READ and DISCUSS:

The ABC of Materialist Dialectics (Trotsky, 1939)⁸

“Dialectics is neither fiction nor mysticism, but a science of the forms of our thinking [that] attempts to arrive at an understanding of more complicated and drawn-out processes. Dialectics and formal logic bear a relationship similar to that between higher and lower mathematics.

Aristotelian logic … starts from the proposition that ‘A’ is equal to ‘A’. This postulate is accepted as an axiom for a multitude of practical human actions and elementary generalisations. But in reality ‘A’ is not equal to ‘A’. [Take] for instance, a pound of sugar. … In reality a pound of sugar is never equal to a pound of sugar - a more delicate scale always discloses a difference. … Again, one can object: but a pound of sugar is equal to itself. Neither is this true - all bodies change uninterruptedly in size, weight, colour, etc.

At first glance it could seem that these “subtleties” are useless. In reality they are of decisive significance. ... To make use of the axiom of ‘A’ is equal to ‘A’ with impunity is possible only within certain limits. When quantitative changes in ‘A’ are negligible for the task at hand then we can presume that ‘A’ is equal to ‘A’. This is, for example, the manner in which a buyer and a seller consider a pound of sugar. … Until recently we consider the buying power of the dollar in the same way. But quantitative changes beyond certain limits become converted into qualitative. A pound of sugar subjected to the action of water or kerosene ceases to be a pound of sugar. A dollar in the embrace of a president ceases to be a dollar. To determine at the right moment the critical point where quantity changes into quality is one of the most important and difficult tasks in all the spheres of knowledge, including sociology.

Every worker knows that it is impossible to make two completely equal objects. In the cutting of brass into bearings, a certain deviation is allowed … which should not, however, go beyond certain limits (this is called tolerance). By observing the norms of tolerance, the cones are considered as being equal. (‘A’ is equal to ‘A’). When the tolerance is exceeded, the quantity goes over into quality; in other words, the bearings become inferior or completely worthless.

Our scientific thinking is only a part of our general practice including techniques. For concepts there also exists “tolerance” which is established not by formal logic issuing from the axiom ‘A’ is equal to ‘A’, but by the dialectical logic issuing from the axiom that everything is always changing. “Common sense” is characterised by the fact that it systematically exceeds dialectical “tolerance”.

Vulgar thought operates with such concepts as capitalism, morals, freedom, workers’ state etc. as fixed abstractions, presuming that ‘capitalism’ is equal to ‘capitalism’, ‘morals’ are equal to ‘morals’, etc. Dialectical thinking analyses all things and phenomena in their continuous change, while determining in the material conditions of those changes that critical limit beyond which ‘A’ ceases to be ‘A’, when [for example, considering the nature of the Soviet Union] a ‘workers’ state’ ceases to be a ‘workers’ state’.

The fundamental flaw of vulgar thought lies in the fact that it wishes to content itself with motionless imprints of a reality which consists of eternal motion. Dialectical thinking gives to concepts, by means of closer approximations, corrections, concretisation, a richness of content and flexibility; I would even say “a succulence” which to a certain extent brings them closer to living phenomena. Not ‘capitalism in general’, but a given capitalism at a given stage of development. Not a ‘workers’ state in general’, but a given workers’ state in a backward country in an imperialist encirclement, etc.

Dialectical thinking is related to vulgar thought in the same way that a motion picture is related to a still photograph. The motion picture does not outlaw the still photograph but combines a series of them according to the laws of motion”.

In defence of Marxist philosophy (Socialism Today, February 2024)⁹

“In 1909, the Russian revolutionary leader Vladimir Lenin published one of his less well-read works, ‘Materialism and Empirio-Criticism’. It was based on nine months of research he conducted in 1908 into the scientific and philosophical debates taking place amongst leading scientists of the time. …

If there is one clear thread running through Lenin’s book, it is his insistence that there are two distinct but contrasting trends in philosophy – materialism and idealism. Lenin explains that a materialist believes that our senses give us an ‘image’, if sometimes imperfectly, of the real objective world that exists around us. However, an idealist outlook believes that thoughts and sensations are primary, that they are the only reality that we perceive.

In setting out his general approach to scientific thought, Lenin refers to Engels’ writing on science which stressed that genuine Marxism, dialectical materialism, rejected a mechanical approach that imposed “fixed boundary lines and distinctions”. He adds that recent evidence, including in radioactivity and electromagnetism, had shown how things that had previously been thought to be entirely separate were, in fact, closely connected.

Lenin explains how Marxists believe that the nature of underlying reality, the ‘things-in-themselves’, can be revealed, as our knowledge becomes more complete. New experimental findings of course meant that our models of the nature of reality have had to change. Lenin emphasises Engels’ insistence on the ‘criterion of practice’ – “the result of our action proves the conformity [or otherwise] of our perceptions with the objective nature of the things perceived”. [or, as Engels also put it more simply, “the proof of the pudding is in the eating” ! ].

Lenin recognised, as understood by such a dialectical approach, that previously accepted models of science would show themselves to be correct only within certain limits. He draws attention to one of the then most recently proposed examples of this, the work of Larmor and Lorentz on the ‘time dilation’ and ‘length contraction’ needed to explain how physics applies to objects travelling at speeds close to that of light. These helped provide the basis of Einstein’s theory of special relativity.

Einstein’s development of relativity theory confirms the dialectical approach to the development of knowledge outlined by Lenin above. It’s clear that classical Newtonian mechanics only gave an accurate picture of the world around us within certain limits. Beyond these limits, a new, more refined, model of reality was required. Einstein’s theories provided the basis of that new model. Newtonian physics could no longer be seen as giving equally valid explanations of reality.

Far from being resistant to theoretical advances in physics, Lenin is clear that Marxism is a philosophy that insists that scientific theory must accord with practice – and consequently has to change when new scientific discoveries require it to do so. Far from insisting dogmatically that previous propositions must not be revised, Lenin asserts that “on the contrary, [this] is demanded by Marxism”.

For example, new experiments suggested that an electron’s mass depended on its velocity. [Einstein was later able to explain this finding as being due to ‘relativistic mass’, summed up in his well-known E=mc² equation]. Lenin’s response to these claims is significant: “However bizarre from the standpoint of ‘common sense’ – all this is but another corroboration of dialectical materialism”, demonstrating “that our knowledge is penetrating deeper”, taking a further step, ‘from relative truth to absolute truth’, towards understanding the actual nature of objective reality.

While scientific conceptions of space and time may have changed since 1909, the need for science to be able to successfully explain the nature of that reality has not. As Lenin wrote then: “Human conceptions of space and time are relative, but these relative conceptions go to compound absolute truth. These relative conceptions, in their development, move towards absolute truth and approach nearer and nearer to it. The mutability of human conceptions of space and time no more refutes the objective reality of space and time than the mutability of scientific knowledge of the structure and forms of matter in motion refutes the objective reality of the external world”.

1. The Greek philosopher Heraclitus is quoted above as saying, “All things flow, all change”,

How does this phrase help to explain a ‘dialectical’ outlook? What examples can you give of things, theories, societies etc. that are not permanently fixed but always subject to change?

2. Reading Trotsky’s ‘ABC of Materialist Dialectics’,

Trotsky writes: “To make use of the axiom of ‘A’ is equal to ‘A’ with impunity is possible only within certain limits”. What does Trotsky mean? What examples does he give of those limits being exceeded?

3. Reading what Lenin writes in ‘Materialism and Empirio-Criticism’,

Some writers have accused Lenin - and genuine Marxism - of being unwilling to accept changes to scientific thought. How would you respond, having read the article above?