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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!
I have tried to keep all these summaries below the 6000 word mark. In this case, that has not been possible.
Quick Links
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!]
1) Non-Empirical Propositions Masquerading As Super-Empirical Theses
d) Ignoring Critics And Evidence
2) Lenin Thinks The Unthinkable
a) Is Motion Without Matter Unthinkable?
a) Invention -- The Mother Of Necessity
Abbreviations Used At This Site
Non-Empirical Propositions Masquerading As Super-Empirical Theses
In what follows, I have had to repeat myself more times than I would like since
the points I am putting across are not at all easy -- in fact, they sailed
right over the heads of some of the greatest minds in human history, and
remained unacknowledged for over 2500 years.
I claim no originality here, except in the way these ideas have been presented.
They have in fact been adapted from
Wittgenstein's early and middle
period.
I have also had to be far more pedantic than I would otherwise wish. For example, I regularly say things like the following: "Knowing the truth or knowing the falsehood of...", rather than just "Knowing the truth or falsehood of...". This has been essential since there is a world of difference between (1) knowing whether a proposition is true or false and (2) knowing whether it is true or knowing whether it is false. The former can be ascertained before any evidence is sought (since every proposition is true or false -- dialecticians who reject this view are taken to task elsewhere at this site), whereas the latter cannot.
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; even so, it is possible to show that that would be as hasty as it is mistaken.
It's 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 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".
Nevertheless, if humanity had access to information about motion and matter many orders of magnitude greater than is available even today, it would still not be enough to show that the separation of matter and motion is unthinkable. No amount of data could substantiate that.
But, as we will see, Lenin's ambitious assertion has far more serious problems to contend with than the mere lack of supporting evidence.
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, helps create even more of a false impression. For example, we find Engels saying things like the following:
"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 outer facade hides a deeper logical form -- several in fact. This is something that only becomes plain when such sentences are examined more closely.
As noted above, expressions like these look as if they revealed profound truths about reality since they plainly 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 Das Kapital.
Compare this with these similar-looking indicative sentences:
T2: Time is a relation between events.
T3: Motion is inseparable from matter.
First, in order to understand T1, it is not necessary to know whether it is true or whether it is false. I'm sure those reading T1 understand it even though they haven't a clue whether or not it is true.
Contrast this with the comprehension of T2 and T3; understanding either of these goes hand-in-hand with knowing they are both true (or, alternatively, knowing they are both false, as the case may be). Their truth or their falsehood follows either (1) from the meaning the words they contain, (2) from specific definitions or (3) from a handful of 'thought experiments' -- i.e., from yet more words.
[In relation to T2, (2) above might be something like "Events take place in time". With T3, it might be "Motion is a form of the existence of matter" -- as Engels and Lenin believed -- and so on. To be sure, (1)-(3) might also be prefaced by some sort of 'philosophical argument' -- but these are just more words; no evidence is needed. It's not possible to devise experiments to test propositions like T2 and T3. What would they even look like?]
For Lenin, understanding what matter is ipso facto involves knowing it is true to say that it moves. It follows from the Engels's' definition that motion is 'the mode of the existence matter'.
"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….
"A motionless state of matter therefore proves to be one of the most empty and nonsensical of ideas…." [Engels (1976), p.74. Italic emphasis in the original.]
This now intimately links the truth-status of sentences like T2 and T3 with meaning, not factual confirmation, and hence not with a confrontation with material reality. Their truth-status is thus independent of, and anterior to, the search for supporting evidence -- not that such a search is relevant anyway, or, indeed, that it is ever carried out. [Again, what could you look for to confirm T2 or T3?]
In contrast, understanding T1 is independent of its confirmation or of its disconfirmation. Indeed, it would be impossible to do either of these if T1 had not already been understood. Plainly, the actual truth or the actual falsehood of T1-type propositions follows from the way the world happens to be, and is not solely based on the meaning of certain expressions. Their truth-status cannot simply be read-off from the words they contain, unlike T2- and T3-type sentences.
Empirical propositions are typically like this; they have to be understood first before they can be confronted with the evidence that would establish their truth-status. In contrast, metaphysical propositions carry their truth or their falsehood on their faces, as it were, and need no evidence to establish either of these. Understanding them is at one with knowing their truth-status. [That is why it's impossible even to conceive of ways of confirming them, just as it's central to judging their opposites "unthinkable".]
To sum up: we have here two sorts of indicative sentences, each with a
radically different logical 'relation' to the world.
Understanding the first sort (i.e., those like T1) is independent of
ascertaining their truth-status, whereas their actual truth or their actual falsehood depends
on the state of the world.
With the second sort (i.e., those like T2 or T3), their truth or falsehood is
not dependent on the state of the world, but follows solely from the meaning of
the words they contain (or from the meaning of those in the argument from which
they were 'derived'). To understand them is
ipso facto to know they are
true or to know they are false.
Second, metaphysical theses (like T2 and T3) were in fact deliberately constructed by philosophers in order to transcend the limitations of the material world. This approach was justified on the grounds that it allowed them to uncover underlying "essences", thus revealing nature's "hidden secrets", i.e., the fundamental principles by means of which the 'deity' had created the world. This idea then linked philosophical language with the underlying structure of reality. That idea still remains in place to this day, even though its theological origin has been forgotten. That's why metaphysical 'truths' are still being read from language/thought alone, even by atheists.
Theses like these are deemed "necessarily true" (or deemed "necessarily false"), and are thus held to express knowledge of fundamental aspects of reality, unlike contingent propositions whose truth can alter with the wind.
[After all, Tony Blair might sell his copy of Das Kapital -- or, indeed, buy the book if he doesn't already own it. 'Philosophical knowledge' -- 'genuine knowledge' -- cannot depend on such changeable features of reality -- or, so we have been led to believe.]
Traditionally, this meant that empirical propositions like T1 were considered to be epistemologically inferior to T2- and T3-type sentences, since they were deemed incapable of revealing fundamental knowledge of this sort. Indeed, "philosophical knowledge" yielding absolute certainty has always been seen as the sole preserve of T2- and T3-type sentences -- as Baker and Hacker noted:
"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 then go way beyond it.
Thus, what they say does not just happen to be so, as is the case with ordinary empirical truths. What T2- and T3-type sentences say cannot possibly be otherwise. The world must conform to whatever they say, not the other way round. They determine the logical form of any possible world.
This is not surprising given the theological origin of these ideas; after all 'god' spoke (so the Bible tells us) and reality just sprang into existence. Hence, on this view, the world is little more than condensed language -- i.e., it was created ex nihilo by the use of words. In that case, philosophers can determine how the world must be by ascertaining the 'divine secrets' underlying 'Being'. No wonder then that such truths follow from language alone, and can be imposed on the world.
This also accounts for the frequent use of modal terms (like "must", "necessary" and "inconceivable") -- as in "I must exist if I can think" [paraphrasing Descartes], "Time must be a relation between events" [paraphrasing Kant], "Being must be identical with and yet at the same time different from Nothing, the contradiction resolved in Becoming" [paraphrasing Hegel] or "Existence can't be a predicate" [paraphrasing Kant and/or Bertrand Russell].
Everything in reality must be this or it must be that.
Contrast this with T1. If anyone were to question its truth, the following response: "Tony Blair must own a copy of Das Kapital" would be highly inappropriate -- unless, of course, T1 itself were the conclusion of an inference of some sort (such as: "Tony Blair told me he owned a copy, so he must own one"), or it was based on a direct observation statement (such as, "I saw his wife buy him a copy and give it to him, and I spotted it on his bookshelf a couple of minutes ago"). But even then, the truth or the falsehood of T1 would still depend on an interface with material reality at some point.
So, with T1-type sentences, the world dictates to us whether what they say is
true or what they say is false. We do not dictate to reality what it must contain, or what it
must be like.
With respect to T2- and T3-type sentences, things are the exact opposite:
because their truth-values (true or false) can be determined independently and
in advance of the way the world happens to be, philosophers use them to
dictate to reality what it must be like.
Such Super-Truths (or Super-Falsehoods) are derived solely from the alleged meaning of the words they contain (or from the 'concepts' they supposedly express). In that case, once they have been understood, metaphysical propositions like T2 and T3 guarantee their own truth or guarantee their own falsehood. They are thus true a priori.
So: to understand a metaphysical thesis is ipso facto to know it is true or to know it is false, as the case may be. That is why to their inventors they appear to be so certain, self-evident, and, in many cases, absolutely true. The intimate connection they have with language means that questioning their veracity seems to run against the grain of our understanding, not of our experience. Indeed, they appear to be self-evident precisely because they need no evidence to confirm their truth-status; they provide their own 'justification', and testify on their own behalf.
Unfortunately, that divorces such theses from material reality, since they are true or they are false independently of any apparent state of the world. [Which is, of course, why no experiment is conceivable by means of which they can be tested.]
In that case, any thesis that can be judged true or judged false on conceptual/linguistic grounds alone cannot feature in a materialist account of reality, only an Idealist one. [Why that is so is explained here and here, but see below, too.]
Now, these assertions might appear to be somewhat dogmatic, but they are based on how we all use ordinary language every day. Moreover, as we shall see, the opposite view is the one that is dogmatic, since it is based on a ruling-class view of reality -- which has to be imposed on the world -- and on a view whose validity is not sensitive to empirical test. [Why that is so will be explained below.]
Nevertheless, it's 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): the internally-generated certitude these theses seem to possess means that no material fact could possibly controvert their content. This implies that such theses cannot have been read from nature (despite the claims made by DM-theorists that this is what they always 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.
That's why these theses have traditionally been based solely on linguistic resources which have been deliberately divorced from material reality -- that is, on abstractions, jargonised expressions, bogus terminology, and on ideas and 'concepts' located in an inner, immaterial world of 'cognition' -- just as we saw in Essay Three Parts One and Two.
As we have seen, this is because 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 it is 'contradictory') command assent from the supposed meaning of words like "move", "same moment in time" and "place", which conclusions he felt he could safely extrapolate to all of reality, for all of time -- simply because such words supposedly guarantee they apply to every single example of motion in the entire universe, past, present and future.
That is also why, if pressed about this, dialecticians can't appeal to any 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 that Engels (Hegel, or Zeno) used.
This explains, too, why dialecticians find it hard to see how anyone could possibly disagree with their theses -- and why they accuse anyone who rejects their theses of not not "understanding" dialectics. That, of course, gives the game away, since it connects these theses with meaning, not evidence. Hence, the rejection of what Engels said about motion seems to conflict with fundamental aspects of language (which, in turn, seems to make the opposite conclusion "inconceivable" or "absurd").
Similarly, Trotsky referred us to the "axiom" that things are never equal to themselves, and he felt he could do so because of the logical properties supposedly built into words (or 'concepts') like "equal", "change", "same" and "different". This thesis, too, applied to everything in reality, for all of time. Indeed, Hegel was able to do 'derive' even more impressive results by considering a few doctored "concepts" (such as 'Being', 'Nothing' and 'Becoming'), as well as what these 'concepts' supposedly implied (as they 'self-developed'), in order to 'derive' the most fundamental principles of all that lay behind all change and development in the entire universe (and possibly beyond), for all of time. [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 -- see also here), we will see that this particular set of theses '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.
We have also seen that Lenin was also able to ascertain from a simple sentence about "John" much of the deep structure of reality, relying on Hegel's fractured ''logic' to derive these impressive results. He also felt he could declare that motion without matter was "unthinkable", and he felt he could do this well in advance of the unimaginably large body of 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 this 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.
Naturally, dialecticians can only claim this impressive, 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 their part in an ancient game, and, what is more to the point, they are doing so according to rules invented by the class enemy, deriving their own a priori theses from words/thought alone -- and then imposing them on the world in a thoroughly traditional manner.
Ignoring Both Critics And Evidence
Hence, Lenin and other DM-theorists feel they can safely ignore any evidence that disconfirms their theses, since the latter 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 materialist account of reality, and hence cannot be used to help change the world. These theses follow from abstract ideas, and are thus quintessentially Idealist; no amount of spin can give them the radical or materialist make-over dialecticians allege for them. As George Novack conceded:
"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.]
So, rather like Catholic Theologians in Galileo's day, who would not even look down his telescope, many DM-fans even refuse to read these Essays. [Exactly why they adopt this nescient posture will be explored in Essay Nine Part Two.]
This also accounts for the cavalier attitude they adopt toward FL, the constant misrepresentation of the ideas of fellow Marxist opponents -- like yours truly --, 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 'licences' the sort of knee-jerk and arrogant high-handedness practically all dialecticians display. Since nothing materially-based could possibly count against their theory, 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.
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 you imagine your beliefs have been sanctioned by the impenetrable 'logic' found in Hegel and the self-development of 'Cosmic Being' (upside down or the 'right way up'), 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, superior, and thus one of The Dialectical Elect.
This also helps account for the sectarianism dialectics aggravates 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'.
Is Motion Without Matter 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's 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, too. Hence, even the most slavishly sycophantic and servile disciple of Lenin can't avoid disobeying the master every time he/she reads this controversial phrase.
Have such characters not noticed that to read Lenin is to disobey/refute him?
This shows that it is not possible to relate the content of Lenin's claim to anything that could be found in material reality, since it is based on concepts knitted together in defiance both of material reality and of the language derived from our complex relation to it (on which topic, see below).
[Someone might object that this confuses use with mention. That response is tackled here.]
Invention -- The Mother Of Necessity
The paradoxical nature of Lenin's words illustrates the ineluctable slide into non-sense that all metaphysical 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.
[It's worth pointing out that "non-sense" is
not the same as "nonsense". The latter word
has various meanings varying from the patently false (such as "Karl Marx was a
shape-shifting lizard") to plain gibberish (such as "783&£$750 ow2jmn 34y4&$
6y3n3& 8FT34n").
"Non-sense" relates to indicative sentences that turn out to be incapable of
expressing a sense no matter what we try to do with them -- that is, they are
incapable of being true and they are incapable of being false. Here, therefore,
the indicative/fact-stating mood will have plainly been mis-used/mis-applied. So, when
such sentences
are employed to state fundamental truths about reality, they seriously misfire
since they can't possibly do this. [This section will explain why that is so.]
So, non-sensical sentences aren't patently false, nor are they plain gibberish.
Finally, the word "sense" is being used in the following way: it expresses what
we understand to be the case for the proposition in question to be true or what
we understand to be the case for the proposition in question to be false, even if we do not know whether it is
actually true or whether it is actually false.
For example, everyone (who knows English, who knows who Tony Blair and what
Das Kapital are) will understand T1 (i.e., "Tony Blair owns a copy of
Das Kapital") upon hearing or reading it. They grasp its sense --, that
is, they understand what the world would have to be like for it to be true or
what the world would have to be like for it to be false.
More importantly, the same situation, if it obtains, will make T1 true,
as it will make T1 false, if it does not obtain. (The significance of that
comment will become clearer below.)
These conditions are integral to our capacity to understand empirical propositions before we know whether they are true. Indeed, they help explain why we know what to look for (or to expect) in order to show such propositions are indeed true, or to show they are in fact false, even if we never succeed in doing either.]
Intractable logical problems soon begin to emerge (with regard to such supposedly 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., if we try to exclude their truth or we try to exclude their 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 -- perhaps as a "law of cognition". Or, more likely, when a 'necessary' truth or a 'necessary' falsehood is mis-identified as a particularly profound sort of empirical thesis, using the indicative mood (etc.), once more.
As we will see, this tactic results in the automatic loss of both semantic options, and with that goes any sense the original proposition might have had, rendering it non-sensical.
This is because an empirical proposition leaves it open as to whether it is true or whether it is false; that is why its truth-value (true/false) cannot simply be read-off from its content, why evidence is required in order to determine its semantic status (true/false, once more), and why it is possible to understand it before its truth or before its falsehood is known. If that were not so, it would be impossible to ascertain its truth-status.
Plainly, it's not possible to confirm or confute a supposedly indicative sentence if no one understands what it is saying.
When this is not the case -- i.e., when either option (truth or falsehood) is closed-off, or when a proposition is 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 linguistic/structural factors, it can't be empirical -- despite its use of the indicative mood.
If, however, such a proposition is still regarded as true by those proposing it, or, what is mote likely, as a Super-truth about the world -- about its "essence". or underlying 'rational structure' -- then it is plainly metaphysical.
[A 'Super-truth' superficially resembles an ordinary scientific truth, but is in fact nothing like it. Super-truths transcend anything the sciences could possibly confirm or confute. T2 and T3 above are excellent examples of this. Their alleged truth depends solely on meaning, not on the way the world happens to be.]
Otherwise the actual truth or actual falsehood of such propositions would be world-sensitive, not solely meaning- or concept-dependent; that is, their actual truth or their actual falsehood would depend on how the world is, and not solely on what their words mean. And that explains why the comprehension of metaphysical propositions appears to go hand in hand with knowing their 'truth' (or knowing their 'falsehood'): their truth-status is based solely on thought, language or meaning, 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 it.
To recap: an empirical proposition derives
its sense from the truth possibilities it appears to hold open (which options
can later be decided upon one way or the other by a confrontation with the
material world -- i.e., with evidence). That is why the actual truth-value of, say, T1 (or its
contradictory, T4, below) does not need to be known before it is understood; but
it is why evidence is
relevant to establishing that truth-value.
T1: Tony Blair owns a copy of Das Kapital.
T4: Tony Blair does not own a copy of Das Kapital.
In order to comprehend T1 or T4, all that is required is some grasp of the
possibilities that they both hold open. T1 and T4 have the
same content, and are made true or made false by the same situation
obtaining, or not obtaining, respectively.
It is also why it's easy to imagine T1 to be true even if it is false,
or false even if it is true. In general, the comprehension of empirical
propositions involves an understanding of the conditions under which they
would/could be true, or would/could be false. As is well-known, these are
otherwise called their "truth-conditions". That, of course, allows anyone so
minded to confirm their actual truth-status by comparison with the world,
since they would in that case know what to look for or to expect.
These non-negotiable facts about language also underpin the Marxist emphasis on
the social -- and hence
the communal and communicational -- nature of discourse.
[That is because this accounts for our ability to grasp empirical propositions before we know whether they are true, or before we know whether they are false (thus enabling communication -- communication would be impossible if you had to know a sentence was true before you understood what it said; how could you possibly manage that?).
For example, how would the 'contents' of one mind be communicated to another if there was no prior means of communication by means of which this could be achieved, something representational theories typically undermine (or even deny)? Indeed, how would it be possible for anyone to communicate with anyone else if they could only figure out what their interlocutors had 'meant' after they had ascertained the truth of what they said? (More on this in Essay Three Part Two, and Essay Thirteen Part Three.)
This is not to argue that other uses of language are not important, but fact-stating language is intimately connected with our capacity to understand nature, and thus to control it -- and that links it with our survival on this planet. It is also the form of language that is aped by metaphysical discourse.]
Naturally, this flies in the face of metaphysical and representational theories of language and 'cognition', which emphasise the opposite: that to understand a proposition goes hand-in-hand with automatically knowing it is true (or automatically knowing it is false) -- by-passing the confirmation or disconfirmation stage, thus reducing the usual 'truth-conditions' to one option only.
[However, there are other serious problems faced by this approach to language over and above the fact it would make it impossible to communicate, and thus to form knowledge. Representationalism will be examined in more detail the rest of Essay Twelve (when it is published) and in Essay Thirteen Part Three, as will the fact that, if true, it would make communication impossible.]
However, if a proposition looks as if it were empirical
-- because it uses the indicative
mood -- and yet it can only be false (as seems to be the case with
L1, below, according to Lenin) then, as we will see, paradox must ensue.
Consider, therefore, the following sentences, the first of which Engels and
Lenin declared "unthinkable" (presumably because L2 is
"necessarily true"):
L1: Motion sometimes occurs without matter.
L2: "Motion without matter is unthinkable." [Lenin (1972), p.318. Italic emphasis in the original.]
Unfortunately for Lenin, as we have seen, in order to declare L1 necessarily (and always) false,
or "unthinkable", he had to think the offending words (or their
content), "matter without motion". In order
to declare it "unthinkable" those words (or their content) patently had to go through his mind.
That is, he had to do what he had just told us no one could do -- i.e., think
these words (or their content)!
But, if the truth of L1 is to be permanently excluded by holding it as
'necessarily false' (or "unthinkable"), then, plainly, whatever would
make it true has to be ruled out conclusively.
And yet, anyone doing that would have to know what L1 rules in
(i.e., they would have to know what would make L1 true) so that they could
comprehend what was being disqualified by its rejection (as always and
'necessarily false').
However, that is precisely what cannot be done if what L1 itself says is
permanently ruled out on semantic/conceptual grounds, and we cannot even
think either it or its content.
Consequently, if a proposition like L1 is declared 'necessarily false' this
charade (i.e., the permanent exclusion of its truth) cannot take place -- since
it would be impossible to say and/or to think what could count as making it
true.
But, because the truth of L1 cannot even be conceived, Lenin was in no
position to say what was excluded by its rejection. He could not now say --
or think -- what he is ruling out!
His own words thus undermined what he thought he wanted to say!
Alas, this now prevents any account being given of what would make L1 false, let
alone 'necessarily' false.
That is, L1 could only be declared 'necessarily false' if what would make it true
could at least be entertained just in order to rule it out as false.
But, according to Lenin, the conditions that would make L1 true cannot even
be conceived, so this train of thought cannot be joined at any point. And,
if the truth of L1 cannot be conceived, then neither can its falsehood, for we
would not then know what was being ruled out.
If we are incapable of thinking these words or their content, we certainly cannot think of
either
as false.
In that case, L1 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
accepted or rejected. L1 would thus lose any sense it had, since it
could not under any circumstances be considered true, and hence not under any circumstances be
considered false.
This is in fact just another consequence of the point made earlier that an
empirical proposition and its negation have the same content (they express the
same possible state of affairs). If one option is ruled out, the other
automatically goes out
of the window with it, which is what we have now seen happen to Lenin's words.
It is also connected with the non-sensicality of all metaphysical
'propositions', for their negations do not have the same content as the
original non-negated 'proposition'. (Why that is so will be explained
presently.)
[It is worth re-reading the above sentence,
since it expresses one of the core ideas of this Essay.]
[The word "proposition" is in 'scare quotes' since if it's not clear what is being
proposed, or put forward for consideration, then plainly nothing has yet been proposed
or put forward.]
Indeed, because their negations do not picture anything that
could be the
case in any conceivable world, they have no content at all. That, of course,
automatically empties the content of the original non-negated proposition.
As we can now see, the radical misuse of language governing the formation of
what look like empirical propositions (like L2) in fact involves an implicit
reference to the sorts of conditions that underlie their normal
employment/reception.
L2: Motion without matter is unthinkable.
L1: Motion sometimes occurs without matter.
L3: Motion never occurs without matter.
Hence, when sentences like L2 are entertained, even momentarily, a pretence (often
genuine) has to be maintained that they actually mean something, that they are
capable of being understood, and thus that they are capable of being true or
capable of being false. In that case, a pretence has to
be maintained that we understand what might make such propositions true, and
their 'negations' false, so that those like L1 can be declared 'necessarily'
false, or "unthinkable".
But, this entire exercise is an empty charade, for no content can be given to
propositions like L1, and thus L2.
With respect to motionless matter, even Lenin had to admit this! Indeed, he it
was who told us this 'idea' was "unthinkable".
The same comments also apply to all the
'necessary truths' that have been concocted by philosophers since
Anaximander was a lad.
[This does not imply they all used the phrase "necessary truth", but the theses
they cobbled-together weren't materially different from such Super-truths.]
We can see why this is so if we consider another typical metaphysical thesis and
its supposed negation:
L4: Time is a relation between events.
L5: Time is not a relation between events.
As we have seen, the alleged truth of L4 is derived from the meaning of the
words it contains. In that case, if the truth of L4 is denied by the use of, say, L5,
then that would amount to a change in the meaning of the word "time".
That's because sentences like L4 define what a given philosopher means by
"time", for instance.
So, if time isn't a relation between events, then the word "time" must
have a different meaning in L4 and L5. And if that is so, L4 and L5 cannot
represent the same state of affairs. They have a different content.
So, despite appearances to the contrary, L5 isn't the negation of L4!
And that's because the subject of each sentence is different.
To see this point, compare the following:
L6: George W Bush is the 43rd President of the United States.
L7: George H W Bush is not the 43rd President of the United States.
L6 and L7 aren't the negations of one another since they relate to two different
individuals, George W Bush and his father, George H W Bush. They are true or
false under entirely different conditions since they do not have the same sense,
the same empirical content. They have different subjects.
The same comment applies to a metaphysical proposition (such as L4) and what
appears to be its negation (i.e., L5).
If now L4 is deemed "necessarily true", then we would have to declare its alleged negation (L5) "necessarily false". But, L5 isn't the negation of L4 (since they both have different subject terms), and so -- as we discovered with Lenin's predicament above -- if we reject L4 by means of L5, we would have no idea what we were ruling out, and thus no idea what we were ruling in.
Or, rather, what we think we are trying to
rule out has not in fact been ruled out since we have simply changed the subject.
In that case, we would be in no position to declare L4 "necessarily true".
[That is because to declare a sentence "true" is ipso facto to declare it
"not false". But, if we can't do that (and plainly we can't do
it if we have no idea what we are ruling out -- or in doing so we change the subject of the
original sentence!), we can't then say the original sentence is
true.]
The same applies if we declare, say, L4 "necessarily false", but I will omit the
tedious details.
In which case, metaphysical propositions can neither be true nor
be false. They
thus lack a sense, and there is nothing that can be done to rectify the
situation.
They are all non-sensical.
Metaphysical Fiat -- Dogma on Stilts
Another odd feature of metaphysical theses is also worth highlighting: 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. That is, they have to
be declared "necessarily true" or declared "necessarily false", and this is plainly
because their truth-status 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 of some sort.
Metaphysical decrees like this are as common as dirt in traditional thought,
and, as we can now see, in DM, too.
Such philosophical 'gems' have 'necessary' truth or 'necessary' falsehood
bestowed on them as a gift. Instead of being compared with material
reality to ascertain the truth-status of such theses, their truth-status is derived solely from, or
compared only with, other related theses (or to be more honest, with yet more obscure jargon), as part of a
terminological gesture at 'verification'. 'Confirmation' thus takes place only in the head of
the theorist who dreamt them up. Hence, their
bona fides
are thoroughly Ideal and therefore 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.
This is indeed how DM has developed. There, 'confirmation' is invariably carried out after the event (that is, after several core ideas had been copied from Hegel). Even then, DM-theses are supported with only a very narrow range of (trite/anecdotal) examples, which do not apply anyway -- as we found with Trotsky's 'analysis' of the LOI and Engels's account of motion, etc. Alternatively, if confirmation 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.
In which case, DM-theses have to be imposed on reality, since they plainly weren't derived from it.
As far as traditional Philosophy (Metaphysics) is concerned, this is precisely what happened as the discipline developed. Philosophers simply invented increasingly complex, jargonised expressions, juggled with obscure terminology, and derived countless 'truths' from thought/language alone. Philosophy thus became a dogmatic discipline wherein sage-like figures revealed cosmic truths to the rest of humanity.
With respect to DM, its class-compromised
origin has encouraged a similar ideological degeneration. Undeniably, every dialectical doctrine was lifted from Hegel (and then
supposedly given a materialist flip); but Hegel's ideas weren't 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.
Alas for their inventors, none of these theses can be given a
sense, no matter what is done with them; as we have discovered, they are all
non-sensical.
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.]
[And we have seen how both metaphysical and DM theses are based on a distorted use of the
indicative mood.
There are other serious mis-uses/distortions of ordinary language at work here. I won't enter into
them in this summary or it will be too long! More details can be found in Essay
Twelve Part One, and throughout
this site.]
Notice that, according to Marx, philosophy is based on "the distorted language of the actual world." Since the indicative mood deals with what we have to say about the "actual world" we can now see how perceptive he was.
There are several reasons why traditional theorists attempted to derive such
fundamental 'truths' from thought alone. One of them is the following:
This way of conceptualising the relationship between reality and our ideas about
it depends on the ancient belief that behind appearances there lies a
hidden world -- accessible to thought alone -- which is more real than
the material universe we see around us.
This approach to 'knowledge' was invented by ruling-class hacks because if you belong to, benefit from
or help run a society which is based on gross inequality, oppression and
exploitation, you can keep order in a number of ways.
The first and most obvious way is through violence. This will work for a time,
but it is not only fraught with danger, it is costly and it stifles innovation
(among other things) -- as we can now see happening in
Egypt and
Libya, for example.
Another way is to persuade the majority -- or a significant section of 'opinion
formers', philosophers, theologians, administrators, 'intellectuals', judges, and
editors, etc. -- that the present order either works for their benefit, is
ordained of the 'gods', or is 'natural' and cannot be fought against, reformed
or negotiated with. In this way, the ruling-class makes sure it's ideas rule --,
as, indeed, Marx noted:
"The ideas of the
ruling class are in every epoch the ruling ideas, i.e. the class which is the
ruling material force of society, is at the same time its ruling intellectual
force. The class which has the means of material production at its disposal,
has control at the same time over the means of mental production, so that
thereby, generally speaking, the ideas of those who lack the means of mental
production are subject to it. The ruling ideas are nothing more than the ideal
expression of the dominant material relationships, the dominant material
relationships grasped as ideas; hence of the relationships which make the one
class the ruling one, therefore, the ideas of its dominance. The individuals
composing the ruling class possess among other things consciousness, and
therefore think. Insofar, therefore, as they rule as a class and determine the
extent and compass of an epoch, it is self-evident that they do this in its
whole range, hence among other things rule also as thinkers, as producers of
ideas, and regulate the production and distribution of the ideas of their age:
thus their ideas are the ruling ideas of the epoch." [Marx
and Engels (1970), pp.64-65. Bold
emphases added.]
Hence, a 'world-view' is necessary for each ruling-class to carry on ruling in the
same old way.
While the content of this ruling ideology may have changed with each new mode of
production, its form has remained largely the same for thousands of years:
Ultimate Truth is ascertainable by thought alone and can therefore be imposed
on reality, dogmatically.
And that is why all of traditional philosophy is dogmatic and thus
non-sensical.
Sadly, this ruling-class view of reality has been appropriated by DM-theorists and incorporated in Marxism. Small wonder then that it has presided
over 150 years of almost total failure.
[Exactly why Dialectical Marxists have done this and how this theory has helped
ruin Marxism are explained in Essay
Nine Part Two.]
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