Engels And Mickey Mouse Science

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A few months ago, I sent a letter to the International Socialist Review concerning an article written by Brian Jones about Engels's book Anti-Dühring, which had been published in the May/June 2008 issue. My letter appeared in the September/October number, along with a reply from comrade Jones.

Here is the original letter, followed comrade Jones's response, and my reply to it:

Brian Jones's summary of Anti-Dühring neglected to say that with respect to philosophy it is among the worst books ever written by a revolutionary.

Space prevents me from outlining its many errors, but one example will do: the "law of the transformation of quantity into quality"

While it is true that some things change "nodally" (in "leaps"), many do not; when heated, metal, glass, plastic, butter, toffee and chocolate melt smoothly. So, the "nodal" aspect of this law is defective.

To be sure, some things change "qualitatively" (exactly as Engels says), once more, many do not. The order in which events take place can effect "quality". For example, anyone who tries pouring a pint of water slowly into a gallon of concentrated sulphuric acid will face a long and painful stay in hospital, whereas the reverse action is perfectly safe.

Worse still, this law is hopelessly vague. For instance, we have yet to be told the precise length of a "nodal point". But, if no one knows, then anything from a Geological Age to an instantaneous quantum leap could be "nodal"!

In addition, Engels failed to say what he meant by "quality". Hegel understood this word in an Aristotelian sense; that is, it refers to a property the change of which alters an object into something new. Unfortunately, given this 'definition', many of the examples dialecticians use to illustrate this law would fail.

For example, the change from water to steam can't be an example of "qualitative change"; ice, water and steam are all H₂O. Quantitative addition or subtraction of energy does not result in a qualitative change of the required sort; nothing substantially new emerges.

Faced with this, we might try to widen the definition of "quality" to neutralise this objection.

Alas, while this might rescue the above example, it would sink the theory: if we relax "quality" so that it applies to any qualitative difference, we would have to include the relational properties of bodies. In that case, we could easily have qualitative change with no extra matter or energy added. For instance, consider three animals in a row: a mouse, a pony, and an elephant. In relation to the mouse, the pony is big, but in relation to the elephant it is small. Change in quality here, but no matter or energy has been added or subtracted. Plainly, that would make a mockery of this law.

Finally, consider stereoisomers: molecules with the same number of atoms arranged differently. Here we have a change in geometry producing a change in quality with the addition of no new matter or energy.

This law's other serious weaknesses are detailed at my site, here:

http://anti-dialectics.co.uk/page%2007.htm

In solidarity,

Rosa Lichtenstein

----------oOo----------

First, Lichtenstein wants dialectical laws to prescribe precise nodal points of transformation from quantity to quality. When dialectical laws cannot meet that level of specificity, she declares them "hopelessly vague." Lichtenstein can knock down her straw-man law all day, but it does not refute the general law that Engels describes. "For our purpose," he writes in Dialectics of Nature, "we could express this by saying that in nature, in a manner exactly fixed for each individual case, qualitative changes can only occur by the quantitative addition or subtraction of matter or motion (so-called energy)" (my emphasis). The transformation of water to ice or to steam, according to Lichtenstein, isn't really a qualitative change anyway, since all three have the same molecular structure. Well, I don’t think we have to “relax” our definition of quality too far to imagine that the unique qualities of steam allowed it to play a special role in industry. An ice engine will never be as productive as a steam engine, even though ice and steam are both H₂O. Lichtenstein must be blissfully unconcerned about the melting of the polar ice caps -- no qualitative change there, she must claim. Polar bears might disagree.

I published a reply to the above at RevLeft, but the latter was written rather hastily, based on an imperfectly typed copy of Jones's response to me (also posted at RevLeft by another comrade).

Anyone using these links must remember that they will be skipping past supporting argument and evidence set out in earlier sections. [If your Firewall has a pop-up blocker, you will need to press the "Ctrl" key at the same time or these and the other links here won't work!]

I made the point in Essay Seven Part One that Dialectical Materialism [DM] relies for its 'veracity' on what I have called "Mickey Mouse Science". Anyone who has studied or practiced genuine science knows the great care and attention to detail that has to be devoted by researchers, often over many years or decades, if they want to add to, or alter, even relatively minor areas of current knowledge, let alone establish a new law. This was the case in Engels's day, just as it is the case today. Moreover, the concepts employed by scientists have to be precise and analytically sound. The use of primary data is essential (or at least it has to be reviewed or referenced by the scientists involved), and supporting evidence has to be extensive, meticulously recorded and subject not only to public scrutiny, but also to peer review.

In contrast, the sort of Mickey Mouse Science one finds in Creationist literature is rightly the target of derision by scientists and Marxists alike. And yet, when it comes to DM, we find in Engels's writings (and those of subsequent dialecticians) little other than Mickey Mouse Science. Engels supplied no original data, and what little evidence he presented in support of his 'Law' would have been rejected as amateurish in the extreme if it had appeared in an undergraduate science paper, let alone in a research document --, even in his day! It is salutary, therefore, to compare Engels's approach to scientific proof with that of Darwin, whose classic work is a model of clarity and original research. Darwin presented the scientific community with extensive evidence and original data, which has been added to greatly over the last 150 years.

The picture is almost the exact opposite when we turn to consider not just the paucity of evidence illustrating (it certainly does not prove) Engels's first 'Law', the transformation of quantity into quality [Q/Q], but also the total lack of clarity in the concepts used. In Anti-Dühring and Dialectics of Nature, for example, we are not told what a "quality" is, nor how long a dialectical "node" is supposed to last. Furthermore, we are left completely in the dark what the phrase "addition" of matter and energy means, nor are we told what the energetic (thermodynamic) boundaries are to any of the systems under consideration. Indeed, we are not even told what constitutes a system, nor what counts as that system "developing"!

Moreover, supporting 'evidence' alone is considered; problem cases are just ignored. In this, too, DM resembles Creation 'Science'.

Again, unlike genuine science, the situation as not changed much in dialectical circles in the last 140 years. This led me to observe (in an earlier Essay):

Moreover, this Law is so vaguely worded that dialecticians can use it in whatever way they please. If this is difficult to believe, ask the very next dialectician you meet precisely how long a "nodal point" is supposed to last. As seems clear, if no one knows, anything from a Geological Age to an instantaneous quantum leap could be "nodal"!

And, it really isn't good enough for dialectically-inclined readers to dismiss this as mere pedantry. Can you imagine a genuine scientist refusing to say how long a crucially important interval in her theory is supposed to be, and accusing you of "pedantry" for even asking?

However, to those who think that this sort "pedantry" can be ignored it is worth pointing out that that would be the only way they could excuse their own sloppy thinking, and the only way they could make their ideas appear to work.

This sort of attitude would not be tolerated for one second in the sciences, or in any other branch of genuine knowledge. Can you imagine the fuss if someone were to argue that it does not matter what the Magna Carta said, or when the Battle of the Nile was fought, or what the Declaration of Independence actually contained, or what the exact wording of Newton's Second Law was, or whether "G", the Gravitational Constant, was 6.6742 x 10^-11 or 6.7642 x 10^-11 Mm²kg^-2, or indeed something else? Would we accept this sort of excuse from someone who said it did not matter what the precise wording of a contract in law happened to be? Or, that it did not really matter what Marx meant by "variable capital", or that he "pedantically" distinguished use-value from exchange-value -- or more pointedly, the "relative form" from the "equivalent form" of value --, we should be able to make do with anyone's guess? And how would we react if someone said, "Who cares if there are serious mistakes in that policeman's evidence against those strikers"? Or if someone else retorted "Big deal if there are a few errors in this or that e-mail address/web page URL, or in that mathematical proof! And who cares whether there is a difference between rest mass and inertial mass in Physics! What are you, some kind of pedant!?"

I even predicted that if readers were to ask dialecticians to be clear about what they meant by "quality" or "node", they would either be ignored or fobbed off.

What then do we find in comrade Jones's response? Does he attempt to tell us what a "quality" is, or define the length of a dialectical "node"? Do we find any reference at all to original data, new field work, greater attempts at analytical clarity?

In that case, we still do not know how long a "nodal" point is, nor what "quality" means, either!

"Hopelessly vague"? Whatever was I thinking!

However, when we compare this recklessly cavalier attitude to evidence, proof and clarity found in DM with the opposite state of affairs in Historical Materialism [HM], in all its forms, the contrast is stark indeed. In economics, history, politics, and current affairs, comrades write with commendable attention to detail and clarity. Moreover, they almost invariably assemble countless pages of data, facts and figures, tables and graphs, evidence and analysis, all carefully researched and referenced. They will also devote page after page analysing concepts such as "ideology", or "mode of production", but not one paragraph on "quality" or "node"!

Indeed, if an enemy of Marxism were to try to attack, say, our economic theory with an argumentative display that was as crassly amateurish and as evidentially-challenged as that which Engels and his epigones have put together in support of this first 'Law', comrades would be right to dismiss it out-of-hand as Mickey Mouse Anti-Marxism!

In fact, this is what comrade Jones all but alleges of my work (he calls much of it "silly"), and yet he is quite happy to accept a theory that enjoys very little evidential support (or any at all), and which is still terminally vague -- even after his 'reply' to me!

Lichtenstein can knock down her straw-man law all day, but it does not refute the general law that Engels describes.

But what "straw man" is this? All I did was ask a few simple questions? How long is a "nodal point", and what is a "quality"?

At least we know something about straw men: they are made of straw and look vaguely human. But this 'Law' is so vague, we do not know what it is. We would be blessed indeed if dialecticians were so clear in what they said that I could even so much as begin to erect a "straw man" -- but they have left me nothing with which to work!

However, in relation to dialectical "nodes", I have said the following in the Essay comrade Jones said he read:

So, dialecticians could specify a minimum time interval during which a phase or state of matter transition must take place for it to be counted as "nodal". In the case of boiling water, say, they could decide that if the transition from water to steam (or vice versa) takes place in an interval lasting less than k seconds/minutes (for some k), then it is indeed "nodal". Thus, by dint of such a stipulation, their 'Law' could be made to work (at least in this respect). But, there is nothing in nature that forces any of this on us -- the reverse is, if anything, the case. Phase/state of matter changes, and changes in general take different amounts of time; under differing circumstances even these alter. If so, as noted above, this 'Law' would become 'valid' only because of yet another stipulation and/or foisting, which would make it eminently 'subjective'.

However, given the strife-riven and sectarian nature of dialectical politics, any attempt to define dialectical-"nodes" could lead to yet more factions. Thus, we are sure to see emerge the rightist "Nanosecond Tendency" -- sworn enemies of the "Picosecond Left Opposition" -- who will both take up swords with the 'eclectic' wing: the "it depends on the circumstances" 'clique' at the 'centrist' "Femtosecond League".

But since the precise dimensions of the "nodes," or threshold -- a millisecond or a geological age -- cannot be prescribed, she claims that the "law" is worthlessly vague. Yet similar events can occur on vastly different scales. Geologists regularly refer to the "collision" of tectonic plates. These are quite different from, say, our automobile collisions. Surely, since tectonic plates move mere millimeters a year, and automobiles move at many miles per hour, Lichtenstein must find it ludicrous to call both "collisions," even though the term describes something important that they have in common.

However, the use of "collision" in mathematics, the physical sciences and geophysics is quite well-defined. When one tectonic plate hits another, their continued collision can last for hundreds of millions of years, but the actual collision is not a protracted affair. It does not take millions of years for two rock faces to touch each other. In fact, to depict the process itself, geophysicists will use the present continuous tense, employing "colliding". Dialecticians do not have a similar present continuous tense they can employ (unless, of course, they appeal to "leaping", or "node-ing").

So, the actual use of "collision" in this case is the same as its use in road crashes; the word connotes suddenness. And so does "node" and its corollary "leap". Indeed, both Hegel and Engels were quite clear about this:

It is said, natura non facit saltum [there are no leaps in nature]; and ordinary thinking when it has to grasp a coming-to-be or a ceasing-to-be, fancies it has done so by representing it as a gradual emergence or disappearance. But we have seen that the alterations of being in general are not only the transition of one magnitude into another, but a transition from quality into quantity and vice versa, a becoming-other which is an interruption of gradualness and the production of something qualitatively different from the reality which preceded it. Water, in cooling, does not gradually harden as if it thickened like porridge, gradually solidifying until it reached the consistency of ice; it suddenly solidifies, all at once. It can remain quite fluid even at freezing point if it is standing undisturbed, and then a slight shock will bring it into the solid state. [Hegel (1999), p.370, §776. Bold emphasis added.]¹

With this assurance Herr Dühring saves himself the trouble of saying anything further about the origin of life, although it might reasonably have been expected that a thinker who had traced the evolution of the world back to its self-equal state, and is so much at home on other celestial bodies, would have known exactly what's what also on this point. For the rest, however, the assurance he gives us is only half right unless it is completed by the Hegelian nodal line of measure relations which has already been mentioned. In spite of all gradualness, the transition from one form of motion to another always remains a leap, a decisive change. This is true of the transition from the mechanics of celestial bodies to that of smaller masses on a particular celestial body; it is equally true of the transition from the mechanics of masses to the mechanics of molecules -- including the forms of motion investigated in physics proper: heat, light, electricity, magnetism. In the same way, the transition from the physics of molecules to the physics of atoms -- chemistry -- in turn involves a decided leap; and this is even more clearly the case in the transition from ordinary chemical action to the chemism of albumen which we call life. Then within the sphere of life the leaps become ever more infrequent and imperceptible. -- Once again, therefore, it is Hegel who has to correct Herr Dühring. [Engels (1976), pp.82-83.I have used the online version here, but quoted the page numbers for the Foreign Languages edition. Bold emphasis added.]

We have already seen earlier, when discussing world schematism, that in connection with this Hegelian nodal line of measure relations -- in which quantitative change suddenly passes at certain points into qualitative transformation -- Herr Dühring had a little accident: in a weak moment he himself recognised and made use of this line. We gave there one of the best-known examples -- that of the change of the aggregate states of water, which under normal atmospheric pressure changes at 0°C from the liquid into the solid state, and at 100°C from the liquid into the gaseous state, so that at both these turning-points the merely quantitative change of temperature brings about a qualitative change in the condition of the water. [Ibid., p.160. Bold emphasis added.]

From this it is quite clear that for both Engels and Hegel, "nodes"/"leaps" are sudden. Indeed, for Engels, this applies right across the sciences. In which case, comrade Jones is out of kilter with Hegel and Engels (and, indeed, with many other dialecticians).

Hence, a collision is a collision no matter whether it is sudden or protracted (so a clear definition is inappropriate), but a "node" has to be sudden, as the above quotations show.

Down here on earth, in order for one thing to truly change from one qualitative state to another, specific quantities of energy must be added or subtracted, in a manner exactly fixed for each individual case.

But, how can he possibly know this? Where has this "must" come from? Has he examined every single change in 'quality' that has ever taken place on this planet (or, indeed, a representative sample)? And how does he know that these "must" occur in a manner "exactly fixed for each individual case"? All comrade Jones has is Engels's word for it. In fact, is it not plain that he has simply accepted Engels's dogmatic word, and imposed an a priori view on nature, too?

Lichtenstein, like Hegel, is trying to “foist on nature and history” dialectics as laws of thought, losing sight of the real life motion of things in the natural world, which is inherently dialectical.

But, where do I try to "foist" anything at all on nature? The comrade does not say --, and no wonder, he cannot, for I do not, and will not do this. And he ignores what Engels himself says:

Dialectics, however, is nothing more than the science of the general laws of motion and development of nature, human society and thought. [Engels (1976), p.180. Bold added.]

For they [the laws of dialectics] are nothing but the most general laws of these two aspects of historical development, as well as of thought itself. [Engels (1954), p.62. Bold added.]

So, it's Engels, not me, who is foisting these laws on nature, society and thought.

In contrast, however, comrade Jones tells us that the natural world is "inherently dialectical". Again: how can he possibly know this? Even physicists cannot yet tell us what the "inherent" nature of reality is. In that case, as with so many other dialecticians, it looks like comrade Jones has indeed "foisted" this idea on nature, too.

[The evidence that this is in fact what all dialecticians do can be found here.]

Indeed, Engels does this sort of thing all the time; here is just one example of many:

The law of the transformation of quantity into quality and vice versa. For our purpose, we could express this by saying that in nature, in a manner exactly fixed for each individual case, qualitative changes can only occur by the quantitative addition or subtraction of matter or motion (so-called energy).

All qualitative differences in nature rest on differences of chemical composition or on different quantities or forms of motion (energy) or, as is almost always the case, on both. Hence it is impossible to alter the quality of a body without addition or subtraction of matter or motion, i.e. without quantitative alteration of the body concerned. [Engels (1954), p.63. Bold emphasis added.]

Engels was quite happy here to impose this 'Law' on nature, asserting that it is "impossible to alter the quality of a body without addition or subtraction of matter or motion" before he had considered all the available evidence. And yet, even if he had access to evidence that was several orders of magnitude greater than we have today, it would still not justify this use of "impossible".

In fact, his employment of "impossible" is not only mistaken (as my stereoisomers example shows -- see below), it's as good an example of "foisting" as one could wish to find.

The transformation of water to ice or to steam, according to Lichtenstein, isn't really a qualitative change anyway, since all three have the same molecular structure. Well, I don’t think we have to "relax" our definition of quality too far to imagine that the unique qualities of steam allowed it to play a special role in industry. An ice engine will never be as productive as a steam engine, even though ice and steam are both H₂O. Lichtenstein must be blissfully unconcerned about the melting of the polar ice caps -- no qualitative change there, she must claim. Polar bears might disagree.

Nevertheless, in my original letter, and despite what comrade Jones says, I did not in fact deny that this was a "qualitative" change, I merely noted the consequences of adopting Hegel's (and derivatively Aristotle's) understanding of "quality". Hence, much of the above is beside the point. [Someone might want to advise comrade Jones to read more carefully.]

To be sure, some things change "qualitatively" (exactly as Engels says), once more, many do not.

Indeed, I am happy to acknowledge that there are qualitative differences between ice, water and steam (where have I ever denied it?) -- but, whether these are the sort of "qualities" Engels refers to it's impossible to decide. [I for one certainly do not mean to use this term in the way Hegel used it. Perhaps comrade Jones does, but he was far too shy to say.]

Nevertheless, comrade Jones should know that Engels did not tell us what he meant by "quality", and so he (comrade Jones) is merely guessing. Indeed, comrade Jones does not tell us what a "quality" is, either -- presumably because he prefers the vague, Mickey Mouse sort of science found in DM.

However, if Engels was using "quality" as Hegel defined it (i.e., in an Aristotelian sense), then a "quality" is an essential, non-accidental property of an object or process the change of which alters it into something new -- a new substance, a new "kind of thing". The problem is that if this is the case, then when liquid water freezes or boils, no new substance comes into being; no new "kind of thing" emerges. In this instance, we have H₂0 throughout, which means that there is no change in an Aristotelian/Hegelian sense of "quality" anywhere in sight here.

[The Aristotelian definition can be found in the Glossary at the Marxist Internet Archive, here; Hegel's can be found here. As we can see from what Hegel says, even he got this wrong! He certainly thought that such phase changes were "qualitative", ignoring his own definition!]

So, the above can't be the "quality" that comrade Jones, at least, is referring to, for he wants us to accept the idea that ice, liquid water and steam exhibit different "qualities". Well, what sort or "quality" is he referring to? Again, we are left in the dark.

Now, comrade Jones dismisses many of the counter-examples I give at my site as "silly" -- which word is, of course, a technical term from Hegelian Philosophy far too complex for most human beings to understand.

Nevertheless, I advanced many of them in order to show that unless and until the term "quality" is clarified, this 'Law' has many trivial counter-examples.

In fact, one of the most important counter-examples I offered was the following:

There are countless examples where significant qualitative change can result from no obvious quantitative difference. These include the qualitative dissimilarities that exist between different chemicals for the same quantity of matter/energy involved.

For instance, Isomeric molecules (studied in stereochemistry) are a particularly good example of this phenomenon. This is especially true of those that have so-called "chiral" centres (i.e., centres of asymmetry). In such cases, the spatial ordering of the constituent atoms, not their quantity, affects the overall quality of the resulting molecule (something Engels said could not happen); here, a change in molecular orientation, not quantity, effects a change in quality.

To take one example of many: (R)-Carvone (spearmint) and (S)-Carvone (caraway); these molecules have the same number of atoms (of the same elements), and the same bond energies, but they are nonetheless qualitatively distinct because of the different spatial arrangement of the atoms involved. Change in geometry --, change in quality.

This un-dialectical aspect of matter is especially true of the so-called "Enantiomers" (i.e., symmetrical molecules that are mirror images of each other). These include compounds like (R)-2-clorobutane and (S)-2-chlorobutane, and the so-called L- and D-molecules, which rotate the plane of polarised light the left (laevo) or the right (dextro)) -- such as, L- and D-Tartaric acid. What might at first appear to be small energy-neutral differences like these have profound biochemical implications; a protein with D-amino acids instead of L- will not work in most living cells since the overwhelming majority of organisms metabolise L-organic molecules. These compounds not only have the same number of atoms in each molecule, there are no apparent energy differences between them; even so, they have easily distinguishable physical qualities.

Finally, Lichtenstein presents the example of stereoisomers. I am not by any stretch of the imagination a chemist. Still, this example doesn’t seem to be a far cry from another very common phenomena in nature -- bicameralism, things that are mirror images of each other yet cannot be exchanged for each other. Your left and right hands are bicameral. If you could detach your hands and place them on the opposite arms, you’d look silly. So your hands are the same stuff arranged a different way -- qualitative change without quantitative change? Sure, if you have found a way to observe the transformation of your left hand into a right hand! Engels, on the other hand (pun intended), was on a different mission. "We are not concerned here with writing a handbook of dialectics," he explains, “but only with showing that the dialectical laws are really laws of [the] development of nature."

Comrade Jones's argument seems to be that since such isomers do not develop into one another, this is a spurious criticism of Engels's 'Law'.

In these series we encounter the Hegelian law in yet another form. The lower members permit only of a single mutual arrangement of the atoms. If, however, the number of atoms united into a molecule attains a size definitely fixed for each series, the grouping of the atoms in the molecule can take place in more than one way; so that two or more isomeric substances can be formed, having equal numbers of C, H, and 0 atoms in the molecule but nevertheless qualitatively distinct from one another. We can even calculate how many such isomers are possible for each member of the series. Thus, in the paraffin series, for C₄H₁₀ there are two, for C₆H₁₂ there are three; among the higher members the number of possible isomers mounts very rapidly. Hence once again it is the quantitative number of atoms in the molecule that determines the possibility and, in so far as it has been proved, also the actual existence of such qualitatively distinct isomers. [Engels (1954), p.67. Bold emphases added.]

But, there is no "development" here! So, if Engels can use examples where there is no "development" to illustrate his 'Law', comrade Jones can hardly complain if similar examples are used to refute it.²

[Several more examples of such 'non-developmental' qualitative differences (referred to by Engels) are given in Note Two.]

Nevertheless, it's quite clear that Engels did not appreciate how this seriously undermined his claim that:

It is impossible to alter the quality of a body without addition or subtraction of matter or motion, i.e. without quantitative alteration of the body concerned. [Engels (1954), p.63. Bold emphasis added.]

For here we have a change in geometry "passing over" into a qualitative change, refuting this 'Law'.

Anyway, it's not too clear why comrade Jones objects to this amendment to Engels's 'Law'. Am I suggesting a non-materialist revision? Is it bad science? Is it anti-Marxist?

On the contrary, it's plain that the only reason he objects is that my criticism shows that Engels's 'Law' is unsound as it stands (and it's not too clear how it can be repaired), and that he is more intent on defending a tradition than he is in understanding nature -- and is thus happy to "foist" a certain view on reality.

But, even if we insist that the 'developmental' aspect of this 'Law' cannot be ignored, one isomer can be turned into another by various chemical reactions. Of course, whether or not this conforms to Engels's 'Law' will depend on how the "addition of energy" clause is to be understood. No surprise then to find that dialecticians do not tell us what they mean by the "addition of energy". Nor do they define the energetic (thermodynamic) boundaries of the systems in question. And yet these are not minor or insignificant details; no genuine scientist would leave such important concepts this vague. [The sorts of problems this introduces are discussed here.]

Indeed, it's important to be clear about the difference between the expenditure of energy and the energy added to a system. This distinction is easy to see. Imagine someone pushing a heavy packing case along a level floor. In order to overcome friction, the one doing the pushing will have to expend energy. But, that energy has not been put into the packing case (as it were).³ However, if the same case is pushed up a hill, Physicists tell us that recoverable energy has been put into the case in the form of Potential Energy.

Now, in the examples of interest to dialecticians, it is the latter addition of energy (but not necessarily always Potential Energy) that appears relevant, not the former. The former sort does not really change the quality of the bodies concerned; the latter does. If so, the above counter-examples (e.g., concerning those Enantiomers) still apply, for the energy expended in order to change one isomer into another is generally of the first sort, not the second.

And, of course, there are many examples of "qualitative development" in nature that do not involve the "addition" of matter or energy -- these were in fact quoted in Essay Seven; so comrade Jones either ignored them, or he did not bother to read that Essay with due care -- or at all.

Bombardier beetles store two separate chemicals (hydroquinone and hydrogen peroxide) that are not mixed until threatened. When this occurs the two chemicals are squirted through two tubes, where they are mixed along with small amounts of catalytic enzymes. When these chemicals mix they undergo a violent 'exothermic' chemical reaction. The boiling, foul smelling liquid partially becomes a gas and is expelled with a loud popping sound.... [Wikipedia.]

A can of beer is pressurised by adding liquid nitrogen, which vaporises and expands in volume after the can is sealed, forcing gas and beer into the widget's hollow interior through a tiny hole -- the less beer the better for subsequent head quality. In addition, some nitrogen dissolves in the beer which also contains dissolved carbon dioxide.

The presence of dissolved nitrogen allows smaller bubbles to be formed with consequent greater creaminess of the subsequent head. This is because the smaller bubbles need a higher internal pressure to balance the greater surface tension, which is inversely proportional to the radius of the bubbles. Achieving this higher pressure is not possible just with dissolved carbon dioxide because of the greater solubility of this gas compared to nitrogen would create an unacceptably large head.

When the can is opened, the pressure in the can quickly drops, causing the pressurised gas and beer inside the widget to jet out from the hole. This agitation on the surrounding beer causes a chain reaction of bubble formation throughout the beer. The result, when the can is then poured out, is a surging mixture in the glass of very small gas bubbles and liquid.

This is the case with certain types of draught beer such as draught stouts. In the case of these draught beers, which before dispensing also contain a mixture of dissolved nitrogen and carbon dioxide, the agitation is caused by forcing the beer under pressure through small holes in a restrictor in the tap. The surging mixture gradually settles to produce a very creamy head. [Wikipedia.]

Anyway, even Lichtenstein's examples of node-less transformations don’t hold up. She claims that all kinds of things don’t melt "smoothly" (meaning, without a precise melting point) -- metal, glass, and so on. Is she serious? If that were correct, metal would begin melting as soon as any heat were applied to it. Hasn’t Lichtenstein ever cooked a meal? Did her metal pots and pans melt on the stove? Probably not, because while she was applying a certain quantity of heat to them, each metal has a unique quantitative threshold at which melting begins -- and not before -- “in a manner exactly fixed for each individual case.”

This is perhaps comrade Jones's weakest point. He does not deny that the changes I noted are smooth, he just advances the following claim:

If that were correct, metal would begin melting as soon as any heat were applied to it.

But, this is not relevant to the fact that all metals go from hard to soft very slowly, as does plastic, glass, resin, toffee, and butter. It's not relevant that in the case of metals this begins at temperatures well above cooking temperature. That is, of course, why we do not use (ordinary) plastic containers to cook food, or install chocolate fire doors (since, obviously, they begin to melt far earlier). But, on the other hand, no one would use, say, an ordinary frying pan to try to melt a steel ingot over a sufficiently hot flame.

Hasn’t Lichtenstein ever cooked a meal? Did her metal pots and pans melt on the stove? Probably not, because while she was applying a certain quantity of heat to them, each metal has a unique quantitative threshold at which melting begins...

We can see from this that comrade Jones has missed a career as a humorist of no little merit.

But, is it true that: "each metal has a unique quantitative threshold at which melting begins"? Sure, each metal has a defined melting point at which juncture it will have melted, but despite this, at lower temperatures that metal will begin to soften, and that softening is gradual. Human beings have known this for thousands of years -- it's what makes metals malleable and formable. So, the "qualitative" transition of metals from solid to liquid is slow, not rapid. At the melting point, the transition has ended, but the lead up to it is slow. The qualitative change (solid-to-liquid) here is typically non-nodal. The same is true of the other examples I gave. Who does not know that glass and plastic melt slowly?

Indeed, there are countless other node-free "qualitative" changes in nature (many of which were listed in the Essay the comrade clearly skim-read). For example, when heated, objects change in quality from cold to warm and then to hot, with no "nodal" point separating these particular qualitative stages. The same happens in reverse when they cool. Now, hot objects/processes are "qualitatively" quite different from cold objects/processes -- indeed, one is almost tempted to retort that comrade Jones might not notice the difference between a cold winter's day and a blisteringly hot summer afternoon, but his sweat glands will.

Moving bodies similarly speed up from slow to fast (and vice versa) without any "nodal" punctuation marks affecting the transition. In like manner, the change from one colour to the next in the normal colour spectrum is continuous, with no "nodal" points evident at all. Sounds, too, change smoothly from soft to loud, and back, in a "node"-free environment.

Also, if you try walking up the stairs in a skyscraper (or along a trail up the side of a mountain), you will ascend from low to high in a "leap"-free manner. If you walk toward a friend, you will move from being far away from her to being close to her "node"-lessly (and your friend will appear to grow in size 'leaplessly', too). If you increase the pressure on your arm, you will pass from comfort to pain slowly in a "node"-free zone.

There are countless examples of continuous change like this in nature and society where distinctive changes occur in a non-"nodal" manner; so many in fact that one wonders why dialecticians have not noticed them. Are they blinded by tradition to such an extent that they cannot think for themselves?

Of course, some of these could be ruled out by suitable definitions of "quality" and/or of "node" (always supposing dialecticians actually get around to doing this -- after all, we have only been waiting for two hundred years!), but how would that be different from imposing dialectics on the facts, and not reading it from the facts?

But, comrade Jones refuses to define these terms, and it's not hard to see why: if he did, many of the examples he and other dialecticians use would fall by the wayside.

Lichtenstein admits that there are some cases of quantitative changes -- for example, increasing degrees of heat -- that lead to qualitative changes. (She concedes some examples of melting -- but why does she admit them, since they also do not produce new molecular composition?).

As noted above, I am quite happy as a materialist to admit that objects and processes change qualitatively (using whatever definition of "quality" dialecticians finally alight upon). Nothing at my site suggests otherwise, so it's not too clear why comrade Jones said this:

She concedes some examples of melting -- but why does she admit them, since they also do not produce new molecular composition?

In fact, this is a problem for him, not me. I am not trying to defend a hopelessly vague 'theory'!

Amazingly, she claims to refute this law further by placing animals next to each other -- a mouse, a pony, and an elephant -- and moving her eyes from one to the other. They have different qualitative sizes, so she determines: "change in quality here, but no matter or energy has been added or subtracted. Plainly that would make a mockery of this law." Let me see if I've got this right: three different animals placed side by side show no change from quantity to quality? If the mouse is not transforming into the pony, and the pony changing into an elephant, what is the change being considered here? Are we talking about the change that takes place in her mind as she looks at different animals? Surely she understands that in order for something the size of a mouse (say, a pony embryo) to grow into something the size of an adult pony, an enormous amount of energy (food, etc.) is required. The same holds true for something the size of a pony (say, a young elephant) to grow to the size of an adult elephant. Plainly Lichtenstein has made a mockery of herself.

Clearly, this comrade has missed the point. My example of comparative sizes was thrown in to the discussion to show what happens if the definition of "quality" is relaxed too far. Here is what I said:

...[I]f we relax "quality" so that it applies to any qualitative difference, we would have to include the relational properties of bodies. In that case, we could easily have qualitative change with no extra matter or energy added. For instance, consider three animals in a row: a mouse, a pony, and an elephant. In relation to the mouse, the pony is big, but in relation to the elephant it is small. Change in quality here, but no matter or energy has been added or subtracted. Plainly, that would make a mockery of this law. [Bold added.]

So, dialecticians' sloppy approach to "quality" (not me) makes a mockery of this 'Law'.

I was certainly not advocating this as genuine science. In that case, far from making a mockery of myself, comrade Jones has simply confirmed his own sloppy approach to this subject.

And of course, these animals do not "develop" into one another, but we have already seen that Engels ignored this particular caveat himself.

Comrade Jones needs to acquaint himself with his own theory before he next tries to defend it.

But, speaking of developing organisms, it's clear that they change from small to large slowly, and in a "leap"-free zone. Who has ever seen, say, a daffodil grow from a seed to a mature plant in one "leap"? But this is just as a much a 'qualitative' change as water boiling is.

What about qualitative changes that are very slow, but where the build-up to them is rapid? Consider the larval stage of moths. The larva/grub will build a cocoon rapidly, but the radical qualitative changes inside that cocoon (from larva to adult moth), in its pupal stage, are painfully slow (relative to the previous stage, and to the lifetime of most moths and butterflies) -- ranging from a few weeks to many months. To be sure, when the moth breaks out, that change will be rapid, but the unseen qualitative changes that have already happened are slow. By no stretch of the imagination is this unseen development -- these radical qualitative changes -- a "leap".

And the same comment applies to the development of reptiles, birds, fish and other animals that grow inside egg sacks. Even a human baby takes nine months to "leap" from fertilised egg to fully-developed foetus before it is born --; as is well-known, fertilisation and parturition are pretty rapid in comparison to the slow qualitative changes in between.

Nature and the changes that take place in it are therefore far too varied and complex to be shoe-horned into dialectical boot they plainly won't fit.

In fact I nowhere said that Necker cubes are qualitatively different from ordinary cubes. What I did say was this:

However, other recalcitrant examples rapidly spring to mind: if the same colour is stared at for several minutes it can undergo a qualitative change into another colour (several optical illusions are based on this fact). Something similar can happen with regard to many two-dimensional patterns and shapes (for example the Necker Cube and other optical illusions); these undergo considerable qualitative change when no obvious quantitative differences are involved. There thus seem to be numerous examples where quantity and quality do not appear to be connected in the way that DM-theorists would have us believe. [Quoted from here.]

The difference here is between two views of the same Necker Cube, not between the latter and an ordinary cube.

However, as we have seen, it's Engels who wants to impose this 'Law' on nature, while I want to impose nothing on anything.

Their qualitative difference from other cubes exists entirely in the realm of the idea of a cube. Lichtenstein has lost sight of the purpose of dialectics -- to understand the motion of things as we observe them in nature. I’m not sure what laws (if any) govern the transformation of one representation of a cube into another representation of a cube.

he has plainly ignored what Engels elsewhere tells his disciples, as we saw above:

Dialectics, however, is nothing more than the science of the general laws of motion and development of nature, human society and thought. [Engels (1976) p.180. Bold emphasis added.]

It is impossible to alter the quality of a body without addition or subtraction of matter or motion, i.e. without quantitative alteration of the body concerned. [Engels (1954), p.63. Bold emphasis added.]

But, when someone (in possession of a very material body) is in a different qualitative state while viewing a Necker Cube one way, and then in another qualitative state while viewing it another, with no new energy added to them, we can see that Engels's defective 'law' has been refuted yet again.⁶

But, as us earthlings can now see, this comrade is wrong; there are many things that can change in "quality" with no new matter or energy "added" -- howsoever these are defined, or not.

Rosa Lichtenstein has a strange approach to the question of dialectics and their applicability to nature and human society. Ultimately, I believe that she reproduces the same upside-down error of Hegelian dialectics that Marx and Engels aimed to turn on its head. Hegel tried to understand the dynamics of the transformation of ideas. For Marx and Engels, the point was to explain the general dynamics of change in the real world.

On the contrary, comrade Jones seems to be in the grip of the odd idea that dialectical materialism can be kept terminally vague -- based on little other than the confused, Hermetic theories of a Christian mystic, Hegel (upside-down or the "right way up") -- and still be called a science.

1. It's quite clear that this is the real source of Engels's 'Law'. Plainly, Engels did not derive it from a careful consideration of all the facts available even in his own day, but from a careful reading of Hegel's 'Logic'! And it's quite clear that Hegel, too, ignored the facts available in his day. Did he not know that many qualitative changes in nature are gradual? Had he never seen an egg slowly turn white when fried? Or butter slowly melt? Or metals slowly soften? Or plants slowly grow?

However, there is another difficulty here that dialecticians have also failed to notice, one that involves the second of Engels's 'Laws':

The law of the interpenetration of opposites.... Mutual penetration of polar opposites and transformation into each other when carried to extremes.... [Engels (1954), pp.17, 62.]

Despite this, it is quite clear that the '"nodal" aspect of the first 'Law' is incompatible with the Unity and Interpenetration of Opposites (UIO), or at least with the link between the UIO and the DM-rejection/criticism of the LEM.

To see this, consider object/process P which is just about to undergo a qualitative change (a "leap") from, say, state P_A to state P_B. For there to be a "nodal" change here it would have to be the case that P is in state P_A one instant/moment, and in state P_B an instant/moment later (howsoever these "instants/moments" are understood). There is no other way of making sense of the abrupt nature of "nodal" change.

[To spare the reader, I will just refer to these as "instants" from now on.]

But, if that is so, then any state description of P would have to obey the LEM, for it would have to be the case that at one instant it would be true to say that P was in state P_A at that instant but not in state P_B at the same instant; that is, it would not be true to say that P was in both states at once. That is, assuming that P_B is not-P_A, then at any one instant, if this change is "nodal", the following would have to be the case: P is either in state P_A or it is in state not-P_A, but not both. In that case, these two states would not interpenetrate one another, and the LEM would apply to this process over these instants, at least.

On the other hand, if these two states do in fact interpenetrate one another such that the "either-or" of the LEM does not apply, and it were the case that P was in both states at once, then the transition from P_A to P_B would be smooth and not "nodal", after all.

This dilemma is independent of the length of time a "node" is held to last (that is, if we are ever told how long a "node" is supposed to be!). It is also worth noting that this inconsistency applies at just the point where dialecticians tell us DL is superior to FL --, that is, at the point of change.

So, once more, we see that not only can DL not explain change, at least two of Engels's three 'Laws' are inconsistent with one another (when applied to objects/process that undergo change).

In view of what Hegel and Engels had to say about the LEM, it does indeed look like these two 'Laws' are incompatible:

Neither in heaven nor in earth, neither in the world of mind nor nature, is there anywhere an abstract 'either-or' as the understanding maintains. Whatever exists is concrete, with difference and opposition in itself. The finitude of things with then lie in the want of correspondence between their immediate being and what they essentially are. Thus, in inorganic nature, the acid is implicitly at the same time the base: in other words its only being consists in its relation to its other. Hence the acid persists quietly in the contrast: it is always in effort to realize what it potentially is. Contradiction is the very moving principle of the world. [Hegel (1975), p.174. Bold emphasis added.]

To the metaphysician, things and their mental reflexes, ideas, are isolated, are to be considered one after the other and apart from each other, are objects of investigation fixed, rigid, given once for all. He thinks in absolutely irreconcilable antitheses. "His communication is 'yea, yea; nay, nay'; for whatsoever is more than these cometh of evil." For him a thing either exists or does not exist; a thing cannot at the same time be itself and something else. Positive and negative absolutely exclude one another, cause and effect stand in a rigid antithesis one to the other.

At first sight this mode of thinking seems to us very luminous, because it is that of so-called sound common sense. Only sound common sense, respectable fellow that he is, in the homely realm of his own four walls, has very wonderful adventures directly he ventures out into the wide world of research. And the metaphysical mode of thought, justifiable and even necessary as it is in a number of domains whose extent varies according to the nature of the particular object of investigation, sooner or later reaches a limit, beyond which it becomes one-sided, restricted, abstract, lost in insoluble contradictions. In the contemplation of individual things it forgets the connection between them; in the contemplation of their existence, it forgets the beginning and end of that existence; of their repose, it forgets their motion. It cannot see the wood for the trees. [Engels (1976), p.26. Bold emphasis added.]

2. As noted in the main body of this reply, Engels (and other dialecticians) appeal to various co-existent organic molecules produced in parallel chemical reactions. In that case, if they can appeal to examples like this to support their 'Law', they can hardly complain when examples of the very same phenomena are used against them.

For example, Woods and Grant (quoting Engels) list several molecules from Organic Chemistry, and, in this case, the qualitative differences between these organic compounds is independent of whether or not they have been derived from one another. Patently, they can exist side-by-side:

Chemistry involves changes of both a quantitative and qualitative character, both changes of degree and of state. This can clearly be seen in the change of state from gas to liquid or solid, which is usually related to variations of temperature and pressure. In Anti Dühring, Engels gives a series of examples of how, in chemistry, the simple quantitative addition of elements creates qualitatively different bodies. Since Engels' time the naming system used in chemistry has been changed. However, the change of quantity into quality is accurately expressed in the following example:

CH₂O₂ -- formic acid       boiling point 100^o melting point 1^o
C₂H₄O₂ -- acetic acid        ".............." 118^o "..............." 17^o
C₃H₆O₂ -- propionic acid   "..............." 140^o "..............." —
C₄H₈O₂ -- butyric acid      "..............." 162^o "..............." —
C₅H₁₀O₂-- valerianic acid "..............." 175^o "................" —

and so on to C₃₀H₆₀O₂, melissic acid, which melts only at 80^o and has no boiling point at all, because it does not evaporate without disintegrating. [Woods and Grant (1995), p.52, quoting Engels (1976), p.163.]

These organic chemicals do not have to be made from one another for this example to work; the differences Engels noted between the various molecules he listed do not depend on them being made from precisely the same atoms, or even in the same laboratory, or at the same time.

However, if it is still insisted that "development" is the key to this 'Law', then many of the examples DM-theorists themselves use will fall by the wayside. For example, this overworked one from Engels would have to go:

In conclusion we shall call one more witness for the transformation of quantity into quality, namely -- Napoleon. He describes the combat between the French cavalry, who were bad riders but disciplined, and the Mamelukes, who were undoubtedly the best horsemen of their time for single combat, but lacked discipline, as follows:

"Two Mamelukes were undoubtedly more than a match for three Frenchmen; 100 Mamelukes were equal to 100 Frenchmen; 300 Frenchmen could generally beat 300 Mamelukes, and 1,000 Frenchmen invariably defeated 1,500 Mamelukes." [Engels (1976), p.163.]

Where is the "development" here? Does anyone imagine that Napoleon tried to pit three French soldiers against two Mamelukes, and then gradually added another ninety-eight Mamelukes and ninety-seven Frenchmen to the original groupings, only to finish off by adding another two hundred to both sides? But, this is the only way that a "development" could have taken place here!

These would have to go, too:

(1) The sphere, however, in which the law of nature discovered by Hegel celebrates its most important triumphs is that of chemistry. Chemistry can be termed the science of the qualitative changes of bodies as a result of changed quantitative composition. That was already known to Hegel himself (Logic, Collected Works, III, p. 488). As in the case of oxygen: if three atoms unite into a molecule, instead of the usual two, we get ozone, a body which is very considerably different from ordinary oxygen in its odour and reactions. Again, one can take the various proportions in which oxygen combines with nitrogen or sulphur, each of which produces a substance qualitatively different from any of the others! How different laughing gas (nitrogen monoxide N₂O) is from nitric anhydride (nitrogen pentoxide, N₂O₅) ! The first is a gas, the second at ordinary temperatures a solid crystalline substance. And yet the whole difference in composition is that the second contains five times as much oxygen as the first, and between the two of them are three more oxides of nitrogen (N0, N₂O₃, NO₂), each of which is qualitatively different from the first two and from each other. [Engels (1954), pp.64-65.]

(2) What qualitative difference can be caused by the quantitative addition of C₃H₆ is taught by experience if we consume ethyl alcohol, C₂H₁₂O, in any drinkable form without addition of other alcohols, and on another occasion take the same ethyl alcohol but with a slight addition of amyl alcohol, C₅H₁₂O, which forms the main constituent of the notorious fusel oil. One's head will certainly be aware of it the next morning, much to its detriment; so that one could even say that the intoxication, and subsequent "morning after" feeling, is also quantity transformed into quality, on the one hand of ethyl alcohol and on the other hand of this added C₃H₆. [Ibid., p.66.]

(3) Transformation of quantity into quality: the simplest example oxygen and ozone, where 2:3 produces quite different properties, even in regard to smell. Chemistry likewise explains the other allotropic bodies merely by a difference in the number of atoms in the molecule. [Ibid., p.294.]

(4) Quantity and quality. Number is the purest quantitative determination that we know. But it is chock-full of qualitative differences. 1. Hegel, number and unity, multiplication, division, raising to a higher power, extraction of roots. Thereby, and this is not shown in Hegel, qualitative differences already make their appearance: prime numbers and products, simple roots and powers. 16 is not merely the sum of 16 ones, it is also the square of 4, the fourth power of 2. Still more. Prime numbers communicate new, definitely determined qualities to numbers derived from them by multiplication with other numbers; only even numbers are divisible by 2, and there is a similar determination in the case of 4 and 8. For 3 there is the rule of the sum of the figures, and the same thing for 9 and also for 6, in the last case in combination with the even number. For 7 there is a special rule. These form the basis for tricks with numbers which seem incomprehensible to the uninitiated. Hence what Hegel says (Quantity, p. 237) on the absence of thought in arithmetic is incorrect. Compare, however, Measure.

When mathematics speaks of the infinitely large and infinitely small, it introduces a qualitative difference which even takes the form of an unbridgeable qualitative opposition: quantities so enormously different from one another that every rational relation, every comparison, between them ceases, that they become quantitatively incommensurable. Ordinary incommensurability, for instance of the circle and the straight line, is also a dialectical qualitative difference; but here it is the difference in quantity of similar magnitudes that increases the difference of quality to the point of incommensurability. [Ibid., pp.258-59.]

In examples (1) and (3) above, Engels notes that it is the proportion among the various elements that initiates these qualitative changes, but none of these have to "develop" from any of the others. No one imagines that every molecule of Ozone has "developed" from ordinary diatomic Oxygen. Sure, some may have done this, but not all have to. But that does not affect the qualitative differences here. This is even more true in the case of another of his examples: the differences between Nitric Oxide and Nitric Anhydride do not depend on one "developing" from the other.

Example (2) is more or less the same; the various alcohols Engels mentions do not have to be "developed" from each other for the qualitative differences to emerge. Sure they can be, but in industrial production they typically aren't.

The clearest counter-example is (4); here mathematical objects cannot "develop" in any meaningful sense. No one imagines -- it is to be hoped (!) -- that, say, sixteen "develops" out of four, for four does not change if we add twelve to it (4 + 12 = 16), or if we multiply it by 4 (4 x 4 = 16). Look, the original four is still there on the page/screen! It hasn't developed in any way.

Someone might object and argue that, say, a collection of four apples develops into a collection of sixteen if twelve are added. Maybe so, but numbers themselves do not develop. Not even numerals do. These very real, physical (and non-abstract) marks on the page do not alter. And if we consider more complex examples, this becomes even clearer. Where is the "development" in a given matrix, say, if it is multiplied by another conformable matrix? The original matrix will annoyingly remain on the page, mocking any dialecticians foolish enough to believe all they have read in Hegel and/or Engels.

Moreover, infinite numbers cannot be generated from the set of finite numbers. As Engels says, there is an "unbridgeable gap" between them.

But, even if the aforementioned organic substances are made from one another, the changes are all sudden; there is no "break in gradualness" as the DM-classicists (and others) require:

With this assurance Herr Dühring saves himself the trouble of saying anything further about the origin of life, although it might reasonably have been expected that a thinker who had traced the evolution of the world back to its self-equal state, and is so much at home on other celestial bodies, would have known exactly what's what also on this point. For the rest, however, the assurance he gives us is only half right unless it is completed by the Hegelian nodal line of measure relations which has already been mentioned. In spite of all gradualness, the transition from one form of motion to another always remains a leap, a decisive change. This is true of the transition from the mechanics of celestial bodies to that of smaller masses on a particular celestial body; it is equally true of the transition from the mechanics of masses to the mechanics of molecules -- including the forms of motion investigated in physics proper: heat, light, electricity, magnetism. In the same way, the transition from the physics of molecules to the physics of atoms -- chemistry -- in turn involves a decided leap; and this is even more clearly the case in the transition from ordinary chemical action to the chemism of albumen which we call life. Then within the sphere of life the leaps become ever more infrequent and imperceptible. -- Once again, therefore, it is Hegel who has to correct Herr Dühring. [Engels (1976), pp.82-83. Bold emphasis added.]

[I]t will be understood without difficulty by anyone who is in the least capable of dialectical thinking...[that] quantitative changes, accumulating gradually, lead in the end to changes of quality, and that these changes of quality represent leaps, interruptions in gradualness…. That is how all Nature acts…. [Plekhanov (1956), pp.74-77, 88, 163. Bold emphasis added.]

The 'nodal line of measure relations' ... -- transitions of quantity into quality... Gradualness and leaps. And again...that gradualness explains nothing without leaps. [Lenin (1961), p.123. Lenin added in the margin here: "Leaps! Leaps! Leaps!" Bold emphasis added.]

What distinguishes the dialectical transition from the undialectical transition? The leap. The contradiction. The interruption of gradualness. The unity (identity) of Being and not-Being. [Ibid., p.282. Bold emphasis added.]

Dialecticians call this process the transformation of quantity into quality. Slow, gradual changes that do not add up to a transformation in the nature of a thing suddenly reach a tipping point when the whole nature of the thing is transformed into something new. [Rees (2008), p.24. Bold emphasis added.]

The argument here is plainly that (1) Quantitative increase in matter or energy results in gradual change, and that (2) At a certain point, any further increase breaks this gradualness, and induces a "leap", a sudden qualitative change.

But, this does not happen in the Organic compounds mentioned above, nor in the Periodic Table (another over-used DM-example). Between each substance or element there is no gradual increase in atoms, nor is there in protons and electrons, leading to a sudden change -- there are only sudden changes, as 'particles' or atoms are added. For example, as one proton and one electron are added to Hydrogen, it suddenly changes into Helium. Hydrogen does not slowly alter and then suddenly "leap" and become Helium. The same is true of every other element in the Table. In that case, one of the best examples dialecticians use to 'illustrate' this 'Law' in fact refutes it! There is no "interruption" in gradualness here.

Finally, dialecticians like to use this 'Law' to argue that as one rises in the orders of existence (from the molecular to higher levels) this change in 'quantity' (but, what change in what quantity?) passes over into quality.

Have read Hofmann. For all its faults, the latest chemical theory does represent a great advance on the old atomistic theory. The molecule as the smallest part of matter capable of independent existence is a perfectly rational category, a 'nodal point', as Hegel calls it, in the infinite progression of subdivisions, which does not terminate it, but marks a qualitative change. The atom -- formerly represented as the limit of divisibility -- is now but a state, although Monsieur Hofmann himself is forever relapsing into the old idea that indivisible atoms really exist. For the rest, the advances in chemistry that this book records are truly enormous, and Schorlemmer says that this revolution is still going on day by day, so that new upheavals can be expected daily. [Engels to Marx, 16/06/1867, in Marx and Engels (1975), p.175. Bold emphasis added.]

Now, there is no way that this can be squeezed into the 'more energy/matter added to the same body/development' straight-jacket. What energy/matter is fed in here?

For example, in Reason in Revolt, comrades Woods and Grant include different levels in reality as different quantities, or qualities (but, again, it's not too clear which is which):

Newton's dynamics were quite sufficient to explain large-scale phenomena but broke down for systems of atomic dimensions. Indeed, classical mechanics are still valid for most operations which do not involve very high speeds or processes which take place at the subatomic level. Quantum mechanics...represented a qualitative leap in science.... But for a long time it met with a stubborn resistance, precisely because its results clashed head-on with the traditional mode of thinking and the laws of formal logic. [Woods and Grant (1995), pp.53-54.]

However, the fact that there is a "qualitative" difference between Classical and Quantum Mechanics cannot be put down to anything obviously quantitative, either. Or, at least, if it can, Woods and Grant were remarkably coy about what that might be. [The 'quantity' of magnification, perhaps? But where is the energy/matter input into the system?]

And note, too, that such levels have been compared with each other even though they do not "develop" into one another. Indeed, what would it be for microscopic particles to "develop" into macroscopic objects? Do electrons grow in size?

In that case, the objection to many of the counter-examples listed here (that they are not relevant because the first 'Law' only applies to objects and processes in "development"/"transformation") cannot now be maintained. DM-theorists use the above 'difference in levels' all the time -- for example, in arguing about determinism, or about the emergence of life and/or mind from matter --, and constantly link these to the first 'Law'.

Once more, they can't consistently complain if my counter-examples are not all "developmental", either.

Here is another related example:

At a certain point, the concatenation of circumstances causes a qualitative leap whereby inorganic matter gives rise to organic matter. The difference between inorganic and organic matter is only relative. Modern science is well on the way to discovering exactly how the latter arises from the former. Life itself consists of atoms organised in a certain way. We are all a collection of atoms but not "merely" a collection of atoms. In the astonishingly complex arrangement of our genes, we have an infinite number of possibilities. The task of allowing each individual to develop these possibilities to the fullest extent is the real task of socialism....

The enormous complexity of the human brain is one of the reasons why idealists have attempted to surround the phenomenon of mind with a mystical aura. Knowledge of the details of individual neurons, axons and synapses, is not sufficient to explain the phenomenon of thought and emotion. However, there is nothing mystical about it. In the language of complexity theory, both mind and life are emergent phenomena. In the language of dialectics, the leap from quantity to quality means that the whole possesses qualities which cannot be deduced from the sum of the parts or reduced to it. None of the neurons is itself conscious. Yet the sum total of neurons and their connections are. Neural networks are non-linear dynamical systems. It is the complex activity and interactions between the neurons which produce the phenomenon we call consciousness. [Ibid., pp.55-56.]

Hence, it's not just quantity that is important here, it's organisation and complexity.

If we imagine any non-living body cut up into smaller and smaller portions, at first no qualitative change occurs. But this has a limit: if we succeed, as by evaporation, in obtaining the separate molecules in the free state, then it is true that we can usually divide these still further, yet only with a complete change of quality. The molecule is decomposed into its separate atoms, which have quite different properties from those of the molecule. In the case of molecules composed of various chemical elements, atoms or molecules of these elements themselves make their appearance in the place of the compound molecule; in the case of molecules of elements, the free atoms appear, which exert quite distinct qualitative effects: the free atoms of nascent oxygen are easily able to effect what the atoms of atmospheric oxygen, bound together in the molecule, can never achieve.

But the molecule is also qualitatively different from the mass of the body to which it belongs. It can carry out movements independently of this mass and while the latter remains apparently at rest, e.g. heat oscillations; by means of a change of position and of connection with neighbouring molecules it can change the body into an allotrope or a different state of aggregation.

Thus we see that the purely quantitative operation of division has a limit at which it becomes transformed into a qualitative difference: the mass consists solely of molecules, but it is something essentially different from the molecule, just as the latter is different from the atom. It is this difference that is the basis for the separation of mechanics, as the science of heavenly and terrestrial masses, from physics, as the mechanics of the molecule, and from chemistry, as the physics of the atom. [Engels (1954), p.64.]

Neither in the imagination nor in the material world is any energy or matter added to, or subtracted from the said bodies, nor do they "develop" or "transform".

3. Sure, some of that energy will appear as heat (and/or perhaps sound), and will warm such a case slightly. But that energy will not be stored in the case; it will not appear there as chemically recoverable (i.e., as structural, or new bond) energy.

4. It could be argued that there is a difference in matter and/or energy in this can, namely the ring pull and gases near the opening. That is undeniable, but is this significant? What causes the change in quality is the Widget, not the ring pull. This can be seen by the fact that in cans where there is no Widget, the above does not happen.

6. It could be argued that there will be small energy changes in the individual concerned. Maybe so, but that response itself is subject to the rebuttals advanced in Note Four, above.

Hegel, G. (1975), Logic, translated by William Wallace (Oxford University Press, 3^rd ed.).

Marx, K. and Engels, F. (1975), Selected Correspondence (Progress Publishers, 3^rd ed.).