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ELEMENTARY PRINCIPLES OF DIALECTICS

Dialectics


Dialectics is the law that explains the development of all phenomena through the antagonisms that exist in the unit. Through this process, a partially qualitative change occurs within the phenomena and brings forth a new set of antagonism. All existing phenomena have a dialectical nature.Image

THE DEVELOPMENT OF DIALECTICAL THOUGHT

The Dialectics of Heraclitus, Aristotle

• Spontaneous Materialist Dialectics of Ancient Greece

"Primitive, naive but intrinsically correct conception of the world is that of Ancient Greek Philosophy, and was first clearly formulated by 
Heraclitus: everything is and is not, for everything is fluid and constantly changing, constantly coming into being and passing away." - Friedrich Engels 
THE DIALECTICS OF KANT, FICHTE, SCHELLING, HEGEL

Idealist Dialectics of German Philosophers

"The law of transformation of quantity into quality and vice versa; the law of interpenetration of opposites; the law of the negation of the negation of all three are developed by 
Hegel in his idealist fashion as mere laws of thought... the mistake lies in the fact that these laws are foisted on nature and history as laws of thought, and not deduced from them." - Friedrich Engels 
THE DIALECTICS of MARX, ENGELS, LENIN and MAO

Scientific Materialist Dialectics

"It is the merit of Marx that... he was the first to have brought to the fore again the forgotten dialectical method, its connection with Hegelian dialectics and its distinction from the latter, andImage
at the same time to have applied this method in Capital... dialectics reduced itself to the science of the general laws of motion, both of external world and of human thought..." - Friedrich Engels 
MATERIALIST DIALECTICS

A materialist and concrete view of the nature of dialectics in phenomena; Marxism reveals the unity of two opposing sides in a phenomenon that defines it. The antagonism between these two aspects is what changes and maintains the phenomena. 
For example, the dialectical unity between the worker and the capitalist, the capitalist needs to the worker to create surplus value and the worker has to sell their labour-power to the capitalist for their subsistence, these opposing interests is and will be the reason for both 
quantitative and qualitative change. Consequently, one can see how one aspect does not exist without the other, the capitalist cannot function without the worker and if the capitalist ceases to exist the capitalist relation to production ceases to exist too. 
"I am therefore I think"

Materialism asserts that the consciousness of individuals is determined by their material conditions as opposed to the idealist statement that it is the consciousness of individuals that determines consciousness and in turn shapes their material conditions. Therefore, it is the base of society that defines the superstructure of society. 
BASE and SUPERSTRUCTURE

There are two main points of interests in Marx’s criticism on literature. The first is the relationship between the past and the present with regard to art and literature, and the second is the relevance of base and superstructure. 
The base of society—which is also translated as “infrastructure”—includes the relations of production and the productive forces. Productive forces name labor-power, instruments or tools used by workers, and the materials workers transform in the production process. 
The superstructure comprises the political-legal system of the state and consciousness—or ideology—in general, which manifests in culture and art, religion and spirituality, ethics and philosophy, etc. The superstructure emerges from the totality of the relations of production.
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The Law of Contradiction and The law of The Negation of The Negation

According to the law of dialectics, there can be no phenomena that reach full consolidation as all matter and thought goes through quantitative and qualitative changes through the development of their internal contradictions. For example, humans go through different stages in their lives; i.e. childhood, adolescence, youth, adulthood and old age. As the person goes through quantitative changes they also go through partially qualitative change, from life to death. 
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