Vogelman
3rd May 2011, 20:29
For several years now I consider myself a Marxist. From the beginning I was, and still am, very interested in the philosophical basis of Marxism i.e. Dialectical Materialism. When I recently discovered this forum I quickly discovered the @nti-dialectics sticky made by Rosa Lichtenstein.
It was one of the first times I found such an extensive text against dialectics, so I started reading.
However, I soon found some scientific arguments that aren't correct and wanted to reply to these. The arguments I want to reply to are more of a scientific character than a pure philosophical, so maybe the thread isn't entirely in the right place... I'll leave it to the moderators to judge about this. Let's get on to the serious business.
The first part will be about her "refutation" of the first of three dialectic laws, the law of a change of quantity at a certain stage resulting in a change of quality.
All dialecticians (i.e., the majority who accept these 'Laws') impose them on nature . What little evidence dialecticians supply to substantiate these 'Laws' is not only woefully insufficient, it is highly contentious -- to say the least.
Anyone who has studied and practiced genuine science will know the lengths to which researchers have to go to alter even minor aspects of current theory, let alone justify major changes in the way we view nature.
In stark contrast, and without exception, dialecticians offer a few paragraphs of trite (and over-used) clichés to support their claims. Hence, all we find are hackneyed references to things like boiling water, balding heads, plants 'negating' seeds, Mamelukes fighting the French, a character from Molière suddenly discovering that he speaks prose, and the like, all constantly retailed, year in, year out.
From such banalities, dialecticians suddenly derive universal laws, applicable everywhere and at all times.
....
The First 'Law', the alleged change of quantity into quality, ignores the many cases in nature where change is not "nodal":
Quote:
"Hegel invented the nodal line of measure relations, in which small quantitative changes at a certain point give rise to a qualitative leap. The example is often given of water, which boils at 100oC at normal atmospheric pressure. As the temperature nears boiling point, the increase in heat does not immediately cause the water molecules to fly apart. Until it reaches boiling point, the water keeps its volume. It remains water, because of the attraction of the molecules for each other. However, the steady change in temperature has the effect of increasing the motion of the molecules. The volume between the atoms is gradually increased, to the point where the force of attraction is insufficient to hold the molecules together. At precisely 100oC, any increase in heat energy will cause the molecules to fly apart, producing steam." [Woods and Grant (1995), p.49.]
But, not everything in nature changes in this way; consider melting glass, metal, rock, butter and plastic. No nodal points anywhere in sight, here. Do Woods and Grant (do any other DM-theorists) consider these counter-examples? Are you kidding? In this part Rosa Liechtenstein claims that the laws of dialectics are imposed on nature and that most of evidence for these laws are over used "clichés". She reproduces one of these often used examples of water boiling by presenting us a quote from the book "Reason in Revolt" by Ted Grant and Alan Woods. (Which is a rather incorrect description of boiling actually)
She then states that in most cases there aren't even nodal points and gives some examples (Melting: Metal, rock, butter and plastic) which she claims are simply ignored by people who adhere dialectics. Well, let's see if there are any nodal points to find here.
First of all let us look at what a solid is. At a molecular level a solid is characterised by molecules that are bonded together by inter or intra molecular forces which causes the molecules to be very static compared to molecules in the gas or water phase. The only motion these molecules are able to make are oscillations. Because of the different kind of forces between the molecules and because of the different ways they can be orientated, there are different classes of solids: metals, various kinds of crystals, glasses,.... All these classes have there own distinct qualities and quantities.
Now let us return to water, this time in its solid form: ice. When we heat up ice the molecules in the crystal structure gain more energy and begin to oscillate more and more. At a certain point the heat added gives the individual water molecules enough energy to overcome the bonds between themselves and the other molecules (In this case hydrogen bonds) so they can now move freely around(or more scientifically: translate), in other words the solid became a liquid. Everyone knows that relatively pure water melts at 0 °C. Before this temperature we don't see any change, ice doesn't become more and more liquid, on the contrary it changes immediately.
This is the case for any more or less pure substance. It happens so sudden at a given temperature which is specific for every material, in the past the determination of the melting temperature was often used to identify a compound.(Today more easy and accurate methods are used) If the substance is dilutedthis melting point can lower or even not happen at all, we will than find an interval(mostly a couple of degrees) at which the substance melts. This is because of the fact that the different compounds in the substance start to at a different temperature instantly. Therefore this method is often used to see how pure a certain substance is.
Now lets continue and take a look at the examples that were given by Rosa. Let us start with metal. For some reason Rosa claims that metals don't melt like ice does, that it becomes gradually a liquid. First of all this shows she has little knowledge of science and confuses different phenomena.
Melting a metal is quite the same as melting ice, at a certain temperature the metal ions gains enough energy to escape from the crystal structure. What she probably confuses with the process of melting is the fact that metals can be bend and manipulated more easily at higher temperatures. The fact that metals are easier to deform at higher temperatures is a direct consequence of the nature of the metal bonding. In a metal the individual atom has released some of its outer shell electrons. These positive charged atoms are called ions and are organised in a crystal structure, around these ions the electrons they gave away move freely. One of the effects is that this kind of bond is extremely durable, but also can be bended because the space and orientation of the metal ions can change without breaking the bond.
If we heat up the metal the bonds become less strong and so we are able to change the place the ions more simply. However, this doesn't make the metal a liquid. The ions are still firmly on their place and if we don't exert any force will stay there.
Now lets look at glass. Glasses are class of solid on there own, they're characterised by an amorphous structure.(They aren't arranged in a crystal structure). Rosa confused in this case the same phenomena. This time the flexibility of the product to bending at higher temperatures is a consequence of the structure and not the type of bonding. A crystal would mostly brake if we tried to bend it, even at higher temperatures. The fact it is amorphous makes it possible for the molecules in the solid to change place when bend without necessarily breaking the bond. It's kind of analogue to the metal.
The rock and the butter are more difficult to explain. Rock seems to melt gradually, however this is not the case. Rock consists of a range of different kinds of crystals and the composition differs from rock to rock. The melting of a rock is difficult process. To put it most simple: different crystals melt at their own melting temperature. When a rock melts it is thus a mixture of solids and liquids.
Butter is a water in oil emulsion. In other words, very tiny bubbles of water which are enclosed by the milk proteins are spread through the solid oil. These bubbles are one of the reasons why butter is as easily spread if we exert force on it. However, this doesn't make it a liquid yet. If you put the butter in the pan and heat it you'll see the oil melt, the water boil away and the proteins will probably disintegrate because of the heat. Though a multitude of reactions happen, both chemical and physical, the melting itself stills happens nodal.
For plastics I cannot provide an answer, simply because this term is far to vague and covers a wide range of materials.
In all the above examples, we can clearly see that the quantitative addition of heat results in a qualitative sudden change: melting.
Let's continue to see what Rosa has to say:
And not every change in quality is produced by quantitative differences (contrary to what Engels said):
Quote:
"...the transformation of quantity into quality and vice versa. For our purpose, we could express this by saying that in nature, in a manner exactly fixed for each individual case, qualitative changes can only occur by the quantitative addition or subtraction of matter or motion (so-called energy)…. Hence it is impossible to alter the quality of a body without addition or subtraction of matter or motion, i.e. without quantitative alteration of the body concerned." [Engels (1954), p.63.]
There are in fact countless changes in quality that are not determined in this way. For example, there are certain molecules that have exactly the same material content and energy levels as one another, but are qualitatively dissimilar because of the different spatial arrangement of their constituent atoms. These are called 'Stereoisomers'.
So, here we have a change in quality produced by change in geometry, not quantity.
Here Rosa shows she even manages to confuse between on the one hand change and on the other difference. Not any sane dialectician would claim that things can't differ even though they have the same material and energetic properties. Rosa proves this in the quote above. However, the first law of dialectics is not about difference but about how things become something different, in other words: how the change.
For a certain sterioisomers to change in another one, we would still have to add energy to break bonds before the atoms of this molecule could get a different spacing. Ironically Rosa her own example turns against her.
I hope I was able to show in this post that Rosa Liechtenstein in order to show that the laws of dialectics were imposed upon nature, she made grave scientific errors. In the end it even turns out that the dialectic law was observed after all.
In her essays many more of these scientific errors can be found. I'm willing to post them and correct them if people are interested.
It was one of the first times I found such an extensive text against dialectics, so I started reading.
However, I soon found some scientific arguments that aren't correct and wanted to reply to these. The arguments I want to reply to are more of a scientific character than a pure philosophical, so maybe the thread isn't entirely in the right place... I'll leave it to the moderators to judge about this. Let's get on to the serious business.
The first part will be about her "refutation" of the first of three dialectic laws, the law of a change of quantity at a certain stage resulting in a change of quality.
All dialecticians (i.e., the majority who accept these 'Laws') impose them on nature . What little evidence dialecticians supply to substantiate these 'Laws' is not only woefully insufficient, it is highly contentious -- to say the least.
Anyone who has studied and practiced genuine science will know the lengths to which researchers have to go to alter even minor aspects of current theory, let alone justify major changes in the way we view nature.
In stark contrast, and without exception, dialecticians offer a few paragraphs of trite (and over-used) clichés to support their claims. Hence, all we find are hackneyed references to things like boiling water, balding heads, plants 'negating' seeds, Mamelukes fighting the French, a character from Molière suddenly discovering that he speaks prose, and the like, all constantly retailed, year in, year out.
From such banalities, dialecticians suddenly derive universal laws, applicable everywhere and at all times.
....
The First 'Law', the alleged change of quantity into quality, ignores the many cases in nature where change is not "nodal":
Quote:
"Hegel invented the nodal line of measure relations, in which small quantitative changes at a certain point give rise to a qualitative leap. The example is often given of water, which boils at 100oC at normal atmospheric pressure. As the temperature nears boiling point, the increase in heat does not immediately cause the water molecules to fly apart. Until it reaches boiling point, the water keeps its volume. It remains water, because of the attraction of the molecules for each other. However, the steady change in temperature has the effect of increasing the motion of the molecules. The volume between the atoms is gradually increased, to the point where the force of attraction is insufficient to hold the molecules together. At precisely 100oC, any increase in heat energy will cause the molecules to fly apart, producing steam." [Woods and Grant (1995), p.49.]
But, not everything in nature changes in this way; consider melting glass, metal, rock, butter and plastic. No nodal points anywhere in sight, here. Do Woods and Grant (do any other DM-theorists) consider these counter-examples? Are you kidding? In this part Rosa Liechtenstein claims that the laws of dialectics are imposed on nature and that most of evidence for these laws are over used "clichés". She reproduces one of these often used examples of water boiling by presenting us a quote from the book "Reason in Revolt" by Ted Grant and Alan Woods. (Which is a rather incorrect description of boiling actually)
She then states that in most cases there aren't even nodal points and gives some examples (Melting: Metal, rock, butter and plastic) which she claims are simply ignored by people who adhere dialectics. Well, let's see if there are any nodal points to find here.
First of all let us look at what a solid is. At a molecular level a solid is characterised by molecules that are bonded together by inter or intra molecular forces which causes the molecules to be very static compared to molecules in the gas or water phase. The only motion these molecules are able to make are oscillations. Because of the different kind of forces between the molecules and because of the different ways they can be orientated, there are different classes of solids: metals, various kinds of crystals, glasses,.... All these classes have there own distinct qualities and quantities.
Now let us return to water, this time in its solid form: ice. When we heat up ice the molecules in the crystal structure gain more energy and begin to oscillate more and more. At a certain point the heat added gives the individual water molecules enough energy to overcome the bonds between themselves and the other molecules (In this case hydrogen bonds) so they can now move freely around(or more scientifically: translate), in other words the solid became a liquid. Everyone knows that relatively pure water melts at 0 °C. Before this temperature we don't see any change, ice doesn't become more and more liquid, on the contrary it changes immediately.
This is the case for any more or less pure substance. It happens so sudden at a given temperature which is specific for every material, in the past the determination of the melting temperature was often used to identify a compound.(Today more easy and accurate methods are used) If the substance is dilutedthis melting point can lower or even not happen at all, we will than find an interval(mostly a couple of degrees) at which the substance melts. This is because of the fact that the different compounds in the substance start to at a different temperature instantly. Therefore this method is often used to see how pure a certain substance is.
Now lets continue and take a look at the examples that were given by Rosa. Let us start with metal. For some reason Rosa claims that metals don't melt like ice does, that it becomes gradually a liquid. First of all this shows she has little knowledge of science and confuses different phenomena.
Melting a metal is quite the same as melting ice, at a certain temperature the metal ions gains enough energy to escape from the crystal structure. What she probably confuses with the process of melting is the fact that metals can be bend and manipulated more easily at higher temperatures. The fact that metals are easier to deform at higher temperatures is a direct consequence of the nature of the metal bonding. In a metal the individual atom has released some of its outer shell electrons. These positive charged atoms are called ions and are organised in a crystal structure, around these ions the electrons they gave away move freely. One of the effects is that this kind of bond is extremely durable, but also can be bended because the space and orientation of the metal ions can change without breaking the bond.
If we heat up the metal the bonds become less strong and so we are able to change the place the ions more simply. However, this doesn't make the metal a liquid. The ions are still firmly on their place and if we don't exert any force will stay there.
Now lets look at glass. Glasses are class of solid on there own, they're characterised by an amorphous structure.(They aren't arranged in a crystal structure). Rosa confused in this case the same phenomena. This time the flexibility of the product to bending at higher temperatures is a consequence of the structure and not the type of bonding. A crystal would mostly brake if we tried to bend it, even at higher temperatures. The fact it is amorphous makes it possible for the molecules in the solid to change place when bend without necessarily breaking the bond. It's kind of analogue to the metal.
The rock and the butter are more difficult to explain. Rock seems to melt gradually, however this is not the case. Rock consists of a range of different kinds of crystals and the composition differs from rock to rock. The melting of a rock is difficult process. To put it most simple: different crystals melt at their own melting temperature. When a rock melts it is thus a mixture of solids and liquids.
Butter is a water in oil emulsion. In other words, very tiny bubbles of water which are enclosed by the milk proteins are spread through the solid oil. These bubbles are one of the reasons why butter is as easily spread if we exert force on it. However, this doesn't make it a liquid yet. If you put the butter in the pan and heat it you'll see the oil melt, the water boil away and the proteins will probably disintegrate because of the heat. Though a multitude of reactions happen, both chemical and physical, the melting itself stills happens nodal.
For plastics I cannot provide an answer, simply because this term is far to vague and covers a wide range of materials.
In all the above examples, we can clearly see that the quantitative addition of heat results in a qualitative sudden change: melting.
Let's continue to see what Rosa has to say:
And not every change in quality is produced by quantitative differences (contrary to what Engels said):
Quote:
"...the transformation of quantity into quality and vice versa. For our purpose, we could express this by saying that in nature, in a manner exactly fixed for each individual case, qualitative changes can only occur by the quantitative addition or subtraction of matter or motion (so-called energy)…. Hence it is impossible to alter the quality of a body without addition or subtraction of matter or motion, i.e. without quantitative alteration of the body concerned." [Engels (1954), p.63.]
There are in fact countless changes in quality that are not determined in this way. For example, there are certain molecules that have exactly the same material content and energy levels as one another, but are qualitatively dissimilar because of the different spatial arrangement of their constituent atoms. These are called 'Stereoisomers'.
So, here we have a change in quality produced by change in geometry, not quantity.
Here Rosa shows she even manages to confuse between on the one hand change and on the other difference. Not any sane dialectician would claim that things can't differ even though they have the same material and energetic properties. Rosa proves this in the quote above. However, the first law of dialectics is not about difference but about how things become something different, in other words: how the change.
For a certain sterioisomers to change in another one, we would still have to add energy to break bonds before the atoms of this molecule could get a different spacing. Ironically Rosa her own example turns against her.
I hope I was able to show in this post that Rosa Liechtenstein in order to show that the laws of dialectics were imposed upon nature, she made grave scientific errors. In the end it even turns out that the dialectic law was observed after all.
In her essays many more of these scientific errors can be found. I'm willing to post them and correct them if people are interested.