"dialectics" can be a matter of the method for understanding empirical reality or epistemology (as with Levins & Lewontin's DIALECTICAL BIOLOGIST). That method is justified by the likelihood that the subject of study involves a dialectical process.
"dialectics" can also refer to a mode of presentation, as with the way that Marx wrote volume I of CAPITAL. Similarly, it can refer to a style of debate/discussion, as in Plato.
On 7/28/05, Mycos <mycos at shaw.ca> wrote:
> Yeah. What he said.....
>
> Gary
>
>
> #
>
> 1. The Marxian process of change through the conflict of
> opposing forces, whereby a given contradiction is characterized by a
> primary and a secondary aspect, the secondary succumbing to the
> primary, which is then transformed into an aspect of a new
> contradiction. Often used in the plural with a singular or plural verb.
> 2. The Marxian critique of this process.
>
> http://dictionary.reference.com/search?q=dialectic
>
> Charles Brown wrote:
> >
> >
> > When it comes to the topic of dialectics, I tend to agree with Noam Chomsky:
> >
> > "Dialectics is one that I've never understood, actually - I've just
> > never understood what the word means. Marx doesn't use it,
> > incidentally,it's used by Engels.|...| I haven't the foggiest idea what it
> > is. It seems to mean something about complexity, or alternative positions,
> > or change, or
> > something. I don't know." [p228 "Understanding Power"]
> >
> > ^^^^
> >
> >>From the below it seems Marx used "dialectics" and had a dialectic method.
> >
> > Charles
> >
> > ^^^^
> >
> >
> >
> > <<block quote>>Whilst the writer pictures what he takes to be actually my
> > method, in this striking and [as far as concerns my own application of it]
> > generous way, what else is he picturing but the dialectic method?
> >
> > Of course the method of presentation must differ in form from that of
> > inquiry. The latter has to appropriate the material in detail, to analyse
> > its different forms of development, to trace out their inner connexion. Only
> > after this work is done, can the actual movement be adequately described. If
> > this is done successfully, if the life of the subject-matter is ideally
> > reflected as in a mirror, then it may appear as if we had before us a mere a
> > priori construction.
> >
> > My dialectic method is not only different from the Hegelian, but is its
> > direct opposite. To Hegel, the life-process of the human brain, i.e., the
> > process of thinking, which, under the name of "the Idea," he even transforms
> > into an independent subject, is the demiurgos of the real world, and the
> > real world is only the external, phenomenal form of "the Idea." With me, on
> > the contrary, the ideal is nothing else than the material world reflected by
> > the human mind, and translated into forms of thought.
> >
> > The mystifying side of Hegelian dialectic I criticised nearly thirty years
> > ago, at a time when it was still the fashion. But just as I was working at
> > the first volume of "Das Kapital," it was the good pleasure of the peevish,
> > arrogant, mediocre 'Epigonoi who now talk large in cultured Germany, to
> > treat Hegel in same way as the brave Moses Mendelssohn in Lessing's time
> > treated Spinoza, i.e., as a "dead dog." I therefore openly avowed myself the
> > pupil of that mighty thinker, and even here and there, in the chapter on the
> > theory of value, coquetted with the modes of expression peculiar to him. The
> > mystification which dialectic suffers in Hegel's hands, by no means prevents
> > him from being the first to present its general form of working in a
> > comprehensive and conscious manner. With him it is standing on its head. It
> > must be turned right side up again, if you would discover the rational
> > kernel within the mystical shell.
> >
> > In its mystified form, dialectic became the fashion in Germany, because it
> > seemed to transfigure and to glorify the existing state of things. In its
> > rational form it is a scandal and abomination to bourgeoisdom and its
> > doctrinaire professors, because it includes in its comprehension and
> > affirmative recognition of the existing state of things, at the same time
> > also, the recognition of the negation of that state, of its inevitable
> > breaking up; because it regards every historically developed social form as
> > in fluid movement, and therefore takes into account its transient nature not
> > less than its momentary existence; because it lets nothing impose upon it,
> > and is in its essence critical and revolutionary.
> >
> > The contradictions inherent in the movement of capitalist society impress
> > themselves upon the practical bourgeois most strikingly in the changes of
> > the periodic cycle, through which modern industry runs, and whose crowning
> > point is the universal crisis. That crisis is once again approaching,
> > although as yet but in its preliminary stage; and by the universality of its
> > theatre and the intensity of its action it will drum dialectics even into
> > the heads of the mushroom-upstarts of the new, holy Prusso-German empire.
> >
> > Karl Marx
> > London
> > January 24, 1873
> >
> > http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1867-c1/p3.htm
> >
> >
> > ___________________________________
> > http://mailman.lbo-talk.org/mailman/listinfo/lbo-talk
> >
> >
>
> --
>
> Gary Williams
>
> Prohibition Funds Terrorism
> ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
> http://mycos.blogspot.com
>
>
>
>
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-- Jim Devine "History is not statistically significant" -- Lucien Foldes & Pauline Watson.