listens to it all the time, so that you have to hear it incredibly often. Now, people also judge the worth of any other song by how much it resembles this one, and if you don't like the song, they will often just dismiss your disagreements with them on other things, attributing them to your lack of liking said song. Also, pretty much any book on music has an obligatory few pages on it, as well as many comments on how awesome it is spread throughout the pages. Now, one would probably get sick of said song, and more than of, say, whatever crap Zarach 'Baal' Tharagh puts out. You could call this an example of quantity turning into quality, but why the hell would you do that. So it would make sense that people who see dialectics as quasi-Hegelian claptrap ('making no sense at all', as Rosa put it), for lack of a better word, would get rather annoyed at how it is used as a substitute for argument (which also means that crappy positions don't need much more justification than 'the dialectic'), to make long, boring books, hell, even infecting the good ones, as an equivalent of penis size in some circles in some circles, called the 'foundations of Marxism' and similar things, and so on.

[DeLeonist]

I agree that "dialectics" can and has been used to justify any position and obscure any argument.

In fact, it was the horrors committed in the name of dialectics (and 'scientific socialism') in the last century that has led me to explore, via Eugene Kamenka's "The Ethical Foundations of Marxism", the continuities between the early and later Marx. Hence, an interest in Marxist-Humanism and Hegel. I don't know much about them at present but as I see it, understanding the errors of the past entails investigating Marx and Hegel's conceptions of freedom, self determination and so forth.

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

^^^The only thing worth bothering with in Hegel is in fact his ethical theory. It's just a pity the man could not write to save his life!

[ZeroNowhere]

Also perhaps of relevance is that, really, I'd say that Feuerbach would probably help somebody with Marx (especially his earlier writings, though the inversion metaphor and such run throughout his work) a lot more than Hegel (though reading him isn't really necessary either). A bonus is that I find his style a lot better than Hegel (and he's a more interesting philosopher in general), though your mileage may vary. Otherwise, the whole 'you must read Hegel to read Capital' thing is completely baseless, and I'm not sure reading Hegel would add much to your understanding of 'Capital' (you could get a bit more familiar with a few words, which could probably be summed up in less than half a page, and in more interesting language. I had read the SoL after 'Capital', and I can't say it enriched my understanding of it at all), and can take quite a lot away from it (I'm sure we've all heard the idea that Capital covers logical categories and therefore it had to be done in the order that it was, since they naturally flow from one to the next? And that's hardly the worst of this kind of thing).

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

^^^Which is, of course, why Marx's own summary of 'his method' has not one atom of Hegel in it:

http://www.revleft.com/vb/showpost.php?p=1158574&postcount=73

[ZeroNowhere]

Well, to be fair, he did say that he had turned Hegel's dialectic upside down, and I'm sure you know that passage (following the one you quoted) well enough by now. The problem with that kind of thing is that due to diamat as developed after Marx, we now tend to see his comments in light (or dark?) of 'dialectics' as propounded by Engels, Lenin and so on. However, the problem here isn't whether or not he referred to 'his dialectic method', and so on, but of what these consisted. So, while it would seem that he did get some influence from Hegel, it would seem this was mainly from repudiating his ideas, apart from the use of a 'rational kernel' for his 'new materialism'. The thing is, hardly anybody seems to try figuring out exactly what said rational kernel was (by modern diamat, one could be tempted to say: everything), or what Marx saw as his dialectic.

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

Marx indeed said that (or rather that he had put him the right way up), but it is clear from his own summary of 'his method' that this rotation has removed every trace of Hegel.

The only things that are left of Hegel, again according to Marx, were a few bits of Hegelian jargon, with which Marx merely 'coquetted' -- i.e., used in a non-serious way (rather like we'd use 'scare' quotes these days).

[ZeroNowhere]

To be honest, I would say Marx's discussion of Hegel's 'rational kernel' does seem to imply more than simply picking up some jargon. Of course, it may have actually been something we may see as fairly mundane, but nevertheless Hegel had some idea which he sees as being an important part of his idea, though it could have only been through difference with previous philosophers. Marx said that he had coquetted with words peculiar to Hegel, but that was separate from his discussion of turning him the right side up, the 'rational kernel' and so on.

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

ZeroNoWhere:


To be honest, I would say Marx's discussion of Hegel's 'rational kernel' does seem to imply more than simply picking up some jargon. Of course, it may have actually been something we may see as fairly mundane, but nevertheless Hegel had some idea which he sees as being an important part of his idea, though it could have only been through difference with previous philosophers. Marx said that he had coquetted with words peculiar to Hegel, but that was separate from his discussion of turning him the right side up, the 'rational kernel' and so on.

Well, we needn't speculate, since Marx very helpfully included a description of his method:


"After a quotation from the preface to my 'Criticism of Political Economy,' Berlin, 1859, pp. IV-VII, where I discuss the materialistic basis of my method, the writer goes on:

'The one thing which is of moment to Marx, is to find the law of the phenomena with whose investigation he is concerned; and not only is that law of moment to him, which governs these phenomena, in so far as they have a definite form and mutual connexion within a given historical period. Of still greater moment to him is the law of their variation, of their development, i.e., of their transition from one form into another, from one series of connexions into a different one. This law once discovered, he investigates in detail the effects in which it manifests itself in social life. Consequently, Marx only troubles himself about one thing: to show, by rigid scientific investigation, the necessity of successive determinate orders of social conditions, and to establish, as impartially as possible, the facts that serve him for fundamental starting-points. For this it is quite enough, if he proves, at the same time, both the necessity of the present order of things, and the necessity of another order into which the first must inevitably pass over; and this all the same, whether men believe or do not believe it, whether they are conscious or unconscious of it. Marx treats the social movement as a process of natural history, governed by laws not only independent of human will, consciousness and intelligence, but rather, on the contrary, determining that will, consciousness and intelligence. ... If in the history of civilisation the conscious element plays a part so subordinate, then it is self-evident that a critical inquiry whose subject-matter is civilisation, can, less than anything else, have for its basis any form of, or any result of, consciousness. That is to say, that not the idea, but the material phenomenon alone can serve as its starting-point. Such an inquiry will confine itself to the confrontation and the comparison of a fact, not with ideas, but with another fact. For this inquiry, the one thing of moment is, that both facts be investigated as accurately as possible, and that they actually form, each with respect to the other, different momenta of an evolution; but most important of all is the rigid analysis of the series of successions, of the sequences and concatenations in which the different stages of such an evolution present themselves. But it will be said, the general laws of economic life are one and the same, no matter whether they are applied to the present or the past. This Marx directly denies. According to him, such abstract laws do not exist. On the contrary, in his opinion every historical period has laws of its own.... As soon as society has outlived a given period of development, and is passing over from one given stage to another, it begins to be subject also to other laws. In a word, economic life offers us a phenomenon analogous to the history of evolution in other branches of biology. The old economists misunderstood the nature of economic laws when they likened them to the laws of physics and chemistry. A more thorough analysis of phenomena shows that social organisms differ among themselves as fundamentally as plants or animals. Nay, one and the same phenomenon falls under quite different laws in consequence of the different structure of those organisms as a whole, of the variations of their individual organs, of the different conditions in which those organs function, &c. Marx, e.g., denies that the law of population is the same at all times and in all places. He asserts, on the contrary, that every stage of development has its own law of population. ... With the varying degree of development of productive power, social conditions and the laws governing them vary too. Whilst Marx sets himself the task of following and explaining from this point of view the economic system established by the sway of capital, he is only formulating, in a strictly scientific manner, the aim that every accurate investigation into economic life must have. The scientific value of such an inquiry lies in the disclosing of the special laws that regulate the origin, existence, development, death of a given social organism and its replacement by another and higher one. And it is this value that, in point of fact, Marx's book has.'

"Whilst the writer pictures what he takes to be actually my method, in this striking and [as far as concerns my own application of it] generous way, what else is he picturing but the dialectic method?" [Marx (1976), pp.101-02. Bold emphases added.]

You will note that Marx calls this the 'dialectic method', and 'his method', but it is also clear that it bears no relation to the sort of dialectics traditionalists ascribe to Marx, for in it there is not one ounce of Hegel -- no quantity turning into quality, no contradictions, no negation of the negation, no unities of opposites, no totality...

So, Marx's method has had Hegel totally extirpated. For Marx, putting Hegel on 'his feet' is to crush his head.

The 'rational kernel' thu has no Hegel in it at all.

[ZeroNowhere]

Yes, that is his description (or rather, what the writer pictures what he takes to be actually his method, Marx doesn't say that it actually is his method, rather specifying that it's what the writer sees as his method, and I wouldn't say it was either, since what is described seems more a mechanical materialism. He was already discussing the writer, so while it's not entirely clear what he was repudiating him on, it's quite clear that he is using that to argue against them, so evidently what the passage being quoted means, as well as the discussion following it, should be determined by figuring out what he was repudiating the reviewer for. Re-reading that section, it seems that his point is that while the writer presents Marx's mode of inquiry as realistic, and mode of presentation as 'dialectical', the method which he takes to be Marx's is dialectical, thus showing that he contradicts himself). The thing is, Marx sees himself as having gained something from Hegel, even if it has nothing to do with the interpenetration of opposites (one would think dialectics were a theory on dating), affirmation, negation, negation of the negation, etc. Perhaps it was just a way of looking at something which he saw as novel to Hegel, or something of the sort.

To put it another way, I'm more with Colletti than Althusser on this, rather than some simple rejection of Hegel, Marx did, certainly according to himself, preserve some aspects of Hegel's thought, but only by doing away with Hegel's dialectic and philosophical system, so that what he preserved was completely transformed in meaning and significance. Which reminds me, it's rather a pity that Colletti went over to Berlusconi (and hell, I've heard people use that to argue that people who reject diamat will eventually drift out of Marxism. Really.)

[LeninKobaMao]

Because they think all Dialectical Materialists are evil communists.

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

ZeroNoWhere:


Yes, that is his description (or rather, what the writer pictures what he takes to be actually his method, Marx doesn't say that it actually is his method, rather specifying that it's what the writer sees as his method, and I wouldn't say it was either, since what is described seems more a mechanical materialism. He was already discussing the writer, so while it's not entirely clear what he was repudiating him on, it's quite clear that he is using that to argue against them, so evidently what the passage being quoted means, as well as the discussion following it, should be determined by figuring out what he was repudiating the reviewer for. Re-reading that section, it seems that his point is that while the writer presents Marx's mode of inquiry as realistic, and mode of presentation as 'dialectical', the method which he takes to be Marx's is dialectical, thus showing that he contradicts himself). The thing is, Marx sees himself as having gained something from Hegel, even if it has nothing to do with the interpenetration of opposites (one would think dialectics were a theory on dating), affirmation, negation, negation of the negation, etc. Perhaps it was just a way of looking at something which he saw as novel to Hegel, or something of the sort.

Well, he says of it that it is the 'dialectic method, and 'my method'.

And although you say this:


The thing is, Marx sees himself as having gained something from Hegel,

there is no evidence that he gained anything from Hegel other than, as he also says, a few jargonised phrases, with which he merely 'coquetted'.


The thing is, Marx sees himself as having gained something from Hegel, even if it has nothing to do with the interpenetration of opposites (one would think dialectics were a theory on dating), affirmation, negation, negation of the negation, etc. Perhaps it was just a way of looking at something which he saw as novel to Hegel, or something of the sort.

But then, what else is there to gain from Hegel?


To put it another way, I'm more with Colletti than Althusser on this, rather than some simple rejection of Hegel, Marx did, certainly according to himself, preserve some aspects of Hegel's thought, but only by doing away with Hegel's dialectic and philosophical system, so that what he preserved was completely transformed in meaning and significance. Which reminds me, it's rather a pity that Colletti went over to Berlusconi (and hell, I've heard people use that to argue that people who reject diamat will eventually drift out of Marxism. Really.)

And several here say this of me -- even though I have been a revolutionary for far longer than most RevLefters have been alive.

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

LeninKobaMao:


Because they think all Dialectical Materialists are evil communists.

Well, as you can see from this thread (and from many others at RevLeft -- see the link at the end), we reject dialectical materialsm because it makes not one ounce of sense.

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

[ZeroNowhere]

Well, he says of it that it is the 'dialectic method, and 'my method'.He didn't call it his method. He had said that the reviewer had quoted the passage on his method from the 'Critique of the Political Economy' (the 'guiding thread' one which Sayer's book is about, I would assume) before writing that passage. He does say that it is 'the dialectic method', but so is Hegel's, he doesn't say that it's either his method, or his 'dialectic method'. The 'what he takes to be actually my method' thing seems to imply the opposite, in fact, but anyways.


And several here say this of me -- even though I have been a revolutionary for far longer than most RevLefters have been alive.You're quoting Max Eastman, which evidently implies that you accept his political ideas, making you a reactionary.


there is no evidence that he gained anything from Hegel other than, as he also says, a few jargonised phrases, with which he merely 'coquetted'.I'll perhaps write about this a little after re-reading 'Marxism and Hegel' (making marginal notes and such this time, marking important quotations, etc).

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

ZeroNoWhere:


He didn't call it his method. He had said that the reviewer had quoted the passage on his method from the 'Critique of the Political Economy' (the 'guiding thread' one which Sayer's book is about, I would assume) before writing that passage. He does say that it is 'the dialectic method', but so is Hegel's, he doesn't say that it's either his method, or his 'dialectic method'. The 'what he takes to be actually my method' thing seems to imply the opposite, in fact, but anyways.

Well, concerning a passage that Marx says is about 'his method', he calls it the 'dialectic method':


"Whilst the writer pictures what he takes to be actually my method, in this striking and [as far as concerns my own application of it] generous way, what else is he picturing but the dialectic method?" [Marx (1976), pp.101-02.]

I am not sure how much clearer Marx could have been.


You're quoting Max Eastman, which evidently implies that you accept his political ideas, making you a reactionary.

Well, I quote him to provoke just that sort of knuckle-headed response -- and from comrades who are quite happy to quote that bourgeois mystic: Hegel.:lol:

[ZeroNowhere]

Firstly, my point on 'his method' was that he was referring to the reviewer quoting what I would assume to be this passage:

"The first work which I undertook to dispel the doubts assailing me was a critical re-examination of the Hegelian philosophy of law; the introduction to this work being published in the Deutsch-Franzosische Jahrbucher issued in Paris in 1844. My inquiry led me to the conclusion that neither legal relations nor political forms could be comprehended whether by themselves or on the basis of a so-called general development of the human mind, but that on the contrary they originate in the material conditions of life, the totality of which Hegel, following the example of English and French thinkers of the eighteenth century, embraces within the term “civil society”; that the anatomy of this civil society, however, has to be sought in political economy. The study of this, which I began in Paris, I continued in Brussels, where I moved owing to an expulsion order issued by M. Guizot. The general conclusion at which I arrived and which, once reached, became the guiding principle of my studies can be summarised as follows.

"In the social production of their existence, men inevitably enter into definite relations, which are independent of their will, namely relations of production appropriate to a given stage in the development of their material forces of production. The totality of these relations of production constitutes the economic structure of society, the real foundation, on which arises a legal and political superstructure and to which correspond definite forms of social consciousness. The mode of production of material life conditions the general process of social, political and intellectual life. It is not the consciousness of men that determines their existence, but their social existence that determines their consciousness. At a certain stage of development, the material productive forces of society come into conflict with the existing relations of production or – this merely expresses the same thing in legal terms – with the property relations within the framework of which they have operated hitherto. From forms of development of the productive forces these relations turn into their fetters. Then begins an era of social revolution. The changes in the economic foundation lead sooner or later to the transformation of the whole immense superstructure.

"In studying such transformations it is always necessary to distinguish between the material transformation of the economic conditions of production, which can be determined with the precision of natural science, and the legal, political, religious, artistic or philosophic – in short, ideological forms in which men become conscious of this conflict and fight it out. Just as one does not judge an individual by what he thinks about himself, so one cannot judge such a period of transformation by its consciousness, but, on the contrary, this consciousness must be explained from the contradictions of material life, from the conflict existing between the social forces of production and the relations of production. No social order is ever destroyed before all the productive forces for which it is sufficient have been developed, and new superior relations of production never replace older ones before the material conditions for their existence have matured within the framework of the old society."
That is, he wasn't saying that what the writer wrote was actually his method. In the sentence you just quoted, he says that it is 'what the writer takes to be actually his method'. However, that this is a dialectic method contradicts the writer's assertion that Marx was realistic in his mode of inquiry, but 'German-dialectical' (thus Marx's later clarification that his 'dialectic' was the opposite of Hegel's) in his mode of presentation, since his own presentation of Marx's method was dialectical. Marx, rather than saying that it was his own method, calls the description "striking" and "[as far as concerns my own application of it] generous", which don't really imply that it was his either. In fact, they could be implying that it stretches his 'guiding thread' into a historico-philosophical theory.

Edit: Perhaps a discussion on Marx's views on history and such would fit better elsewhere, since here they seem fairly off-topic? I mean, a further discussion of this would probably have to go into Marx's other texts, seeing as Marx was fairly ambiguous about whether what was described was his method in this text. And really, I'm not sure a discussion of that kind of thing could work in a thread about why people dislike dialectics.

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

Well, the passage of Marx's you quote came from an earlier period when he was clearly influenced by Hegel. The point is that he waved this 'gooodbye' when he came to write Das Kapital.

But what about this?


That is, he wasn't saying that what the writer wrote was actually his method. In the sentence you just quoted, he says that it is 'what the writer takes to be actually his method'. However, that this is a dialectic method contradicts the writer's assertion that Marx was realistic in his mode of inquiry, but 'German-dialectical' (thus Marx's later clarification that his 'dialectic' was the opposite of Hegel's) in his mode of presentation, since his own presentation of Marx's method was dialectical. Marx, rather than saying that it was his own method, calls the description "striking" and "[as far as concerns my own application of it] generous", which don't really imply that it was his either. In fact, they could be implying that it stretches his 'guiding thread' into a historico-philosophical theory.

In fact, he said that what the writer took to be 'his method' is indeed the 'dialectic method'. In fact, this would have been an ideal moment to say, 'But this is not my method'. What does he do instead? He calls this the 'dialectic method' -- not 'This is not my method'.

Now, unless you think Marx was using some ofter method, the conclusion is inescapable, that this is indeed a summary of 'his method'.

But this method is much more like that of Aristotle, Kant, and the Scottish Historical Materialists (all of whom we know Marx studied -- and two of which he praised highly, namely Aristotle and the Scottish School).

[ZeroNowhere]

Well, the passage of Marx's you quote came from an earlier period when he was clearly influenced by Hegel. The point is that he waved this 'gooodbye' when he came to write Das Kapital.It's actually the passage Marx was probably referring to as the one discussing the the materialistic basis of his method. Nevertheless, the passage was certainly from the same text.

Anyways, I can't really see much point in debating how one interprets that sentence. After all, if how one reads the passage depends on whether they think Marx adhered to that method or not, I would say debating how to interpret it would be fairly pointless, so I suppose I'll settle for showing that an alternate interpretation of that section is possible, and equally viable. After all, one could conversely say that he should have said it was his method rather than 'what the writer takes to actually be his method'. One could also read the part on the writer's 'generosity' as meaning that he gives Marx's method as he sees it far more power than Marx's own application of his method. And the comment on it picturing the 'dialectic method' could just as well be read as a quip at the writer's expense. That is, his own attempt to illustrate Marx's 'form of inquiry', which he described as severely realistic in contrast to Marx's 'form of presentation' (which would make him seem the most 'German' philosopher), in fact illustrates a dialectical method. This also means that what the reviewer is advocating as realistic is, in fact, dialectical, which he condemns Marx's mode of presentation for being (ie. you have become what you wanted to destroy). Of course, just being dialectical doesn't make something Marx's dialectic. He then goes on to clarify that his method is not, in fact, 'German-dialectic', let alone idealist, as it is the opposite of Hegel's, and summarize how he has viewed Hegel, defending him as well as saying that he got things upside down. Also, when we're on that subject, why is it that some Hegelian Marxists like to go around using this metaphor to somehow claim that Marx thought Hegel's dialectic applicable only to capitalism due to it being 'upside down'? Oh, right, because they're making shit up. Anyhow. It would seem he says that the fact that, "The mystification which dialectic suffers in Hegel’s hands, by no means prevents him from being the first to present its general form of working in a comprehensive and conscious manner," is the reason for him avowing himself pupil of this 'mighty thinker', and doing the coquetting, due to the fact that Hegel was now being attacked and presented as useless (well, alternatively, he could have just been going soft. Still, that's the reason he presented). He hardly implies in any way that all he does is borrow jargon from him, on the contrary he implies that the reason for the coquetting was because of Hegel's 'rational kernel' (again, I will not discuss what this may have been yet. Though I will say: that was rather Althusserian of you), and the coquetting was done, along with the avowing himself as pupil jazz, in order to repudiate the 'Epigonoi' who presented him as useless. As such, it would seem he was using (flirting with) Hegel's terms in order to repudiate the Epigonoi, rather than disagreeing with the Epigonoi because he liked some of Hegel's terms. Of course, one could also make more trivial objections, such as why Marx would refer to it as a 'striking' way of presenting his ideas if it were completely accurate, but never mind. So yeah, I would read that end section as part of the response to that writer, in which case there's no reason to suppose that quoting the writer was meant to show what his own method is rather than just lead off with a bang (for lack of a better phrase).

Also, that's a very fancy way of saying that if you think that what was summarized was Marx's method, it was a summary of Marx's method. ;)

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

This is indeed how traditionalists interpret this passage, but it neglects Marx's later comment, that all he could bring himself to do with Hegel's method was 'coquette' with a few of his jargonised expressions, here and there in Das Kapital.


Anyhow. It would seem he says that the fact that, "The mystification which dialectic suffers in Hegel’s hands, by no means prevents him from being the first to present its general form of working in a comprehensive and conscious manner," is the reason for him avowing himself pupil of this 'mighty thinker',

Well, I have covered these points many times. First, Marx puts his praise of Hegel in the past tense, so it is not true that he is "avowing himself pupil of this 'mighty thinker'".

What he said was this:


...I therefore openly avowed myself the pupil of that mighty thinker" and even, here and there, in the chapter on the theory of value, coquetted with the mode of expression peculiar to him." [Marx (1976), p.103. Bold emphasis added.]

He passed no opinion about his current view of Hegel, except, if he still thought highly of him, he'd hardly merely 'coquette' with Hegelian terms in Das Kapital.

But, even if Marx still thought highly of Hegel, and considered him a 'mighty thinker', that does not mean he agreed with him, or used his method. For example, I think Plato is a 'mighty thinker', but I disagree with practically everything he said, and I do not use his method.

In fact, as I noted above, the very best Marx could bring himself to do with respect to this 'mighty thinker' was 'coquette' with a few of his jargonised expressions.

This is hardly a ringing endorsement.

What about this, then?


The mystification which dialectic suffers in Hegel’s hands, by no means prevents him from being the first to present its general form of working in a comprehensive and conscious manner,

Indeed, Marx is right, this isn't what prevents Hegel being the first to do this; this is:


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), The German Ideology, p.118. Bold emphases added.]

Which explains why Marx found he could only 'coquette' with the obscure jargon Hegel inflicted on humanity, and tried to substitute everyday language for it where he could.


Also, that's a very fancy way of saying that if you think that what was summarized was Marx's method, it was a summary of Marx's method.

Well, it is the most mature summary of 'his method', and it appears in his most important published work. Moreover, it is how Marx himself described it.

[ZeroNowhere]

This is indeed how traditionalists interpret this passage, but it neglects Marx's later comment, that all he could bring himself to do with Hegel's method was 'coquette' with a few of his jargonised expressions, here and there in Das Kapital.A comment which he did not make.


He passed no opinion about his current view of Hegel, except, if he still thought highly of him, he'd hardly merely 'coquette' with Hegelian terms in Das Kapital.He was writing about the period during which he was writing Das Kapital ("just as I was working at the first volume of “Das Kapital”"). I thought your argument was that he had made a clean break from Hegel by then? He may well have (again, a subject for another time, perhaps late next month or something I'll make a post on it, anyways), but he didn't seem to think so.


But, even if Marx still thought highly of Hegel, and considered him a 'mighty thinker', that does not mean he agreed with him, or used his method.Sure, I never said that he used Hegel's method.


In fact, as I noted above, the very best Marx could bring himself to do with respect to this 'mighty thinker' was 'coquette' with a few of his jargonised expressions.As well as avowing himself pupil of said mighty thinker, and, as in the text we are referring to, claiming that Hegel was the first to present "its [the dialectic's] general form of working in a comprehensive and conscious manner". I'd say that that wasn't especially minor. Of course, he didn't adopt what he viewed as Hegel's 'rational kernel' because of the Epigonoi (his reaction to the Epigonoi is what is being discussed there), he instead implies that it was the reason why he defended Hegel from the Epigonoi (who saw him as a 'dead dog'). So it wouldn't make much sense to say that if he didn't mention it in that sentence, he wasn't influenced by Hegel on it, since if he didn't think Hegel had anything to offer already, why would he have bothered defending him?


Indeed, Marx is right, this isn't what prevents Hegel being the first to do thisI'm assuming that you mean this as your opinion, rather than Marx's, since Marx quite clearly did not mean it that way.


"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."And, for that matter, how is this independent of 'mystification' of the dialectic?


Well, it is the most mature summary of 'his method', and it appears in his most important published work. Moreover, it is how Marx himself described it.Marx did not describe that extract as 'his method', he described it as what the writer takes to actually be his method, as well as being dialectical (rather than 'realistic' as opposed to 'dialectic').


Which explains why Marx found he could only 'coquette' with the obscure jargon Hegel inflicted on humanity, and tried to substitute everyday language for it where he could.No, what explains why Marx coquetted with Hegel's language (and he doesn't give much reason to believe that he couldn't have just used non-Hegelian language instead, rather he makes it clear that he was doing the coquetting quite purposefully rather than just because he couldn't substitute in everyday language, though how that could be described as 'coquetting', I do not know), is that, "[J]ust as I was working at the first volume of “Das Kapital,” it was the good pleasure of the peevish, arrogant, mediocre Epigonoi who now talk large in cultured Germany, to treat Hegel in same way as the brave Moses Mendelssohn in Lessing’s time treated Spinoza, i.e., as a “dead dog.”" "[T]herefore [...] here and there, in the chapter on the theory of value, [Marx] coquetted with the modes of expression peculiar to him [Hegel]." This is because, "The mystification which dialectic suffers in Hegel’s hands, by no means prevents him from being the first to present its general form of working in a comprehensive and conscious manner. With him it is standing on its head. It must be turned right side up again, if you would discover the rational kernel within the mystical shell." Of course, this all comes up in the discussion of the reviewer who says that, "At first sight, if the judgment is based on the external form of the presentation of the subject, Marx is the most ideal of ideal philosophers, always in the German, i.e., the bad sense of the word," and also calls his mode of presentation, in Marx's words, "unfortunately, German-dialectical." So it would seem that in response, after showing that even the reviewer's presentation of his 'severely realistic' method of inquiry was dialectical, he then goes on to discuss why he isn't 'German-dialectical' and idealist (his method is the opposite of Hegel's), but then goes on to defend Hegel's dialectic (which was obviously being attacked by implication) on the basis that, though it 'mystifies' dialectics, it also presents the rational kernel which allowed Marx to develop dialectics 'in its rational form', which is "a scandal and abomination to bourgeoisdom".

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

ZeroNoWhere:


A comment which he did not make.

In fact he said:


and even, here and there, in the chapter on the theory of value, coquetted with the mode of expression peculiar to him.

I think my paraphrase is accurate; what else is Hegelian jargon but a "mode of expression peculiar to him"?


He was writing about the period during which he was writing Das Kapital ("just as I was working at the first volume of “Das Kapital”"). I thought your argument was that he had made a clean break from Hegel by then? He may well have (again, a subject for another time, perhaps late next month or something I'll make a post on it, anyways), but he didn't seem to think so.

Indeed, and he was working on it for many years, the Grundrisse being the first attempt in that direction eight or ten years earlier.

So, Marx's use of the past tense is significant, for in the Grundrisse, Hegel is much more up-front.

But, whatever else happened to Marx's opinion between then and the publication of Das Kapital, the very best Marx could do is 'coquette' with a few 'expressions peculiar' to Hegel. And according to Marx, he did not even have a copy of Hegel's 'logic' and had to borrow one from Freiligrath -- so he was no big fan of Hegel.

No wonder then that he put this praise of Hegel in the past tense.

So, I think Marx was gradually drifting away from Hegel all his life, but he was still trapped in the idiom of his age when he wrote Das Kapital (so I am not an Althusserian on this).

It is no longer necessary to remain trapped in that idiom. We have the logical and linguistic techniques now to recast Das Kapital in a modern form.


Sure, I never said that he used Hegel's method.

And, according to Marx (not me) 'his method' owed absolutely nothing to Hegel.


As well as avowing himself pupil of said mighty thinker, and, as in the text we are referring to, claiming that Hegel was the first to present "its [the dialectic's] general form of working in a comprehensive and conscious manner". I'd say that that wasn't especially minor. Of course, he didn't adopt what he viewed as Hegel's 'rational kernel' because of the Epigonoi (his reaction to the Epigonoi is what is being discussed there), he instead implies that it was the reason why he defended Hegel from the Epigonoi (who saw him as a 'dead dog'). So it wouldn't make much sense to say that if he didn't mention it in that sentence, he wasn't influenced by Hegel on it, since if he didn't think Hegel had anything to offer already, why would he have bothered defending him?

As I pointed out, Marx's reference to the 'rational' core of Hegel's method is not as clear cut as tradition would have us believe. His words in fact are rather odd:


The mystification which dialectic suffers in Hegel’s hands, by no means prevents him from being the first to present its general form of working in a comprehensive and conscious manner,

If has been mystified, then surely that would prevent Hegel from being the first to "present its general form of working in a comprehensive and conscious manner".

But then Marx says that this does not prevent him from being the first to do this. So, what does prevent him (in view of the fact that it is not possible to comprehend mystified theories)?

As I noted, it's Hegel's use of distorted language that prevents him from being the first to "present its general form of working in a comprehensive and conscious manner".

Indeed, since Marx was the first to do this, no wonder then that he added a summary of 'his method' in which there is no trace of Hegel and his distorted language, and then found that the very best he could do was to 'coquette' with a few expressions 'peculiar to him'.


Of course, he didn't adopt what he viewed as Hegel's 'rational kernel' because of the Epigonoi (his reaction to the Epigonoi is what is being discussed there), he instead implies that it was the reason why he defended Hegel from the Epigonoi (who saw him as a 'dead dog'). So it wouldn't make much sense to say that if he didn't mention it in that sentence, he wasn't influenced by Hegel on it, since if he didn't think Hegel had anything to offer already, why would he have bothered defending him?

Sure he defended Hegel back then, but that was in the past. Later, the most he could do was add a summary of 'his method' from which every trace of Hegel has been removed, and then merely 'coquette' with a few expressions 'peculiar to him'.

So, he is no longer defending Hegel; he is 'coquetting' with him.


As well as avowing himself pupil of said mighty thinker,

You keep putting this in the present tense. Why? Marx put it in the past tense.


I'm assuming that you mean this as your opinion, rather than Marx's, since Marx quite clearly did not mean it that way.

I've already covered this above. Sure it's an interpretation of Marx (but so is the traditional view you are defending), and yet it fits in with the other things I say. So, it's not my view, it's my interpretation of Marx, and it's one that doesn't make Marx look like an idiot (who thought that a mystified method makes some sort of sense!).


And, for that matter, how is this independent of 'mystification' of the dialectic?

Well, the mystification Hegel inflicts on his system is connected with the theological language he uses, but the distorted ordinary language he employs is the main problem, as Marx noted in the Holy Family:


"The mystery of critical presentation…is the mystery of speculative, of Hegelian construction….

"If from real apples, pears, strawberries and almonds I form the general idea 'Fruit', if I go further and imagine that my abstract idea 'Fruit', derived from real fruit, is an entity existing outside me, is indeed the true essence of the pear, the apple, etc., then -- in the language of speculative philosophy -- I am declaring that 'Fruit' is the 'Substance' of the pear, the apple, the almond, etc. I am saying, therefore, that to be an apple is not essential to the apple; that what is essential to these things is not their real existence, perceptible to the senses, but the essence that I have abstracted from them and then foisted on them, the essence of my idea -- 'Fruit'…. Particular real fruits are no more than semblances whose true essence is 'the substance' -- 'Fruit'….

"Having reduced the different real fruits to the one 'fruit' of abstraction -- 'the Fruit', speculation must, in order to attain some semblance of real content, try somehow to find its way back from 'the Fruit', from the Substance to the diverse, ordinary real fruits, the pear, the apple, the almond etc. It is as hard to produce real fruits from the abstract idea 'the Fruit' as it is easy to produce this abstract idea from real fruits. Indeed, it is impossible to arrive at the opposite of an abstraction without relinquishing the abstraction….

"The main interest for the speculative philosopher is therefore to produce the existence of the real ordinary fruits and to say in some mysterious way that there are apples, pears, almonds and raisins. But the apples, pears, almonds and raisins that we rediscover in the speculative world are nothing but semblances of apples, semblances of pears, semblances of almonds and semblances of raisins, for they are moments in the life of 'the Fruit', this abstract creation of the mind, and therefore themselves abstract creations of the mind…. When you return from the abstraction, the supernatural creation of the mind, 'the Fruit', to real natural fruits, you give on the contrary the natural fruits a supernatural significance and transform them into sheer abstractions. Your main interest is then to point out the unity of 'the Fruit' in all the manifestations of its life…that is, to show the mystical interconnection between these fruits, how in each of them 'the Fruit' realizes itself by degrees and necessarily progresses, for instance, from its existence as a raisin to its existence as an almond. Hence the value of the ordinary fruits no longer consists in their natural qualities, but in their speculative quality, which gives each of them a definite place in the life-process of 'the Absolute Fruit'.

"The ordinary man does not think he is saying anything extraordinary when he states that there are apples and pears. But when the philosopher expresses their existence in the speculative way he says something extraordinary. He performs a miracle by producing the real natural objects, the apple, the pear, etc., out of the unreal creation of the mind 'the Fruit'….

"It goes without saying that the speculative philosopher accomplishes this continuous creation only by presenting universally known qualities of the apple, the pear, etc., which exist in reality, as determining features invented by him, by giving the names of the real things to what abstract reason alone can create, to abstract formulas of reason, finally, by declaring his own activity, by which he passes from the idea of an apple to the idea of a pear, to be the self-activity of the Absolute Subject, 'the Fruit'.

"In the speculative way of speaking, this operation is called comprehending Substance as Subject, as an inner process, as an Absolute Person, and this comprehension constitutes the essential character of Hegel's method." [Marx and Engels (1975), The Holy Family, pp.72-75. Bold added.]

So, Marx connects Hegel's mystification to his odd use of theological language, but the core of the problem is that he uses ordinary words in distorted ways, unlike the 'ordinary man'. These are two separate but connected issues.


Marx did not describe that extract as 'his method', he described it as what the writer takes to actually be his method, as well as being dialectical (rather than 'realistic' as opposed to 'dialectic').

We have been over this already: Marx did not try to correct this reviewer and say something like "He thinks this is my method, but it isn't", he concluded it was indeed the 'dialectic method'. So, once more, unless you think Marx was using some other 'method', the conclusion is inescapable: this was indeed a summary of 'his method'.

Or do you think Marx was using a different method -- i.e., not the 'dialectic method'?


No, what explains why Marx coquetted with Hegel's language (and he doesn't give much reason to believe that he couldn't have just used non-Hegelian language instead, rather he makes it clear that he was doing the coquetting quite purposefully rather than just because he couldn't substitute in everyday language, though how that could be described as 'coquetting', I do not know), is that,"[J]ust as I was working at the first volume of “Das Kapital,” it was the good pleasure of the peevish, arrogant, mediocre Epigonoi who now talk large in cultured Germany, to treat Hegel in same way as the brave Moses Mendelssohn in Lessing’s time treated Spinoza, i.e., as a “dead dog.”" "[T]herefore [...] here and there, in the chapter on the theory of value, [Marx] coquetted with the modes of expression peculiar to him [Hegel]."

Well, your case depends solely on substituting the present tense here, when Marx pointedly used the past tense, and you keep doing it even when this has been pointed out to you!

But why 'coquette' with Hegelian terminology if he wanted to respond to these critics? Surely that would add fuel to the fire?

But, when we take note of Marx's deliberate use of the past tense (and I do not have to substitute this verb form to make my case, unlike you), his use of 'coquette' becomes clear, as does his use of a summary of what someone else took to be his method, in which there is not one atom of Hegel.

If he was still trying to defend Hegel, this is an odd way to go about it.


So it would seem that in response, after showing that even the reviewer's presentation of his 'severely realistic' method of inquiry was dialectical, he then goes on to discuss why he isn't 'German-dialectical' and idealist (his method is the opposite of Hegel's), but then goes on to defend Hegel's dialectic (which was obviously being attacked by implication) on the basis that, though it 'mystifies' dialectics, it also presents the rational kernel which allowed Marx to develop dialectics 'in its rational form', which is "a scandal and abomination to bourgeoisdom"

Well you omitted the full passage here; here it is:


In its mystified form, dialectic became the fashion in Germany, because it seemed to transfigure and to glorify the existing state of things. In its rational form it is a scandal and abomination to bourgeoisdom and its doctrinaire professors, because it includes in its comprehension and affirmative recognition of the existing state of things, at the same time also, the recognition of the negation of that state, of its inevitable breaking up; because it regards every historically developed social form as in fluid movement, and therefore takes into account its transient nature not less than its momentary existence; because it lets nothing impose upon it, and is in its essence critical and revolutionary.

Note what Marx says:


because it includes in its comprehension and affirmative recognition of the existing state of things, at the same time also, the recognition of the negation of that state, of its inevitable breaking up; because it regards every historically developed social form as in fluid movement, and therefore takes into account its transient nature not less than its momentary existence; because it lets nothing impose upon it, and is in its essence critical and revolutionary

Bold added.

Unless we think Marx thought that the dialectic was a person (the highlighted terms, if interpreted literally, suggest Marx did think the dialectic was a human being!), then this passage is largely figurative.

Now, we have seen that in its rational form (i.e., with Hegelian gobbledygook completely extirpated) it more closely resembles Aristotle and/or Kant's method, the traditional interpretation of which Marx now challenges in order to show that their method was revolutionary because it was not hampered by the mystical rubbish Hegel dragged in.

Finally, what about this?


My dialectic method is not only different from the Hegelian, but is its direct opposite. To Hegel, the life-process of the human brain, i.e., the process of thinking, which, under the name of “the Idea,” he even transforms into an independent subject, is the demiurgos of the real world, and the real world is only the external, phenomenal form of “the Idea.” With me, on the contrary, the ideal is nothing else than the material world reflected by the human mind, and translated into forms of thought.

Of course, one cannot get more 'opposite' than to reject Hegel in his entirety.

And it seems that his only contact with Hegel's method is to translate it into a psychological/logical form -- but this just means that Marx is once more closer to Aristotle and Kant, for whom dialectic was a rational form of argument, not a theory about reality.

So, contrary to what supporters of the Marx/Hegel tradition constantly tell us, this passage offers them no support at all; quite the contrary, it shows how far Marx had drifted from his youthful dalliance with this mystical idiot.

And no wonder, the dialectic cannot explain change, social or natural.

[DeLeonist]

Hi Rosa,

Given your interpretation above, I was wondering whether you had any thoughts on the following (from a message by Andrew Kliman here: http://archives.econ.utah.edu/archives/ope-l/2000m04/msg00029.htm):

This is what Marx wrote about his relationship to Hegel, in a footnote
in _Capital_, Vol. II:

"In a review of the first volume of _Capital_, Mr. Duehring notes that,
in my zealous devotion to the schema of Hegelian logic, I even discovered
the Hegelian forms of the syllogism in the process of circulation. My
relationship with Hegel is very simple. I am a disciple of Hegel, and
the presumptuous chattering of the epigones who think they have buried
this great thinker appear frankly ridiculous to me. Nevertheless, I have
taken the liberty of adopting towards my master a critical attitude,
disencumbering his dialectic of its mysticism and thus putting it through
a profound change, etc."


Engels left this out of the version of Vol. II he edited. It appears in
Rubel's French edition. I have quoted from the English translation, in
Raya Dunayevskaya's _Rosa Luxemburg, Women's Liberation, and Marx's
Philosophy of Revolution_, p. 149. I do not know the exact date this
passage was written, but Dunayevskaya (ibid.) notes that "Marx wrote this
after volume 1 had already been published."

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

DeLeonist, quoting someone else:


"In a review of the first volume of _Capital_, Mr. Duehring notes that,
in my zealous devotion to the schema of Hegelian logic, I even discovered
the Hegelian forms of the syllogism in the process of circulation. My
relationship with Hegel is very simple. I am a disciple of Hegel, and
the presumptuous chattering of the epigones who think they have buried
this great thinker appear frankly ridiculous to me. Nevertheless, I have
taken the liberty of adopting towards my master a critical attitude,
disencumbering his dialectic of its mysticism and thus putting it through
a profound change, etc."

Engels left this out of the version of Vol. II he edited. It appears in
Rubel's French edition. I have quoted from the English translation, in
Raya Dunayevskaya's _Rosa Luxemburg, Women's Liberation, and Marx's
Philosophy of Revolution_, p. 149. I do not know the exact date this
passage was written, but Dunayevskaya (ibid.) notes that "Marx wrote this
after volume 1 had already been published."

Well, in view of the fact that not even Engels could bring himself to add this to Volume Two, I think we can draw the relevant conclusions about its provenance.

[DeLeonist]

Engels edited Marx's later volumes extensively, so I don't think the fact that he left that footnote out is of great significance.

As far as I can see, Rubel's editions were based on manuscripts of Capital held in the International Institute of Social History in Amsterdam (see here (http://books.google.com.au/books?id=XN49AAAAIAAJ&pg=PA125&lpg=PA125&dq=%22rubel%22+engels+%22institute+of+social+histo ry%22&source=bl&ots=h0E1XRrnL4&sig=hZ-GuwvYRME4epog_gtRxnLbVcw&hl=en&ei=plWYSpuJMpqWkQXLx72rAg&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=1#v=onepage&q=%22rubel%22%20engels%20%22institute%20of%20socia l%20history%22&f=false) for example).

So on the face of it, I see no reason to doubt that it was the mature Marx who wrote "I am a disciple of Hegel".

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

DeLeonist:


Engels edited Marx's later volumes extensively, so I don't think the fact that he left that footnote out is of great significance.

The point is that Marx did not publish Volume Two, and Engels saw fit not to include this passage, so it's authority cannot supercede the comments Marx himself published in Volume One -- noted above.


As far as I can see, Rubel's editions were based on manuscripts of Capital held in the International Institute of Social History in Amsterdam (see here for example).

So on the face of it, I see no reason to doubt that it was the mature Marx who wrote "I am a disciple of Hegel".

And yet, Marx did not publish this comment, and not even Engels did, so we cannot regard it as authoritative.

What Marx did publish indicates that he was far from being a 'disciple' of this incompetent bumbler.

[DeLeonist]

And yet, Marx did not publish this comment, and not even Engels did, so we cannot regard it as authoritative.



Still, it was written in a manuscript intended for publication, and I think it lends weight to alternative interpretations of what Marx did publish on the matter (such as that of ZeroNowhere above).

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

DeLeonist:


Still, it was written in a manuscript intended for publication, and I think it lends weight to alternative interpretations of what Marx did publish on the matter (such as that of ZeroNowhere above).

As I said, not even Engels wanted to publish it. Moreover, we have no idea when it was written -- that is, whether it was written before Marx changed his mind in the Postface to the second edition of Das Kapital -- which he himself published -- or after.

Unless, you, or someone else can find something published by Marx himself which indicates he did not abandon Hegel in his entirety, and which was published after the Postface, then that is the safest conclusion to draw from the available evidence.

[DeLeonist]

As I said, not even Engels wanted to publish it.

There may have been any number of reasons why Engels edited out the footnote - none of which are relevant to the fact that Marx wrote it.



Moreover, we have no idea when it was written -- that is, whether it was written before Marx changed his mind in the Postface to the second edition of Das Kapital -- which he himself published -- or after.


What is significant from the standpoint of Marx’s method and his attitude to Hegel is that we know the footnote was written after his major finished work (Vol 1 of Capital) was published in 1867. If he did change his mind, it was after Volume 1 was completed.


Unless, you, or someone else can find something published by Marx himself which indicates he did not abandon Hegel in his entirety, and which was published after the Postface, then that is the safest conclusion to draw from the available evidence.

I would say the safer conclusion is that the Postface of 1873 should be in interpreted in a manner consistent with the unpublished footnote - I.e. rather than abandoning Hegel in his entirety, Marx adopted a critical attitude towards his ‘master’, “disencumbering his dialectic of its mysticism and thus putting it through a profound change, etc”.

[ZeroNowhere]

There may have been any number of reasons why Engels edited out the footnote - none of which are relevant to the fact that Marx wrote it.Let's say that Engels omitted it because it was basically a rehashing of the postface. This is perfectly plausible, and the fact that it is merely speculation is unimportant here. Now, this would in no way indicate that he regarded it as unimportant, let alone as an opinion which Marx didn't actually hold. It certainly doesn't indicate what Marx thought of it. So the fact that Engels didn't publish it doesn't really tell us a whole lot.

As to the fact that Marx didn't publish it, are we to reject the whole of the second and third volumes of 'Capital' (as well as 'Theories of Surplus Value') as representing Marx's thought on the matters covered on the basis of them not being published by Marx, as well as the Critique of the Gotha Program because it wasn't made public, the Ethnological Notebooks, On Certainty, etc? In fact, according to my copy of 'Philosophical Investigations' here, it was first published in 1953. Works don't suddenly start representing the author's opinions as soon as they get published, and unpublished works can be valid as 'evidence' of their opinions.

Also, you should really stop quoting that passage by Marx from 'The German Ideology'.

Though if your argument is that the comment could have been made before the postface was written, wouldn't that contradict the position that Marx had abandoned it by the time he wrote 'Capital'?

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

ZeroNoWhere:


Let's say that Engels omitted it because it was basically a rehashing of the postface. This is perfectly plausible, and the fact that it is merely speculation is unimportant here. Now, this would in no way indicate that he regarded it as unimportant, let alone as an opinion which Marx didn't actually hold. It certainly doesn't indicate what Marx thought of it. So the fact that Engels didn't publish it doesn't really tell us a whole lot.

That is one possibility, but there is no evidence to support it, and it would have been an excellent way for Engels to have pinned this 'theory' on Marx, for it has him going much further than he did in the Postface. Moreover, Engels did not edit out other comments that seem to picture Marx as a supporter of the traditional view of dialectics.

Even so, no secure conclusion can be built on this speculation of yours since the hard evidence we have, published by Marx himself, tells us he had already drifted far from Hegel; and, if we are to believe that review he added, had adopted a version of the 'dialectic method' from which every trace of Hegel had been removed.

And, as I pointed out earlier, if he was still a 'disciple' of Hegel, then why treat his theory with such contempt by merely 'coquetting' with Hegelian jargon in his most important work, Das Kapital? Why promise to provide a summary of Hegel's method (in a few printers' sheets), and then never do so. After all, he wasted a whole year on that eminently forgettable book, Herr Vogt, but could not bring himself to summarise this supposedly historically important method. I think that tells us enough.

And, Marx also admits he did not even possess a copy of Hegel's 'logic' (he had to borrow one from Freiligrath); so if anything, and at best, Marx was not a very keen 'disciple' of that incompetent mystic.


As to the fact that Marx didn't publish it, are we to reject the whole of the second and third volumes of 'Capital' (as well as 'Theories of Surplus Value') as representing Marx's thought on the matters covered on the basis of them not being published by Marx, as well as the Critique of the Gotha Program because it wasn't made public, the Ethnological Notebooks, On Certainty, etc? In fact, according to my copy of 'Philosophical Investigations' here, it was first published in 1953. Works don't suddenly start representing the author's opinions as soon as they get published, and unpublished works can be valid as 'evidence' of their opinions

Ah, but you miss the point; I am not arguing that we should ignore Marx's unpublished work, only that comments in unpublished work cannot take precedence over published remarks.

And that takes care, too, of your comment about the German Ideology. If you can find something in any of his later published works that countermands what he said there, I will withdraw what I have said about it, and apologise profusely.


Though if your argument is that the comment could have been made before the postface was written, wouldn't that contradict the position that Marx had abandoned it by the time he wrote 'Capital'?

What I said is that we do not know when this 'extra comment' was written -- so no weight can be put on it, or none that can countermand the things he himself published.

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

DeLeonist:


There may have been any number of reasons why Engels edited out the footnote - none of which are relevant to the fact that Marx wrote it.

Indeed, but as I have just pointed out to ZeroNoWhere, since we do not know when this 'extra comment' was written, and since we do not know why Engels left it out, no weight can be put on it, or none that can countermand the things Marx himself published.


What is significant from the standpoint of Marx’s method and his attitude to Hegel is that we know the footnote was written after his major finished work (Vol 1 of Capital) was published in 1867. If he did change his mind, it was after Volume 1 was completed.

Do we 'know' this? How do you know we 'know' this?


I would say the safer conclusion is that the Postface of 1873 should be in interpreted in a manner consistent with the unpublished footnote - I.e. rather than abandoning Hegel in his entirety, Marx adopted a critical attitude towards his ‘master’, “disencumbering his dialectic of its mysticism and thus putting it through a profound change, etc”.

You are perfectly at liberty to believe what you want; but you are never going to win an argument based on your own opinion.

The published comments we actually have tell us Marx had abandoned Hegel in his entirety. Now, you can scrape together unpublished remarks until the cows evolve, but unless you can come up with published remarks that support your view, that view will always remain unsafe.

And good job too, since this 'theory' would make change (social and natural) impossible.

[DeLeonist]

Quote:
What is significant from the standpoint of Marx’s method and his attitude to Hegel is that we know the footnote was written after his major finished work (Vol 1 of Capital) was published in 1867. If he did change his mind, it was after Volume 1 was completed.


Do we 'know' this? How do you know we 'know' this?



Rosa,

We know this because in the footnote Marx refers to a review of the first volume of Capital by Duehring.

Duehring's review was published in December 1867 (refer here (http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1877/anti-duhring/index.htm)).

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

DeLeonist:


We know this because in the footnote Marx refers to a review of the first volume of Capital by Duehring.

OK, so let's have another look at this unpublished comment:


In a review of the first volume of _Capital_, Mr. Duehring notes that, in my zealous devotion to the schema of Hegelian logic, I even discovered the Hegelian forms of the syllogism in the process of circulation. My relationship with Hegel is very simple. I am a disciple of Hegel, and the presumptuous chattering of the epigones who think they have buried this great thinker appear frankly ridiculous to me. Nevertheless, I have taken the liberty of adopting towards my master a critical attitude, disencumbering his dialectic of its mysticism and thus putting it through a profound change, etc.

The comment about Hegel being a 'great thinker' I have dealt with in earlier posts discussing a similar comment Marx added to the Postface.

So, the only telling point is that Marx calls himself a 'disciple' of Hegel. And indeed he is, just as I am a disciple of Frege; but I have learnt to reject practically everything Frege had to say, agreeing with Wittgenstein's criticisms of him.

So, in view of Marx's published comments about 'his method', added to the Postface, and the above comment that Marx had 'disencumbered' Hegel's dialectic of its mysticism, "thus putting it through a profound change", this means that there is no trace of Hegel at all in Marx's method. One cannot put Hegel's method through a more "profound change" than that.

Hence, the alleged 'rational kernel' is simply that which can be found in Aristotle and Kant (and a few others).

You will also note that Marx says this:


Mr. Duehring notes that, in my zealous devotion to the schema of Hegelian logic, I even discovered the Hegelian forms of the syllogism in the process of circulation.

This is Dühring's opinion; Marx nowhere endorses it.

Indeed, in his published comments added to the Postface, after the above was written, he ends all speculation, indicating clearly that 'his method' contains not one atom of Hegel. Moreover, he limits the influence of Hegel on Das Kapital to his own 'coquetting' with Hegelian jargon, and then only in a few places in that book. No mention then of this Hegelian 'syllogism', and yet this would have been an ideal place to mention this wider and deeper Hegelian influence, had there been any.

So, this passage offers no support at all to the traditional view of Das Kapital.

[DeLeonist]

Allright, so now rather than saying that Marx "was far from being a 'disciple' of this incompetent bumbler", your saying that he was indeed a disciple of Hegel.

A disciple is more than just a learned student, so if you reject most of what Frege says, I wouldn't call you a disciple of him. According to the free on-line dictionary, a disciple is:

a. One who embracesand assists in spreading the teachings of another.
b. An active adherent, as of a movement or philosophy.

While Marx may not have been meaning to say he was as much a fan of Hegel as this definition states, the postface and the footnote read together indicate to me that the mature Marx was more positively influenced by Hegel than you suggest.

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

DeLeonist:


Alright, so now rather than saying that Marx "was far from being a 'disciple' of this incompetent bumbler", your saying that he was indeed a disciple of Hegel.

Well, we can judge how much of a 'disciple' of Hegel Marx was by several things:

1) He did not even possess his own copy of Hegel's 'Logic' but had to borrow one from Freiligrath.

2) Several years earlier he said he wanted to summarise the dialectical method in a few printers' sheets, but as things turned out, he could not summon up the will to do so, even though he wasted a whole year on writing Herr Vogt. Clearly Marx's enthusiasm for Hegel was on the wane.

3) In the Postface to Das Kapital, the latest published work we have of his that records his opinions of Hegel, he put his support for him in the past tense and inlcuded a summary of his method that had absolutely no trace of Hegel in it.

4) He then went on to tell us he merely 'coquetted' with a few jargonised phrases Hegel had invented, and only here and there in Das Kapital.

This is not the attitude and behaviour of a born again disciple of Hegel.


A disciple is more than just a learned student, so if you reject most of what Frege says, I wouldn't call you a disciple of him. According to the free on-line dictionary, a disciple is:

a. One who embraces and assists in spreading the teachings of another.
b. An active adherent, as of a movement or philosophy.

I am indeed a disciple of Frege; I never speak anything other than highly of him, and recommend his work as a major advance on anything that had gone before. I merely adhere to Wittgenstein's profound criticisms of him, but that in no way detracts from his towering stature in my eyes. Indeed, I count myself as a neo-Fregean Wittgensteinian.

But, let us suppose you are right; in that case your definition of 'disciple' implies that Marx was a full on Hegelian in that he must have been:


a. One who embraces and assists in spreading the teachings of Hegel.
b. An active adherent of Hegelian philosophy

But, by no stretch of the imagination was this true of Marx.

So, you have a problem. Either you admit, according to this definition (and one we can be sure that Marx in the 1860s or 1870s had not seen) that Marx was a full-blooded Hegelian, or you acknowledge the weakened sense of 'disciple' that I am using -- one that is consistent with points 1) - 4) above.


While Marx may not have been meaning to say he was as much a fan of Hegel as this definition states, the Postface and the footnote read together indicate to me that the mature Marx was more positively influenced by Hegel than you suggest.

In that case, not even you believe that your definition of 'disciple' applies to Marx!

[BakuninFan]

Sartre's defense of Dialectical Materialism and regection of Hegelianism is certainly intriguing...has anyone ever read "Critique of Dialectical Reason"?

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

^^^Yes, and my opinion of it is rather low.

[BakuninFan]

Why is that? I found it rather intriguing...

By the way, I am an existentialist that supports left-libertarianism.

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

Like all other forms of traditional philosophy, it is full of a priori dogmatic theses, and of a rather substandard variety, too.

[DeLeonist]

So, you have a problem. Either you admit, according to this definition (and one we can be sure that Marx in the 1860s or 1870s had not seen) that Marx was a full-blooded Hegelian, or you acknowledge the weakened sense of 'disciple' that I am using -- one that is consistent with points 1) - 4) above.

Quote:

While Marx may not have been meaning to say he was as much a fan of Hegel as this definition states, the Postface and the footnote read together indicate to me that the mature Marx was more positively influenced by Hegel than you suggest.

In that case, not even you believe that your definition of 'disciple' applies to Marx!

No, I'm saying that reasonable usages of the word 'disciple' are not exhausted by what it says in the Free On-line Dictionary.

However, I don't believe such usages are so broad that they encompass someone who has abandoned another's system in its entirety calling themselves a 'disciple' of that person.

If you believe that 'disciple' does have such a broad range of application, why were you previously so adamant that Marx was 'far from being' a disciple of Hegel?

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

DeLeonist:


No, I'm saying that reasonable usages of the word 'disciple' are not exhausted by what it says in the Free On-line Dictionary.

Then it is possible that Marx was a 'disciple' of Hegel in the same sense I am 'disciple' of Frege.


However, I don't believe such usages are so broad that they encompass someone who has abandoned another's system in its entirety calling themselves a 'disciple' of that person.

Fortunately for us, Marx ended all speculation on this score when he included a review of Das Kapital in the Postface, which Marx tells us is the 'dialectic method', and in which there is absolutely no trace of Hegel.

The inescapable conclusion, therefore, is that Marx was a 'disciple' of Hegel in the same way I am a 'disciple' of Frege.

Or, if you do not like that analogy, then Marx is the sort of 'disciple' who was (1) happy to endorse a summary of 'his method' that contained not one atom of Hegel, who (2) at best, on his own admission, merely 'coquetted' with Hegelian jargon in a few places in Das Kapital, who (3) did not even own a copy of Hegel's 'Logic', and who (4) could not be bothered to summarise this 'historic method' even though he found the time and motivation to waste a whole year on Herr Vogt.

In that sense, Marx was even less of a 'disciple' of Hegel than I am of Frege.

Oddly enough, I can live with that.

In fact, that is why I can also endorse this:


Marx was 'far from being' a disciple of Hegel

In other words, Marx's actions speak louder than his words.

[red_che]

In a word: because the theory makes no sense at all.

There are many pages here at RevLeft wherein I and others have demolished this theory (including the 'laws' you mention); you can find them all collated here:

Oh, really? :tt2:


Well, according to the dialectical classics (you can see dozens of quotations to this effect in the links above), things change because of a struggle of opposites, and they also change into those opposites.

In that case, the proletariat should change into the bourgeoisie, and vice versa! Capitalism should change into communism, and communism into capitalism!

This makes no sense, as I said.

Well, you're idea of dialectical materialism is absurd, just as you're "philosophy" is absurd.

Just where exactly (and who said) that "and they also change into those opposites" which makes you conclude that "In that case, the proletariat should change into the bourgeoisie, and vice versa"? Can you show proof of this? You're making false claims and twisting the facts to justify your so-called "demolition job" on dialectical materialism.

As ever, you feel that you can fool people out of your "grandiose" words and "sophisticated" babbling. However, no one can be fooled. If you think that because some people are not arguing against you means they really believe you, you're fooling your self.


Historical materialism (minus the 'dialectics') is all we need.

How can historical materialism become "historical materialism minus the dialectics"? You haven't explained this yet. All you did (before and until now) was to weave in thousands of flowery, sophisticated (which really wasn't) and complicated words (which you think are effective) and form a conclusion which could not even stand alone when questioned. Stripped of the thousands of "essentially complicated words" you're theory is nothing!

You haven't even explained your "formal logic" yet...

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

Red:


Oh, really?

Well, the last time you stuck your head above the parapet here, you were singularly inept at trying to defend this 'theory'.

Here is yet another example of an inept intervention form you:


Well, you're idea of dialectical materialism is absurd, just as you're "philosophy" is absurd.

Just where exactly (and who said) that "and they also change into those opposites" which makes you conclude that "In that case, the proletariat should change into the bourgeoisie, and vice versa"? Can you show proof of this? You're making false claims and twisting the facts to justify your so-called "demolition job" on dialectical materialism.

As ever, you feel that you can fool people out of your "grandiose" words and "sophisticated" babbling. However, no one can be fooled. If you think that because some people are not arguing against you means they really believe you, you're fooling your self.

If you have bothered to read what has been posted here since you last summoned up enough courage to try to take me on, you would have come accross this series of quotations from the dialectical classics:


"If, for instance, the Sophists claimed to be teachers, Socrates by a series of questions forced the Sophist Protagoras to confess that all learning is only recollection. In his more strictly scientific dialogues, Plato employs the dialectical method to show the finitude of all hard and fast terms of understanding. Thus in the Parmenides he deduces the many from the one. In this grand style did Plato treat Dialectic. In modern times it was, more than any other, Kant who resuscitated the name of Dialectic, and restored it to its post of honour. He did it, as we have seen, by working out the Antinomies of the reason. The problem of these Antinomies is no mere subjective piece of work oscillating between one set of grounds and another; it really serves to show that every abstract proposition of understanding, taken precisely as it is given, naturally veers round to its opposite.

"However reluctant Understanding may be to admit the action of Dialectic, we must not suppose that the recognition of its existence is peculiarly confined to the philosopher. It would be truer to say that Dialectic gives expression to a law which is felt in all other grades of consciousness, and in general experience. Everything that surrounds us may be viewed as an instance of Dialectic. We are aware that everything finite, instead of being stable and ultimate, is rather changeable and transient; and this is exactly what we mean by that Dialectic of the finite, by which the finite, as implicitly other than what it is, is forced beyond its own immediate or natural being to turn suddenly into its opposite." [Hegel (1975), pp.117-18.]

"Everything is opposite. Neither in heaven nor in earth, neither in the world of mind nor nature, is there anywhere an abstract 'either-or' as the understanding maintains. Whatever exists is concrete, with difference and opposition in itself. The finitude of things with then lie in the want of correspondence between their immediate being and what they essentially are. Thus, in inorganic nature, the acid is implicitly at the same time the base: in other words its only being consists in its relation to its other. Hence the acid persists quietly in the contrast: it is always in effort to realize what it potentially is. Contradiction is the very moving principle of the world." [Ibid., p.174.]

"The law of the interpenetration of opposites.... Mutual penetration of polar opposites and transformation into each other when carried to extremes...." [Engels (1954), pp.17, 62.]

"Dialectics, so-called objective dialectics, prevails throughout nature, and so-called subjective dialectics, dialectical thought, is only the reflection of the motion through opposites which asserts itself everywhere in nature, and which by the continual conflict of the opposites and their final passage into one another, or into higher forms, determines the life of nature. Attraction and repulsion. Polarity begins with magnetism, it is exhibited in one and the same body; in the case of electricity it distributes itself over two or more bodies which become oppositely charged. All chemical processes reduce themselves -- to processes of chemical attraction and repulsion. Finally, in organic life the formation of the cell nucleus is likewise to be regarded as a polarisation of the living protein material, and from the simple cell -- onwards the theory of evolution demonstrates how each advance up to the most complicated plant on the one side, and up to man on the other, is effected by the continual conflict between heredity and adaptation. In this connection it becomes evident how little applicable to such forms of evolution are categories like 'positive' and 'negative.' One can conceive of heredity as the positive, conservative side, adaptation as the negative side that continually destroys what has been inherited, but one can just as well take adaptation as the creative, active, positive activity, and heredity as the resisting, passive, negative activity." [Ibid., p.211.]

"For a stage in the outlook on nature where all differences become merged in intermediate steps, and all opposites pass into one another through intermediate links, the old metaphysical method of thought no longer suffices. Dialectics, which likewise knows no hard and fast lines, no unconditional, universally valid 'either-or' and which bridges the fixed metaphysical differences, and besides 'either-or' recognises also in the right place 'both this-and that' and reconciles the opposites, is the sole method of thought appropriate in the highest degree to this stage. Of course, for everyday use, for the small change of science, the metaphysical categories retain their validity." [Ibid., pp.212-13.]

"Further, we find upon closer investigation that the two poles of an antithesis positive and negative, e.g., are as inseparable as they are opposed and that despite all their opposition, they mutually interpenetrate. And we find, in like manner, that cause and effect are conceptions which only hold good in their application to individual cases; but as soon as we consider the individual cases in their general connection with the universe as a whole, they run into each other, and they become confounded when we contemplate that universal action and reaction in which causes and effects are eternally changing places, so that what is effect here and now will be cause there and then, and vice versa." [Engels (1976), p.27.]

"Already in Rousseau, therefore, we find not only a line of thought which corresponds exactly to the one developed in Marx's Capital, but also, in details, a whole series of the same dialectical turns of speech as Marx used: processes which in their nature are antagonistic, contain a contradiction; transformation of one extreme into its opposite; and finally, as the kernel of the whole thing, the negation of the negation. [Ibid., p.179.]

"...but the theory of Essence is the main thing: the resolution of the abstract contradictions into their own instability, where one no sooner tries to hold on to one side alone than it is transformed unnoticed into the other, etc." [Engels (1891), p.414.]

"And so every phenomenon, by the action of those same forces which condition its existence, sooner or later, but inevitably, is transformed into its own opposite…." [Plekhanov (1956), p.77.]

"[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), pp.221-22, 357-58.]

"Hegel brilliantly divined the dialectics of things (phenomena, the world, nature) in the dialectics of concepts…. This aphorism should be expressed more popularly, without the word dialectics: approximately as follows: In the alternation, reciprocal dependence of all notions, in the identity of their opposites, in the transitions of one notion into another, in the eternal change, movement of notions, Hegel brilliantly divined precisely this relation of things to nature…. [W]hat constitutes dialectics?…. [M]utual dependence of notions all without exception…. Every notion occurs in a certain relation, in a certain connection with all the others." [Lenin (1961), pp.196-97.]

"'This harmony is precisely absolute Becoming change, -- not becoming other, now this and then another. The essential thing is that each different thing, each particular, is different from another, not abstractly so from any other, but from its other. Each particular only is, insofar as its other is implicitly contained in its Notion...' Quite right and important: the 'other' as its other, development into its opposite." [Ibid., p.260. Lenin is here commenting on Hegel (1995), pp.278-98; this particular quotation coming from p.285.]

"Dialectics is the teaching which shows how Opposites can be and how they happen to be (how they become) identical, -- under what conditions they are identical, becoming transformed into one another, -- why the human mind should grasp these opposites not as dead, rigid, but as living, conditional, mobile, becoming transformed into one another." [Ibid., p.109.]

"Development is the 'struggle' of opposites." [Lenin, Collected Works, Volume XIII, p.301.]

"Why is it that '...the human mind should take these opposites not as dead, rigid, but as living, conditional, mobile, transforming themselves into one another'? Because that is just how things are in objective reality. The fact is that the unity or identity of opposites in objective things is not dead or rigid, but is living, conditional, mobile, temporary and relative; in given conditions, every contradictory aspect transforms itself into its opposite....

"In speaking of the identity of opposites in given conditions, what we are referring to is real and concrete opposites and the real and concrete transformations of opposites into one another....

"All processes have a beginning and an end, all processes transform themselves into their opposites. The constancy of all processes is relative, but the mutability manifested in the transformation of one process into another is absolute." [Mao (1961b), pp.340-42.]

"The law of contradiction in things, that is, the law of the unity of opposites, is the basic law of materialist dialectics....

"As opposed to the metaphysical world outlook, the world outlook of materialist dialectics holds that in order to understand the development of a thing we should study it internally and in its relations with other things; in other words, the development of things should be seen as their internal and necessary self-movement, while each thing in its movement is interrelated with and interacts on the things around it. The fundamental cause of the development of a thing is not external but internal; it lies in the contradictoriness within the thing. There is internal contradiction in every single thing, hence its motion and development....

"The universality or absoluteness of contradiction has a twofold meaning. One is that contradiction exists in the process of development of all things, and the other is that in the process of development of each thing a movement of opposites exists from beginning to end.... [Ibid., pp.311-18.]

"Second, and just as unconditionally valid, that all things are at the same time absolutely different and absolutely or unqualifiedly opposed. The law may also be referred to as the law of the polar unity of opposites. This law applies to every single thing, every phenomenon, and to the world as a whole. Viewing thought and its method alone, it can be put this way: The human mind is capable of infinite condensation of things into unities, even the sharpest contradictions and opposites, and, on the other hand, it is capable of infinite differentiation and analysis of things into opposites. The human mind can establish this unlimited unity and unlimited differentiation because this unlimited unity and differentiation is present in reality." [Thalheimer (1936), p.161.]

"So far we have discussed the most general and most fundamental law of dialectics, namely, the law of the permeation of opposites, or the law of polar unity. We shall now take up the second main proposition of dialectics, the law of the negation of the negation, or the law of development through opposites. This is the most general law of the process of thought. I will first state the law itself and support it with examples, and then I will show on what it is based and how it is related to the first law of the permeation of opposites. There is already a presentiment of this law in the oldest Chinese philosophy, in the of Transformations, as well as in Lao-tse and his disciples -- and likewise in the oldest Greek philosophy, especially in Heraclitus. Not until Hegel, however, was this law developed.

"This law applies to all motion and changes of things, to real things as well as to their images in our minds, i.e., concepts. It states first of all that things and concepts move, change, and develop; all things are processes. All fixity of individual things is only relative, limited; their motion, change, or development is absolute, unlimited. For the world as a whole absolute motion and absolute rest coincide. The proof of this part of the proposition, namely, that all things are in flux, we have already given in our discussion of Heraclitus.

"The law of the negation of the negation has a special sense beyond the mere proposition that all things are processes and change. It also states something about the most general form of these changes, motions, or developments. It states, in the first place, that all motion, development, or change, takes place through opposites or contradictions, or through the negation of a thing.

"Conceptually the actual movement of things appears as a negation. In other words, negation is the most general way in which motion or change of things is represented in the mind. This is the first stage of this process. The negation of a thing from which the change proceeds, however, is in turn subject to the law of the transformation of things into their opposites." [Ibid., pp.170-71.]

"The second dialectical law, that of the 'unity, interpenetration or identity of opposites'…asserts the essentially contradictory character of reality -– at the same time asserts that these 'opposites' which are everywhere to be found do not remain in stark, metaphysical opposition, but also exist in unity. This law was known to the early Greeks. It was classically expressed by Hegel over a hundred years ago….

"[F]rom the standpoint of the developing universe as a whole, what is vital is…motion and change which follows from the conflict of the opposite." [Guest (1963), pp.31, 32.]

"The negative electrical pole…cannot exist without the simultaneous presence of the positive electrical pole…. This 'unity of opposites' is therefore found in the core of all material things and events." [Conze (1944), pp.35-36.]

"This dialectical activity is universal. There is no escaping from its unremitting and relentless embrace. 'Dialectics gives expression to a law which is felt in all grades of consciousness and in general experience. Everything that surrounds us may be viewed as an instance of dialectic. We are aware that everything finite, instead of being inflexible and ultimate, is rather changeable and transient; and this is exactly what we mean by the dialectic of the finite, by which the finite, as implicitly other than it is, is forced to surrender its own immediate or natural being, and to turn suddenly into its opposite.' (Encyclopedia, p.120)." [Novack (1971), 94-95; quoting Hegel (1975), p.118, although in a different translation from the one used here.]

"Contradiction is an essential feature of all being. It lies at the heart of matter itself. It is the source of all motion, change, life and development. The dialectical law which expresses this idea is the law of the unity and interpenetration of opposites….

"In dialectics, sooner or later, things change into their opposite. In the words of the Bible, 'the first shall be last and the last shall be first.' We have seen this many times, not least in the history of great revolutions. Formerly backward and inert layers can catch up with a bang. Consciousness develops in sudden leaps. This can be seen in any strike. And in any strike we can see the elements of a revolution in an undeveloped, embryonic form. In such situations, the presence of a conscious and audacious minority can play a role quite similar to that of a catalyst in a chemical reaction. In certain instances, even a single individual can play an absolutely decisive role....

"This universal phenomenon of the unity of opposites is, in reality the motor-force of all motion and development in nature…. Movement which itself involves a contradiction, is only possible as a result of the conflicting tendencies and inner tensions which lie at the heart of all forms of matter....

"Contradictions are found at all levels of nature, and woe betide the logic that denies it. Not only can an electron be in two or more places at the same time, but it can move simultaneously in different directions. We are sadly left with no alternative but to agree with Hegel: they are and are not. Things change into their opposite. Negatively-charged electrons become transformed into positively-charged positrons. An electron that unites with a proton is not destroyed, as one might expect, but produces a new particle, a neutron, with a neutral charge.

"This is an extension of the law of the unity and interpenetration of opposites. It is a law which permeates the whole of nature, from the smallest phenomena to the largest...." [Woods and Grant (1995), pp.43-47, 63-71.]

"This struggle is not external and accidental…. The struggle is internal and necessary, for it arises and follows from the nature of the process as a whole. The opposite tendencies are not independent the one of the other, but are inseparably connected as parts or aspects of a single whole. And they operate and come into conflict on the basis of the contradiction inherent in the process as a whole….

"Movement and change result from causes inherent in things and processes, from internal contradictions….

"Contradiction is a universal feature of all processes….

"The importance of the [developmental] conception of the negation of the negation does not lie in its supposedly expressing the necessary pattern of all development. All development takes place through the working out of contradictions -– that is a necessary universal law…." [Cornforth (1976), pp.14-15, 46-48, 53, 65-66, 72, 77, 82, 86, 90, 95, 117; quoting Hegel (1975), pp.172 and 160, respectively.]

"Opposites in a thing are not only mutually exclusive, polar, repelling, each other; they also attract and interpenetrate each other. They begin and cease to exist together.... These dual aspects of opposites -- conflict and unity -- are like scissor blades in cutting, jaws in mastication, and two legs in walking. Where there is only one, the process as such is impossible: 'all polar opposites are in general determined by the mutual action of two opposite poles on one another, the separation and opposition of these poles exists only within their unity and interconnection, and, conversely, their interconnection exists only in their separation and their unity only in their opposition.' in fact, 'where one no sooner tries to hold on to one side alone then it is transformed unnoticed into the other....'" [Gollobin (1986), p.115; quoting Engels (1891), p.414.]

"The unity of opposites and contradiction.... The scientific world-view does not seek causes of the motion of the universe beyond its boundaries. It finds them in the universe itself, in its contradictions. The scientific approach to an object of research involves skill in perceiving a dynamic essence, a combination in one and the same object of mutually incompatible elements, which negate each other and yet at the same time belong to each other.

"It is even more important to remember this point when we are talking about connections between phenomena that are in the process of development. In the whole world there is no developing object in which one cannot find opposite sides, elements or tendencies: stability and change, old and new, and so on. The dialectical principle of contradiction reflects a dualistic relationship within the whole: the unity of opposites and their struggle. Opposites may come into conflict only to the extent that they form a whole in which one element is as necessary as another. This necessity for opposing elements is what constitutes the life of the whole. Moreover, the unity of opposites, expressing the stability of an object, is relative and transient, while the struggle of opposites is absolute, ex pressing the infinity of the process of development. This is because contradiction is not only a relationship between opposite tendencies in an object or between opposite objects, but also the relationship of the object to itself, that is to say, its constant self-negation. The fabric of all life is woven out of two kinds of thread, positive and negative, new and old, progressive and reactionary. They are constantly in conflict, fighting each other....

"The opposite sides, elements and tendencies of a whole whose interaction forms a contradiction are not given in some eternally ready-made form. At the initial stage, while existing only as a possibility, contradiction appears as a unity containing an inessential difference. The next stage is an essential difference within this unity. Though possessing a common basis, certain essential properties or tendencies in the object do not correspond to each other. The essential difference produces opposites, which in negating each other grow into a contradiction. The extreme case of contradiction is an acute conflict. Opposites do not stand around in dismal inactivity; they are not something static, like two wrestlers in a photograph. They interact and are more like a live wrestling match. Every development produces contradictions, resolves them and at the same time gives birth to new ones. Life is an eternal overcoming of obstacles. Everything is interwoven in a network of contradictions." [Spirkin (1983), pp.143-46.]

"'The contradiction, however, is the source of all movement and life; only in so far as it contains a contradiction can anything have movement, power, and effect.' (Hegel). 'In brief', states Lenin, 'dialectics can be defined as the doctrine of the unity of opposites. This embodies the essence of dialectics…'

"The world in which we live is a unity of contradictions or a unity of opposites: cold-heat, light-darkness, Capital-Labour, birth-death, riches-poverty, positive-negative, boom-slump, thinking-being, finite-infinite, repulsion-attraction, left-right, above- below, evolution-revolution, chance-necessity, sale-purchase, and so on.

"The fact that two poles of a contradictory antithesis can manage to coexist as a whole is regarded in popular wisdom as a paradox. The paradox is a recognition that two contradictory, or opposite, considerations may both be true. This is a reflection in thought of a unity of opposites in the material world.

"Motion, space and time are nothing else but the mode of existence of matter. Motion, as we have explained is a contradiction, -- being in one place and another at the same time. It is a unity of opposites. 'Movement means to be in this place and not to be in it; this is the continuity of space and time -- and it is this which first makes motion possible.' (Hegel)

"To understand something, its essence, it is necessary to seek out these internal contradictions. Under certain circumstances, the universal is the individual, and the individual is the universal. That things turn into their opposites, -- cause can become effect and effect can become cause -- is because they are merely links in the never-ending chain in the development of matter.

"Lenin explains this self-movement in a note when he says, 'Dialectics is the teaching which shows how opposites can be and how they become identical -- under what conditions they are identical, becoming transformed into one another -- why the human mind should grasp these opposites not as dead, rigid, but living, conditional, mobile, becoming transformed into one another.'" [Rob Sewell, quoted from here.]

Bold emphases added.

References and links can be found at my site, here:

http://anti-dialectics.co.uk/page%2007.htm

More to follow...

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

And, you would have encountered this argument:


As we are about to see, this idea -- that there are such things as "dialectical contradictions" and "unities of opposites" (etc.), which cause change -- presents DM-theorists with some rather nasty dialectical headaches, if interpreted along the lines expressed in the DM-classics (quoted above).

[DM = Dialectical Materialism/ist; NON = Negation of the Negation; FL = Formal Logic.]

To see this, let us suppose that object/process A is comprised of two "internal contradictory opposites" O* and O**, and it thus changes as a result.

[The same problems arise if these are viewed as 'external' contradictions.]

But, O* cannot itself change into O** since O** already exists! If O** didn't already exist then, according to this theory, O* could not change at all, for there would be no opposite to bring that about.

Hence, it is no good propelling O** into the future so that it is now said to be what O* will change into, since O* will do no such thing unless O** is already there, in the present, to make that happen!

So, if object/process A is already composed of a 'dialectical union' of O* and not-O* (interpreting O** now as not-O*), how can O* possibly change into not-O* when not-O* already exists?

Several alternatives now suggest themselves which might allow dialecticians to dig themselves out of this hermetic hole. Either:

(1) O* 'changes' into not-O*, meaning there would now be two not-O*s where once there was one (unless, of course, one of these not-O*s just vanishes into thin air -- see below); or:

(2) O* does not change, or it disappears. Plainly, O* cannot change into what already exists -- that is, O* cannot change into its opposite, not-O* without there being two of them (see above). But even then, one of these will not be not-O* just a copy of it. In that case, O* either disappears, does not change at all, or changes into something else; or:

(3) Not-O* itself disappears to allow a new (but copy) not-O* to emerge that O* can and does change into. If so, questions would naturally arise as to how the original not-O* could possibly cause O* to change if is has just vanished. Of course, this option merely postpones the evil day, for the same difficulties will afflict the new not-O* that afflicted the old. If it exists in order to allow O* to change, then we are back where we were to begin with.

Anyway, as should seem obvious, among other things already mentioned, alternative (2) plainly means that O* does not in fact change into not-O*, it is just replaced by it. Option (1), on the other hand, has the original not-O* remaining the same (when it was supposed to turn into its own opposite -- O* -- according to the DM-classics), and options (2) and (3) will only work if matter and/or energy can either be destroyed or created from nowhere!

Naturally, these problems will simply re-appear at the next stage as not-O* readies itself to change into whatever it changes into. But, in this case there is an added twist, for there is as yet no not-not-O* in existence to make this happen. This means that the dialectical process will grind to a halt, unless a not-not-O* pops into existence to start things up again.

But what could possibly engineer that?

Indeed, at the very least, this 'theory' of change leaves it entirely mysterious how not-O* itself came about in the first place. It seems to have popped into existence from nowhere, too. [Gollobin (above) sort of half recognises this without realising either his error or the serious problems this creates.]

But, not-O* cannot have come from O* itself, since O* can only change because of the operation of not-O*, which does not yet exist! And pushing the process into the past (via a 'reversed' version of the NON) will merely reduplicate the above problems.

[However, on the NON, see below.]

Now, it could be objected that all this seems to place objects and/or processes in fixed categories, which is one of the main criticisms dialecticians make of FL. Hence, on that basis, it could be maintained that the above argument is entirely misguided.

Fortunately, repairs are easy to make: let us now suppose that object/process A is comprised of two changing "internal/external opposites" O* and O**, (the latter once again interpreted as not-O*) and it thus develops as a result.

The rest still follows as before: if object/process A is already composed of a changing dialectical union of O* and not-O*, and O* 'develops' into not-O* as a result, how is it possible for O* to change into not-O* when not-O* already exists?

Of course, it could be argued that not-O* 'develops' into O* while not-O* 'develops' into O*.

[This objection might even incorporate that eminently obscure Hegelian term-of-art: "sublation". More on that presently.]

But, if this were so, while it was happening these two would no longer be 'opposites' of one another --, not unless we widen the term "opposite" to mean "anything that an object/process turns into, and/or any intermediate object/process while that is happening". Naturally, that would make this 'Law' work by definitional fiat, rendering it eminently 'subjective', once more.

But, if we ignore that 'difficulty' for now, and even supposing it were the case that not-O* 'developed' into O* while not-O* 'developed' into O*, and such process were governed by the obscure term "sublation", this alternative will still not work (as we are about to see).

Indeed, developing this option further before it is demolished, it could be argued that Engels had himself anticipated the above objections when he said:


"[RL: Negation of the negation is] a very simple process which is taking place everywhere and every day, which any child can understand as soon as it is stripped of the veil of mystery in which it was enveloped by the old idealist philosophy and in which it is to the advantage of helpless metaphysicians of Herr Dühring's calibre to keep it enveloped. Let us take a grain of barley. Billions of such grains of barley are milled, boiled and brewed and then consumed. But if such a grain of barley meets with conditions which are normal for it, if it falls on suitable soil, then under the influence of heat and moisture it undergoes a specific change, it germinates; the grain as such ceases to exist, it is negated, and in its place appears the plant which has arisen from it, the negation of the grain. But what is the normal life-process of this plant? It grows, flowers, is fertilised and finally once more produces grains of barley, and as soon as these have ripened the stalk dies, is in its turn negated. As a result of this negation of the negation we have once again the original grain of barley, but not as a single unit, but ten-, twenty- or thirtyfold. Species of grain change extremely slowly, and so the barley of today is almost the same as it-was a century ago. But if we take a plastic ornamental plant, for example a dahlia or an orchid, and treat the seed and the plant which grows from it according to the gardener's art, we get as a result of this negation of the negation not only more seeds, but also qualitatively improved seeds, which produce more beautiful flowers, and each repetition of this process, each fresh negation of the negation, enhances this process of perfection. [Engels (1976), pp.172-73.]

"But someone may object: the negation that has taken place in this case is not a real negation: I negate a grain of barley also when I grind it, an insect when I crush it underfoot, or the positive quantity a when I cancel it, and so on. Or I negate the sentence: the rose is a rose, when I say: the rose is not a rose; and what do I get if I then negate this negation and say: but after all the rose is a rose? -- These objections are in fact the chief arguments put forward by the metaphysicians against dialectics, and they are wholly worthy of the narrow-mindedness of this mode of thought. Negation in dialectics does not mean simply saying no, or declaring that something does not exist, or destroying it in any way one likes. Long ago Spinoza said: Omnis determinatio est negatio -- every limitation or determination is at the same time a negation. And further: the kind of negation is here determined, firstly, by the general and, secondly, by the particular nature of the process. I must not only negate, but also sublate the negation. I must therefore so arrange the first negation that the second remains or becomes possible. How? This depends on the particular nature of each individual case. If I grind a grain of barley, or crush an insect, I have carried out the first part of the action, but have made the second part impossible. Every kind of thing therefore has a peculiar way of being negated in such manner that it gives rise to a development, and it is just the same with every kind of conception or idea....

"But it is clear that from a negation of the negation which consists in the childish pastime of alternately writing and cancelling a, or in alternately declaring that a rose is a rose and that it is not a rose, nothing eventuates but the silliness of the person who adopts such a tedious procedure. And yet the metaphysicians try to make us believe that this is the right way to carry out a negation of the negation, if we ever should want to do such a thing. [Ibid., pp.180-81.]

Engels's argument seems to be that "dialectical negation" is not the same as ordinary negation in that it is not simple destruction. Dialectical negation "sublates"; that is, it both destroys and preserves, so that something new or 'higher' emerges as a result. Nevertheless, we have already seen here [in the original article, this 'here' links to another argument at my site, as do several of the other 'here's dotted around this post], that Hegel's use of this word (i.e., "sublate") is highly suspect, and we will also see below [again, this 'below' refers to a later section of the essay from which this was extracted] that this 'Law' (i.e., the NON) is even more dubious still (partly because Hegel confused ordinary negation with 'cancelling out', or with destruction, as did Engels).

Well, despite all this, is it the case that the above comments neutralise the argument presented in this part of this post? Is the argument here guilty of the following:


"These objections are in fact the chief arguments put forward by the metaphysicians against dialectics, and they are wholly worthy of the narrow-mindedness of this mode of thought." [Ibid.]

To answer this, let us once again suppose that object/process A is comprised of two changing "internal opposites" O* and not-O*, and thus develops as a result. On this scenario, O* would change/develop into a "sublated" intermediary, but not into not-O* -- incidentally, contradicting the DM-worthies quoted earlier. O* should, of course, change into not-O*, not into some intermediary.

Putting this minor quibble to one side, too, on this 'revised' view, let us suppose that O* does indeed change into that intermediary. To that end, let us call the latter, "O*(1)" (which can be interpreted as a combination of the old and the new; a 'negation' which also 'preserves'/'sublates').

If so, then O*(1) must remain forever in that state, unchanged, for there is as yet no not-O*(1) in existence to make it develop any further.

[Recall that on this 'theory', everything (and that must include O*(1)) changes because of a 'struggle' with its opposite.]

So, there must be a not-O*(1) to make O*(1) change further. To be sure, we could try to exempt O*(1) from this essential requirement on an ad hoc basis (arguing, perhaps, that O*(1) changes spontaneously with nothing actually causing it), and yet if we do that, there would seem to be no reason to accept the version of events contained in the DM-classics, which tells us that every thing/process changes because of the operation of opposites (and O*(1) is certainly a thing/process). Furthermore, if we make an exemption here, then the whole point of the exercise would be lost, for if some things do and some things do not change according this dialectical 'Law', we would be left with no way of telling which changes were and which were not subject to it.

[This would also mean that the second 'Law' (discussed here) was not a 'law' either, just like the first.]

This is, of course, quite apart from the fact that such a subjectively applied exemption certificate (issued to O*(1)) would mean that nothing at all could change, for everything in the universe is in the process of change, and is thus already a 'sublated' version of whatever it used to be.

Ignoring this, too, even if O*(1) were to change into not-O*(1) (as we suppose it must, given the doctrine laid down by the DM-prophets), then all the earlier problems simply reappear, for this could only take place if not-O*(1) already existed to make it happen! But not-O*(1) cannot already exist, for O*(1) has not changed into it yet!

Once more, it could be objected that the dialectical negation of O* to produce not-O* is not ordinary negation, as the above seems to assume.

In that case, let us say that O* turns into its 'sublated' opposite not-O*(s), but if that is to happen, according to the Dialectical Gospels, not-O*(s) must already exist! If so, and yet again, O* cannot turn into not-O*(s), for it already exists! On the other hand, if not-O*(s) does not already exist, then O* cannot change, for O* can only change if it struggles with what it changes into, i.e., not-O*(s).

Once more we hit the same non-dialectical brick wall.

It could be objected that the above abstract argument misses the point; in the real world things manifestly change. For example, it might be the case that John is a boy, but in a few years time it will be the case that John is a man. Now, the fact that other individuals are already men, does not stop John changing into a man (his opposite), as the above argues. So, John can change into his opposite even though that opposite already exists.

Or so it could be claimed.

But, this theory tells us that things/processes change because of a struggle with their opposites, and with what they become. Are we now to assume that John has to struggle with all the individuals that are already men if he is to become a man himself (if we now treat all these other men as John's opposites)? And are we to suppose that John struggles with what he is to become, even before it exists? If not, then the above response is beside the point. And, in view of the fact that John must turn into his opposite, does that mean he has to turn into these other men, or even into one of them? But he must do so if the Dialectical Holy Books are to be believed.

Anyway, according to the DM-worthies quoted above, John can only change because of a struggle between opposites taking place in the here-and-now. Are we now really supposed to believe that "John is a man" is struggling with "John is a boy" -- or that manhood is struggling with boyhood?

Some might be tempted to reply that this is precisely what adolescence is, and yet, in that case, John-as-boy and John-as-a-man would have to be locked in struggle in the present. [Of course, adolescence cannot struggle with anything, since it is an abstraction.] But, John-as-a-man does not yet exist, and so 'he' cannot struggle with John-as-boy. On the other hand, if John-as-a-man does exist, so that 'he' can struggle with his youthful self, then John-as-boy cannot change into 'him', for John-as-a-man already exists!

To be sure, John's 'opposite' is whatever he will become (if he is allowed to develop naturally), but, as noted above, that opposite cannot now exist otherwise John would not need to become him!

Looking at this more concretely, in ten or fifteen years time, John will not become just any man, he will become a particular man. In that case, let us call the man that John becomes "Man-J". But, once again, Man-J must exist now or John cannot change into him (if the DM-worthies quoted earlier are to be believed), for John can only become a man if he is locked in struggle with his own opposite, Man-J. But, if that is so, John cannot become Man-J since Man-J already exists!

[This, of course, is simply a more concrete version of the argument outlined above.]

Consider another hackneyed example: water turning into steam at 100oC (under normal conditions). Are we really supposed to believe that the opposite that water becomes (i.e., steam) makes water turn into steam? This must be so if the Dialectical Saints are to be believed.

Hence, while you might think it is the heat/energy you are putting into the water that turns it into steam, what really happens, according to these wise old dialecticians, is that steam makes water turn into steam!

In that case, save energy and turn the gas off!

In fact, let us track a water molecule to see what happens to it. To identify it, we shall call it "W1", and the steam molecule it turns into "S1". But, if the DM-Worthies above are correct, S1 must already exist, otherwise W1 could not change into it! Again, if that is so, where does S1 disappear to if W1 changes into it?

In fact, according to the Dialectical Magi, since opposites turn into one another, S1 must change into W1 at the same time as W1 is turning into S1! So while you are boiling a kettle, according to this Superscientific 'theory', steam must be turning back into the water you are boiling, and it must do so at the same rate!

One wonders, therefore, how dialectical kettles manage to boil dry.

This must be so, otherwise when W1 turns into S1 -- which already exists, or W1 could not change into it -- there would have to be two S1s where there used to be one! Matter created from nowhere!

Of course, the same argument applies to water freezing (and to any and all other alleged examples of DM-change).

It could be objected that the opposite that liquid water turns into is a gas; so the dialectical classicists are correct. However, if we take them at their word, then that gas must 'struggle' with liquid water in the here-and-now if water is to change. But that gas does not yet exist; in which case, water would never boil if this 'theory' were true. But even if it did, it is heat that causes the change not the gas! However we try and slice it, this 'theory' is totally useless -- that is, what little sense can be made of it.

This, of course, does not deny that change occurs, only that DM cannot account for it.

Alternatively, if DM were true, change would be impossible.

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

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

Red:


How can historical materialism become "historical materialism minus the dialectics"? You haven't explained this yet. All you did (before and until now) was to weave in thousands of flowery, sophisticated (which really wasn't) and complicated words (which you think are effective) and form a conclusion which could not even stand alone when questioned. Stripped of the thousands of "essentially complicated words" you're theory is nothing!

Very easy, we do what Marx did in Das Kapital.


You haven't even explained your "formal logic" yet...

And how is that relevent, even if I had a 'Formal Logic'?

[red_che]

Oh, there you go. A rather fast reply. :D

Hegel is not a materialist. His ideas are as absurd as yours. So I will not include him in my response, I will not even defend him. As for Plekhanov, he is an example of a distorted materialist, so I will not defend him as well. I will only deal with the quotes on Engels and Lenin, for they are the true Marxists. As for the others, I'm not sure and would not bother to read their quotes.


"The law of the interpenetration of opposites.... Mutual penetration of polar opposites and transformation into each other when carried to extremes...." [Engels (1954), pp.17, 62.]


is only the reflection of the motion through opposites which asserts itself everywhere in nature, and which by the continual conflict of the opposites and their final passage into one another, or into higher forms, determines the life of nature


and all opposites pass into one another through intermediate links


"Already in Rousseau, therefore, we find not only a line of thought which corresponds exactly to the one developed in Marx's Capital, but also, in details, a whole series of the same dialectical turns of speech as Marx used: processes which in their nature are antagonistic, contain a contradiction; transformation of one extreme into its opposite; and finally, as the kernel of the whole thing, the negation of the negation. [Ibid., p.179.]


but the transitions of every determination, quality, feature, side, property into every other


Development is the 'struggle' of opposites…. [This] alone furnishes the key to the self-movement of everything existing….


The struggle of mutually exclusive opposites is absolute, just as development and motion are absolute….


Dialectics is the teaching which shows how Opposites can be and how they happen to be (how they become) identical, -- under what conditions they are identical, becoming transformed into one another, -- why the human mind should grasp these opposites not as dead, rigid, but as living, conditional, mobile, becoming transformed into one another.

I'm not really surprised that you find these phrases to mean that "the proletariat should change into the bourgeoisie" because as it is, your philosophy is incompetent.

It does not take that much thinking to understand that the "unity of opposites" is simply the struggle between the contradicting forces, i.e. the proletariat against the bourgeoisie. Because otherwise, they will not be considered opposites, which is really unrealistic and defies nature.

As one can see, opposite forces can only "unite" or to use a clearer term they form part a struggle. For example, the bourgeoisie and the proletariat are the antagonists and the protagonists in a social movement. They are continually in struggle against each other and that struggle or the "unity of opposites" will end only when one is victorious and the other is defeated.

For otherwise, there will be no struggle at all. And the proletariat and the bourgeoisie will simply live in peace with one another, which is hilarious.

Marx and Engels stated in the Communist Manifesto that "But not only has the bourgeoisie forged the weapons that bring death to itself; it has also called into existence the men who are to wield those weapons -- the modern working class -- the proletarians." If this dialectical materialist analysis is wrong, then there is no cause for the proletariat to revolt. There is not a struggle to begin with. And, alas, your "FORMAL LOGIC" prevails! And that is truly absurd!!!

[red_che]

Rosa:


Very easy, we do what Marx did in Das Kapital.

Das Kapital is one example of Dialectical Materialism applied to Historical Materialism. :)

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

Red:


Hegel is not a materialist. His ideas are as absurd as yours. So I will not include him in my response, I will not even defend him. As for Plekhanov, he is an example of a distorted materialist, so I will not defend him as well. I will only deal with the quotes on Engels and Lenin, for they are the true Marxists. As for the others, I'm not sure and would not bother to read their quotes.

1) I quoted him to show comrades here where the idea came from, and in this respect how it is no different from the ideas contained in the writings of those who claim to be materialists, like Engels, Plekhanov, Lenin, and many others.

2) You dismiss Plekhanov, but Lenin praised him highly, and the quotation from his work is no different from that contained in Lenin's work.

3) The others I quote, like Trotsky, Mao, Novack, and Cornforth, merely echo what Hegel, Engels and Lenin said.

In other words, you supposed materialists, are no different from card-carrying idealists in this regard. No wonder your 'theory' does not work.


I'm not really surprised that you find these phrases to mean that "the proletariat should change into the bourgeoisie" because as it is, your philosophy is incompetent.

But, as you can see, Lenin tells us that this process, whereby everything struggles with and then turns into its opposite, governs the development of everything in existence.

In that case, either you believe the proletariat do not exist or this implies that the proletariat, after struggling with the bourgeois class, must turn into it, and vice versa.

So, pick a fight with Lenin, not me.

As I noted, this does not deny change, only that dialectics cannot account for it -- or, alternatively, if dialectics were true, change would be impossible.


It does not take that much thinking to understand that the "unity of opposites" is simply the struggle between the contradicting forces, i.e. the proletariat against the bourgeoisie. Because otherwise, they will not be considered opposites, which is really unrealistic and defies nature.

As one can see, opposite forces can only "unite" or to use a clearer term they form part a struggle. For example, the bourgeoisie and the proletariat are the antagonists and the protagonists in a social movement. They are continually in struggle against each other and that struggle or the "unity of opposites" will end only when one is victorious and the other is defeated.

You clearly did not read what Lenin had to say


"[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?]….

"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), pp.221-22, 357-58.]

"Hegel brilliantly divined the dialectics of things (phenomena, the world, nature) in the dialectics of concepts…. This aphorism should be expressed more popularly, without the word dialectics: approximately as follows: In the alternation, reciprocal dependence of all notions, in the identity of their opposites, in the transitions of one notion into another, in the eternal change, movement of notions, Hegel brilliantly divined precisely this relation of things to nature…. [W]hat constitutes dialectics?…. [M]utual dependence of notions all without exception…. Every notion occurs in a certain relation, in a certain connection with all the others." [Lenin (1961), pp.196-97.]

"'This harmony is precisely absolute Becoming change, -- not becoming other, now this and then another. The essential thing is that each different thing, each particular, is different from another, not abstractly so from any other, but from its other. Each particular only is, insofar as its other is implicitly contained in its Notion...' Quite right and important: the 'other' as its other, development into its opposite." [Ibid., p.260. Lenin is here commenting on Hegel (1995), pp.278-98; this particular quotation coming from p.285.]

"Dialectics is the teaching which shows how Opposites can be and how they happen to be (how they become) identical, -- under what conditions they are identical, becoming transformed into one another, -- why the human mind should grasp these opposites not as dead, rigid, but as living, conditional, mobile, becoming transformed into one another." [Ibid., p.109.]

So, according to Lenin, the proletariat, in struggling with the capitalist class as its opposite, must turn into the capitalist class, and vice versa.

Again, pick a fight with Lenin (and Engels) who said such crazy things.


For otherwise, there will be no struggle at all. And the proletariat and the bourgeoisie will simply live in peace with one another, which is hilarious.

Indeed, it is hilarious, but it follows from what Engels and Lenin said.


Marx and Engels stated in the Communist Manifesto that "But not only has the bourgeoisie forged the weapons that bring death to itself; it has also called into existence the men who are to wield those weapons -- the modern working class -- the proletarians."

And that is why we need to remove dialectics from historical materialism, since Marx's theory works, but the mystical theory Engels, and later Lenin, imported into Marxism from Hegel, does not.


If this dialectical materialist analysis is wrong, then there is no cause for the proletariat to revolt. There is not a struggle to begin with.

Marx's analysis is 100% correct, but then it has been ruined by the importation into Marxism of an unworkable 'theory' derived from Hegel, as I noted above.


And, alas, your "FORMAL LOGIC" prevails!

What 'formal logic' is this? I haven't used any.


And that is truly absurd!!!

But, only if you believe the crazy 'theory' Engels and Lenin dumped on us.

[red_che]

Rosa:


I quoted him to show comrades here where the idea came from

Hegel does not own dialectics. Whether the idea of "dialectics" came from him or not is not relevant. What is relevant is, if his idea is the same as the Dialectical Materialism espoused by Marx. And Marx himself said it, he repudiates Hegel's mysticism.


You dismiss Plekhanov, but Lenin praised him highly, and the quotation from his work is no different from that contained in Lenin's work.

Oh, really? That does not mean I should praise him as well. In fact, I am not aware of it. But that's not significant. We're talking here of theories, not personalities.


But, as you can see, Lenin tells us that this process, whereby everything struggles with and then turns into its opposite, governs everything in existence, In that case, either you believe the proletariat do not exist or this implies that the proletariat, after struggling with the bourgeois class, must turn into it, and vice versa....

So, according to Lenin, the proletariat, in struggling with the capitalist class as it opposite, must turn into the capitalist class, and vice versa.

The opposite referred there by Lenin is that the proletariat should turn into the ruling class after the revolution have been won, and not turn into the bourgeoisie. The "opposite" being referred to is not becoming the bourgeoisie but the the opposite of slavery, which is becoming the master. It's that simple, no need to circumvent, just as you have been fond of.


Indeed, it is hilarious, but it follows from what Engels and Lenin said.

Nope, only you said it.


And that is why we need to remove dialectics from historical materialism, since Marx's theory works, but the mystical theory Engels, and later Lenin, imported into Marxism from Hegel, dose not.

If we remove dialectics from historical materialism, it's going to be like a revolutionary stripped of his essentials.

Note: Marx and Engels co-wrote the Communist Manifesto and other works...

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

Red:


Hegel does not own dialectics. Whether the idea of "dialectics" came from him or not is not relevant. What is relevant is, if his idea is the same as the Dialectical Materialism espoused by Marx. And Marx himself said it, he repudiates Hegel's mysticism.

Who says he did? The point is that you rejected Hegel as an idealist, even though he agrees in every detail on this issue with Engels and Lenin (and many others).


Oh, really? That does not mean I should praise him as well. In fact, I am not aware of it. But that's not significant. We're talking here of theories, not personalities.

The more I can get you to disagree with Lenin, the better.:)


The opposite referred there by Lenin is that the proletariat should turn into the ruling class after the revolution have been won, and not turn into the bourgeoisie. The "opposite" being referred to is not becoming the bourgeoisie but the opposite of slavery, which is becoming the master. It's that simple, no need to circumvent, just as you have been fond of.

But, on the ground, it is workers who struggle with capitalists; so on that score, workers should turn into capitalists, and vice versa.


Nope, only you said it.

Not at all, I just quoted Engels and Lenin (among others).


If we remove dialectics from historical materialism, it's going to be like a revolutionary stripped of his essentials.

Not according to Marx.


Note: Marx and Engels co-wrote the Communist Manifesto and other works...

Ok, so now we know you are good at stating the bleeding obvious.

[DeLeonist]

Rosa,

Backtracking to your comment:



Or, if you do not like that analogy, then Marx is the sort of 'disciple' who was (1) happy to endorse a summary of 'his method' that contained not one atom of Hegel, who (2) at best, on his own admission, merely 'coquetted' with Hegelian jargon in a few places in Das Kapital, who (3) did not even own a copy of Hegel's 'Logic', and who (4) could not be bothered to summarise this 'historic method' even though he found the time and motivation to waste a whole year on Herr Vogt.


If these were the only relevant factors to consider and were all uncontentious, then your unconventional interpretation of ‘disciple’ may have some weight.

However, this is not the case - as demonstrated by the numerous other threads and posts on the topic on this forum (which I won’t digress too far into here, except to say that (1) the fact that Marx ‘avowed himself of this mighty thinker’ at the same time as he ‘coquetted’ with Hegelian terms suggests your reading too much into the use of ‘coquetted’ and; (2) parts of the purportedly Hegel-free summary of his method sound quite like a Hegelian process of self -development to me - eg, talk of the ‘transition from one form into another, from one series of connexions into a different one’ and ‘the necessity of the present order of things, and the necessity of another order into which the first must inevitably pass over’).

Rather than using contentious interpretations to support another unconventional interpretation, I would say that the conventional interpretation of ‘disciple’ undermines your contentious interpretation of the postface.

After all, in speaking in the footnote of ‘disencumbering’ Hegel’s dialectic of its mysticism, Marx clearly implies that there is something left after the encumbrance has been removed.

[Hit The North]

This issue of coquetting is an interesting one. It's well known that the first edition of Das Kapital coquetted with Hegelian modes of expression a lot. Marx then revised it so it coquetted a little. As far as I'm aware he nowhere stated that this revision changed the actual content of his analysis.

Btw, is it possible to see a copy of this first edition?

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

DeLeonist:


If these were the only relevant factors to consider and were all uncontentious, then your unconventional interpretation of ‘disciple’ may have some weight.

However, this is not the case - as demonstrated by the numerous other threads and posts on the topic on this forum (which I won’t digress too far into here, except to say that (1) the fact that Marx ‘avowed himself of this mighty thinker’ at the same time as he ‘coquetted’ with Hegelian terms suggests your reading too much into the use of ‘coquetted’ and; (2) parts of the purportedly Hegel-free summary of his method sound quite like a Hegelian process of self -development to me - eg, talk of the ‘transition from one form into another, from one series of connexions into a different one’ and ‘the necessity of the present order of things, and the necessity of another order into which the first must inevitably pass over’).

1) Marx pust this avowal in the past tense, something you keep ignoring. And this is significant since it helps us understand that the very best Marx could do in Das Kapital, was to 'coquette' with a few Hegelian terms-of-art.

2) I am not sure why you think those parts of that summary sound like Hegel; they could just as well have come from Adam Smith, Adam Ferguson, John Millar, Kant or even Aristotle himself.


Rather than using contentious interpretations to support another unconventional interpretation, I would say that the conventional interpretation of ‘disciple’ undermines your contentious interpretation of the Postface.

Well, I think yours is the 'contentious' interpretation, since mine depends only on what Marx actually published in Das Kapital.

And, even you had to admit that the 'conventional' interpretation of 'disciple' does not fit Marx. So, I do not know what you are complaining about.


After all, in speaking in the footnote of ‘disencumbering’ Hegel’s dialectic of its mysticism, Marx clearly implies that there is something left after the encumbrance has been removed.

In view of the fact that Hegel got the original theory from Kant, who in turn derived it from Ferguson, Millar and Smith, but superimposed on it a mystical dynamic, ridding Hegel of the mystical elements simply returns us to Kant, Smith, Ferguson and Millar.

In other words, no trace of Hegel was left, which is why the passage Marx called 'the dialectic method' contained no trace of Hegel, and the very best Marx could do is 'coquette' with a few Hegelian terns in Das Kapital.

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

BTB:


This issue of coquetting is an interesting one. It's well known that the first edition of Das Kapital coquetted with Hegelian modes of expression a lot. Marx then revised it so it coquetted a little. As far as I'm aware he nowhere stated that this revision changed the actual content of his analysis.

By 'a lot', how many times do you mean?

Anyway, you are the last person who should be pushing this case, since, 1) You not only haven't read Hegel, you refuse to do so, and 2) You yourself reject the Hegelian influence on Marx -- or you can't make your mind up, and 3) You disagree even with leading members of your own party about what the 'dialectic method' is.


As far as I'm aware he nowhere stated that this revision changed the actual content of his analysis

Well, once again, we needn't speculate, for Marx added a summary of the 'dialectic method' in which there is no trace of Hegel -- something which should please you.

I'd quote it again, but I'd be in danger of being accused by you of 'spamming'.

[Hit The North]

BTB:

By 'a lot', how many times do you mean?



I dunno, I haven't read it. I got the information from an article called NIKOLAI SIEBER: THE FIRST RUSSIAN MARXIST by James D. White.

Is this first edition available anywhere?


I'd quote it again, but I'd be in danger of being accused by you of 'spamming'.

Thanks for that, at least. :)

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

BTB:


I dunno, I haven't read it. I got the information from an article called NIKOLAI SIEBER: THE FIRST RUSSIAN MARXIST by James D. White.

Well, what exactly is that 'information'?


Is this first edition available anywhere?

No idea; I imagine you might be able to obtain a copy in the Bodelian Library, or the National Reference Library, etc.


Thanks for that, at least.

An odd sort of Marxist who thanks me for not quoting Marx!

[red_che]

Rosa:


Who says he did? The point is that you rejected Hegel as an idealist, even though he agrees in every detail on this issue with Engels and Lenin (and many others)

It is only you're insistence that Hegel agrees with Engels and Lenin on every point, which is not necessarily correct. Marx, Engels and Lenin did not agree with Hegel on every point.


The more I can get you to disagree with Lenin, the better.

Hahaha! Pray unto your God that it should happen.


But, on the ground, it is workers who struggle with capitalists; so on that score, workers should turn into capitalists, and vice versa

Your rabid display of narrow-mindedness is impeccable, and despicable. You cannot win an argument by merely insisting on something which has just been disputed.

On the ground, above ground, or underground, or whatever ground it may be!!!, there is antagonism between the proletariat and the bourgeoisie. The worker's struggle is not confined only within the four walls of the workplace. As Marx said:
Meanwhile the antagonism between the proletariat and the bourgeoisie is a struggle of class against class, a struggle which carried to its highest expression is a total revolution. Indeed, is it at all surprising that a society founded on the opposition of classes should culminate in brutal contradiction, the shock of body against body, as its final d&eacutenouement ? (The Poverty of Philosophy) (emphasis is mine).

I bet you will dismiss it as "nonsense" and insist on your narrow interpretation of dialectics, which you eagerly and insistently anchor upon Hegel's even if it has been stated so many times that Hegel's dialectics is idealist and that Marx, Engels, Lenin and other "DMs" have already took out the Hegelian mysticism on dialectics.


Ok, so now we know you are good at stating the bleeding obvious.

And so now, you are showing your true color... that you are not a Marxist, not even a revolutionary because you despise revolution and struggle...

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

Red:


It is only you're insistence that Hegel agrees with Engels and Lenin on every point, which is not necessarily correct. Marx, Engels and Lenin did not agree with Hegel on every point.

Well, as you would know if you read Lenin's Philosophical Notebooks with due care and attention, Lenin quotes Hegel extensively on this point, and indicates he agrees with almost every word. He even calls it the work of 'genius', a word I do not think he ever used of Marx!

As far as Engels is concerned: you tell us where he disagreed with Hegel on this point, and I'll acknowledge that difference. Until you do, the obvious fact that Engels agreed with Hegel on this issue still stands.


Marx, Engels and Lenin did not agree with Hegel on every point.

And where did I say they did?

However, Engels, Lenin, Plekhanov, Mao (and many others) agree with Hegel over this aspect of change through contradiction, and that objects/processes change into their opposites -- which they can't do if they also 'struggle' with them, as I have shown.


Pray unto your God that it should happen

No need to pray to any 'god', least of all yours, since you already disagree with Lenin, as I pointed out.


Your rabid display of narrow-mindedness is impeccable, and despicable. You cannot win an argument by merely insisting on something which has just been disputed.

So, once more, you can't answer this point of mine:


But, on the ground, it is workers who struggle with capitalists; so on that score, workers should turn into capitalists, and vice versa

But can only resort to abuse.

However, you do try to respond with this rather weak counter-claim:


On the ground, above ground, or underground, or whatever ground it may be!!!, there is antagonism between the proletariat and the bourgeoisie. The worker's struggle is not confined only within the four walls of the workplace. As Marx said:

In that case, according to Lenin and Engels, the proletariat will turn into the bourgeoisie, and vice versa.

In your confused state of mind, you ignored this -- or, alternatively, you do disagree with Lenin and Engels, as I predicted.

Then you quote Marx (why you did this is unclear, since he had nothing to say about the crazy 'theory' you are trying to defend (by the sole tactic of abuse)):


Meanwhile the antagonism between the proletariat and the bourgeoisie is a struggle of class against class, a struggle which carried to its highest expression is a total revolution. Indeed, is it at all surprising that a society founded on the opposition of classes should culminate in brutal contradiction, the shock of body against body, as its final d&eacutenouement [Eh??]?

In that case, and once more, as Engels and Lenin implied, the proletariat will turn into the bourgeoisie, and vice versa, since these two told us that opposites are locked in struggle, and that they turn into one another.

Once more, you conveniently ignored this.

In your parlous state, I would too.


I bet you will dismiss it as "nonsense" and insist on your narrow interpretation of dialectics, which you eagerly and insistently anchor upon Hegel's even if it has been stated so many times that Hegel's dialectics is idealist and that Marx, Engels, Lenin and other "DMs" have already took out the Hegelian mysticism on dialectics.

And you'd lose your bet, since I have told you many times, on your previous sad attempts to take me on here over two years ago, that I agree with Marx (except I'd not use the word 'contradiction' here, since it isn't one, as Marx later came to see when he wrote Das Kapital).

What I would do is point out that this importation into Marxism of ideas and concepts from Hegel, by Engels, Lenin and Plekhanov, among others, has only succeeded in undermining historical materialism [HM], leading to the ridiculous result that the proletariat must change into the bourgeoisie!

So, the only way to rescue HM is to cut this ruling-class 'theory' of yours out.

Now, the alleged 'flip' inflicted we have been told that was on Hegel's system, to 'put it on its feet', and to find its 'rational core', cannot and has not succeeded, as I have shown.

Upside down or the 'right way up', this 'theory' cannot account for change in nature or in society, since it has objects and processes 'struggling' with their 'opposites' and then changing into those opposites.

But that can't happen, since those opposites already exist. If they didn't exist there would be nothing there to form half of that 'struggle'.

The bottom line is that, if this 'theory' were correct, then not only would the proletariat struggle with the bourgeoisie, they would change into them, and the forces of production would change into the relations of production, and vice versa.

This result is too ridiculous for words; hence your 'theory' (or what sense can be made of it) cannot work. Alternatively, if your 'theory' were true, change would be impossible.

You can find a long and detailed version of this argument above, in an earlier post -- but I suspect in your logically-challenged state, it will go right over your empty head.

I do not expect a sensible answer from you, just more abuse -- which would indirectly make my case for me.


And so now, you are showing your true color... that you are not a Marxist, not even a revolutionary because you despise revolution and struggle...

And how did that over-heated, mystically-compromised, dormant organ between your ears work that one out?

[Lyev]

Some of this discussion is going way over my head. I didn't even realise this thread was still going. By the way, does anyone know any literature that dissects dialectical materialism from a relatively unbiased point of view? I feel that on an argument like this people are either strongly for or strongly against so sometimes it's hard picking out the objective and subjective things that people say. Thanks.

Also I see it that DM does have some relevant things in it, but when Engels mystified it with the 3 laws it became fairly difficult to give examples of these laws and tricky to pick out the relevant things. As I see it, all DM is, before the murky laws like 'negation of the negation' were added, is affirmation of Heraclitus' law of 'the only constant is change'. However maybe my distrust for DM is partly cos I've never found a consice, straight forward definition of any of the laws, so if anyone can provide a good definition I'd be grateful. :)

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

AGW:


By the way, does anyone know any literature that dissects dialectical materialism from a relatively unbiased point of view?

Well, unfortunately, this 'theory' is is poor that most philosophers totally ignore it, and of those who do not, they tend to confuse dialectical [DM] with historical materialism [HM], and use the glaring weaknesses of the former to denigrate the scientific status of the latter.

So, there are no impartial critiicisms of DM; the best there is from a Marxist angle (other than my own) is:

Eric Petersen, The Poverty of Dialectical Materialism (Red Door, 1994).

http://catalogue.nla.gov.au/Record/383178

However, this book is not easy to get hold of. Eric believes that dialectics applies to soical change, but not to change in the natural world -- so he only goes half as far as me. He was working on a second edition when I was last in contact with him (four years ago), but I think the presence of my work on the internet has probably made him think again. His book is excellent, except, you have to ignore what he has to say about 'Formal Logic', since, like all other dialecticians, he gets this seriously wrong.


Also I see it that DM does have some relevant things in it, but when Engels mystified it with the 3 laws it became fairly difficult to give examples of these laws and tricky to pick out the relevant things. As I see it, all DM is, before the murky laws like 'negation of the negation' were added, is affirmation of Heraclitus' law of 'the only constant is change'. However maybe my distrust for DM is partly cos I've never found a consice, straight forward definition of any of the laws, so if anyone can provide a good definition I'd be grateful.

You can find a concise summary here, along with a very brief critique:

http://anti-dialectics.co.uk/Anti-D_For_Dummies%2001.htm

[red_che]

Okay, I will make this response as brief and concise as possible since I have urgent things to attend and will have to cut my “vacation” short.



Rosa:



As far as Engels is concerned: you tell us where he disagreed with Hegel on this point, and I'll acknowledge that difference. Until you do, the obvious fact that Engels agreed with Hegel on this issue still stands.


Engels:



Hegel was an idealist. To him the thoughts within his brain were not the more or less abstract images of actual things and processes, but on the contrary, things and their development were only the realized images of the "Idea", existing somewhere[* (http://www.marx2mao.com/M&E/AD78.html#fnp30)] from eternity before the world existed. (Anti-Dühring).




Rosa:





And where did I say they did?


Rosa:
The point is that you rejected Hegel as an idealist, even though he agrees in every detail on this issue with Engels and Lenin (and many others)



In that case, according to Lenin and Engels, the proletariat will turn into the bourgeoisie, and vice versa.

In your confused state of mind, you ignored this -- or, alternatively, you do disagree with Lenin and Engels, as I predicted.


Or was it you that is really in a confused state of mind. I already disputed your point:
The "opposite" being referred to is not becoming the bourgeoisie but the the opposite of slavery, which is becoming the master. You simply and conveniently avoided this.





Even if it is a waste of time and a very boring and useless activity, I will quote phrases from Rosa Lichtenstein’s “essays” to show that his/her “criticisms” were nothing but pure intellectual masturbation and was not able to demolish a single atom of dialectical materialism.

In her/his “Essay Twelve,” Rosa Lichtenstein started his/her “criticism” on dialectical materialism with a quote of Engels taken by Lenin stating that:


"M1: [M]otion without matter is unthinkable." [Lenin (1972), p.318. Italic emphasis in the original.]

And then s/he concluded right away that:
Here, Lenin was making a typically metaphysical (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metaphysics) statement.

To back this assertion up, she used a linguistic interpretation of the above-quoted phrase taken from Engels. S/he said:
The seemingly profound nature of theses like M1 is linked to rather more mundane features of the language in which they are expressed: that is, to the fact that the main verb they use is often in the indicative mood (http://everything2.com/index.pl?node_id=1057133).

Instead of showing proof by presenting material evidence, s/he employed linguistic trickery to cast confusion and serve as his/her basis of attacking dialectical materialism. This approach is made to obscure the readers' mind and then open the opportunity for his/her so-called demolition job.

Rosa said:
The seemingly profound nature of theses like M1 is linked to rather more mundane features of the language in which they are expressed: that is, to the fact that the main verb they use is often in the indicative mood (http://everything2.com/index.pl?node_id=1057133).

And from there, s/he went on with his/her verbal prowess to make dialectical materialism a “confusing” theory. Rosa said:


Sometimes, the latter is beefed-up with subjunctive (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Subjunctive_mood) and/or modal (http://www.englishpage.com/modals/modalintro.html) qualifying terms -- which, incidentally, help create even more of a false impression.

For example, we find Engels saying things like this: "Motion is the mode of existence of matter. Never anywhere has there been matter without motion, nor can there be…. Matter without motion is just as inconceivable as motion without matter. Motion is therefore as uncreatable and indestructible as matter itself; as the older philosophy (Descartes) expressed it, the quantity of motion existing in the world is always the same. Motion therefore cannot be created; it can only be transmitted." [Engels (1976), p.74. Bold emphases added.]
"The law of the transformation of quantity into quality and vice versa…[operates] in nature, in a manner fixed for each individual case, qualitative changes can only occur by the quantitative addition or quantitative subtraction of matter or motion….
"Hence, it is impossible to alter the quality of a body without addition or subtraction of matter or motion. [Engels (1954), p.63. Bold emphases added.]2 (http://anti-dialectics.co.uk/page%2012_01.htm#Note%2002)

Now, this apparently superficial grammatical facade hides a deeper logical form -- several in fact. This is something which only becomes plain when such sentences are examined more closely.

As noted above, expressions like these look as if they reveal deep truths about reality since they certainly resemble empirical propositions (i.e., propositions about matters of fact). In the event, they turn out to be nothing at all like them.

As can be seen from the above, s/he did not present any material proof, s/he just employed verbal trickery, to show that motion without matter is not unthinkable. Rosa did not only avoid the issue of matter and motion being inseparable, s/he also decoyed into linguistic babble to hide his/her ineptness to disprove the fact that matter and motion is indeed inseparable.

Upon establishing his/her arguments, based on linguistic/verbal nonsense, Rosa goes on to claim that:
So, in practice dialecticians do the opposite of what they say they do; they are quite happy to impose their ideas on the world, declaring them true prior to, and independent of, sufficient (or, in some cases, any) material evidence.. Following this assertion, Rosa then is saying that the Marxist conception of class struggle, that there is contradiction between the proletariat and the bourgeoisie, is just an imposition into the real world. Therefore, according to Rosa, class contradiction and class struggle is just an a priori imposition in society, that this struggle is in fact nonexistent. And following Rosa’s assertion, there is no sufficient material evidence to prove that there is class struggle, or that there is contradiction between the proletariat and the bourgeoisie.



Rosa is mentally blind or incapacitated to realize that everything that what the mind conceives is just a reflection of the material world. Lenin said:
The fundamental distinction between the materialist and the adherent of idealist philosophy consists in the fact that the materialist regards sensation, perception, idea, and the mind of man generally, as an image of objective reality. The world is the movement of this objective reality reflected by our consciousness. Rosa Lichtenstein therefore falls in the category of the “adherent of the idealist philosophy.”

What Rosa Lichtenstein cannot recognize also is the fact that DM not only interprets the world, it pushes for it to change. Just as Marx have said:
The philosophers have only interpreted the world, in various ways; the point, however, is to change it. I’m quite sure that Rosa will argue against this. Rosa Lichtenstein is an avid fan of non-contradiction. Therefore, she will not push for change.

One can also observe that despite Rosa’s lengthy “criticism” of dialectical materialism, she fails to show any alternative. When questioned about it, all s/he can merely say is:
Historical materialism. If asked to explain, Rosa will just tell this:
If so, the link would be to two books that are not in fact on-line, since I do not try to explain it. Why does s/he refuse to explain it?
My sole concern at present, however, is to stem the flow of poison into Marxism (from this ruling-class theory) first -- if I can -- before this slowly dying patient can be helped to full recovery (if that is possible now we have let the working class down so much and for so long). That will take me another ten years at least -- and I have been at this for eleven years already.. A rather lame excuse. If one criticises something, during the process of his/her investigation/research, one can already provide an alternative. Just as a child when learning to walk, the child does not only learn the wrong moves, he/she also could learn how this could be corrected.

However, in the case of Rosa Lichtenstein, s/he really could not provide an alternative, because in the first place, she could not see anything wrong. Despite the thousands or even millions of words s/he has interwoven, Rosa could not explain what “historical materialism minus the dialectics” could mean. S/he simply cannot do that, dialectics could not simply be removed from historical materialism, because if it can be removed, s/he could have easily explained it. If Rosa has the confidence to say that DM is wrong, how come s/he does not have any courage to expound on his/her “historical materialism minus the dialectics” proposition? Once can be confident in saying that this is wrong or that is not correct, and conversely, one can also be confident in saying that this is right or that is correct, especially if that individual has proof. But in the case of Rosa Lichtenstein, s/he cannot be confident because s/he does not have anything to back it up. Or s/he is afraid that s/he might finally end up resorting to dialectics if she will do so. Perhaps, still, s/he is afraid that her true colour will be exposed, that s/he is not a revolutionary.



So, the only way to rescue HM is to cut this ruling-class 'theory' of yours out.


That means, according to Rosa Lichtenstein, there is no ruling class. It follows therefore that, since there is no ruling class, there is no class struggle. Indeed, Rosa has just exposed herself/himself; that s/he is not a revolutionary.

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

Red, quoting Engels:


Hegel was an idealist. To him the thoughts within his brain were not the more or less abstract images of actual things and processes, but on the contrary, things and their development were only the realized images of the "Idea", existing somewhere from eternity before the world existed. (Anti-Dühring)

That just means that when it came to dialectics, Engels was an idealist too. That is why his allegedly materialist 'theory' cannot account for change in nature or society.


Or was it you that is really in a confused state of mind. I already disputed your point:


The "opposite" being referred to is not becoming the bourgeoisie but the opposite of slavery, which is becoming the master.

You simply and conveniently avoided this.

So you say, but Lenin said this:


[Among the elements of dialectics are the following:] 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?]….

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….

'This harmony is precisely absolute Becoming change, -- not becoming other, now this and then another. The essential thing is that each different thing [tone], each particular, is different from another, not abstractly so from any other, but from its other. Each particular only is, insofar as its other is implicitly contained in its Notion...' Quite right and important: the 'other' as its other, development into its opposite.

Dialectics is the teaching which shows how Opposites can be and how they happen to be (how they become) identical, -- under what conditions they are identical, becoming transformed into one another, -- why the human mind should grasp these opposites not as dead, rigid, but as living, conditional, mobile, becoming transformed into one another.



Notice that? This 'struggle' involves "not only the unity of opposites, but the transitions of every determination, quality, feature, side, property into every other [into its opposite?]…." and it covers "everything existing."

Now, real live proletarians do not 'struggle' with an abstraction (what you call 'the master'), since that does not distinguish struggle under capitalism from struggle under feudalism, or under a slave society. What happens under capitalism is that workers do not just struggle with their masters, but with their opposite under capitalism, and thus with the capitalists.

In that case, the proletariat struggles with the capitalist class, and so, according to Lenin, they must change into them!

[I]So, your 'reply' is no good.


Even if it is a waste of time and a very boring and useless activity, I will quote phrases from Rosa Lichtenstein’s “essays” to show that his/her “criticisms” were nothing but pure intellectual masturbation and was not able to demolish a single atom of dialectical materialism.

Are you addressing me, or some audience you think is interested in what you have to say?


In her/his “Essay Twelve,” Rosa Lichtenstein started his/her “criticism” on dialectical materialism with a quote of Engels taken by Lenin stating that:


"M1: [M]otion without matter is unthinkable." [Lenin (1972), p.318. Italic emphasis in the original.]

And then s/he concluded right away that:


Here, Lenin was making a typically metaphysical statement.

To back this assertion up, she used a linguistic interpretation of the above-quoted phrase taken from Engels. S/he said:


The seemingly profound nature of theses like M1 is linked to rather more mundane features of the language in which they are expressed: that is, to the fact that the main verb they use is often in the indicative mood.

Instead of showing proof by presenting material evidence, s/he employed linguistic trickery to cast confusion and serve as his/her basis of attacking dialectical materialism. This approach is made to obscure the readers' mind and then open the opportunity for his/her so-called demolition job.

1) As I explained, if you had bothered to read the above essay with due care and attention, the phrase "metaphysical statement" is contested territory, and so for those who object to its use (like you), I'd use the more neutral "necessary proposition", which I almost exclusively do in that essay.

2) Then you say this:


Instead of showing proof by presenting material evidence, s/he employed linguistic trickery to cast confusion and serve as his/her basis of attacking dialectical materialism. This approach is made to obscure the readers' mind and then open the opportunity for his/her so-called demolition job

a) Are you denying that Lenin used an indicative sentence here?

b) The rest of that essay (all 72,000 words of it) is aimed at providing evidence and argument in support of the initial bold claims I make -- and I point this out too, in the following terms (something you just ignored):


Now, these assertions might strike some readers as rather difficult to swallow. Because of that, much of the rest of this Part of Essay Twelve will be aimed at undermining such reticence.

You:


As can be seen from the above, s/he did not present any material proof, s/he just employed verbal trickery, to show that motion without matter is not unthinkable. Rosa did not only avoid the issue of matter and motion being inseparable, s/he also decoyed into linguistic babble to hide his/her ineptness to disprove the fact that matter and motion is indeed inseparable.

And yet, as I also noted, the 'material evidence' you request can be found in Essays Two, Three Part One and Two, Four Part One, Five, Six Part One, Seven Part One, Eight Parts One and Two.

In other words, you have to tell lies about my work in order to try to defend the idealist 'theory' you have swallowed.


Following this assertion, Rosa then is saying that the Marxist conception of class struggle, that there is contradiction between the proletariat and the bourgeoisie, is just an imposition into the real world. Therefore, according to Rosa, class contradiction and class struggle is just an a priori imposition in society, that this struggle is in fact nonexistent. And following Rosa’s assertion, there is no sufficient material evidence to prove that there is class struggle, or that there is contradiction between the proletariat and the bourgeoisie.

Where did I say that?

What I have said is that you mystics are quite happy to impose dialectical materialism on the world; I did not mention the class struggle, and I defy you to find anywhere where I have said this, or anything like it.

And what else I have said is that you mystics have imposed dialectics on the class struggle, but nowhere have said that the class struggle has been imposed on the world.

So, yet another lie.


Rosa is mentally blind or incapacitated to realize that everything that what the mind conceives is just a reflection of the material world

And how do you know this? Your only 'proof' is to quote Lenin as if he were 'god'.

In other words, as I predicted, you are happy to impose this thesis on nature (or on humanity, in this case).


Rosa Lichtenstein therefore falls in the category of the “adherent of the idealist philosophy.”

Well, it is you who wants to impose things on nature, not I, so you need to rotate that grubby, accusatory finger of yours through 180 degrees.


What Rosa Lichtenstein cannot recognize also is the fact that DM not only interprets the world, it pushes for it to change. Just as Marx have said:


The philosophers have only interpreted the world, in various ways; the point, however, is to change it.

1) And yet, as I have shown, and as you have yet to show otherwise, dialectics cannot account for change -- or, alternatively, if dialectics were true, change would be impossible.

2) Notice that while Marx tells us that philosophy is useless, you want to saddle Marxism with a philosophy of your own -- dialectical materialism.

So, you, not I, need to read Marx more carefully (ha, some hope!).

No wonder he abandoned your 'theory' by the time he came to write Das Kapital.


I’m quite sure that Rosa will argue against this. Rosa Lichtenstein is an avid fan of non-contradiction. Therefore, she will not push for change.

But, as I have shown, 'contradictions' cannot explain change, so no wonder I am an avid fan of their opposite.

And, if you wanted genuine change, you would be too.



One can also observe that despite Rosa’s lengthy “criticism” of dialectical materialism, she fails to show any alternative. When questioned about it, all s/he can merely say is:


Historical materialism.

So, in the same breath as saying I offer no alternative, you admit that I do offer an alternative. Is this the sort of 'contradiction' you mystics prefer?


If asked to explain, Rosa will just tell this:


If so, the link would be to two books that are not in fact on-line, since I do not try to explain it.

Why does s/he refuse to explain it?

But, as well you know, that is not the only thing I have said in reply; what I generally respond with is this: I do not need to explain it since Marx did a pretty good job for us.

Of course, if Marx is not good enough for you, that is your problem.


A rather lame excuse. If one criticises something, during the process of his/her investigation/research, one can already provide an alternative. Just as a child when learning to walk, the child does not only learn the wrong moves, he/she also could learn how this could be corrected.

Hardly a 'lame excuse' if we can all see for ourselves the deleterious affect this 'theory' has had on you.

But, all the more so, if we examine the even worse affect it has had on Dialectical Marxism; on that see here:

http://anti-dialectics.co.uk/page%2009_02.htm

http://anti-dialectics.co.uk/page%20010_01.htm


However, in the case of Rosa Lichtenstein, s/he really could not provide an alternative, because in the first place, she could not see anything wrong. Despite the thousands or even millions of words s/he has interwoven, Rosa could not explain what “historical materialism minus the dialectics” could mean. S/he simply cannot do that, dialectics could not simply be removed from historical materialism, because if it can be removed, s/he could have easily explained it. If Rosa has the confidence to say that DM is wrong, how come s/he does not have any courage to expound on his/her “historical materialism minus the dialectics” proposition? Once can be confident in saying that this is wrong or that is not correct, and conversely, one can also be confident in saying that this is right or that is correct, especially if that individual has proof. But in the case of Rosa Lichtenstein, s/he cannot be confident because s/he does not have anything to back it up. Or s/he is afraid that s/he might finally end up resorting to dialectics if she will do so. Perhaps, still, s/he is afraid that her true colour will be exposed, that s/he is not a revolutionary.

But, you have already admitted I have an alternative, so what are you moaning about?

Apparently, your only beef is that I 'refuse' to explain it; but I do not, since, as I pointed out above, Marx has already done that for us.


That means, according to Rosa Lichtenstein, there is no ruling class. It follows therefore that, since there is no ruling class, there is no class struggle. Indeed, Rosa has just exposed herself/himself; that s/he is not a revolutionary.

And here we have yet another lie.

Where on earth did you dredge up this idea that I think there is no ruling class?

----------------------------

This part of my reply is addressed to comrades who are 'not a few workers short of a picket', like this numpty here is:

Readers of this thread will note that this joker does not quote a single sentence of mine that asserts this, or even one which implies this. And that is because it is yet another bare-faced lie.

And yet the above comment of his was in reply to this post of mine (which he even quotes, for goodness sake):


So, the only way to rescue HM is to cut this [B]ruling-class 'theory' of yours out.

Bold added.

In that case, this plonker is determined to renew his reputation (masterfully won two years ago) as probably the worst arguer RevLeft has ever seen.

[DeLeonist]

Rosa , re:



Marx pust this avowal in the past tense, something you keep ignoring. And this is significant since it helps us understand that the very best Marx could do in Das Kapital, was to 'coquette' with a few Hegelian terms-of-art.


I’m not denying that ‘avowed’ is in the past tense. But so is ‘coquetted’, which means the negative connotations of the latter term may be less than you suggest.

For example, it is possible that as well as being influenced by Hegel’s dialectical method, Marx is saying that he also went so far as to flirt with trying to express himself in the unique way that the ‘mighty’ Hegel does.

That “coquetted” should not be read in too negative a sense is supported by reading the sentence in conjunction with the footnote in the French edition of Volume 2:

Marx referring to a time just as he was working on Volume 1 of Capital:


I therefore openly avowed myself the pupil of that mighty thinker, and even here and there, in the chapter on the theory of value, coquetted with the modes of expression peculiar to him.


Marx writing after Volume 1 had been published:


I am a disciple of Hegel, and the presumptuous chattering of the epigones who think they have buried this great thinker appear frankly ridiculous to me. Nevertheless, I have taken the liberty of adopting towards my master a critical attitude, disencumbering his dialectic of its mysticism and thus putting it through a profound change, etc.

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

DeLeonist:


I’m not denying that ‘avowed’ is in the past tense. But so is ‘coquetted’, which means the negative connotations of the latter term may be less than you suggest.

Ah, but he did not avow this in Das Kapital, whereas he did 'coquette' this in Das Kapital, which, since it is a book that is still around (while the events you refer to no longer exist), are still being 'coquetted' with, even to this day.

Unless, you think the original 'coquetting' has faded over the years...?


For example, it is possible that as well as being influenced by Hegel’s dialectical method, Marx is saying that he also went so far as to flirt with trying to express himself in the unique way that the ‘mighty’ Hegel does.

Well, Marx very helpfully ended all speculation by including a summary of 'his method' in which no trace of Hegel is to be found.


That “coquetted” should not be read in too negative a sense is supported by reading the sentence in conjunction with the footnote in the French edition of Volume 2:

And yet that was never published by Marx.

So, based on what Marx actually published himself, we may conclude that Hegel had vanished from Marx's work like the last traces of the Cheshire Cat.

[DeLeonist]

I’m not denying that ‘avowed’ is in the past tense. But so is ‘coquetted’, which means the negative connotations of the latter term may be less than you suggest.


Ah, but he did not avow this in Das Kapital, whereas he did 'coquette' this in Das Kapital, which, since it is a book that is still around (while the events you refer to no longer exist), are still being 'coquetted' with, even to this day.

The point was that Marx tells us that he ‘avowed’ himself during the same period whilst working on Volume 1 that he ‘coquetted’, so ‘coquetted’ should be interpreted with this fact in mind.

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

DeLeonist:


The point was that Marx tells us that he ‘avowed’ himself during the same period whilst working on Volume 1 that he ‘coquetted’, so ‘coquetted’ should be interpreted with this fact in mind.

Indeed, and that influence is quite clear in the Grundrisse, which Marx chose not to publish, even though it was a prepartory work for Das Kapital, but by the time he came to actually write Das Kapital, he had abandoned Hegel, something that becomes clear from the summary of the 'dialectic method' which he included in the Postface.