By Harsh Thakor
Dialectical materialism is a precise expression for the
Marxist materialist philosophy as opposed to both idealism (objective and
subjective) and to mechanical materialism. Materialist dialectics takes into
account the materiality of the universe as well as the contradictory factors in
the balances and transformations within nature and society and in the
interactions of society and nature. The dialectical materialist adopts the
materialist and scientific outlook and the mode of cognition and practice that
gives due attention to the dialectical or interactive relation of human
consciousness and material reality, especially in the process of social
transformation, and debunks the supernatural as well as the subjectivist as the
sole or main determinant of reality and the transformation of social reality.
Dialectical materialism seeks to comprehend both the natural and social
sciences, study how materialist dialectics (with its laws of contradiction) applies
in any field of scientific knowledge and understand scientific knowledge as
both products of social practice and being consequential to social reality and
social transformation. Dialectical materialists are ever obliged and ready to
learn from social investigation as well as scientific experiment. Dialectical
materialism is ever interested in and enlightened by the entire range of
natural sciences. It appreciates the basic laws of motion in various types of
natural phenomena as an explanation and confirmation of the materiality of the
universe. In the dialectical materialist explanation of Mao, a piece of stone
cannot take the place of the egg and bring forth a chicken, no matter the
amount of temperature applied and no matter how much praying by the objective
idealist and wishing by the subjective idealist. The fundamental principles of
dialectical materialism as laid down and clarified by Marx and Engels,
benefited from the rise of humanism against divinism during the Renaissance and
the rise of scientific and rational thought from the 16th century onwards.
Philosophy became increasingly shorn of the superfluous Platonistic, idealistic
and divinistic categories among the most advanced thinkers. It became clear
that matter is the object of scientific investigation. Dialectical materialists
appreciate Newtonian physics as a great scientific advance in its own time and
remains useful in building houses and bridges and in making and operating
electro-mechanical processes. But it rejects mechanical materialism and sheer
empiricism as much as it rejects objective idealism as philosophy and as the
basis of or guide to social science. Thus, dialectical materialists have put
forward materialist dialectics as the interaction of human consciousness and
material reality. Dialectical materialists appreciate the advance of scientific
knowledge, such as the epochal one from Newtonian to Einsteinian physics. The
latter gives us a more intimate knowledge of the atom, the materiality of
energy and the realm of astral physics. Pertinent to quantum physics, Einstein
demonstrated that the photons in a wave of light strike and disturb the
electrons of a targeted object in photography. Quantum physics verifies that
particles are in waves and that the particle and wave are two sides of the same
physical phenomenon, in the same way as matter and energy as well as photon and
light. It debunks the attempt of some idealist scientists and philosophers to
spiritualize the wave and make the particles subordinate to it and make these
less essential or less important. There is double absurdity in the statement
that “scientific developments, especially in quantum physics, are increasingly
in relative correspondence with the spiritual belief systems of what Engels
called primitive communist societies. There is an attempt to misrepresent
Engels as having been an idealist and as having asserted the scientific
validity of spiritual belief systems where in fact he saw through such
unscientific belief systems as reflections of social practice and the given
level of speculation in primitive communal societies. The great Mao made no
rupture from dialectical materialism when he answered the question, Where do
correct ideas come from? His answer is a brilliant summation and amounts to an
enrichment or development of Marxist philosophy, particularly in the
epistemology of dialectical materialism. He declares and explains that the
source of knowledge is social practice, consisting of production, class
struggle and scientific experiment. The three terms are well sequenced
historically: primitive and more advanced societies exist and develop on the
basis of production as human activity, class struggle impels and propels the
maintenance and change of class-divided societies and scientific experiment
enables the scientific and technological development that leads to social
development. In our time the application of quantum physics has generated
information technology to accelerate production, communications and
distribution of goods to favor the monopoly bourgeoisie and its financial
oligarchy, especially during the decades of the neoliberal policy regime. But
the adoption of higher technology has made more frequent and worse the economic
crisis (the crisis of overproduction) and the financial crisis (the abuse of credit)
of the capitalist system. Consequently the deepening and worsening of the
crisis of the world capitalist system has generated among the proletariat and
people the outrage and desire for revolution. The recurrent rounds of crisis
have become the opportunity for building the mass movement and revolutionary
forces. And the higher technology for maximizing profit and accelerating the
private accumulation of capital provides the tools for arousing , organizing
and mobilizing the masses at a faster rate than ever and eventually for
building socialism at new and higher technical and cultural level. Dialectical
materialists always seek to learn from the laws of natural science in order to
shed light on the materiality of the objective conditions and subjective
factors interacting in social reality and social transformation. And in the
realm of social science, they learn best and most from the impact on and
consequences of the advances in science and technology to society. But they
never seek to replace with any notion of dialectical materialism any scientific
law or process discovered and proven in the process of scientific experiment or
technological innovation.
No comments:
Post a Comment