This is absurd.If contradiction is the root of motion and life,then why is cancelling that contradiction (domination of the 1 opposite in today's society-laborers) is good?
Since communism is stateless and classless,where is the internal contradiction?If there is none wont the movement and change be halted?

This is abstract and subjective as hell,because it depends on the definition of the object/process.When is a cat not a cat?What is a cat?
Philosophically,at each moment the cat of the previous moment is not the same cat,but it has changed,into something else (still a cat practically).
So what changes are adequate according to DM to change the object/process? When do we say 'whoa,the cat has ben non'd into something else'?

There are is a group of anti-DM RevLeft members on the forums. You should take this there. I'm still exploring the validity of Dialectical Materialism myself.

When the contradiction between the working class and the capitalist class is over, there will still be other opposites which will further development, such as between manual and intellectual labour, or between the countryside or the city. So development doesnt halt when the contradictory struggle between worker and capitalist halt.

Absolut, unfortunately the theory behind what you say is radically flawed. On that see here:

http://www.revleft.com/vb/showpost.p...4&postcount=23

http://www.revleft.com/vb/showpost.p...5&postcount=24

There you will see that dialectical classicists like Hegel, Engels, Plekhanov, Lenin, and many others (whom I have quoted extensively there) argue that 'dialectical opposites' (comprisng these 'contradictions') all inevitably turn into one another.

That can only mean that the capitalist class must turn into the proletariat, and the proletariat must turn into the capitalist class!

It also means that the forces of production must turn into the relations of production!

Fortunately, we do not need dialectics to make Historical Materialism work.

Bulk Sheep, well done for your forthright stance, but you need to know you are banging your head against a brick wall.

That is why I chose this signature:

Alas, dialectically-distracted comrades cling on to this 'theory' for non-rational reasons, those I outlined here:

http://www.revleft.com/vb/showpost.p...79&postcount=2

That is why you will never get much sense out of the vast majority of them.

[I have been trying now for over 25 years -- with very little success so far!]

Having corresponded with you for a while, I have an idea what it must feel like. Anyway, must you trash every thread with this anti-dialectic diatribe?

Back to topic:

Bulk Sheep,

The movement and change will continue, as you've rightly suspected. But it will continue within the field of what we call communism, hence the apparent contradictions are resolved.

BenHur:

1) Yes -- get used to it -- or don't.

Why do you think I have notched up nearly 10,000 posts in just over three years? And why do you think the dialectical mystics here had to limp off and form their own secret little coven (the Dialectical Materialism group), which I am not allowed to join?

2) But, aren't you the numpty who said this?

http://www.revleft.com/vb/showpost.p...8&postcount=37

To which I replied:

http://www.revleft.com/vb/showpost.p...5&postcount=41

3) And, as I predicted, you mystics cannot respond effectively to my demolition of your mystical 'theory', so you just resort to abuse.

But we already know this can't work -- anyway, you think that 'opposites' should 'combine'.

So, not even you 'understand' this 'theory'!

I never said I confessed to dialectic materialism, I just tried to explain it as Ive had it explained to me, as Ive also asked the same question. Personally, I feel I know too little of it to confess to it. Ill definately check your links out though.

You must admit that these so-called "opposites" are based upon conceptual differentiations which may, or may not, exist.

Ex: your use of "manual labor" and "intellectual labor."
1) Why are these forms of labor 'opposed' to one another?
2) Does not intellectual labor entail manual labor?
3) Is not intellectual labor manual labor, and manual labor intellectual labor?

If you admit that manual labor (such as digging a ditch) entails intellectual labor (such as engaging in basic logic), then why are they opposed? Where is the opposition?

- August

"Movement," what movement?
"Change," what change?

Can you be anything other than abstract and vague? I could say that there is 'movement' and 'change' in the fairies which live in my computer and make it function...

- August

Your points may very well be valid, and Im not going to engange in any kind of defence for dialectic materialism. I can only point you to my answer above.

Absolut:

And I never said you did, I merely said that the theory behind what you say (not what you believe or what you accept) is radically flawed.

In that case I misunderstood what you said, sorry.

It is a dynamic process. Where class society is 'negated' humans will be left with the battle against nature until either or neither wins.

Surely every reality depends on having a system of quantifying what any given thing is at any given time. Your point might actually be counter-productive, given that if you understand that everything must decay in to something else, then there must be a dynamic process behind this.

RD:

But even if there were, that process cannot be 'dialectical', for the reasons I detailed here:

http://www.revleft.com/vb/showpost.p...4&postcount=23

http://www.revleft.com/vb/showpost.p...5&postcount=24

it allows for the beginning of human history. humans and their societies are no longer controlled by the whims and choas of markets, tyrants, war and unavoidable social conflicts.

the theory goes that change would no longer be directed by forces external to the individual, or internal contradictions (social conflicts from partisan class material interests that cannot be resolved within that society and poitn to the creation of a new society). change would be man-made and designed.

well for one thing, I don't see the values of dialectics applied to nature. that was something Engels and later the Soviets really applied, not so much Marx.

however it was a positive critique of bourgeois thinking. like take the idea that someone is a petit bourgeois. rather than look at them as a petit bourgeois defined by the nature of the petit bourgeoisie, we may examine how their class is changing and their relationship to other classes in a specific period of time. not just the nature of something, but where it is going, and its interaction within a whole. dialectical reasoning was an attempt to move past the mechanistic thinking inherent to the bourgeoisie, for while it was progressive at one time it has limitations. as does dialectical thinking- it shouldn't be held up as some sort of religion as admittedly many do.

PRC:

But this is Historical Materialism, not dialectics.

Not only are we never told what these alleged 'contradictions' are, or rather why they are contradictions to begin with, what little we are told implies this theory cannot work (or that if dialectics were true, change would be impossible):

Quotes from the Dialectical Classics:

http://www.revleft.com/vb/showpost.p...4&postcount=23

Argument showing this 'theory' cannot work:

http://www.revleft.com/vb/showpost.p...5&postcount=24

I agree, but then your 'half-way house' compromise suggests that human beings are not part of nature!

Better to dump this useless, mystical theory altogether.

-Since communism is stateless and classless,where is the internal contradiction?
- You previously said that "some opposites are antagonistic", so there must be non antagonistic contradictions or opposites in the communist society

-When is a cat not a cat?What is a cat?
-When light is a wave and when a corpuscle? How can light be 2 different things at one and the same time?

If Hegels' explanation on how things change is not good, are we to redefine Marxism anew?

el chavista:

We do not need to -- all we need is classical historical materialism with the Hegelian jargon removed.

Our understanding of history and how to change it will not be affected in the least.

Marx made no such distinction. He applied dialectics to his studies. DM was a legitimising ideology which was created post-Marx, as my comments about dialectics on nature and science were made in reference to.

we've heard it all before. from Bernstein, actually.