What is 'Dialectics'?

[fashbash]

I've heard 'Dialectics' mentioned a lot on this site, but I have no idea what it is. Is it relevant to actual leftist thinking? And more importantly, is it relevant to actual leftist activity? Tell me more!

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

No, it's a hang-over from an ancient, mystical view of nature and of change -- of absolutely no use to anyone (except, perhaps, those looking for consolation for the fact that Dialectical Marxism is such a long-term failure).

There are threads here that link to sites that will explain this 'theory' to you, but this introductory essay of mine will explain why it is so useless (and mistaken), as well as provide you with links to sites that take the opposite view:

http://anonym.to/?http://homepage.ntlworld...Oppose%20DM.htm (http://anonym.to/?http://homepage.ntlworld.com/rosa.l/Why%20I%20Oppose%20DM.htm)

Try here too:

http://www.revleft.com/index.php?showtopic...entry1292314645 (http://www.revleft.com/index.php?showtopic=66348&st=25&#entry1292314645)

However, may I suggest you alter your signature slightly, since it suggests I disagree with Marx!

And you have my name slightly wrong!

[Faceless]

I don't have the desire to get into a debate with Rosa about how true dialectics is. I can tell you what Marxists understand by it. Dialectical Materialism is a way of looking at the world.

To Marxists, the world is always in motion, and motion is inherent in everything. Nothing is entirely static. Things can move through an internal impetus caused by contradicting but inseperable elements.

"For dialectical philosophy nothing is final, absolute, sacred. It reveals the transitory character of everything and in everything; nothing can endure before it except the uninterrupted process of becoming and of passing away, of endless ascendancy from the lower to the higher." -Engels

For instance, society evolves through the contradiction between classes, the life of a star is dominated by the opposing forces of outward pressure and inwardly collapsing gravity etc. So basically, dialectics claims to deal with the evolution of something caused by its internal contradictions. This is as opposed to seeing something as just reacting to entirely external forces.

For example, you can ask the question, "what happens if i apply an external force on this ball?" It will probably move under the pressure of that force. However, the fact is that the ball will apply an opposite force on you and a more accurate description of what is happening will consider these opposing forces from the perspective of yourself and this object as a totality with mutually contradicting (but entirely interdependent) forces.

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

We must thank Faceless for repeating the tired old nostrums, that do not work, and have been shown not to work.

For example:


For example, you can ask the question, "what happens if i apply an external force on this ball?" It will probably move under the pressure of that force. However, the fact is that the ball will apply an opposite force on you and a more accurate description of what is happening will consider these opposing forces from the perspective of yourself and this object as a totality with mutually contradicting (but entirely interdependent) forces.

Modern physics has abandoned 'forces' (except as an heuristic device for those who do not know the mathematics) in its account of reality, preferring to speak only of 'exchange of momentum'.

And this is no surprise, since Faceless, and anyone else who has uses this word, will not be able to tell you what 'forces' are, except they have to use animistic terms to do so.

Even Engels had to admit this. See below:


Mechanical materialism holds that all things are set in motion by an external 'push' of some sort. In contrast, dialecticians claim that because of their 'internal contradictions', objects and processes in nature and society are 'self-moving'.

Lenin expressed this idea as follows:

"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. The two basic (or two possible? or two historically observable?) conceptions of development (evolution) are: development as decrease and increase, as repetition, and development as a unity of opposites (the division of a unity into mutually exclusive opposites and their reciprocal relation).

"In the first conception of motion, self-movement, its driving force, its source, its motive, remains in the shade (or this source is made external -- God, subject, etc.). In the second conception the chief attention is directed precisely to knowledge of the source of 'self-movement'.

"The first conception is lifeless, pale and dry. The second is living. The second alone furnishes the key to the 'self-movement' of everything existing; it alone furnishes the key to the 'leaps,' to the 'break in continuity,' to the 'transformation into the opposite,' to the destruction of the old and the emergence of the new." [Lenin (1961), pp.357-58.]

There are a number of serious problems with this passage, not the least of which is that it clearly suggests that things are self-moving. In fact, Lenin did more than just suggest this, he insisted upon it:

"Dialectical logic demands that we go further…. [It] requires that an object should be taken in development, in 'self-movement' (as Hegel sometimes puts it)…." [Lenin (1921), p.90. Bold emphases in the original. Italic emphasis added.]

Other Marxists talk the same way; here are comrades Woods and Grant (readers will note, I am sure, how they impose this doctrine on nature):

"Dialectics explains that change and motion involve contradiction and can only take place through contradictions.... Dialectics is the logic of contradiction....

"So fundamental is this idea to dialectics that Marx and Engels considered motion to be the most basic characteristic of matter.... [Referring to a quote from Aristotle] [t]his is not the mechanical conception of motion as something imparted to an inert mass by an external 'force' but an entirely different notion of matter as self-moving....

"The essential point of dialectical thought is not that it is based on the idea of change and motion but that it views motion and change as phenomena based on contradiction.... 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 unity and interpenetration of opposites....

"The universal phenomena of the unity of opposites is, in reality, the motor-force of all motion and development in nature. It is the reason why it is not necessary to introduce the concept of external impulse to explain movement and change -- the fundamental weakness of all mechanistic theories. 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....

"...Matter is self-moving and self-organising." [Woods and Grant (1995), pp.43-45, 47, 68, 72. Bold emphases added.]

But, if this were so, nothing in nature would or could have any effect on anything else. Hence, while you might think that it is your kick that moves a ball, according to the above, the ball moves itself.

Now, in order to avoid such absurd consequences, dialecticians have had to allow for the existence of "external contradictions", which are somehow also involved in such changes. [More details here.]

But, as seems obvious, this makes a mockery of the idea that all change is internally-generated, just as it undermines the contrast drawn above between mechanical and 'dialectical' theories of motion. Indeed, what becomes of Lenin's "insistence", if everything that changes in fact violates this caveat?

Also, DM-theorists appeal to "internal contradictions" in order to undercut theism (there was a flavour of this too in the Woods and Grant quotation above):

"The second dogmatic assumption of mechanism is the assumption that no change can ever happen except by the action of some external cause.

"Just as no part of a machine moves unless another part acts on it and makes it move, so mechanism sees matter as being inert -- without motion, or rather without self-motion. For mechanism, nothing ever moves unless something else pushes or pulls is, it never changes unless something else interferes with it.

"No wonder that, regarding matter in this way, the mechanists had to believe in a Supreme Being to give the "initial push"....

"No, the world was not created by a Supreme Being. Any particular organisation of matter, any particular process of matter in motion, has an origin and a beginning.... But matter in motion had no origin, no beginning....

"So in studying the causes of change, we should not merely seek for external causes of change, but should above all seek for the source of change within the process itself, in its own self-movement, in the inner impulses to development contained in things themselves." [Cornforth (1976), pp.40-43.]

But, if external causes are now permitted in order to stop this theory becoming absurd (as we saw above), then that will simply allow 'god' to sneak back in through a side door.

Of course, all this is independent of whether or not it makes sense to say that anything in nature or society can be described as a "contradiction". Dialecticians, following Hegel, certainly believe they can, but up until now they have merely been content to assert this for a fact, forgetting the proof. Hegel's authority -- that of an Idealist -- is sufficient apparently. And it is worth recalling that Hegels' use of this term in this way was based on a crass piece of sub-Aristotelian logic.

But even if all objects and processes actually possessed "internal contradictions", just as DM-theorists suppose, this would still not explain why anything actually moved or changed.

In fact, as is easy to confirm, dialecticians have been hopelessly unclear as to whether things change because of (1) their internal contradictions (and/or opposites), or (2) whether they change into these opposites, or, indeed, (3) whether they create such opposites when they change. [Details here.]

Of course, if the third option were the case, the alleged opposites could not cause change, since they would be produced by it, not the other way round. And they could scarcely be 'internal opposites' if they were produced by change.

If the second alternative were correct, then we would see things like males naturally turning into females, the capitalist class into the working class, electrons into protons, left hands into right hands, and vice versa. and a host of of other oddities. [On this, see here.]

And as far as the first option is concerned, it is worth making the following points:

[A] If objects/processes change because of already existing internal opposites, and they change into these opposites, then they cannot change, since those opposites must already exist. So, if object/process A is already a dialectical union of A and not-A, and it 'changes' into not-A, where is the change? All that seems to happen is that A disappears. [And do not ask where it disappears to!]

At the very least, this account of change leaves it entirely mysterious how not-A itself came about. It seems to have popped into existence from nowhere.

[It cannot have come from A, since A can only change because of the operation of not-A, which does not exist yet! And pushing the process into the past will merely reduplicate the above problems.]

[B] Exactly how an (internal) opposite is capable of making anything change is somewhat unclear, too. Given the above, not-A does not actually alter A, it merely replaces it!

Now, in order to answer such questions, dialecticians have appealed to forces (of attraction and repulsion) to explain how and why these obscure 'contradictions' are capable of actually moving bits of matter about the place.

Unfortunately, the nature of forces is a mystery even to this day; this is one reason why scientists have abandoned them, preferring to talk about exchange of energy and momentum instead.

Of course, in popular and school physics, people still talk about forces, but since there is no way of giving them any sort of physical sense (other than as part of a vector field, etc.), advanced physics translates forces in the way indicated. Indeed, in Relativity Theory, the 'force' of gravity has been replaced by the movement of objects along "geodesics".

Even Woods and Grant concede this point:

"Gravity is not a 'force,' but a relation between real objects. To a man falling off a high building, it seems that the ground is 'rushing towards him.' From the standpoint of relativity, that observation is not wrong. Only if we adopt the mechanistic and one-sided concept of 'force' do we view this process as the earth's gravity pulling the man downwards, instead of seeing that it is precisely the interaction of two bodies upon each other." [Woods and Grant (1995), p.156.]

However, Woods and Grant failed to tell us how such a "relation" can make anything move; still less do they reveal how these items are 'opposites', let alone 'internal opposites'.

As Max Jammer notes:

"[The eliminability of force]...is not confined to the force of gravitation. The question of whether forces of any kind do exist, or do not and are only conventions, ha[s] become the subject of heated debates....

"In quantum chromodynamics, gauge theories, and the so-called Standard Model the notion of 'force' is treated only as an exchange of momentum and therefore replaced by the ontologically less demanding concept of 'interaction' between particles, which manifests itself by the exchange of different particles that mediate this interaction...." [Jammer (1999), p.v.]

This is re-iterated by Professor Wilzcek (of MIT):

"The paradox deepens when we consider force from the perspective of modern physics. In fact, the concept of force is conspicuously absent from our most advanced formulations of the basic laws. It doesn't appear in Schrödinger's equation, or in any reasonable formulation of quantum field theory, or in the foundations of general relativity. Astute observers commented on this trend to eliminate force even before the emergence of relativity and quantum mechanics.

"In his 1895 Dynamics, the prominent physicist Peter G. Tait, who was a close friend and collaborator of Lord Kelvin and James Clerk Maxwell, wrote

"'In all methods and systems which involve the idea of force there is a leaven of artificiality...there is no necessity for the introduction of the word 'force' nor of the sense−suggested ideas on which it was originally based.'"

This is probably why Engels himself said the following:

"When two bodies act on each other…they either attract each other or they repel each other…in short, the old polar opposites of attraction and repulsion…. It is expressly to be noted that attraction and repulsion are not regarded here as so-called 'forces', but as simple forms of motion." [Engels (1954), p.71. Bold emphasis added. A copy of this can be found here.]

But, if there are no classical forces, then there can't be any (dialectical) contradictions in nature --, 'external' or 'internal' (or, at least, none that could make anything happen).

Hence, even if there were such 'contradictions' in nature, they would do no work, and DM, the erstwhile philosophy of change, would not be able to account for it.

Faced with this, some DM-apologists have tried to argue that modern science is either dominated by 'positivism', or is 'reactionary'. In other words, to save their theory, they are prepared to cling on to an animistic view of nature, one that even Engels was ready to abandon.

More here (links and references ommitted from the above):

http://anonym.to/?http://anonym.to/%3Fhttp...Oppose%20DM.htm (http://anonym.to/?http://anonym.to/%3Fhttp://homepage.ntlworld.com/rosa.l/Why%20I%20Oppose%20DM.htm)

[Janus]

Please use the search engine, there have been countless threads on dialectics and dialectical materialism in Learning and Philosophy.

[Luís Henrique]

Originally posted by [email protected] 13, 2007 03:51 pm
Please use the search engine, there have been countless threads on dialectics and dialectical materialism in Learning and Philosophy.
They are, however, useless, since any possibility of debate is choked under a pile of insults and intellectual snobberish.

Luís Henrique

[Faceless]

Modern physics has abandoned 'forces' (except as an heuristic device for those who do not know the mathematics) in its account of reality, preferring to speak only of 'exchange of momentum'.

And this is no surprise, since Faceless, and anyone else who has uses this word, will not be able to tell you what 'forces' are, except they have to use animistic terms to do so.

Force is defined as rate of change of momentum.

Of those 9 words, which of them is borrowed from "animism"?? :huh:

[EDIT]:
please Rosa, you have given us the link to your website, and you have copied and pasted a large chunk of it into this thread. I told fashbash what I consider, and what many other marxists consider, dialectics means. fashbash can make of these ideas what he will. You and I have nothing to gain by insulting eachother, and burying this thread in the way LH described.

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

LH:


They are, however, useless, since any possibility of debate is choked under a pile of insults and intellectual snobberish.

Yes, Dialectical Mystics will stoop to any level....

[Janus]

They are, however, useless, since any possibility of debate is choked under a pile of insults and intellectual snobberish.
Yes, I agree which is why we should keep this as a purely introductory thread.

[Hit The North]

fashbash,

This is a good article on the importance of the dialectic in Marxist social theory HERE (http://www.marxists.org/reference/subject/philosophy/works/en/wilde1.htm)

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

Not really; Wilde has clearly no idea what a formal contradiction is (and you do not either), so his comments on the relation between dialectical 'logic' and formal logic are worthless.

And since Marx said he merely "coquetted" with a few bits of Hegelian jargon, and only in a few places in Capital, even he would have disgreed with Wilde.

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

Faceless:


Force is defined as rate of change of momentum.

Of those 9 words, which of them is borrowed from "animism"??

Well, even Engels admitted 'force' was:


"All natural processes are two-sided, they are based on the relation of at least two operative parts, action and reaction. The notion of force, however, owing to its origin from the action of the human organism on the external world…" [Dialectics of Nature, p.82.]

Hence your definition is what is called a replacement definition -- and that is why physicists do not use the term (except in the way I said).


please Rosa, you have given us the link to your website, and you have copied and pasted a large chunk of it into this thread. I told fashbash what I consider, and what many other marxists consider, dialectics means. fashbash can make of these ideas what he will. You and I have nothing to gain by insulting eachother, and burying this thread in the way LH described.

I did give the link; and I only give as good as I get (often better) -- so if you do not start, I won't.

[ÑóẊîöʼn]

Dialectics is a tautology - a very fancy and long-winded way of saying the bloody obvious.


Originally posted by Faceless
For example, you can ask the question, "what happens if i apply an external force on this ball?" It will probably move under the pressure of that force. However, the fact is that the ball will apply an opposite force on you and a more accurate description of what is happening will consider these opposing forces from the perspective of yourself and this object as a totality with mutually contradicting (but entirely interdependent) forces.

Physicists know this, and 99.99% they didn't come to know such things through dialectics.

How, for example, would dialectics apply to quantum mechanics, or either of the theories of relativity?

[Hit The North]

Originally posted by NoXion+May 13, 2007 05:54 pm--> (NoXion @ May 13, 2007 05:54 pm)Dialectics is a tautology - a very fancy and long-winded way of saying the bloody obvious.


Faceless
For example, you can ask the question, "what happens if i apply an external force on this ball?" It will probably move under the pressure of that force. However, the fact is that the ball will apply an opposite force on you and a more accurate description of what is happening will consider these opposing forces from the perspective of yourself and this object as a totality with mutually contradicting (but entirely interdependent) forces.

Physicists know this, and 99.99% they didn't come to know such things through dialectics.

How, for example, would dialectics apply to quantum mechanics, or either of the theories of relativity?[/b]
It strikes me that these questions are irrelevant for Marxists (or at least should be). Marx never employed the dialectic to explain a nature which is external to human agency, he used it to chart the motion of human history (and was concerned with nature only in so much as it inter-relates with that history).

The material dialectic should not be used to explain natural phenomenon, this clearly should be left to natural scientists. However, it could be useful in examining the relations which exist between science (as a form of social practice), and the wider mode of production and the ideological emanations of that mode.

The scientific status of Marxism - and the usefulness of a dialectic method - depends not on how well it explains nature, but how well it explains and helps to predict human society and history.

[ÑóẊîöʼn]

The material dialectic should not be used to explain natural phenomenon, this clearly should be left to natural scientists. However, it could be useful in examining the relations which exist between science (as a form of social practice), and the wider mode of production and the ideological emanations of that mode.

My point was that if natural sciences can do without dialectics, why not the social sciences? Marxism is perfectly understandable without dialectics, making it extraneous.

[Hit The North]

Originally posted by [email protected] 13, 2007 06:17 pm

The material dialectic should not be used to explain natural phenomenon, this clearly should be left to natural scientists. However, it could be useful in examining the relations which exist between science (as a form of social practice), and the wider mode of production and the ideological emanations of that mode.

My point was that if natural sciences can do without dialectics, why not the social sciences? Marxism is perfectly understandable without dialectics, making it extraneous.
Well, that's obviously a much more pertinent question. As far as I can tell, social sciences which do not employ a dialectic method tend to lapse into either a strictly deterministic or voluntaristic view of social life.

The element which social science has to contend with and natural science does not, is human consciousness and action based on motivation.

[Faceless]

Dialectics is a tautology - a very fancy and long-winded way of saying the bloody obvious.


QUOTE (Faceless)
For example, you can ask the question, "what happens if i apply an external force on this ball?" It will probably move under the pressure of that force. However, the fact is that the ball will apply an opposite force on you and a more accurate description of what is happening will consider these opposing forces from the perspective of yourself and this object as a totality with mutually contradicting (but entirely interdependent) forces.



Physicists know this, and 99.99% they didn't come to know such things through dialectics.

How, for example, would dialectics apply to quantum mechanics, or either of the theories of relativity?
Bloody obvious it may be. Indeed, dialectics is simple to a child like extent, I would agree with you. I did not even disagree that physicists have come to understand this on their own, and have their own methods. However, many physicists have come to incorrect conclusions. Scientists have spent years trying to find patterns in earthquakes when these systems have now been shown to be chaotic by nature. and quantum mechanics has been interpreted by quite eminent physicists to mean that only in the act of observing something does it become real. A completely Idealist interpretation. To quote Engels:

Probably the same gentlemen who up to now have decried the transformation of quantity into quality as mysticism and incomprehensible transcendentalism will now declare that it is indeed something quite self-evident, trivial, and commonplace, which they have long employed, and so they have been taught nothing new.

But to have formulated for the first time in its universally valid form a general law of development of nature, society, and thought, will always remain an act of historic importance. And if these gentlemen have for years caused quantity and quality to be transformed into one another, without knowing what they did, then they will have to console themselves with Moliere's Monsieur Jourdain who had spoken prose all his life without having the slightest inkling of it.

In terms of investigating society scientifically, it is much more common that this "tautology" as you put it is questioned by bourgeois intellectuals. The "common sense" view is that capitalism is unchanging, that there is nothing to be gained at looking at society as a totality with contradicting classes. Elementary as dialectics may seem, there are still people who do not accept it. And therefore it becomes of a fundamental importance.

[Faceless]

Well, even Engels admitted 'force' was:


QUOTE
"All natural processes are two-sided, they are based on the relation of at least two operative parts, action and reaction. The notion of force, however, owing to its origin from the action of the human organism on the external world…" [Dialectics of Nature, p.82.]



Hence your definition is what is called a replacement definition -- and that is why physicists do not use the term (except in the way I said).

My definition is not a replacement definition. This is the definition of Force which goes back to Newton. However, it remains the case, if you wish to talk of things in terms of momentum, that a thing can not be made to change its momentum without conserving momentum and giving something else an equal but opposite change of momentum. Engels is precisely right that natural processes are two sided. I was trying to illustrate this with my picture of a human organism pushing a ball. That the ball also pushes back on the human organism. I have never denied the idea of a single force being one-sided. There is always a reaction for every action.

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

Faceless:


My definition is not a replacement definition. This is the definition of Force which goes back to Newton. However, it remains the case, if you wish to talk of things in terms of momentum, that a thing can not be made to change its momentum without conserving momentum and giving something else an equal but opposite change of momentum. Engels is precisely right that natural processes are two sided. I was trying to illustrate this with my picture of a human organism pushing a ball. That the ball also pushes back on the human organism. I have never denied the idea of a single force being one-sided. There is always a reaction for every action.

Well, this just makes your theory animistic then. Newton's idea of force was demonstrably animistic -- I provide references at my site to books and articles that show this.

And Newton's third law cannot be implicated in this theory of yours since his forces are not contradictions.

Indeed, opposite momentums are not dialectical momentums, for reasons outlined in that passage from my essay (above), and in far more detail at my site.

And, you will find an excellent critique of Newton's view of forces in Schelling (and an inferior one to that in Hegel!).

[So these two Idealists were more advanced that you are.]

Hence, you need to update your knowledge of Physics; as the quotes I included above show, the idea of a 'force' has been progressively abandoned since the 1870's.

And, once more it is not hard to see why: it is impossible to say what these obscure things are, short of a reference being made to relative motion (as Engels tries to do), and as soon as you do that, the internal relations dialectical materialsm needs go out of the window.

Opposite motions are the 'external relations' of 'crude materialism'.

So, current physics is more like crude materialism -- at least here.

Now, I am not endorsing this view of matter, just pointing out that the old animistic Newtonian forces (which were of no use to dialectics anyway, since they are not contradictions) have been replaced in modern physics.

[Unfortunately, this now means that no one can explain why anything happens!]

[ÑóẊîöʼn]

Originally posted by Faceless+--> (Faceless)However, many physicists have come to incorrect conclusions. Scientists have spent years trying to find patterns in earthquakes when these systems have now been shown to be chaotic by nature.[/b]

Chaotic =/= predictable by dialectics I'm afraid. If you mean what I think you mean by chaotic, then perhaps some kind of application of Chaos theory could be useful?

With regard to earthquakes, I always understand them as happening like so: pressure between continental plates builds up until it exceeds the shear strength of the continental substrate, resulting in an earthquake.

If I'm correct, that means the phenomenon I just mentioned can be explained using normal logic and ordinary scientific language, rendering dialectics a bit of a waste of time - why faff about learning dialectical terminology when you can simply use what's already being used and get on with the real business of studying earthquakes?


and quantum mechanics has been interpreted by quite eminent physicists to mean that only in the act of observing something does it become real. A completely Idealist interpretation.

Ah yes, the Copenhagen Interpretation. Remember that is only one of several possible interpretations of quantum mechanics, and far from being idealist (Perhaps you're confusing it with the Consciousness causes collapse (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Consciousness_causes_collapse) interpretation - quantum mystics would like you to believe it so) it is more of a hasty fudge attempting to explain behaviour that would be completely anomalous on the macroscale.

Personally, I favour the "Many Worlds" interpretation (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Many-worlds_interpretation)


In terms of investigating society scientifically, it is much more common that this "tautology" as you put it is questioned by bourgeois intellectuals. The "common sense" view is that capitalism is unchanging, that there is nothing to be gained at looking at society as a totality with contradicting classes. Elementary as dialectics may seem, there are still people who do not accept it. And therefore it becomes of a fundamental importance.

Historical materialism also shows that societies change and evolve*, and that class struggle exists - it tends to be a much better tool for examining human societies, as it refers to entities and concepts in plain language that can be understood by most people with an IQ greater than a mushroom.

*One only has to look at history to disprove the bourgeois intellectuals' ridiculous assertion of unchanging capitalism.


Citizen Zero
The element which social science has to contend with and natural science does not, is human consciousness and action based on motivation.

Humans are more predictable than you think. Motivations can be studied and rationalised - a helpful pointer is to study the balance between selfish and altruistic behaviour, but without making value judgements like bourgeois sociologists do - otherwise one ends up with complete cack such as Social Darwinism.

[Hit The North]

NoXion:


Humans are more predictable than you think.

If that is the case, why is there no universal scientifically agreed account of human behaviour?

[stevensen]

let fashbash find out for himself whether he agress with rosa or not... btw fashbash just type dialectics in google and u can come up with many sites that explain this

[Faceless]

Ah yes, the Copenhagen Interpretation. Remember that is only one of several possible interpretations of quantum mechanics, and far from being idealist (Perhaps you're confusing it with the Consciousness causes collapse interpretation - quantum mystics would like you to believe it so) it is more of a hasty fudge attempting to explain behaviour that would be completely anomalous on the macroscale.
I believe that the existence of the classical "path" can be pregnantly formulated as follows: The "path" comes into existence only when we observe it.
These were the words of the creator of the Copenhagen interpretation, Heisenberg. That the path only becomes real when we observe it; that the observer is the creator of reality, is patently idealistic. Materialism demands that the photon, the electron and the rest of material reality has an existence independent of the conscious observer.

I don't really see the value of arguing the toss over whether or not this or that individual scientist has made an idealist interpretation of some law of nature or if in fact I mean the "consciousness causes collapse" interpretation (I don't see how these interpretations really differ). My point is that this can happen and does happen and moving forward with a consciousness of dialectical materialism can prevent making such mistakes. That isn't to say that having a philosophy is enough and to hell with well established methods of scientific investigation.


Historical materialism also shows that societies change and evolve*, and that class struggle exists - it tends to be a much better tool for examining human societies, as it refers to entities and concepts in plain language that can be understood by most people with an IQ greater than a mushroom.

*One only has to look at history to disprove the bourgeois intellectuals' ridiculous assertion of unchanging capitalism.
Historical Materialism is dialectics applied to the study of human history. Of course it is stupid to say "and here we have interpenetrating opposites" when I am illustrating the bourgeoisie and the proletariat. But the underlying method remains the same. It may well be to you that you only have to look at history to disprove the ridiculous idea of capitalism as the law of nature, but the majority of humanity look at human history and they do not see this. Most people will look at history and see the "great man" elevated by chance, not the underlying contradicting class forces.

It is not very useful, is it, to denounce every worker who can not understand this childishly simple thing as being as thick as a mushroom. In fact, if you want to revolutionise society you are already putting yourself on the backfoot. The difference between the method of historical materialism and bourgeois history is that marxists take the point of view of the working class involved in a class struggle. This world view which entails all the obvious conclusions of dialectics is impossible though if you do not take a class position. If you do not take a class perspective it is then very easy for even the most intelligent person to make these mistakes.

[Y Chwyldro Comiwnyddol Cymraeg]

Faceless you promised not to argue...

Does it therfore contradict Hegel and thus Marx's theories of an absolute

[Faceless]

I said I didn't want to... I guess it demonstrates the negation of the negation or something.. or maybe not :D

plus I have exams and I need a reason not to study

[ÑóẊîöʼn]

Originally posted by Citizen Zero+--> (Citizen Zero)If that is the case, why is there no universal scientifically agreed account of human behaviour?[/b]

Because the sheer amount of variables that effect the course of both individual and social human behaviour makes such a task difficult in the extreme - Doubtless our understanding of human behaviour will advance as time goes by, but dialectics is simply not the tool for such a vast endeavour - it's dualistic simplicity simply cannot take into account all the variable and conditions that effect human behaviour.

Remember just how little we actually know about the universe, and the fact that our lack of knowledge multiplies the more we know, simply by virtue of the fact that revealing the answers also reveals yet more questions. This is why that in spite of all the physical evidence pointing towards a deterministic universe, there will most likely never be a Theory of Everything, which zealous dialecticians have claimed dialectics to be.


Faceless
I believe that the existence of the classical "path" can be pregnantly formulated as follows: The "path" comes into existence only when we observe it.
These were the words of the creator of the Copenhagen interpretation, Heisenberg. That the path only becomes real when we observe it; that the observer is the creator of reality, is patently idealistic. Materialism demands that the photon, the electron and the rest of material reality has an existence independent of the conscious observer.

So let's say for the sake of argument that the Copenhagen Interpretation is wrong (I'm not saying it's correct either, btw). Considering that there are other models out there, how in any way does that validate dialectics? If A =/= B then it does not follow that A = C when X, Y, Z and λ are just as if plausible if not more so.


My point is that this can happen and does happen and moving forward with a consciousness of dialectical materialism can prevent making such mistakes.

Science has a proven track record of correcting past mistakes. I can't be so sure about dialectics, especially when it's really nothing special considering that the ordinary scientific method is perfectly capable of explaining "dialectical" concepts in a much clearer language - the dynamic equilibrium between a stars gravity and the outward pressure it's radiation exerts being such an example.

Dialectics is simply not necessary.


Historical Materialism is dialectics applied to the study of human history.

No it's not, it's looking at history from a materialist perspective, as it's name suggests. The conclusions of class struggle and societal evolution are inevitable from a materialist perspective on history.


Of course it is stupid to say "and here we have interpenetrating opposites" when I am illustrating the bourgeoisie and the proletariat. But the underlying method remains the same.

In which case dialectics is a more complicated way of saying the obvious. Thanks for the admission.


It may well be to you that you only have to look at history to disprove the ridiculous idea of capitalism as the law of nature, but the majority of humanity look at human history and they do not see this. Most people will look at history and see the "great man" elevated by chance, not the underlying contradicting class forces.

I believe the "great man" theory of history has been dropped by most bourgeois historians, in favour of a "shit happens" theory.

The fact that the majority of humans view history as being shaped by "great men" is down to humanity's strong tendency to make everything into a narrative. Or an example of the power of propaganda.


It is not very useful, is it, to denounce every worker who can not understand this childishly simple thing as being as thick as a mushroom.

First, don't fucking strawman my arguments, it is in an incredibly dishonest debating tactic. Secondly, people would find understanding a rational view of history much easier if dialecticians did not insist on using obfuscatory terminology and language.


In fact, if you want to revolutionise society you are already putting yourself on the backfoot. The difference between the method of historical materialism and bourgeois history is that marxists take the point of view of the working class involved in a class struggle. This world view which entails all the obvious conclusions of dialectics is impossible though if you do not take a class position. If you do not take a class perspective it is then very easy for even the most intelligent person to make these mistakes.

I do take a class perspective and analyse history using historical materialism. Classes struggle exist, events in history have strictly material causes. How is that bourgeois?

[Faceless]

I do take a class perspective and analyse history using historical materialism. Classes struggle exist, events in history have strictly material causes. How is that bourgeois?

:) Speaking of strawmen, I never even said you took a bourgeois view of society. When I said you were putting yourself on a backfoot, it was in reference to the previous sentence, that you are on the backfoot by saying that the marxist view of history is "obvious" and that anyone who is the victim of bourgeois ideology is as thick as a mushroom.

I'm sorry if it seemed that I was creating strawmen, I did misunderstand what I was quoting. You were only talking about the simplicity of the language

When I then said "The difference between the method of historical materialism and bourgeois history is that marxists take the point of view of the working class involved in a class struggle." I wasn't contrasting your method and my method. To the extent that you do take a class perspective I am sure that you understand many things (if not by the name) as evolving in a dialectical way.


No it's not, it's looking at history from a materialist perspective, as it's name suggests. The conclusions of class struggle and societal evolution are inevitable from a materialist perspective on history.
It is possible to see things as having a cause grounded in material relations, but to then make other mistakes. For instance, elevating the laws of capitalism to a law of nature. To take a snapshot view of history and to consider this the natural and eternal law of existence doesn't necessarily imply that you take an idealist view that ideas have an independence from material conditions.


First, don't fucking strawman my arguments, it is in an incredibly dishonest debating tactic. Secondly, people would find understanding a rational view of history much easier if dialecticians did not insist on using obfuscatory terminology and language.
Ditto with the strawmen. on the obfuscating terminology I said:
Of course it is stupid to say "and here we have interpenetrating opposites" when I am illustrating the bourgeoisie and the proletariat. But the underlying method remains the same.
I never said that we had to use the language often associated with dialectics in propaganda. But writing for the masses and writing to try and train marxist cadres is very different. It is in my opinion best that cadres are taught to know the general laws of development in thought, society and so on, instead of simply saying that by looking at official bourgeois history it is, ya know, obviously wrong.

You do look at things from a class perspective; as a totality instead of the sum of competing individuals. You do see society as an evolving thing with capitalism being a transitory phenomenon. (I've not lost you so far with strange terminology have I?) This is what makes it scientifically correct and is what makes your conclusions valid. If you are conscious of the fact then all the better. And what terminology you use is your business.

[Luís Henrique]

Originally posted by [email protected] 13, 2007 05:17 pm
My point was that if natural sciences can do without dialectics, why not the social sciences?
There are two issues in which social sciences differ from natural sciences.

First, in natural science it is usually possible to assume that the observer is distinct from what is being observed. In social sciences, the observer is him/herself part of what is being observed (notice that similar problems arise in subatomic physics).

Second, and related to the above, in social sciences we deal with conflict, which is not the case in natural sciences. People can support or oppose a revolution, a strike, a candidate. It is rarely the case that someone opposes things falling due to gravity, or water boiling at 100 degrees Celsius.

Those differences account for necessary differences in the method of social sciences in regard to natural sciences - even if you refuse the notion of dialectics.

Luís Henrique

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

LH:


Those differences account for necessary differences in the method of social sciences in regard to natural sciences - even if you refuse the notion of dialectics.

I think you are right about the distinction you draw, but since dialectics is based solely on a series of crass logical blunders that Hegel committed, even if we wanted a social science that was or was not separate from the natural sciences, dialectics would not be a candidate -- if fact, it would not even make the reserve list.

[fashbash]

Thanks for your help people, although to be fair I only read half the first page. So basically, Dialectic Theory is a highbrow abstract concept concerning the Marxist vista?

Rosa Lichtenstein, you are clearly a very intelligent person; I'm afraid I couldn't keep up with your essay(s)!

I think I will leave Dialectics to you, and all of you who understand it. For me Marxism is very simple- 'eglitaire, libertaire et fraternity'.

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

FB, I am sorry you found my essays a challenge; did you begin with the one I suggested?

If so, I will have to write an even easier one.

I'll do that over the summer.

[Janus]

There have been so many threads on this subject that I think it's high time that we sticky a combined thread either in here or in Philosophy. Now that the search function is working again:

Dialectics (http://www.revleft.com/index.php?showtopic=36155&hl=dialectics)

Dialectical materialism (http://www.revleft.com/index.php?showtopic=62804&hl=+dialectical++materialism)

Historical and dialectical materialism (http://www.revleft.com/index.php?showtopic=57319&hl=+dialectical++materialism)

Dialectical materialism? (http://www.revleft.com/index.php?showtopic=48119&hl=+dialectical++materialism)

Dialectical materialism (http://www.revleft.com/index.php?showtopic=38478&hl=+dialectical++materialism)

[ComradeRed]

Originally posted by [email protected] 13, 2007 10:59 am

Ah yes, the Copenhagen Interpretation. Remember that is only one of several possible interpretations of quantum mechanics, and far from being idealist (Perhaps you're confusing it with the Consciousness causes collapse interpretation - quantum mystics would like you to believe it so) it is more of a hasty fudge attempting to explain behaviour that would be completely anomalous on the macroscale.
I believe that the existence of the classical "path" can be pregnantly formulated as follows: The "path" comes into existence only when we observe it.
These were the words of the creator of the Copenhagen interpretation, Heisenberg. That the path only becomes real when we observe it; that the observer is the creator of reality, is patently idealistic. Materialism demands that the photon, the electron and the rest of material reality has an existence independent of the conscious observer.
You are making the critical mistake that the observe has to be conscious (Here's a critique of that point of view (http://arxiv.org/abs/0705.1996)). An observing system is defined as that which initiates the measurement process, and the observed system is the system which is subjected to a measurement.

But if you never measure or observe a system, you can never know anything about that system. Even then the measurements are relative (i.e. observer dependent).

The idea of an observer independent measurement is simply nonsensical by virtue of the definition of a measurement.

Note that you are assuming the observer to be a human, it doesn't have to be. It can be any system you'd like. An electron could be an "observer" if you really want.

But would there be a value for the position of the particle at some time t? Yeah, there is, definitionally in quantum mechanics (even the idealist interpretations). Can you find it out? Yeah, but only through measuring or observing it.

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

Janus, I will; be creating just such a 'sticky' over the next few months -- and it will be a balanced one, too (although there are far more sites that support this ancient view of the world than there are that do not) -- in the Philosophy section.

[Luís Henrique]

There is a third difference between social and natural sciences: in natural sciences you can often count with repeatability, so that you can isolate variables. Such cannot be done in social sciences, except in a very limited way.

Luís Henrique

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

Maybe so, but dialectics would not even be in the running in the choce of scientific theories to explain social change, so confused is it.

[Faceless]

You are making the critical mistake that the observe has to be conscious (Here's a critique of that point of view). An observing system is defined as that which initiates the measurement process, and the observed system is the system which is subjected to a measurement.
Oh dear, oh dear. It makes no sense to me why when discussin dialectics, we always end up talking about quantum mechanicsc. It seems to me to be the scientific theory we know least about, and is the most esoteric. How can I give a popular account of dialectics and how can a person like fashbash find it useful, if the first question a person asks is, "how can I apply this to relativity and quantum mechanics?" It is like a person saying "how do I use maths?" I could say, "You count like this, and then you add and subtract like so." But how exasperating for a maths naysayer to then come in and say, "well that useless if you can't explain the maths in general relativity".

This is not your fault comradered. The question had already been brought up, and is inevitable in these threads. Someone tell me why! Anyway, In heisenberg's quotation, he said when we observe it. I maintain though that whether the observer is made by a concsious being or not, the idea that there was no path already taken by the particle, that there is no causality until it is measured is an idealist interpretation. A path doesn't just mean some position x at a time t. The path refers to what also happens between measurements. In quantum mechanics it might be beyond us at the moment to be able to infer the path, but that is miles away from it not existing.
Bleh, I hate quantum mechanics.

[ComradeRed]

Originally posted by [email protected] 16, 2007 09:12 am
How can I give a popular account of dialectics and how can a person like fashbash find it useful, if the first question a person asks is, "how can I apply this to relativity and quantum mechanics?"
You can't give an explanation of quantum mechanics without destroying what quantum mechanics means.

That's life.

You can give an explanation involving math and so forth, but I have yet to see one involving no math whatsoever that adequately describes quantum mechanics.

There is the "Many Worlds" interpretation, which in my opinion is platonic (only because of the unitary wave function of the universe, remove this and you get Relational Quantum Mechanics...this is not Platonic, but it can be easily confused for subjectivist nonsense - which it isn't!).

There really aren't many materialist, consistent interpretations (there's the Bohm interpretation, but it's incompatible with relativity, and was created only to disprove Bell's inequalities that there cannot be an interpretation without hidden variables).

In my opinion, quantum theory will become observer dependent like relativity, and thus the relational interpretation is preferred.


It is like a person saying "how do I use maths?" I could say, "You count like this, and then you add and subtract like so." But how exasperating for a maths naysayer to then come in and say, "well that [is] useless if you can't explain the maths in general relativity". Perhaps, but I would think that your explanation of math is entirely flawed.

I'm a physicist and not a mathematician, but it seems like you are forgetting about the structure of math, and so forth.

You have a basic explanation of certain operations in math, but not math itself.

It's like explaining formal logic by saying "Ah yes there are these connectives 'AND', 'OR', ..." rather than begin by explaining formal logic!


Anyway, In heisenberg's quotation, he said when we observe it. I maintain though that whether the observer is made by a concsious being or not, the idea that there was no path already taken by the particle, that there is no causality until it is measured is an idealist interpretation. But that's now what the equations say!

It's not saying that "No path is taken by the particle until it is observed".

It's saying "A path is taking by the particle, there is absolutely certainty (i.e. a probability of 1) that the particle takes a path; which path it takes is unknown unless you observe it."

And that's true if you think about it: if you close your eyes, and have some particle run around silently, you won't know what path it's taking! That is not the same as saying that no path is taken, which is implied by Heisenberg but disputed by the math of quantum theory (just definitionally, the particle exists at some time, so the probability of finding the particle somewhere at that time is normalized to 1; ditto for the momentum, but you can use the momentum vector at different times to figure out the path taken; at all times the probability of the momentum vector having a length greater than or equal to zero is 1 if the particle exists).

It should be noted that Heisenberg was part of the losing school of thought in quantum mechanics that was defeated by the Einstein-Schrodinger-Bohm wave interpretation...so bringing up Heisenberg's philosophy of quantum mechanics is about as relevant as bringing up Newton's philosophy of quantum mechanics. Unless you are using Heisenberg's matrix mechanics, then it would be relevant; however we're not, so it isn't.

But canonical quantum mechanics isn't really taught that way anymore (it might have been at one time, but it is no longer that way).