Materialist Dialectics

[Bud Struggle]

So what do Materialist Dialectics mean in the real world? Not the theory--anyone can read the Philosophy threads on that. But what does dialectics have to do with Communism and Capitalism now, today?

[mikelepore]

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'm not certain what you mean by what does it mean to the real world, without the theory, but I'll take a stab at answering it.

Marx's version would be that a social system, capitalism, for example, has a time when it's progress and then a time when it's regress. (Reminds me of Ecclesiastes :o) The point is not to deny the benefits of capitalism that Adam Smith claimed for it in 1776; the point is that what was true in 1776 soon afterwards became false.

Engels' version, unfortunately, to judge by his 1883 manuscript _The Dialectics of Nature_, would be some vision of yin and yang swirling around, or some such incomprehensible picture that looks as though it was lifted out of Taoism.

[mikelepore]

One good point I find in Engels' treatment of the subject is what he called "transformation of quantity into quality." Here's an example of how an accumulation of many small, quantitative material changes have completely reversed a social principle. When the U.S. was founded, Benjamin Franklin's little printing press exemplified the meaning of the publishing business. His enlightened, forward-looking attitude exemplified the role of the publishing business. Censorship was a bad thing that governments did. How has that all changed? Today, escapism and the status quo, rather than enlightenment and skepticism, dominate the media. Government censorship is practically nonexistent in many industrial countries. Instead of being a government imposition, censorship today is something that the media owners themselves impose, as in the time when the journalists at NBC's news division were forbidden by the management to report on a scandal involving defective parts sold by NBC's parent company, General Electric. An accumulation of quantitative material changes have changed the relationship between private property and freedom of the press into its opposite.

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

TomK:

So what do Materialist Dialectics mean in the real world? Not the theory--anyone can read the Philosophy threads on that. But what does dialectics have to do with Communism and Capitalism now, today?

In three words: "Nothing at all".

The theory has no practical applications (that is, other than negative -- it tends to confuse those whose minds it has colonised), which is not surprising since it makes not one ounce of sense.

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

Mike:

One good point I find in Engels' treatment of the subject is what he called "transformation of quantity into quality." Here's an example of how an accumulation of many small, quantitative material changes have completely reversed a social principle. When the U.S. was founded, Benjamin Franklin's little printing press exemplified the meaning of the publishing business. His enlightened, forward-looking attitude exemplified the role of the publishing business. Censorship was a bad thing that governments did. How has that all changed? Today, escapism and the status quo, rather than enlightenment and skepticism, dominate the media. Government censorship is practically nonexistent in many industrial countries. Instead of being a government imposition, censorship today is something that the media owners themselves impose, as in the time when the journalists at NBC's news division were forbidden by the management to report on a scandal involving defective parts sold by NBC's parent company, General Electric. An accumulation of quantitative material changes have changed the relationship between private property and freedom of the press into its opposite.

Mike we have been over this before; Engels's 'law' is so vaguely worded that it is practically useless.

For example, we are seldom told what a 'quality' is -- in the few cases where we have been, we are saddled with an unworkable Aristotelian 'definition', which dialecticians then proceed to forget, anyway (see below).

Here is what Hegel had to say:

"Quality is, in the first place, the character identical with being: so identical that a thing ceases to be what it is, if it loses its quality. Quantity, on the contrary, is the character external to being, and does not affect the being at all. Thus, e.g. a house remains what it is, whether it be greater or smaller; and red remains red, whether it be brighter or darker." [Hegel (1975) Shorter Logic, p.124, §85.]

The Glossary at the Marx Internet Archive defines it this way:

Quality is an aspect of something by which it is what it is and not something else and reflects that which is stable amidst variation. Quantity is an aspect of something which may change (become more or less) without the thing thereby becoming something else.

Thus, if something changes to an extent that it is no longer the same kind of thing, this is a 'qualitative change', whereas a change in something by which it still the same thing, though more or less, bigger or smaller, is a 'quantitative change'.

In Hegel's Logic, Quality is the first division of Being, when the world is just one thing after another, so to speak, while Quantity is the second division, where perception has progressed to the point of recognising what is stable within the ups and downs of things. The third and final stage, Measure, the unity of quality and quantity, denotes the knowledge of just when quantitative change becomes qualitative change.

http://www.marxists.org/reference/ar...p/glossary.htm

This is an essentialist, Aristotelian definition.

Now, the most hackneyed example dialecticians use to 'illustrate' this 'law' is that of water turning to ice or steam, if cooled or heated. But, given the above 'definition', this wouldn't be an example of qualitative change, since water (as ice, liquid or steam) is still water (i.e., H2O). Quantitative addition or subtraction of energy does not result in a qualitative change of the required sort; nothing substantially new emerges. This substance stays H2O throughout.

Hence, as noted above, dialecticians in fact ignore their own definition!

Moreover, no such 'quality' exists in your example:

An accumulation of quantitative material changes have changed the relationship between private property and freedom of the press into its opposite.

There is no 'essence' of the above relationship. In that case, Engels's 'law' cannot apply to it.

[mikelepore]

Mike we have been over this before

We didn't persuade each other the last time either.

Engels's 'law' is so vaguely worded that it is practically useless.

Vagueness is okay if later study fills in the gaps. Vagueness like Galileo starting a discussion about mechanics without having such concepts as momentum or kinetic energy, but later Newton came along to fix the theory up. Vagueness like Faraday describing the electric field with all sketches and no equations, until Maxwell later came to fix it. I think Engels made a good start with quantity and quality, but no one later made it more precise, far as I know.

Now, the most hackneyed example dialecticians use to 'illustrate' this 'law' is that of water turning to ice or steam, if cooled or heated. But, given the above 'definition', this wouldn't be an example of qualitative change, since water (as ice, liquid or steam) is still water (i.e., H2O). Quantitative addition or subtraction of energy does not result in a qualitative change of the required sort; nothing substantially new emerges. This substance stays H2O throughout.

Naturally, there must first be a decision about what the subject of a discussion is going to be. It's no reflection on the ability of a method to explain a problem if people didn't previously agree on what problem they're talking about.

In the water phase example, they're talking about bonds between molecules, and you're talking about bonds between atoms.

When water changes state, the bonds between atoms are unaffected, and it's still H2O. But bonds between molecules and their neighboring molecules are made or broken. It's a good example of qualitative abruptness from a quantitative increment.

The process of melting ice: As you add more and more energy, the molecules jiggle with greater amplitudes, but remain in fixed positions. At some point, when as you add just a little bit more energy, molecules suddenly leave their fixed positions and begin to tumble around each other.

The process of boiling water: You add a lot more energy, and the molecules still remain in a bunch in the container, tumbling around each other. Adding a little bit more energy, suddenly the molecules become completely disassociated from one another and float away individually into the sky. The tiniest fraction of a percent of additional energy has caused an abrupt observation.

The Van der Walls force between two adjacent water molecule is one of the most abrupt effects documented. We think the inverse square law for gravitational and electric forces is a rapid rate of fall-off with distance? Well, the Van der Walls force between two molecules drops off with the _seventh_ power of the distance. I think it's valid to conclude that there is some point where a little quantitative change in a variable moves the whole problem into another category.

Engels: "The law of the transformation of quantity into quality and vice versa."

What Engels failed to do is to establish what all this has to do with social science, if anything.

[Red Economist]

put as breifly as I can:

'Dialectical Materialism': Change originating from Matter.

Dialectics states the contradictions between the new and the old (one replaces the other, in the same way the computer replaces the typerwriter), and materialism studies the motive force for these changes (the need for capitalism to compute higher levels of data...and write more propaganda obviously).

[Kronos]

It's a good example of qualitative abruptness from a quantitative increment.

But you are mistaking a relationship which conforms to laws for a qualitative change in those things which conform to the law. The term "quality" is a misnomer in this case. If you mean by "quality" a phenomena that changes its appearance, chemistry, or physical characteristics, then you are referring to a finite set of elements acting according to laws. Therefore there isn't any fundamental change in the elements themselves which compose the phemomena, but only a new relation, a new "compounding" of finite elements.

Let me ask you this: can there be a qualitative change in a particle, or do we attribute the nature of a particle to the specific relationships between the components of the particle? If the latter, then the particle doesn't change- it is either a particle or not. The definition of the particle depends on the constitution of its physical apparatus. If a component no longer conforms to the law which effected it, as it composed the particle, the particle doesn't change...the component changes...and it changes only in so far as its behavior no longer conforms to a law.

Now you no longer have a particle, but you still have a component...only it is behaving differently. The same holds true for the component, regarding its components. The same reasoning applies reductio ad absurdem.

There are physical entities and laws, and a "change" in an entity cannot mean that some aspect of its being is altered. It can only mean that particular things that compose its being have stopped behaving a certain way. If this is so, then the "thing" is no longer what it was...since the "things" definition includes all components and all laws which those components follow.

The easiest way to conceive of this is to imagine the universe containing a finite amount of elementary parts. All macrocosmic "change" is only a redistribution, reorganization or rearrangement of those elementary parts. Therefore there is no qualitative change, only quantitative.

I can take some clay and make two different objects with it. Does the clay change.....or only the physical characteristics of the objects composed of clay change?

You see what I mean.

Rosa is correct through and through. The term "quality" is very inappropriate in the context it is used in that law of dialectics.

[trivas7]

You see what I mean.

No, I don't see what you mean. Only an idealist imagines "the universe containing a finite amount of elementary parts". What are these motionless, changeless, elementary particles?

Dialectics is a way of looking at the world which sets out from the axiom that everything is in a constant state of change and flux. Dialectics explains that change and motion only takes place through contradictions. So instead of a smooth, uninterrupted line of progress, incremental change is interrupted by sudden and explosive qualitative change: quantity is transformed into quality. Dialectics is the logic of change -- not physics.

[mikelepore]

I refer to examples from physical science only because it's the subject I know best. People who know other fields can look there.

Sometimes, when one thing depends on another thing, the relationship is strongly nonlinear. Developers of the atomic bomb determined that uranium-235 has a critical mass of 56 grams. 55.9 grams, the city is still there. 56 grams, no more city. Change a number just a little bit, and suddenly something important happens. Engels used the term "the transformation of quantity into quality." Those who don't don't like calling it by that name can choose another name. I'm not going to argue about the name.

This kind of strong nonlinear dependence also occurs in human history. Economic production levels are incremental. In the Politics, Aristotle came close to predicting that one day there would be automated machinery and this is what would make slavery become obsolete. He wrote: "For if every instrument could accomplish its own work, obeying or anticipating the will of others, like the statues of Daedalus, or the tripods of Hephaestus, which, says the poet, 'of their own accord entered the assembly of the Gods'; if, in like manner, the shuttle would weave and the plectrum touch the lyre without a hand to guide them, chief workmen would not want servants, nor masters slaves."

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

Mike:

We didn't persuade each other the last time either.

It was far worse than that, since you were unable to tell us what either a 'quality' or a 'node' is. And we know why -- this allows you to get away with several wild guesses about what is or what is not an example of the 'law.

You would not tolerate for one second such sloppy work in your area of science.

But, you have an answer:

Vagueness is okay if later study fills in the gaps. Vagueness like Galileo starting a discussion about mechanics without having such concepts as momentum or kinetic energy, but later Newton came along to fix the theory up. Vagueness like Faraday describing the electric field with all sketches and no equations, until Maxwell later came to fix it. I think Engels made a good start with quantity and quality, but no one later made it more precise, far as I know.

But this 'theory' is still no less vague -- we still do not know what a 'quality' or a node is, nor do we know what it means to 'add energy or matter' to a system, nor do we know what the thermodynamic boundaries are of these Engelsian 'objects and processes'.

Once more, this would not be tolerated for one second in Physics or Chemistry (to say nothing of the other sciences).

And yet, this is perfectly acceptable here!

No wonder I have called this 'Mickey Mouse Science'.

And here is a perfect example:

Naturally, there must first be a decision about what the subject of a discussion is going to be. It's no reflection on the ability of a method to explain a problem if people didn't previously agree on what problem they're talking about.

In the water phase example, they're talking about bonds between molecules, and you're talking about bonds between atoms.

When water changes state, the bonds between atoms are unaffected, and it's still H2O. But bonds between molecules and their neighboring molecules are made or broken. It's a good example of qualitative abruptness from a quantitative increment.

The process of melting ice: As you add more and more energy, the molecules jiggle with greater amplitudes, but remain in fixed positions. At some point, when as you add just a little bit more energy, molecules suddenly leave their fixed positions and begin to tumble around each other.

The process of boiling water: You add a lot more energy, and the molecules still remain in a bunch in the container, tumbling around each other. Adding a little bit more energy, suddenly the molecules become completely disassociated from one another and float away individually into the sky. The tiniest fraction of a percent of additional energy has caused an abrupt observation.

The Van der Walls force between two adjacent water molecule is one of the most abrupt effects documented. We think the inverse square law for gravitational and electric forces is a rapid rate of fall-off with distance? Well, the Van der Walls force between two molecules drops off with the _seventh_ power of the distance. I think it's valid to conclude that there is some point where a little quantitative change in a variable moves the whole problem into another category.

Engels: "The law of the transformation of quantity into quality and vice versa."

What Engels failed to do is to establish what all this has to do with social science, if anything.

And yet, because you are dealing with a vague notion both of 'quality' and of 'node' here you can fit anything you like into this 'law'.

But, if we use Hegel's definition, your example fails yet again, since we are still dealing with the same substance, H20.

And, the change in the bonds between atoms which you refer to can only be described as 'sudden' if we know how long a dialectical 'node' is supposed to last -- but we don't. I have asked countless times, but dialecticians refuse to say. And we can see why; once more it allows you to inject an element of subjectivity onto what is supposed to be an objective law.

It's a good example of qualitative abruptness from a quantitative increment.

But, what definition of 'quality' are you dealing with here? You dance round this issue, but still refuse to say.

Well, the Van der Walls force between two molecules drops off with the _seventh_ power of the distance. I think it's valid to conclude that there is some point where a little quantitative change in a variable moves the whole problem into another category.

But, this is a continuous function, so there are no sudden, discontinuities here, and thus no 'nodes'.

Forgive me for saying this, but you remind me of Christians who have inherited a bunch of odd ideas from the ancients and who spend all their time trying to make them consistent with modern science -- ignoring whatever does not fit, and any awkward questions about 'god'.

So, you have inherited a 'law' from Hegel (who based it on hardly any evidence at all (i.e., he just dreamt it up) -- and even he ignored his own definition of 'quality' to make his 'law' seem to work -- and he, too, did not tell us how long a 'node' was supposed to last), and now you are trying to squeeze some areas of science into a dialectical boot it won't fit, ignoring the many cases were qualitative changes (however it is defined) take place with no addition of energy or matter, and awkward questions about 'nodes' and 'qualities'.

Dozens of examples listed here:

http://homepage.ntlworld.com/rosa.l/page%2007.htm

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

Trivas:

Dialectics is a way of looking at the world which sets out from the axiom that everything is in a constant state of change and flux. Dialectics explains that change and motion only takes place through contradictions. So instead of a smooth, uninterrupted line of progress, incremental change is interrupted by sudden and explosive qualitative change: quantity is transformed into quality. Dialectics is the logic of change -- not physics.

In other words, when we cut through the c*ap, this is just a priori dogmatics, and thus a prime example of idealism.

Moreover, there are many changes of 'quality' in nature and society that are smooth, and not at all sudden (so this can't be a 'law').

Dozens of examples given here:

http://homepage.ntlworld.com/rosa.l/page%2007.htm

Moreover, we already know that this can't be correct:

Dialectics is the logic of change

And that is because, not only can this 'theory' not explain change, if it were true, change would be impossible.

Quotations from the Dialectical Gospels:

http://www.revleft.com/vb/showpost.p...0&postcount=76

Argument:

http://www.revleft.com/vb/showpost.p...1&postcount=77

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

Kronos, I agree with what you say -- but, just you watch: even if the word 'quality' were appropriate, not one single supporter of this 'theory' will tell you (us) what either a 'quality' or a 'node' is.

I know, I have been asking them for over 25 years!

[Rosa Lichtenstein]

SRACTLM:

'Dialectical Materialism': Change originating from Matter.

Dialectics states the contradictions between the new and the old (one replaces the other, in the same way the computer replaces the typerwriter), and materialism studies the motive force for these changes (the need for capitalism to compute higher levels of data...and write more propaganda obviously).

Unfortunately, when you examine the details, this theory does not work.

For example, as I noted above, if this theory were true, change would be impossible:

Quotes:

http://www.revleft.com/vb/showpost.p...0&postcount=76

Argument:

http://www.revleft.com/vb/showpost.p...1&postcount=77

And, the things you mention aren't contradictions either.

[trivas7]

In other words, when we cut through the c*ap, this is just a priori dogmatics, and thus a prime example of idealism.

And that is because, not only can this 'theory' not explain change, if it were true, change would be impossible.

You confuse a dogma, idealism, w/ a methodology, an epistemology.

[Pogue]

I agree with Rosa, it has no relevancy to anyone's life.

[Kronos]

Only an idealist imagines "the universe containing a finite amount of elementary parts". What are these motionless, changeless, elementary particles?

Take the periodic table of elements. If an element undergoes a chemical change, the atoms which compose the molecules don't change, but only break their bonds and establish new ones.

If there is a known finite set of chemical elements, each consisting of one type of atom with its own atomic number, then any possible composition of these elements in a molecule is only subject to be quantified, not qualified. The "quality" of a molecule means only "X amount of atoms". And if the molecule "changes", this only means the bonding has changed, and if this is the case.....then you no longer have molecule X, but molecule Y, depending on the composition of the newly bonded atoms.

Think about how iron rusts and what happens. There is a transfer of electrons from the iron to the oxygen. This is an electrochemical change....but the iron doesn't change, literally, because it ceases to be iron when the elements which compose it break down their atomic bonds, and therefore their molecular structure.

To the eye there appears to be change, but looking closer we see there is no change, like we thought, but only a rearrangement of atomic compounds.

Don't think in terms of the physical appearance of things- think only in terms of the quantifiable number of atoms, and the possible combination of atoms.

Dialectics explains that change and motion only takes place through contradictions.

There is no contradiction in nature. You are committing a pathetic fallacy- ascribing human sentiments, qualities and values onto nature. This accounts for a large percent of Hegel's error. He viewed the "mind" as that which interprets nature as a teleological process....so that when something in nature is found to be disagreeable to our senses, or ill fashioned as a means to our ends, we call it a "contradiction". For example, if we use Hegel's theory of the master/slave dialectic as our criterion, then we would naturally suppose that an economic revolution is an process of a synthesis of these two conflicting parts- proletariat and bourgeois. But that doesn't mean such a dichotomy is conflicting in nature. It is only conflicting if you view it through Hegel's theoretical model, see.

This same idea, viewed from Spinoza's perspective (Hegel began as a Spinozist), is that "conflict" is only a judgment formed from an inadequate understanding, having inadequate knowledge of, the causes which brought about such an effect through their determination. There can be no conflict in nature because nothing is an "accident", nothing is "contingent".

Hegel was not satisfied with this and through his phenomenology of the spirit, tried to interpret nature as a medium through which the "for-itself", consciousness or self awareness, transcended the irrational by absolving natural contradictions. This is what "mind" was for Hegel. But for Spinoza, "irrational" means only a "passive idea"....an idea that is not adequate and therefore muddled, confused. Nature is nothing short of perfect. Only ideas are imperfect, as a result of not having the breadth of understanding, of not being able to account for all causes which result in an effect.

Every aspect of the judgment "contradiction" is founded in such a pathetic fallacy. Applying a teleological judgment onto nature so that it can be evaluated according to our ends. But in nature there is no "end".

Do I believe capitalism should be abolished? Certainly, but not because of the reasons Hegel's dialectical materialism puts forth.

[mikelepore]

When they say "quality" in this context, they mean anything observed that depends on something else observed, but in a strongly nonlinear way. You could add heat 1.0000 x to the wick of dynamite, and nothing unusual happens, but when you add heat 1.0001 x to the wick, a building falls down. There is some resulting event whose magnitude is considerably out of proportion to the change in a variable that triggered it.

Many break-point relationships like are found in nature. Engels believed that the same principle operates in human history, for example, in the way that economic development reaches a moment when there is a change between capitalism being the best promoter of social progress to capitalism being the worst obstacle to social progress, or the change from having no prospects for a revolution to the imminence of revolution.

Engels didn't offer an explanation why an observation about natural forces might apply to human history, therefore his discussion never goes beyond making the analogy, without demonstration of a mechanism. His "dialectics" as described in his book 'Dialectics of Nature' is a compilation of analogies between nature and society, and the claim that the same "laws" operates in both.

I believe that social science won't become an exact science until one day in the future when we may have a complete neurological model of the human mind. Until then, all supposed explanation of sociological events is mainly a lot of analogies and correlations, but very little mechanism. I expect that Engels might have had a good point regarding quantity and quality, but so far no one can demonstrate a mechanism that could account for it.

His "interpenetration of opposites" is another analogy from nature to history. Nature exhibits movement and change caused by gradients (Fick's law of diffusion, Ohm's law for currents, Carnot's and Clausius' second law of thermodynamics, etc.). As they say in systems theory, "across variables" cause "through variables." Engels believed that there is a connection between this fact and social movement and change caused by technology potential and economic class gradients. Here too, Engels didn't suggest any mechanism which could account for such natural forces to have a connection to historical events. He asserted an analogy and stopped there.

[Kronos]

I understand the analogy these dialecticians are using to explain social phenomenon and I think it is acceptable as a philosophical outlook. But it isn't scientific in any sense.

There is some resulting event whose magnitude is considerably out of proportion to the change in a variable that triggered it.

The problem is, how do you determine what a correct proportion would be? There are correlations made here that are completely superfluous, and in saying there is a proportionate irregularity is like saying "the building shouldn't fall when the explosion compromises the structural integrity of the foundation". But why not? If you look at such an event incrementally, suddenly you don't have one radical, disproportionate change....but a series of small, minor changes which in succession result in a major change.

1. The foundation has a hole blown in it.
2. The weight of the building causes the structure to collapse.
3. What was once an enormous building is reduced to rubble in less than thirty seconds.
4. All this because of the smallest difference in the dynamite.

If you look at the end result, then sure, something extraordinary strikes you. But if you look at the event incrementally, nothing significant is happening...nothing "disproportionate".

Also, what if the psi rating of the concrete which was used to build the foundation was increased by one gram.....and that one gram made all the difference....preventing the dynamite from compromising it enough to cause the building to collapse?

What if I am frying and egg....and I don't extend my hand far enough toward the pan to reach the egg with the spatula? Wait! If just extend it one more centimeter I can reach the egg....and something extraordinary will happen: the egg gets flipped.

Never knew a centimeter meant so much and could affect such great change in the world.

Everything in nature that happens suddenly might not have happened if the conditions pertaining to the thing that changed were ever-so-slightly different. Sort of takes the magic out of the dialectical view of change, huh?

[Kronos]

Have a look at Althusser's concept of "overdetermination". As I understand the idea it presents a kind of stochastic factor to the original dialectical view of contradiction. In a sense it obscures the original terms of the view so that accounting for the causes of conflict in a case of contraction involves inductive measures rather than clear, deductive analysis of change.

For instance, revolution may not occur as a synthesis of conflicts which are direct results of capitalism. There may be other contradictions which stimulate revolution that may arise in a communist state if it occurs...so....the supposed antithesis could be germane to any set of conditions.

The "triad" of dialectical tensions and processes are therefore not so "cut and dried". Such critical "breaking points", the "straw that broke the camel's back", could very well not be a single straw...but an accumulation of several straws that can't be accounted for.

This changes the linear, analytical approach of Hegelian dialectics quite drastically. And, it is in good keeping with a Spinozean model of causality. "Breaking points" might not be conceivable at all.....especially if we consider the number of causes that evade our knowledge.