International Phenomenological Society

Philosophy and Phenomenological Research

On "Marx's Use of Contradiction"

Author(s): Igor Narskii
Source: Philosophy and Phenomenological Research, Vol. 40, No. 4 (Jun., 1980), pp. 564-567
Published by: International Phenomenological Society
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/2106849
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 DISCUSSION

ON "MARX'S USE OF CONTRADICTION"

I feel that it is necessary, in order that what I say below concern-

ing the ideas in Prof. Crocker's article is not misunderstood, or ap-
pear to be a set of unfounded postulates, to dwell first of all on the
conclusions arrived at in my Dialektischer Widerspruch und Erkennt-
nislogik (Berlin, 1973) and Zapadnoevropeiskaya filosofiya XIX
veka/Western European Philosophy of the Nineteenth Century/
(Moscow, 1976) on the basis of analysis of Hegel's dialectical logic.
The first of these conclusions is that the category of "understand-
ing (Verstand), which Hegel employs, in particular, to characterize
formal logic and its laws (including the law of noncontradiction) has
a double sense - a dialectical and a metaphysical one (the latter
term meaning "antidialectical.") This conclusion follows from a com-
parison of what Hegel says in the introduction to the Logic (in the En-
cyclopedia of Philosophical Sciences) concerning the three
"moments" (stages) of the dialectical method, i.e., what, in Hegel's
opinion, is the true relation of thought to objectivity. It turns out that
the "'moment" of understanding can function both in the form of
methodological tendencies contrary to dialectics and in the form of
an initial stage which is, as well, an always necessary aspect of dialec-
tical thinking. The understanding, like two-faced Janus, can appear
in absolutized status and, in that case, be opposed to dialectical
"reason" (Vernunft), but if correctly understood can be an instru-
ment of the theoretically thinking dialectician. Hegel writes that "the
aim of the struggle of reason is to surmount what has been fixed by
understanding," (Works/Russian/Vol. I, Moscow, 1929, p. 70) but
he also states that "in both the theoretical and practical domains it is
impossible to arrive at solidity and definiteness without the aid of
understanding ... philosophy too cannot do without the understand-
ing." (Ibid., Vol. I, p. 132)
What we have here is not a confusion in the thinking of the great
philosopher but a pointing out of different states and, hence, of the
diverse functions of the logic of the understanding (formal logic). As
strongly as Hegel condemns the metaphysical treatment of that logic

564

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565 ON "MARX'S USE OF CONTRADICTION"

by the school of Wolff, and subsequently by Kant, equally strong is

his approval of the understanding and the applications of it that are
possible on the basis of the scientific dialectical method. In other
words, when we read this or that statement of Hegel's on the
understanding, we should always keep in mind that these statements
are not universal in nature but imply one of the two contrary states of
the understanding, or some state intermediate between the two.
The second conclusion derived from the analysis of Hegel's logic
is that Hegel, by virtue of his idealist principle of the indentity of be-
ing and thinking, did not draw any distinction between the structure
of the dialectical contradictions of objective reality and the structure
of the contradictions that arise in the process of knowing, as a
"moment" thereof. Furthermore, he sharply counterposed dialectical
contradictions to those of formal logic, but lost sight of the fact that
the dialectical contradictions of cognition, which he "sharpened"
(zugespitzt) ibidd., Vol. VI, p. 44-45) to the joint of antinomic
polarization, appear to assume, temporarily, the aspect of formal-
logical contradictions, although they remain dialectical in content.
The result was, therefore, that Hegel operated with "sharpened" con-
tradictions (of the type "S is P and is not P") as being completely
dialectical, and at the same time erroneously supposed that they sur-
mount and throw into the discard the formal-logical law of noncon-
tradiction (although actually that law does not in any way impinge on
strictly dialectical contradictions, while the latter need not discard
the law, i.e., they do not impinge on it, either). These matters are
dealt with in detail in Ch. IV of my Western European Philosophy of
the Nineteenth Century (Moscow, 1976).
The first of the two conclusions described above indicates that
when we try to ascertain the precise meaning of some judgment of
Marx, Engels, or Lenin containing an evaluation of Hegel's
statements on dialectics, the understanding or the logic of the
understanding (formal logic), we must, in each case, specify the
Hegelian context. This will make it clear in just what sense the
"understanding" is being spoken of. Only then will the meaning of
the opinion in question be clear and precise.
The second conclusion derived from the analysis of Hegel's logic
indicates that the philosophers speaking from the position of dialec-
tical materialism, while observing the unity and similarity between
objective and cognitive dialectical contradictions, should not
overlook the differences in their structures and functions. Special ac-
curacy is called for in dealing with the "sharpened," i.e., antinomic

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 PHILOSOPHY AND PHENOMENOLOGICAL RESEARCH 566

contradictions of the process of cognition (it is only within that pro-

cess that they arise) of the type "S is P and is not P") since in such
cases the illusion arises that dialectical contradictions exist by virtue
of breaking the formal-logical law of noncontradiction. But an-
tinomic contradictions are of the nature of problems and like all prob-
lems are neither true nor false, so that they do not enter into the
sphere of the law's action.
Now I should like to comment on the text of Prof. Crocker's arti-
cle.
Does the Hegelian dialectic conflict with formal logic? Where
Hegel develops his doctrine of the two basic forms of the understand-
ing and applies it consistently, no, there is no conflict. Where Hegel
departs from the doctrine and, most inconsistently, in his doctrine of
essence unqualifiedly condemns the formal-logical laws of identity
and contradiction as hopelessly metaphysical, i.e., always hostile to
dialectics, yes, there is conflict. When the conflict in question is not
present in Hegel, his views on the correlation of dialectics and formal
logic are not controverted by Marxism but are developed further.
When this conflict is present in Hegel, his arguments are rejected by
Marxism.
The quotation from Engel's Anti-Diihring cited by Prof. Crocker
shows only that Engels was an opponent of the logic of the under-
standing, i.e., formal logic, when it is developed and interpreted
metaphysically; it does not signify that he altogether rejected the laws
of formal logic as such. In the Dialectics of Nature he speaks of for-
mal logic in a positive sense as a method for arriving at the truth. As
for the contradictions of mechanical motion, the objective contradic-
tion moving it can of course only be the dynamic contradiction of ac-
tion and reaction according to the third law of Newtonian mechanics.
The contradiction " ... at one and the same instant of time is and is
not at the same point of its motion" is neither a dynamic nor an objec-
tive contradiction. It is a subjective contradiction, i.e, one which
arises within the process of considering the geometrical aspect of mo-
tion, and it attests the dialectics of the very process of knowing, and
does not come into conflict with the formal-logical law of noncon-
tradiction, for that contradiction is a problem-antinomy and not a
solution thereof which, being an assertion, could claim to have at-
tained truth. This claim did occur in Hegel, as in the case of the "fly-
ing arrow" antinomy (and in the case of the problem of the essence of
the differential) he erroneously regarded the initial statement of the
existence of the antinomy as its solution, and thereby, in essence,

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567 ON "MARX'S USE OF CONTRADICTION"

froze the sides of the antinomic contradiction in an unresolved state.

Later, Professor Crocker speaks of the noncontradictory nature of a
description of motion through a continuum. I will not quarrel with
this statement of his.
When Engels discusses the dialectical contradictions in the con-
cepts of the differential calculus, we are faced once again with prob-
lem-antinomies such as that "the differential is and is not an Ar-
chimedean quantity," etc. What is involved here is knowledge (from
the point of view of epistemology) of the concepts of the differential
calculus itself as an instrument of knowledge. Marx, in his
mathematical manuscripts, without knowing the work of Cauchy and
Weierstrass, arrived at a correct treatment of the concepts of
mathematical analysis, and Engels valued these results of Marx very
highly. Marx explained that the differential is neither a finite nor an
infinite nor an indefinite quantity. It is neither something nor
nothing but a "stratagem of action," that is, the symbol of a program
of definite operations by the mathematician.
Professor Crocker is quite correct when he writes, at the begin-
ning of the second section of his article, that "the dialectical concept
of contradiction applied by Marx and Engels does not conflict with the
principle of non-contradiction." (retranslated) The description of the
concept of objective dialectical contradiction, which Prof. Crocker
gives in two variants, seems to me to come close to the truth,
although, unfortunately, it is not quite accurate in either variant,
since it overlooks the important fact of the interdependence of the
two sides of the contradiction. Prof. Crocker himself rightly speaks
later of essential "internal contradictions."
Prof. Crocker's further argument rouses no objections in me. I
think he is quite correct in stressing that Marx and Engels always
strove to keep their thinking logically free from contradiction and
laid great weight on exposing the formal-logical contradictions in the
arguments of their opponents, regarding the presence of such con-
tradictions in arguments as evidence of falsity. It was with interest
that I read the many penetrating ideas of Prof. L. Crocker on the ob-
jective dialectics of economic processes and conditions, as set forth by
Marx in his Capital.
IGOR NARSKII.
Moscow UNIVERSITY.

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