My reading of Hegel's Logic has led me to the conclusion that the entire
Logic, and all its little syllogisms, judgments and moments, make perfect
sense if you understand him as talking about how rational social relations
develop, and that he expresses this description of the "laws of motion of
social rationality" in the form of a critique of the types of thinking that
rationalise each stage of the process.
See http://home.mira.net/~andy/works/iup.htm
Andy
At 00:11 13/06/2000 +0000, you wrote:
>Eva, thanks for your question, and Jay for the response. Eva discerned what
>had been muddled in my response to Bill -- I'd been thinking of dialectics
>as characteristic of thought, whether thought about material reality or
>about us-in-material/social-reality. In fact, despite Jay's persuasive case
>for conflictual relations among elements in any system, I'm inclined to
>assert unknowability about systems we're not part of and the principles of
>'life' -- a bit of mysticism? or is it humility (Hah!)
>a wishful thinker is never a humble thinker
>
>jay wrote:
>>My deepest understanding of dialectics is that it embodies the insight that
>>heterogeneity combined with interaction leads to change. In dynamic system
>>terms, rather than as a purely philosophical argument, the issue here is
>>about what happens when differences collide -- not trivial differences of
>>variation on a theme, but profound differences of a kind we have never
>>really been able to characterize (contradiction is certainly not the right
>>condition, incommensurability may be too strong a condition). How does a
>>whole hold together when it contains incompatible or antagonistic elements,
>>and especially when those elements need each other, or imply each other?
>>when the whole cannot resolve the conflict, but in fact arises itself out
>>of this conflict? theories of emergence of higher levels of organization,
>>now a cornerstone of ecological models, are direct descendants of
>>philosophical dialectics (albeit by a different path than, say, historical
>>materialism's).
>
>
>
>Judith Diamondstone (732) 932-7496 Ext. 352
>Graduate School of Education
>Rutgers, the State University of New Jersey
>10 Seminary Place
>New Brunswick, NJ 08901-1183
>
>
>
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