Dialectical and Formal Thinking -|- Educational Philosophy Theory

Dialectical and Formal Thinking

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The correct application of the dialectical method means that the investigator must completely immerse himself in the study of the object, examining it from all sides in order to determine the inner contradictions and necessary laws of motion which governs its existence. The classical example of this method is to be found in the three volumes of Marx’s Capital. Marx did not invent the laws which govern the capitalist mode of production in an arbitrary fashion, but derived them from a painstaking dialectical analysis of all aspects of capitalism, tracing its historical development and following the process of commodity production through all its phases.

In his Philosophical Notebooks, which contain a detailed study of Hegel’s Science of Logic, Lenin points out that the first condition for dialectical thought is "the determination of the concept out of itself (the thing itself must be considered in its relations and in its development)." Or, put another way, the dialectical method sets out from "the absolute objectivity of consideration, (not examples, not divergences, but the Thing-in-Itself)." (Lenin, Collected Works, Vol. 38, p. 221.)

The first and lowest form of thought is sense-perception, that is to say, the information immediately given to us by our senses—what we see, hear, touch, etc. This is followed by understanding (Verstand), which attempts to explain what is, but does so in a one-sided way, registering isolated facts. Broadly speaking, the understanding here is identical with formal logic, ordinary thinking, and "common sense." We see that a thing exists, that it is itself, and nothing but itself. There seems nothing more to be said. But, in reality, there is a great deal more to be said. The understanding presents things as isolated, fixed and unchanging. Reality, however, is not like that at all.

A more advanced form of thinking is what Hegel (and Kant) call Reason (Vernunft). Reason attempts to go beyond the immediate facts established by understanding, to break them down, dissolve them, and behind the apparently solid exterior appearances, to reveal the inner contradictory tendencies, which, sooner or later, will lead to profound transformations. "The battle of reason," says Hegel, "is the struggle to break up the rigidity to which the understanding has reduced everything." (Hegel, Logic, p. 53.)

The first principle of dialectical thought is absolute objectivity. The subject matter must be approached objectively, and the final result must not be anticipated in advance. We must absorb ourselves in the subject matter, until we grasp not just a series of isolated facts, but their inner connection and lawfulness. The laws of dialectics, unlike formal logic are not arbitrary constructions which can be applied in an external manner to any particular content. They have been derived from a careful observation of the development of nature, society and human thought.

The usual forms of thought represented by formal logic can be applied to any subject matter in an external and arbitrary fashion. Indeed, the real content of the subject matter is entirely irrelevant to it. Formal logic, as expressed in the abstract law of identity (A equals A) appears to express an indisputable truth. In reality, it is an empty tautology, "monochrome formalism," or as Hegel says wittily, "the night in which all cows are black—that is the very na•vety of emptiness of knowledge." (Hegel, Phenomenology, p. 79.)

The so-called law of identity is only an abstract form with no real content, incapable of movement or further development. It cannot be applied to the dynamic reality of a restless universe, in which everything constantly changes, comes into being, and passes away, and therefore cannot be considered self-equal. In the same way, the law of contradiction is false because every really existing thing contains both positive and negative. It is and it is not because it is in a constant state of movement and change. The only thing which does not change is change itself. All attempts to fix the truth as a one-sided and static thing is doomed to failure. As Hegel wittily expressed it, the truth is "bacchanalian revel." The existence of contradiction is reflected intuitively in the popular consciousness in the form of proverbs and sayings which, however, because of their unsystematic and intuitive character, often contradict each other. For example, "One man’s meat is another man’s poison."

In science also we see contradictions at all levels, for example attraction and repulsion, North and South in magnetism, positive and negative in electricity, action and reaction in mechanics, contraction and expansion, etc. As against formal logic, dialectics does not inflict itself on nature, but derives its categories from reality itself. Real dialectics has nothing in common with the caricature outlined by its critics, who try to present it as a subjective and arbitrary play on words. This is really the dialectic of Sophism, which, like formal logic, is also applied in an external manner to any given content with the intention of manipulating contradictions in a subjective manner. Nor does dialectics have anything in common with the gross oversimplification of the "triad" (thesis, antithesis, synthesis), which was adopted by Kant and turned into a lifeless formulae. Real dialectics attempts to discover, by means of a rigorously objective analysis, the inner logic and laws of motion of a given phenomenon.

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