David,
The quotes we are discussing from Ilyenkov's Introduction to
Problems of Dialectical Logic are part of a set of three
paragraphs. The three paragraphs in question are copied below for
reference.
The most interesting and relevant paragraph, I think, is the third,
where Ilyenkov speaks about the object or subject matter of his
book, thinking, and succinctly summarizes some of his essential
theses on thinking.
************************
On the first two of the three paragraphs ...
I happened to find on the internet a clearer translation of the
Hegel quote that the one that appears in the Ilyenkov text. It is
copied below. Seeing the whole quote seems to help grasp what Hegel
was saying and what point Ilyenkov was making.
I think Ilyenkov is offering the following three-step reasoning in
these first two of the three paragraphs in question. Please let me
know if something does not logically match:
1. Just as Hegel pointed out ... that it is the final result of
philosophizing that is salient whereas the way of carrying it out is
inessential ... so too, those that view dialectics as just a method
for deriving a perspective (whether this perspective had already
been arrived at or not) ... are using dialectics in the manner of a
sophist, and are thereby using dialectics in a way that is "empty of
content," as though they are "swimming at random".
2. Real dialectics requires more than just trying to apply the
dialectical method. It also requires having a clear idea of the
object (the subject matter) being analyzed.
3. Ilyenkov therefore feels obliged to reveal the object (subject
matter) of his book to the reader.
My take on these two paragraphs is that Ilyenkov seems to be making
clever uses of Hegel and some other phrases to make his point.
Perhaps he is telling an "inside joke" or two - I'm not sure. An
irony that may be intended is that he refers to the well-known quote
(copied below) from Hegel that argues a real philosophical work
can't be summarized, but Ilyenkov then goes ahead and provides a
succinct summary of the subject matter of his book anyway! But I
would need help to understand more about Ilyenkov's specific
references to delve any further. Perhaps others could help with
these paragraphs.
*******************************
The third paragraph is much more interesting, to my mind, because
this is where Ilyenkov's central theses about thinking, the central
subject of his book, are succinctly summarized. This paragraph
contains three sentences, which we can number (letter) a, b, c.
Let's look at sentences (b) and (c) first.
* sentence (b)
EVI:
(b) "In other words Logic must show how thought develops if it is
scientific, if it reflects, i.e. reproduces in concepts, an object
existing outside our consciousness and will and independently of
them, in other words, creates a mental reproduction of it,
reconstructs its self-development, recreates it in the logic of the
movement of concepts so as to recreate it later in fact (in
experiment or in practice)."
This is a complex sentence. Despite this, it is actually a
forthright statement of several of Ilyenkov's general theses about
human thinking.
But to be as clear as possible, let's make sure we are really
getting his points by break this long sentence into parts. See if my
translation matches the sentence (b) logically.
1. Logic must show how thought that is scientific and reflective
develops.
2. Thought that is scientific and reflective reproduces objects
existing outside of and independently of human consciousness and
will in concepts.
3. Such thought creates mental reproductions of such objects,
reconstructs their self-development, recreates them in the movement
of concepts, and recreates these objects later, in experiment or in
practice.
****************
* sentence (c)
As seen in (b), EVI has been talking about scientific thinking.
Sentence (c) offers his conclusion about what Logic is:
EVI:
(c) "Logic then is the theoretical representation of such thinking."
Ilyenkov is saying, as far as I can tell, that
1. Dialectical logic is the representation, in theoretical terms, of
scientific thinking.
***************
* sentence (a)
This final sentence takes more work to figure out. This seems to be
the one most troublesome to you, David.
EVI:
"Our ‘object’ or ‘subject matter’ in general, and on the whole, is
thought, thinking; and dialectical Logic has as its aim the
development of a scientific representation of thought in those
necessary moments, and moreover in the necessary sequence, that do
not in the least depend either on our will or on our consciousness."
Again, let's carefully translate this long sentence into smaller
parts. See if my reasoning makes sense to you.
The first part of the sentence seems easy enough and requires little
rework.
See 1. below.
Part 2. is trickier. I suggest we make two small translating
maneuvers to get to daylight.
Maneuver one. Lets find a substitute term for "moments." I used
the term "existence" the other day. It served the purpose up to a
point, but I have a better term now. In googling around the internet
to try to find a useful ballpark definition of the Hegelian term
"moment", I found something Lenin wrote in the margin notes in his
Philosophical Notebooks.
"The word “moment” is often used by Hegel in the sense of moment of
connection, moment of concatenation." See http://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1914/cons-logic/ch02.htm
Knowing Ilyenkov's respect for Lenin's work in philosophy, he
probably more or less agreed with this observation. So here is
maneuver one: substitute "connections" for "moments."
Maneuver two. This one involves adding a phrase to clarify just
precisely **what** is being connected. We know from the sentence
that **thoughts** are one side of the answer. What is on the other
side? Well, we know, from reading Ilyenkov, a consistent
materialist, what he would be referring to when he speaks of
"necessary connections" between thought and [ ? ] He would be
referring to the necessary connections ... between thought and the
**world of objects**.
See 2. below.
We can use these same ideas to translate the next part of the
sentence, too, pertaining to sequences.
See 3. below.
We now come to the part of Ilyenkov's sentence that includes the
phrase "not depending on our will and consciousness". What is
Ilyenkov saying here?
We already know from the next sentence (b), (translated above), that
Ilyenkov states quite explicitly that human thought reflects objects
in the world that exist outside of and independently of human
consciousness and will. Now that we have deciphered part 2. and 3.
of the sentence, and made those two translating maneuvers, it all
falls into place.
So here is 1., 2., 3., 4.:
1. The object or subject matter of this book is thought, thinking.
2. Dialectical logic has as its aim the development of a scientific
representation of thought when thought appears in its necessary
connections with the world of objects.
3. Moreover, dialectical logic aims to understand these connections
between thought and the world of objects in their necessary sequences.
4. The necessary connections between thought and the world of
objects, and the sequences of these connections, do not in the least
depend on our consciousness and will.
**************************
So that's my take on these three paragraphs, especially the third one.
Let's compare takes. The problem seems to lie in determining
**what** it is that Ilyenkov is claiming is independent of human
will and consciousness:
Your comments:
Ilyenkov seems to be saying that our goal is the representation of
thinking (a process, and not, as he says later, a kind of mental
organ). We have to represent this process as an objective process.
We do that by representing it as a set of determined, definite
steps and stages, like any other objective process. We do that by
representing it as determined, definite, defined steps and stages
WHICH ARE INDEPENDENT OF HUMAN WILL AND CONSCIOUSNESS. For me, that
is, dk, that is a step too far. That brings us right back to the
entirely pre-scientific era of philosophy.
Why would dialectical logic want a representation of thinking that
is independent of human will or human consciousness? That's the
task of religion, of metaphysics, and of teenage vampire literature.
What is the difference between your take and mine?
On one hand, I am pretty sure that Ilyenkov is saying that the
**connections between thoughts and the world of objects** are
independent of human will and consciousness. (Connections in the
sense of an Hegelian 'moment', of course).
On the other hand, you seem pretty sure that Ilyenkov is saying that
the **steps and stages of thinking** are independent of human will
and consciousness.
If Ilyenkov were indeed saying what you seem to think, I would agree
with you that he is way off base. But that is not what he is
saying. Nowhere does Ilyenkov say that **thinking** and its stages
are independent of human will and consciousness. This is simply a
misunderstanding of Ilyenkov.
What he is saying, as I read it, is that the "moments" or, in
English, the "connections" between thoughts and the world of objects
are independent of will and consciousness.
This, of course, is VERY different from saying that THOUGHTS are
independent of will and consciousness.
But this raises an interesting question. Does the claim that
Ilyenkov does seem to be making - that the **connections** between
thoughts and objects are independent of consciousness and will -
hold water? I think this question is important to CHAT. Might be
interesting to discuss.
Cheers,
~ Steve
**************************
**************************
original from http://www.marxists.org/archive/ilyenkov/works/essays/essayint.htm
from Dialectical Logic, Essays on its History and Theory
by Evald Ilyenkov, written 1974, published in English by Progress
Publishers 1977
from the Introduction
In philosophy, more than in any other science, as Hegel remarked
with some regret in his Phenomenology of Mind, ‘the end or final
result seems ... to have absolutely expressed the complete fact
itself in its very nature; contrasted with that the mere process of
bringing it to light would seem, properly speaking, to have no
essential significance’.
That is very aptly put. So long as dialectics (dialectical logic) is
looked upon as a simple tool for proving a previously accepted
thesis (irrespective of whether it was initially advanced as the
rules of mediaeval disputes required, or only disclosed at the end
of the argument, in order to create the illusion of not being
preconceived, that is, of saying: “Look, here is what we have
obtained although we did not assume it”), it will remain something
of ‘no essential significance’. When dialectics is converted into a
simple tool for proving a previously accepted (or given) thesis, it
becomes a sophistry only outwardly resembling dialectics, but empty
of content. And if it is true that real dialectical logic takes on
life not in ‘naked results’, and not in the ‘tendency’ of the
movement of thought, but only in the form of ‘the result along with
the process of arriving at it’, then during the exposition of
dialectics as Logic, we must reckon with this truth. For it is
impossible to go to the other extreme, taking the view that we had
allegedly not set ourselves any aim determining the means and
character of our activity from the very outset in the course of our
analysis of the problem, but had set out swimming at random. And we
are therefore obliged, in any case, to say clearly, at the very
beginning, what the ‘object’ is in which we want to discover the
intrinsically necessary division into parts.
Our ‘object’ or ‘subject matter’ in general, and on the whole, is
thought, thinking; and dialectical Logic has as its aim the
development of a scientific representation of thought in those
necessary moments, and moreover in the necessary sequence, that do
not in the least depend either on our will or on our consciousness.
In other words Logic must show how thought develops if it is
scientific, if it reflects, i.e. reproduces in concepts, an object
existing outside our consciousness and will and independently of
them, in other words, creates a mental reproduction of it,
reconstructs its self-development, recreates it in the logic of the
movement of concepts so as to recreate it later in fact (in
experiment or in practice). Logic then is the theoretical
representation of such thinking.
*****************************
*****************************
The quote in the first Ilyenkov paragraph above is from the passage
below in Hegel.
from: http://web.mac.com/titpaul/Site/Phenomenology_of_Spirit_page_files/Preface.pdf
http://web.mac.com/titpaul/Site/Phenomenology_of_Spirit_page.html
from Phenomenology of Spirit by Hegel
Preface
1. In the preface to a philosophical work, it is customary for the
author to give an explanation – namely, an explanation of his
purpose in writing the book, his motivations behind it, and the
relations it bears to other previous or contemporary treatments of
the same topics – but for a philosophical work, this seems not only
superfluous but in light of the nature of the subject matter, even
inappropriate and counterproductive. For whatever it might be
suitable to say about philosophy in a preface – for instance, to
give some historical instruction about the biases and the standpoint
of the text, or some talk about the general content and the results
together with a set of scattered assertions and assurances about the
truth – none of these can count as the way to present philosophical
truth. – Moreover, because philosophy essentially exists in the
element of universality, which encompasses the particular within
itself,
[the following partial sentence is quoted by Ilyenkov in his
Introduction to Dialectical Logic, although translated there more
awkwardly -sg]
it might seem that in philosophy, indeed even more so than in the
other sciences, that what is salient about its subject matter, even
its perfect essence, would be expressed in the goal of the work and
in its final results, and that the way the project is in fact
carried out would be what is inessential.
In contrast, if a person were to have only a general notion of, for
example, anatomy, or, to put it roughly, if he were to have an
acquaintance with the parts of the body taken in terms of their
lifeless existence, nobody would thereby think that he has come into
full possession of the salient subject matter of that science, which
is to say, its content. One would think that in addition he would
have to go to the trouble to pay attention to the particularities of
the science. – Furthermore, that kind of an aggregation of little
bits and pieces of information has no real right be called science,
and a conversation about its purpose and other such generalities
would be in no way distinct from the ordinary historical and
uncomprehending way in which the content, that is, these nerves and
muscles, and so forth, is itself discussed. In the case of
philosophy, this would give rise to the following incongruity,
namely, that if philosophy were indeed to make use of such a method,
then it would have shown itself to be incapable of grasping the truth.
**************************
**************************
<end>
On Sep 8, 2009, at 4:04 PM, David Kellogg wrote:
Steve:
Thanks. Yes, very useful. But I think the most useful thing about
it is that your paraphrase (which I would qualify as an English-to-
English TRANSLATION) differs from my reading of Ilyenkov in EXACTLY
the places I have trouble. Since sg is no philosophical neophyte,
ergo, dk is not losing what paltry philosophical wit he was endowed
with.
Here's what I mean:
sg: Hegel made an interesting remark about philosophy. He said
that, on one hand, the end results of philosophy express the
complete facts themselves in their very nature, whereas, on the
other hand, the mere process of bringing these facts to light has
no essential significance. –sg]
evi: In philosophy, more than in any other science, as Hegel
remarked with some regret in his Phenomenology of Mind, ‘the end or
final result seems ... to have absolutely expressed the complete
fact itself in its very nature; contrasted with that the mere
process of bringing it to light would seem, properly speaking, to
have no essential significance’.
dk: Hang on. That isn't how I read the Hegel at all, nor is it how
I read the Ilyenkov. I read Hegel as saying that philosophy, unlike
other sciences, has neither an experimental nor an empirical METHOD
to offer. The end is everything and the means is nothing. This
seems very true to me and it is a legacy of the fact that
philosophy is still in many ways a kind of intellectual fossil,
methodologically pre-scientific in the same way that religion, art
or literature is. But Ilyenkov takes this true and, as he says,
"very apt" observation and twists it into a comment on how
dialectics should not be used to "prove" things we already know are
true. This may also be true (one suspects he has certain colleagues
in mind), but it's a very different statement and in some ways it
means the precise opposite of what the Hegel says. Ilyenkov holds
that the MEANS is everything, precisely because it leads to
unexpected and surprising ENDS. This is really backed up by
his statement later on that:
,
sg: 9. Real dialectical logic does not take on life in the form of
‘naked results’ nor in the ‘tendency’ of the movement of thought.
It takes on life only in the form of ‘the result along with the
process of arriving at it.’ Therefore, we must take this into
account in our investigation of dialectics.
evi: And if it is true that real dialectical logic takes on life
not in ‘naked results’, and not in the ‘tendency’ of the movement
of thought, but only in the form of ‘the result along with the
process of arriving at it’, then during the exposition of
dialectics as Logic, we must reckon with this truth.
dk: Wait a minute. If we take 'the result ALONG WITH THE PROCESS OF
ARRIVING AT IT" we have very considerably more than naked results.
There is a unity of ends and means here that suggests a scientific,
rather than a pre-scientific, philosophy. And it also suggests that
a certain amount of reverse engineering is in fact justifiable. So
we have a contradiction upon a contradiction.
sg: 12. Our ‘object,’ that is, our ‘subject matter’, is thought.
Dialectical logic aims to scientifically represent thought in its
necessary concrete, developmental, objective existences, including
those aspects of these existences that are objectively independent
of will and consciousness.
evi: Our ‘object’ or ‘subject matter’ in general, and on the whole,
is thought, thinking; and dialectical Logic has as its aim the
development of a scientific representation of thought in those
necessary moments, and moreover in the necessary sequence, that do
not in the least depend either on our will or on our consciousness.
dk: Hmmm. You, sg, say that the goal of dialectical logic is to
represent thought as an objective fact, including its aspects that
are involuntary and unconscious. That is excellent and good, and I
think it actually includes a lot of what Haydi and Mike have been
batting back and forth about the mental life of animals. The
problem is that YOU, evi, don't seem to be saying that at all.
Ilyenkov seems to be saying that our goal is the representation of
thinking (a process, and not, as he says later, a kind of mental
organ). We have to represent this process as an objective process.
We do that by representing it as a set of determined, definite
steps and stages, like any other objective process. We do that by
representing it as determined, definite, defined steps and stages
WHICH ARE INDEPENDENT OF HUMAN WILL AND CONSCIOUSNESS. For me, that
is, dk, that is a step too far. That brings us right back to the
entirely pre-scientific era of philosophy.
Why would dialectical logic want a representation of thinking that
is independent of human will or human consciousness? That's the
task of religion, of metaphysics, and of teenage vampire literature.
David Kellogg
Seoul National University of Education
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