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16-12-01 -- Summary Of Essay Twelve Part One: The Metaphysical Status Of Dialectics
These are Introductory Essays, which have been written for those who find the main Essays either too long, or too difficult. They do not pretend to be comprehensive since they are simply summaries of the core ideas presented at this site. Most of the supporting evidence and argument found in each of the main Essays has been omitted. Anyone wanting more details, or who would like to examine my arguments and evidence in full, should consult the Essay for which each is a précis. [In this case, that can be found here.]
In this particular Summary, several of the things I say may appear somewhat controversial; however the main Essay contains an extensive defence of these assertions, as well as references to the literature were the ideas are covered and/or defended in detail. Recall, this is only a summary!
Abbreviations Used At This Site
Non-Empirical Propositions Masquerading As Super-Empirical Theses
In MEC, Lenin quoted the following words (from Engels):
M1: "[M]otion without matter is unthinkable." [Lenin (1972), p.318. Italic emphasis in the original.]
Here, Lenin was making a typically metaphysical statement. Naturally, dialecticians will repudiate that assertion; nevertheless, it is possible to show that such a rejection would be as hasty as it is mistaken.
[MEC = Materialism And Empirio-Criticism.]
It is worth noting at the outset that theses like M1 purport to inform us of fundamental aspects of nature -- albeit in this case disguised as part of Lenin's admission of his own incredulity.
But, we are not to conclude from M1 that Lenin was merely recording his own personal views. On the contrary, he certainly believed that matter and motion were fundamental aspects of "objective reality"; that they were inseparable and that this was a scientific (or even a philosophical) fact. Moreover, like Engels, he held the view that motion was the mode of the existence of matter -– that is, he believed that matter could not exist without motion, nor vice versa. Motion was thus one of the principal ways that matter expressed itself exterior to the mind.
The metaphysical nature of Lenin's declaration can be seen by the way that it bypassed the need for any supporting evidence. It seemed to Lenin to be such an obvious 'fact' about matter and motion that to deny it was "unthinkable".
However, if humanity had access to information about motion and matter many orders of magnitude greater than is available today, it would still not be enough to show that the separation of matter from motion is unthinkable. No amount of data could substantiate that.
But, as we will see, Lenin's ambitious declaration has much more serious problems to contend with than the mere lack of supporting evidence.
Indicative Of What?
The seemingly profound nature of theses like M1 is linked to rather more mundane features of the language in which they are expressed: that is, to the fact that the main verb they use is often in the indicative mood.
Sometimes, the latter is beefed-up with subjunctive and/or modal qualifying terms -- which, incidentally, help create even more of a false impression.
For example, we find Engels saying things like this:
"Motion is the mode of existence of matter. Never anywhere has there been matter without motion, nor can there be…. Matter without motion is just as inconceivable as motion without matter. Motion is therefore as uncreatable and indestructible as matter itself; as the older philosophy (Descartes) expressed it, the quantity of motion existing in the world is always the same. Motion therefore cannot be created; it can only be transmitted." [Engels (1976), p.74. Bold emphases added.]
"The law of the transformation of quantity into quality and vice versa…[operates] in nature, in a manner fixed for each individual case, qualitative changes can only occur by the quantitative addition or quantitative subtraction of matter or motion….
"Hence, it is impossible to alter the quality of a body without addition or subtraction of matter or motion. [Engels (1954), p.63. Bold emphases added.]
Now, this apparently superficial grammatical facade hides a deeper logical form -- several in fact. This is something which only becomes plain when such sentences are examined more closely.
As noted above, expressions like these look as if they reveal deep truths about reality since they certainly resemble empirical propositions (i.e., propositions about matters of fact). In the event, they turn out to be nothing at all like them.
Consider an ordinary empirical proposition:
T1: Tony Blair owns a copy of The Algebra Of Revolution.
Compare this with these similar-looking indicative sentences:
T2: Time is a relation between events.
T3: Motion is inseparable from matter.
In order to understand T1, it is not necessary to know whether or not it is true.
However, the comprehension of T2 and T3 does go hand-in-hand with knowing either or both are true (or, conversely, knowing either or both are false). The truth of T2 and T3 thus follows from the meaning of certain words (or from certain definitions -- i.e., from yet more words).
[In T2 this might be something like "events take place in time". To be sure, T2 and T3 might be motivated by some sort of 'philosophical argument' -- on that see below.]
For Lenin, to understand what matter is ipso facto involves knowing that it is true to say that it moves.
This now intimately links the alethic status of T2 and T3 with meaning, but not with material confirmation, and hence not with a confrontation with reality. Their truth-status is independent of and anterior to the evidence.
In contrast, understanding T1 is independent of the evidence that could or would confirm or refute it -- indeed, it would be impossible to do either of these if T1 had not already been understood.
Empirical propositions are typically like this; they have to be understood first before they can be confronted with physical evidence that would establish their truth-status.
So, here we have two sorts of indicative sentences, each with a radically different 'relation' to 'reality'. Understanding the first sort (i.e., those like T1) is independent of their truth-status, whereas their actual truth or falsehood depends on the state of the world. In the second (i.e., those like T2 or T3), their truth or falsehood is not dependent on the state of the world, but follows from the meaning of the words they contain (or on those found in the argument from which they were 'derived'). To understand them is ipso facto to know they are true before material evidence is even sought.
Indeed, metaphysical theses (like T2, and, as will be agued, T3) are deliberately constructed to transcend the limitations of the material world, which tactic is excused on the grounds that it allows the aspiring metaphysician to uncover "underlying essences", revealing nature's "hidden secrets". Theses like these are deemed "necessarily true" (or "necessarily false"), and are thus held to express knowledge of fundamental aspects of reality, unlike contingent propositions whose truth can alter with the wind. Traditionally, this meant that empirical propositions like T1 were considered to be incapable of revealing authentic or genuine knowledge. Indeed, "philosophical knowledge" (underlying absolute certainty) has always been held to be of the sort delivered by T2 or T3-type sentences: necessary, a priori, non-contingent, and generated by thought alone. As Baker and Hacker note:
"Empirical, contingent truths have always struck philosophers as being, in some sense, ultimately unintelligible. It is not that none can be known with certainty…; nor is it that some cannot be explained…. Rather is it that all explanation of empirical truths rests ultimately on brute contingency -- that is how the world is! Where science comes to rest in explaining empirical facts varies from epoch to epoch, but it is in the nature of empirical explanation that it will hit the bedrock of contingency somewhere, e.g., in atomic theory in the nineteenth century or in quantum mechanics today. One feature that explains philosophers' fascination with truths of Reason is that they seem, in a deep sense, to be fully intelligible. To understand a necessary proposition is to see why things must be so, it is to gain an insight into the nature of things and to apprehend not only how things are, but also why they cannot be otherwise. It is striking how pervasive visual metaphors are in philosophical discussions of these issues. We see the universal in the particular (by Aristotelian intuitive induction); by the Light of Reason we see the essential relations of Simple Natures; mathematical truths are apprehended by Intellectual Intuition, or by a priori insight. Yet instead of examining the use of these arresting pictures or metaphors to determine their aptness as pictures, we build upon them mythological structures.
"We think of necessary propositions as being true or false, as objective and independent of our minds or will. We conceive of them as being about various entities, about numbers even about extraordinary numbers that the mind seems barely able to grasp…, or about universals, such as colours, shapes, tones; or about logical entities, such as the truth-functions or (in Frege's case) the truth-values. We naturally think of necessary propositions as describing the features of these entities, their essential characteristics. So we take mathematical propositions to describe mathematical objects…. Hence investigation into the domain of necessary propositions is conceived as a process of discovery. Empirical scientists make discoveries about the empirical domain, uncovering contingent truths; metaphysicians, logicians and mathematicians appear to make discoveries of necessary truths about a supra-empirical domain (a 'third realm'). Mathematics seems to be the 'natural history of mathematical objects' [Wittgenstein (1978), p.137], 'the physics of numbers' [Wittgenstein (1976), p.138; however these authors record this erroneously as p.139, RL] or the 'mineralogy of numbers' [Wittgenstein (1978), p.229]. The mathematician, e.g., Pascal, admires the beauty of a theorem as though it were a kind of crystal. Numbers seem to him to have wonderful properties; it is as if he were confronting a beautiful natural phenomenon [Wittgenstein (1998), p.47; again, these authors have recorded this erroneously as p.41, RL]. Logic seems to investigate the laws governing logical objects…. Metaphysics looks as if it is a description of the essential structure of the world. Hence we think that a reality corresponds to our (true) necessary propositions. Our logic is correct because it corresponds to the laws of logic….
"In our eagerness to ensure the objectivity of truths of reason, their sempiternality and mind-independence, we slowly but surely transform them into truths that are no less 'brutish' than empirical, contingent truths. Why must red exclude being green? To be told that this is the essential nature of red and green merely reiterates the brutish necessity. A proof in arithmetic or geometry seems to provide an explanation, but ultimately the structure of proofs rests on axioms. Their truth is held to be self-evident, something we apprehend by means of our faculty of intuition; we must simply see that they are necessarily true…. We may analyse such ultimate truths into their constituent 'indefinables'. Yet if 'the discussion of indefinables…is the endeavour to see clearly, and to make others see clearly, the entities concerned, in order that the mind may have that kind of acquaintance with them which it has with redness or the taste of a pineapple' [Russell (1937), p.xv; again these authors record this erroneously as p.v, RL], then the mere intellectual vision does not penetrate the logical or metaphysical that to the why or wherefore…. For if we construe necessary propositions as truths about logical, mathematical or metaphysical entities which describe their essential properties, then, of course, the final products of our analyses will be as impenetrable to reason as the final products of physical theorising, such as Planck's constant." [Baker and Hacker (1988), pp.273-75. Referencing conventions in the original have been altered to conform to those adopted here.]
Metaphysical propositions thus masquerade as especially profound super-empirical truths which cannot fail to be true (or cannot fail to be false, as the case may be). They do this by aping the indicative mood --, but they go way beyond this. Thus, what they say does not just happen to be this way or that, as with ordinary empirical truths -- these propositions cannot be otherwise. The world must conform to whatever they say. Indeed, this accounts for the use of modal terms (like "must", "necessary" and "inconceivable"), especially if their status is questioned --, or, of course, whenever their content is being sold to us.
Conversely, if anyone were to question the truth of T1, the following response: "Tony Blair must own a copy of The Algebra of Revolution" would be highly inappropriate -- unless, perhaps, T1 itself was the conclusion of an inference, such as: "Tony Blair told me he owned a copy, so he must own one", or it was based on a direct observation statement. But even then, the truth or falsehood of T1 would depend on an interface with material reality at some point.
So, in relation to propositions like T1, reality dictates to us whether what we say was true or false. We would not be dictating to nature what it must contain, or what it must be like, as metaphysicians have always done.
Hence, with respect to T2 and T3, things are radically different; their truth-values (true or false) can be determined independently, and in advance of the way the world happens to be. Here, the supposedly essential nature of reality can be ascertained from words alone. Such Super-Truths (or Super-Falsehoods) are derived solely from the alleged meaning of the words they contain (or from the 'concepts' they allegedly express). In that case, once understood, metaphysical propositions like T2 and T3 guarantee their own truth or their own falsehood. They are thus true a priori.
So, to understand a metaphysical thesis is to know it is true, or to know it is false in advance of any supporting evidence. That is why, to their inventors, metaphysical propositions appear to be so certain and self-evident. Questioning them seems to run against the grain of our understanding, not our experience. Indeed, they appear to be self-evident precisely because they need no evidence to confirm their truth-status; they provide their own evidence, and testify on their own behalf. Their veracity thus follows from the alleged meaning of the words they contain. They, not the world, guarantee their own truth (or falsehood).
Unfortunately, this divorces such theses from material reality, since they are true or false independently of any apparent state of the world.
In that case, any thesis that can be judged true or false on conceptual grounds alone cannot feature in a materialist account of reality, only an Idealist one.
This might seem to be a somewhat dogmatic statement to make, but as we shall see (in later sections of Essay Twelve when they are published), the opposite view is the one that is dogmatic, since it is based on a ruling-class view of reality (and on one whose validity is not sensitive to empirical test), which collapses into incoherence when examined closely.
Imposed On Reality
Nevertheless, it is now possible to see exactly why DM-theses can be (and are) so readily imposed on nature (in Essay Two we saw that dialecticians repeatedly do this): their internally-generated certitude means that no material fact could possibly controvert their content. This further implies that such theses cannot be read from nature (despite the claims made by DM-theorists that this is what they do), since that would undermine their status by turning them into ordinary, common-or-garden empirical propositions, demoting them from super-duper truths to boring material facts.
This is why they have traditionally been based solely on linguistic resources which have been deliberately divorced from material reality -- that is, on non-material abstractions, jargonised expressions and bogus terminology -- on ideas and 'concepts' located in an inner, immaterial world of 'cognition' -- just as we saw in Essay Three Part One and Part Two.
So, the truth of DM-propositions is ascertainable from the alleged meaning of the words they contain, not from the way the world happens to be.
For instance, the conclusions Engels drew about motion (i.e., that is was 'contradictory') command assent from the supposed meaning of words like "move", "same time" and "place", which he felt he could safely extrapolate to all of reality for all of time -- simply because such words supposedly guaranteed they applied to every single example of motion in the entire universe, past, present and future.
That is why, if pressed about this, dialecticians cannot appeal to evidence to support this thesis. As we saw in Essay Five, no evidence could show that an object is in two places in the same instant, in one of them and not in it. Hence, they have to rely on the meanings of the words Engels (Hegel, or Zeno) used.
This also explains why dialecticians find it hard to see how anyone could disagree with Engels, Lenin or Hegel; and that is plainly because these conclusions were based on (alleged) meanings, not on evidence to begin with. Hence, the rejection of what Engels said about motion seems to conflict with fundamental aspects of language (which in turn naturally seems to make the opposite conclusion "inconceivable").
Similarly, Trotsky was able to refer to the "axiom" that things are never equal to themselves because of the logical properties supposedly built into words (or 'concepts') like "equal", "change", "same" and "different". Indeed, Hegel was able to do something even more impressive by considering a few transmogrified "concepts" (such as 'Being' and 'Nothing'), and what they allegedly implied as they "developed". [More on that in Parts Five and Six of Essay Twelve, when it is published.]
In Essays Three to Six (and in more detail here), we will see that this particular thesis 'follows' from Hegel's idiosyncratic analysis of subject/predicate propositions, wherein the subject is allegedly different from the predicate. This meant for Hegel that our words/concepts had alteriety or difference (and hence negativity) built into them. [See also here.]
Lenin, too, felt he could declare that motion without matter was "unthinkable", and that he could do this well in advance of the unimaginably large body of empirical evidence that would be needed to justify even a weaker form of this thesis. He was able to do this because matter and motion are inter-defined in DM (the latter being a "mode" of the existence of the former). So, from such a definition, super-empirical truths could be 'deduced', short-circuiting or by-passing the empirical checking stage.
As is abundantly clear from the record, Lenin did not first review the evidence in favour of his thesis (that motion without matter is "unthinkable") before he delivered this semi-divine pronouncement; he dictated what he thought the world must be like, deriving this idea from what he took the words "matter" and "motion" to mean, or from what the DM-tradition stipulates they must mean (and thus, of course, from Engels, who did likewise).
We have also seen that Lenin was able to ascertain from a simple sentence about "John" much of the deep structure of reality.
Naturally, dialecticians can only claim this impressively magical skill for themselves because of the social space that traditional thought has created for them -- and which their own class position predisposes them to prefer. [More on this in Essay Nine Parts One and Two.]
So, dialecticians are simply playing an ancient game according to the rules, deriving a priori theses from words alone.
The only problem is that these rules were laid down by ruling-class theorists.
Ignoring Both Critics And Evidence
Hence, Lenin and other DM-theorists feel they can safely ignore any evidence that disconfirms such theses, since they weren't empirical to begin with -- despite their indicative veneer. [A recent example of this can be found here.]
Unfortunately, as noted above, this means that dialectical-metaphysical theses can form no part of a material account of reality, and hence cannot be used to change the world. These theses follow from abstract ideas, and are thus thoroughly Idealist; no amount of spin can give them the radical or materialist make-over dialecticians allege for them. As George Novack concedes:
"A consistent materialism cannot proceed from principles which are validated by appeal to abstract reason, intuition, self-evidence or some other subjective or purely theoretical source. Idealisms may do this. But the materialist philosophy has to be based upon evidence taken from objective material sources and verified by demonstration in practice...." [Novack (1965), p.17. Bold emphasis added.]
This also explains why DM-theorists to this day ignore anything (material) that contradicts their theses. In fact, rather like the benighted souls in Galileo's day, who would not even look down his telescope, some even refuse to read these Essays! [Exactly why this is so will be explored in Essay Nine Part Two.] This also accounts for the cavalier attitude adopted by dialecticians toward FL, the constant misrepresentation of the ideas of fellow Marxist opponents like myself, and the watery-thin evidence they offer-up in support of their 'laws'.
If DM-theses are self-evident (or follow from the sort of immanent 'logic' one finds in Hegel), then that plainly licences the sort of knee-jerk and arrogant high-handedness practically all dialecticians display. Since nothing materially-based could possibly count against their theory -- it is indeed hermetically sealed-off from the physical world --, anyone who dares to produce argument or evidence against it can safely be ignored, abused for their pains, and dismissed with the hackneyed judgement that they do not "understand" dialectics.
[This inadvertent admission alone shows that 'Materialist Dialectics' is not based on evidence, but on how certain words must be "understood".]
In fact, this attitude of mind is somewhat reminiscent of the theologically-motivated arrogance displayed by certain Christian sects. Anyone who has conversed with, say, a devout Protestant from Northern Ireland will know of what I speak -- indeed, in attitude alone, if nowhere else, there is more than a passing resemblance between born-again dialecticians and born-again Christians.
To be sure, if your beliefs have been sanctioned by the impenetrable 'logic' found in Hegel (in the case of DM-fans), or by the equally impenetrable will of God (in the case of Christians), you are going to think and act as if you are special -- and superior --, and thus one of the Elect.
Since DM-theses are not materially-based, nothing in material reality could possibly disconfirm them. That is why dialecticians consider it a waste of time reading demolition-jobs like those published at this site. Once saved, always saved.
As we will see, this helps account for the sectarianism dialectics encourages in all who allow it to colonise their brains. [More on this in Essay Nine Part Two.]
In this way -- and as with other varieties of ruling-class, anti-materialist thought --, DM is just another form of Idealism. To be sure, this is what Hegel himself said of all philosophical theories:
"Every philosophy is essentially an idealism or at least has idealism for its principle…." [Hegel (1999), pp.154-55.]
That rare moment of clarity needs no spinning to put it back on its feet.
Lenin Thinks The Unthinkable
With regard to Lenin's avowal reported in M1a, it's worth asking the following question: What is it about these five words that make their content seem so "unthinkable"?
M1a: "Motion without matter is unthinkable."
Curiously, however, in Lenin's case at least, it is obvious that he must have thought the above words in order to declare that they were unthinkable!
In that case, the phrase "motion without matter" must have gone through his head at some point. Even if Lenin went on to think the additional words tacked on at the end (i.e., "…is unthinkable"), he must have rattled past the three offending words first (i.e., "motion without matter"). No one imagines that his brain switched his thoughts on just as they reached the relative safety of the last two terms in that sentence!
In that case, Lenin must have done what he declared could not be done; he must have thought the "unthinkable" in the act of declaring that no one could do what he himself had just done.
Naturally, this means that in practice Lenin contradicted himself, for he managed to do what he said could not be done. That is why in practice Lenin's thesis becomes impossible either to comprehend or even to state. If he accomplished what he said no one could do in the act of telling us just that, why can't anyone else do it? What is so special about him?
Worse still, if the rest of us can think the three offending words ("motion without matter") whenever we read Lenin telling us that we can't do the very thing we must have done to grasp his point, we too must contradict Lenin in practice. Indeed, the very act of telling us we cannot think these words prompts us to do just that!
Even those who agree with Lenin that "motion without matter is unthinkable" must think these three illicit words. Hence, even the most slavishly obedient Lenin-groupie cannot avoid disobeying the master every time he/she reads this controversial phrase.
Have such characters not noticed that to read Lenin is to disobey him?
This shows that it is not possible to relate the content of Lenin's claim to anything that could be found (or that could occur) in material reality, since it was based on concepts knitted together in defiance of material reality and of the language derived from our complex relation to it (on which topic, see below).
Invention Is The Mother Of Philosophical Necessity
The paradoxical nature of Lenin's words illustrates the ineluctable slide into non-sense that all theories undergo whenever their proponents try to undermine either the vernacular or the logical and pragmatic principles on which it is based -- those which, for example, ordinary speakers regularly use to state contingent truths or falsehoods about the world without such a fuss.
Intractable logical problems soon begin to emerge (with regard to such putatively empirical, but nonetheless metaphysical, sentences) if an attempt is made to restrict or eliminate one or other of the paired semantic possibilities associated with ordinary empirical propositions: i.e., truth and falsehood.
This occurs, for example, when an apparently empirical proposition is declared to be only true or only false (or, more pointedly, 'necessarily' the one or the other) -- as a "law of cognition", perhaps -- or, more likely, when a 'necessary' truth or falsehood is mis-identified as a particularly profound sort of empirical thesis.
As we will soon see, this tactic results in the automatic loss of both semantic options, and with that goes any sense that the original proposition might have had, rendering it incomprehensible.
This is because empirical propositions leave it open as to whether they are true or false; that is why their truth-values cannot simply be read-off from their content, why evidence is required in order to determine their semantic status, and why it is possible to understand them before their truth or falsehood is known. If that were not so, it would be impossible to ascertain their truth-status, as we have seen.
When this is not the case -- i.e., when either option (truth or falsehood) is closed-off, when propositions are said to be "necessarily true" or "necessarily false" -- evidence clearly becomes irrelevant. Thus, whereas the truth or falsehood of an empirical proposition cannot be ascertained on linguistic, conceptual or semantic grounds alone, if the truth or falsehood of a proposition is capable of being established solely on the basis of such structural factors, that proposition cannot be empirical.
If, however, such propositions are still regarded (by those who propose them) as truths (or Supertruths) about the world, about its "essence", then they are plainly metaphysical.
Otherwise the truth or falsehood of such propositions would be world-sensitive, not solely meaning- or concept-dependent. And that explains why the comprehension of metaphysical propositions appears to go hand in hand with knowing their 'truth' (or their 'falsehood') -- they are based on features of thought/language, not on the material world. This means that they can't be related to the material world or anything in it, and hence they can't be used to help change reality.
Of course, it could always be claimed that such 'essentialist' thoughts 'reflect' the world.
But, if thought 'reflects' the world, it would be possible to understand a proposition that allegedly expressed such a reflected thesis in advance of knowing whether it was true or false, otherwise confirmation in practice, or by comparing it with the world, would become an empty gesture.
And yet, on the other hand, if the truth of such a thought could be ascertained from that proposition/'thought' itself (i.e., if it were "self-evident"), then plainly the world would drop out of the picture, which just means that that 'thought'/proposition cannot be a reflection of the world, whatever else it is.
Furthermore, and worse, if a proposition is purported to be empirical, but which can only be false (as seems to be the case with M2, below, according to Lenin) then, as we will see, paradox must ensue.
Consider the following sentence, one which Lenin would presumably have declared necessarily false (if not "unthinkable"):
M2: Motion sometimes occurs without matter.
Unfortunately for Lenin, in order to declare M2 necessarily (and always) false, the possibility of its truth must first be entertained: if the truth of M2 is to be permanently excluded by holding it as necessarily false, then whatever would make it true has to be ruled out conclusively. But, anyone doing that would have to know what M2 rules in so that he/she could comprehend what it is that is being disqualified by its rejection as always and necessarily false. And yet, this is precisely what cannot be done if what M2 itself says is permanently ruled out on semantic/conceptual grounds.
Consequently, if a proposition like M2 is necessarily false this charade (i.e., the permanent exclusion of its truth) cannot take place -- since it would be impossible to say (or to think) what could count as making M2 true. Indeed, Lenin himself had to declare it "unthinkable".
However, because the truth of M2 cannot even be conceived, Lenin was thus in no position to say what was excluded by its rejection.
Unfortunately, this prevents any account being given of what would make M2 false, let alone 'necessarily' false. Given this twist, and paradoxically, M2 would now be necessarily false if and only if it was not capable of being thought of as necessarily false!
That is: M2 could be thought of as necessarily false if and only if what would make it true could at least be entertained so that it could then be ruled out as necessarily false. But, according to Lenin, the conditions that would make M2 true cannot even be conceived, so this train of thought cannot be joined at any point. And, if the truth of M2 -- or the conditions under which it would be true -- cannot be conceived, then neither can its falsehood, for we would not then know what was being ruled out.
In that case, the negation of M2 (i.e., M3) can neither be accepted nor rejected by anyone, for no one would know what its content committed them to so that it could be either countenanced or repudiated. Hence, M2 would lose any sense it had, since it could not under any circumstances be either true or false.
M3: Motion never occurs without matter.
This means that whoever propounds such a thesis would have to know what "motion without matter" rules in so that he/she knows exactly what it rules out as always and necessarily false. And yet, this is precisely what cannot be done if "motion without matter" is "unthinkable".
Such Super-Empirical theses thus collapse under the weight of their own defective use of language.
Which is why Marx said the following:
"The philosophers have only to dissolve their language into the ordinary language, from which it is abstracted, in order to recognise it, as the distorted language of the actual world, and to realise that neither thoughts nor language in themselves form a realm of their own, that they are only manifestations of actual life." [Marx and Engels (1970), p.118. Bold emphases added.]
[The same slide into incoherence can be demonstrated with respect to each and every metaphysical thesis (but not on the same lines as attempted here, of course); that will not be demonstrated in this Summary since it is not relevant to its overall aims. However, in other Essays, each and every DM-thesis of any significance has been shown to disintegrate in like manner.]
Metaphysical Fiat -- Dogma on Stilts
Another odd feature of metaphysical theses is worth pointing out: since the truth-values of defective sentences like these are plainly not determined by the world, they have to be given a truth-value by fiat. They have to be declared "necessarily true" or "necessarily false", and this is plainly because their truth cannot be derived from the world, with which they cannot now be compared.
Or, more grandiloquently, their opposites have to be pronounced "unthinkable" by a sage-like figure -- a Philosopher, or perhaps a Dialectical Magus of some sort.
Metaphysical decrees like this are as common as dirt in traditional thought -- and, as we can now see, in dialectics, too.
Isolated theses like these have necessary truth or falsehood granted them as a gift. In that case, instead of being compared with material reality to ascertain their truth-status, they are derived solely from or compared with other related theses (or to be more honest, they are merely compared with yet more jargon) as part of a terminological gesture at 'verification'. Their bona fides are thus thoroughly Ideal and 100% bogus.
The normal cannons that determine when something is true or false (i.e., a comparison with reality) have to be set aside, and a spurious 'evidential' ceremony substituted for it -- which in DM is often carried out after the event, and even then with only a very narrow range of examples (as we found with Trotsky's 'analysis' of the LOI and Engels's account of motion, etc.) -- or, if it is carried out in advance, it is performed in the head as a sort of 'thought experiment', or perhaps as part of a very hasty and superficial consideration of the 'concepts' involved.
As far as traditional Philosophy (Metaphysics) is concerned, we know this is precisely what happened as the subject developed. But with respect to DM, its class-compromised origin also mirrors this ideological degeneration. As is well-known, every dialectical doctrine was lifted from Hegel (and were then allegedly given a materialist flip), but Hegel's ideas were not based on experimentation of any sort, nor were they derived from material reality. He openly borrowed them from earlier mystics (as we will see in Essay Fourteen (summary here)), while attempting to justify them with some of his own 'innovative' word-juggling.
So, it is only after the event that supporting evidence is sought by dialecticians to substantiate their a priori theses -- and, as we will see in the Essays posted here, this 'evidence' is not only wafer-thin, what little there is does not support DM anyway.
Because of this, DM-theses are quintessentially Idealist and thoroughly anti-materialist.
Aristotle Refutes Lenin
Engels went further than Lenin:
"Matter without motion is just as inconceivable as motion without matter. Motion is therefore as uncreatable and indestructible as matter itself." [Engels (1976), p.74.]
However, in this particular case, not only is it easy to speak about motionless matter (using materially-grounded ordinary language -- several examples of this are given in Essays Five and Twelve Part One) -- up until recently, human beings actually managed to think about it, too. Indeed, motionless matter was a fundamental tenet of Aristotelian Physics.
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