What is "Dialectics"? (1995)

[Roger Bissell]

WHAT IS "DIALECTICS"?

by Roger E. Bissell

10/26/95

Let's begin by asking Rand's Question: what facts in reality give rise to the need for the concept of "dialectics"?

In any developmental process, including the acquisition of knowledge or the achievement of goals, there are points at which or periods during which legitimate, needed progress is delayed or blocked and/or illegitimate "progress" needs to be delayed or blocked. In the intellectual and moral realms, such delays or blockages are often the result of oppositions or conflicts between two or more ideas or values.

1. Sometimes one is presented with a false alternative and one needs to identify a correct, third possibility. (E.g., sacrifice self to others vs. sacrifice others to self--vs.--sacrifice no one.)

2. Sometimes one needs to dissolve false oppositions by revealing the deeper compatibility of the two supposedly antagonistic ideas or values. (E.g., reason vs. the emotions.)

3. Sometimes one needs to show how one of two oppositions is dependent upon and/or parasitic upon the other. (E.g., good and evil, physical objects and consciousness).

4. Sometimes one needs to draw a new distinction between a third position and the two original ones, with the earlier two in a subordinate distinction to each other, as in "two sides of the same coin" (E.g. the intrinsic and subjective views both hold that having a nature invalidates consciousness, whereas the objective view holds that conscious is valid because of its nature.)

5. Sometimes one needs to insist on "polarizing," i.e. heightening an existing opposition, rather than brushing it under the table, or creating a new one. (E.g., seeing everything as black vs. white in moral judgment, rather than compromising by reducing everything to shades of grey. Also, highly significant, is Rand's article, "Credibility and Polarization," The Ayn Rand Letter, Vol. 1, No. 1, Oct. 11, 1971, in which she discusses "intellectual polarization." See discussion below.)

In order to deal properly with all these intellectual and moral situations, people need a method or approach that helps them to sharpen and clarify opposing ideas or distinctions--including the creation of new oppositions or distinctions, in some cases--so that they may be retained if valid and complete, abandoned if invalid, or transcended (going beyond present limits and reaching a new level of mental integration) if incomplete. This method or approach is the dialectic.

A dialectical process (in the context of thought, rather than historical or natural processes) is thus a process of logically sharpening and clarifying intellectual or moral distinctions. (Dialectics, in short, is the science of distinctions.)

The historical accuracy of this definition can be seen in the following quote by Mortimer Adler: "The thread of common meaning which runs through these four conceptions of dialectic [viz., those of Plato, Aristotle, Kant, and Hegel] is to be found in the principle of opposition. In each of them dialectic either begins or ends with some sort of intellectual conflict, or develops and then resolves such oppositions." ("Dialectic," in The Great Books, Vol. 2, The Great Ideas. A Syntopicon, 2, Angel to Love, p. 350)

In this same vein, Aristotle himself said: "A dialectical problem is a subject of inquiry that contributes either to choice and avoidance [i.e., resolves a value-controversy or conflict], or to truth and knowledge [i.e., resolves a controversy or conflict over an intellectual issue], and that either by itself, or as a help to the solution of some other such problem." (Topics, Book I, chapter 11, 104b, 1-3)

Aristotle also made it clear that a dialectical problem may be over a present intellectual or value dispute between two conflicting parties, each of whom holds a definite position on the matter; or it may be over an issue on which no one has formed a definite position, but which may be developed into such a problem and then dealt with. (104b, 4ff)

In describing the dialectic according to Aristotle, Mortimer Adler also said: "Though it is primarily a method of arguing from assumptions and of dealing with disputes arising from contrary assumptions, dialectic is also concerned with the starting points of arguments." (p. 348, "Dialectic," in The Great Books, Vol. 2, The Great Ideas. A Syntopicon, 2, Angel to Love) In other words, as Ayn Rand said, "Check your premises," succinctly stating another dialectical aspect of her philosophic approach.

Of the four main historical advocates cited, only Hegel (and his followers) applied dialectic beyond the realm of human thought, as well. Hegel and Marx applied it to the task of describing historical and/or socio-economic change. In this context, Rand's 1971 article, "Credibility and Polarization" (Ayn Rand Letter) is highly significant. She says that when people are pressured into refraining from "intellectual polarization"--i.e., dialectic processes over conflicting ideas and values--in the name of "national unity," what results, ironically, is "the ugliest kind of divisiveness or existential polarization, if you will: pressure-group warfare."

Thus, Rand has put her finger on one of the key factors lending plausibility to Hegelian and Marxist analysis of social change--how suppression or absence of an intellectual dialectic generates a subterranean pressure that breaks out in myriad manifestations of seemingly unresolvable social conflict. This is a powerful dialectical insight.

In that same article, Rand gave at least a partial description of a dialectical process in outlining what intellectual polarization would bring about:

It would establish the minimum requirement of civilized discourse: that the proponents of ideas strive to make themselves understood and lay all their cards on the table (including their axioms). It would leave no significant audience or influence to those who specialize in the unintelligible, or preach blatant contradictions, or proclaim ends with total unconcern for means, or hold fundamental principles they would not dare name openly, or disseminate anti-concepts. It would enable men to know their own stand and that of their adversaries. It would enable them to make conscious choices and to take the consequences--or to change their course, when proved wrong. What they would regain is the power to understand, to consider, to judge--and to communicate with each other.

I say, "Three cheers for Ayn Rand, the Dialectical Objectivist!"