Lesson Three
Dialectic Materialism

We now enter an important stage of our study – the discussion of dialectic materialism, the method by which scientists analyse the objective world and arrive at their conclusions. Dialectic materialism is the science of evolution of matter. It is the “science of the general laws of motion and development in nature, human society and thought” – according to Engels.

A. Society and Science in the 18th and 19th Centuries

By the middle of the 18th century, the development of capitalism had gone far. In England it had practically conquered; in France it was about to conquer. The bourgeoisie had acquired tremendous wealth because of the possibilities for increased production which the physical sciences opened up for it. By the 19th century, not only had the bourgeoisie conquered most of the world but the proletariat had sharply differentiated itself from the bourgeoisie and had begun to struggle in its own behalf.

The bourgeoisie gave tremendous impetus to the physical sciences. Later, in attacking the citadels of feudalism and in building its own economic foundations, it began to develop the social sciences to a certain point: economics, sociology, jurisprudence. But because of the social implications of these sciences to the bourgeoisie their scope and development was limited. It becomes increasingly clear that only the proletariat can possibly develop these sciences properly.

The 19th century society, dominated by metaphysical dogma and theology, certain attitudes in the sciences became more and more definitely established. Kant and Laplace were the first in modern times to apply the idea of evolution to the astronomical world in their theory of the development of the solar system. In 1858 the same idea was applied to the development of animal and plant species by Charles Darwin. Marx and Engels expressed and applied hypothetically the same idea of evolution to society in 1843–4. But even before the latter two applications, the conception of evolution had taken hold of the philosophical world, beginning with Kant and culminating, in an idealistic form, in Hegel. Revolutionary changes taking place in society at that time emphasized the idea.

B. Development of the Dialectic from Kant to Hegel

Without clearly understanding the significance of his analysis, Kant nevertheless did extraordinary work in showing the contradictory nature of universal principles when applied to the material world. To Kant the dialectic (the logic which analyses and points out the contradictions in the world) acts as a shield against the misuse of reason. To him the dialectic was the logic of illusion and proved that to know TRUE REALITY is impossible.

Hegel took the dialectic of Kant seriously. He declared however that the world (reality) was contradictory by nature. He showed that the dialectic was not the logic of illusion but the logic of reality. But as an idealist, he declared mind or spirit to be independent of and superior to matter. He assumed God, or spirit, to be the source of all things. God is external and harmonious, according to Hegel, though he reveals himself in the form of contradictions, i.e. Development.

The general process of development by contradictions was formulated by Hegel into a series of fundamental principles which can be summarised as follows: (a) Transformation into opposites; (b) Quantity differences cause quality changes; (c) Negation of the negation.

The first law (a) means that anything, under certain conditions, can be transformed into a thing having exactly the opposite nature. (Primitive society based on collective ownership of property is transformed, under the influence of certain factors, into a society based on private ownership). The second law (b) means that the continued addition of identical elements leads to a change in the properties of the thing added to. (Add successive units of heat to water changes it into steam.) The third law (c) means that under certain conditions a thing not only changes into its opposite, but if the development continues, it changes back into its former self but on a different plane, and with an added difference. A new cycle of development now begins again with the generation of new opposite.

While Hegel formulated the laws of the dialectic correctly in the formal sense, he could not apply them because, as an idealist, he used them to deduce realities from ideas instead of shaping ideas to reality. He tried to make the world conform to his ideas, instead of making his ideas conform to the world. He assumed as true what had to be proved to be true.

C. The Laws of Dialectic Materialism

1. Law of the Unity of Opposites (“polar unity of all things” – Lenin; thesis-antithesis – Hegel). Every developing situation contains contradictory elements (opposites). These opposites involve each other. One of these opposites is positive in the sense of resisting change; the other is negative, in that it seeks to destroy both itself and its opposite.

First Corollary: Opposites are not mere differences. They must involve each other’s existence. The existence of the one implied the existence of the other; the destruction of one implies the destruction of the other. Example one: The existence of the capitalist class involved the existence of the working class; the existence of the working class involves the existence of the capitalist class. The capitalist, one who hires and exploits workers, is unthinkable without workers. Neither could the wage-worker exists, for without capitalists to whom could they sell their labor-power? Example two: The capitalist class represents the positive element in modern social development. It seeks to keep intact the worker-capitalist relationship. The proletariat is the negative element. It seeks to destroy both the capitalist and itself by creating a classless society.
Second Corollary: REAL opposites are those by which the development of a situation can be explained. False opposites cannot do so. Example one: St. Simon divided men into workers and idlers. This mechanical, non-dialectical antithesis is not capable of demonstrating social development. It therefore must be rejected.
Third Corollary: Opposites capable of explaining development cannot be selected through inner contemplation; but only through experiment, careful analysis and test. Only in this way can the spurious opposite be detected from the true.
Fourth Corollary: Opposites must involve a going-beyond, a development into a new situation in which they lose their original character. Otherwise they are not real opposites. Example: Empedocles, Nietszche, Spengler conceive the world as eternal repetition of what existed before. This concept denies that essential change can take place, that new properties can ever emerge.
Fifth Corollary: In real situations opposites are often complicated by other opposing forces which influence the fundamental opposition. Example: Capitalism today is not pure capitalism, consisting only of two classes; it contains the remnants of feudalism, also intermediate classes like farmers and professionals.
Sixth Corollary: There may be additional contradictions developing on the basis of the old opposition. Example: With the development of credit, money economy is subjected to new factors operating according to new laws, which complicate the fundamental laws of money economy. Example: Atoms combined in the form of molecules carry their contradiction to a higher plane when molecules combine to form complex organic compounds known as colloids, etc., up to the appearance of living matter.

Summary of First Law: We have stated the law of the co-existence or unity of the opposites. We have therefore stated the BASIS for change. We will now state the laws of change themselves, that is, the operation of these antagonistic forces thru TIME.

2. Law of Quantity Into Quality (Quantity differences cause quality changes, and vice versa) This law, as Hegel stated it, asserts that the addition of elements identical in their properties to a given situation will suddenly or ultimately change the properties of the situation. This law is a fundamental law of matter whose action in nature and society can be traced step by step. Example one: In geology, many illustrations. The addition of sand particles to a given area ultimately leads to the formation of rock. The addition of more rock superimposed on the old rock leads to the transformation of this sand-stone into another metamorphic rock like schists or slate. Example two: In biology, it can be illustrated in cell-fission. Simple increase in volume of the cell due to addition of content leads to splitting up of that cell in two. Further the mere aggregation of cells ultimately leads to differentiation of function; outer skin, inner organs, excretory, etc. Example three: In political economy, numerous illustrations. Money must accumulate to a certain point before it can function as capital to buy machinery, raw material and labor. The working class much reach a certain size before the overthrow of capitalism can be accomplished. The aggregation of money in banks must reach a certain size before it can supercede industrial capital. Markets must reach a certain size before they can support large-scale machine industry which superceded handicrafts. NOTE: This law has meaning only where the field of its operation is specified. For example, the mere accumulation of shoes will not alter the shoes, although it will have a terrific effect on the price of shoes. The mere accumulation of water in a given area will not change the character of the water, but will have an enormous effect on the habitat of humans.

3. Law of the Negation of the Negation (“permeation of opposites” – Lenin; thesis–antithesis–synthesis – Hegel) A basic, general law of motion. This law asserts that, in changing, a thing is permeated by and transformed into its opposite (negation) It is then permeated by and transformed into the opposite of the opposite (negation of the negation) that is to say, the original thing, only this time complicated by other factors – on a different plane. Example: Primitive communism, a controlled society, collective in character develops into its opposite, a class society, based on private property, and uncontrolled. Class society returns to its original status of a controlled, collective society, which, in turn lays the basis for the development of further contradictions on new planes. Each stage is created by the generation and triumph of the opposite which destroys the entire previous relationship.

D. Methodological Considerations

1. To be scientific the dialectic must be based on materialism. It should be obvious that the world must be conceived as independent of the human mind. The dialectic grew out of the need for a method of explaining motion and change in the material world.

2. The dialectic process is always subject to test and proof by demonstration. The mere knowledge of the existence of the dialectic process does not give you the right to declare that a certain law is operative in a given situation, unless it is SHOWN to be operative. It must be shown to inhere in, to describe the nature of the transformations taking place. In short, it must fit the facts. (See Hegel’s failures.)

3. The dialectician must acquaint himself thoroughly with the facts. The dialectic does not of itself reveal the secrets of nature. It helps reveal the movement and changes in reality only when we have thoroughly acquainted ourselves with its past and present.

4. The proof of the dialectic depends on the fact that the world moves dialectically, and not the other way round. The dialectic does not regulate how the world shall move. Matter, changing dialectically, is proof of dialectics. In other words, the dialectic is subject to the fundamental test of practice.

E. Relation of Formal Logic to the Dialectic

1. Logic, i.e. formal logic, aristotelian logic, is non-dialectical. It assumes that nature is static and not contradictory; that a thing cannot be itself and something else; that everything is entirely different from everything else. The metaphysical attitude which formal logic emphasizes grows out of the fact that at first mankind thought of things as entities. Because things changed so slowly, they seemed distinct from each other. He therefore discounted all change or motion. It also arose from man’s natural desire to have things sharply and clearly distinguished and to overlook the vague and obscure.

2. Nevertheless, logic is a useful science and has a very definite place in scientific thinking. Science succeeds in making distinctions that are clear and sharp, whose logical relations are well-defined. Here logic plays an extremely useful role. It is also useful in revealing mistakes in thinking due to ambiguous concepts or conclusions derived which are not warranted by the premises. When the domain of logic is properly delimited, it becomes part of the general science of the dialectic, a special phase of the dialectic.

3. All scientific method is really dialectical. It formulates the methods by which reality and its changes are discovered. It is therefore a formulation of dialectics. Most books on the scientific method are handicapped by a static approach. So far as it has gone, however, it has approached a clear statement of the dialectical method.

4. Broadly speaking, therefore, dialectics is that science which deals with the general laws of motion; with those properties all motions have.