What Is Dialectics, Really? Part 1: Dialectics and Philosophy
Dialectics is a philosophy. In modern times it is often equated with Hegel’s philosophy, and rightly so, for it was indeed Hegel who systematized and deepened dialectics into a complete system. Yet as an idea, dialectics was established already in antiquity: Heraclitus of ancient Greece, for example, is regarded as its founder. In the East, the writings of China’s Laozi are likewise full of dialectical thought and stand as an outstanding expression of Eastern wisdom. Since East and West became aware of dialectics and of the dialectical way of thinking, that is, speculative thinking, at almost the same time, we can see that it is a most fundamental and most important idea.
Put simply, philosophy is the science that questions the universe and human life to the very end, answering the fundamental questions about knowing the world and knowing ourselves. It is usually divided into several branches, such as ontology, epistemology and ethics. Ontology is the study of the ultimate principles of the universe: what is the ultimate principle of the myriad things that exist, where do they come from, on what do they rest, what truly exists, and why do things exist at all? Epistemology turns its gaze upon thinking itself. It asks whether our questioning of the universe is valid and reliable, where true knowledge or truth comes from, how human beings acquire knowledge, and whether that knowledge holds. Ethics turns its gaze to the realm of practice, asking how we ought to live, how we should treat others and the world, what the source and foundation of morality are, and related questions.
As for the relationship between dialectics and philosophy, to put it simply, dialectics is philosophy. It is at once epistemology and ontology, and it is also a logic, one that goes beyond the formal logic on which our everyday life and the sciences rely, called dialectical logic. Dialectics is all aspects of philosophy at once. One may say that dialectics is something wholly unified: the division of philosophy into branches, and every external distinction, is overcome in dialectics. If philosophy is the pearl in the crown of human civilization, dialectics is the light shining from that pearl, that which best represents human wisdom and the radiance of reason.
Dialectics is a special way of thinking: a higher-dimensional way of thinking and a higher-dimensional framework of thought. It breaks entirely through our ways of thinking based on formal logic, both everyday thinking and the thinking of the natural sciences, and gives us the ability to see the world more fully and more deeply. Compared with our everyday thinking and with scientific and technical thinking, dialectical thinking is like higher mathematics compared with elementary mathematics: a thoroughgoing elevation. Dialectics is truly comprehensive thinking. What appears completely separate to formal logic and to our Understanding is, in a higher-dimensional space, actually connected, indeed identical. The thinking of the Understanding is only a slice of true reality, a one-sided way of thinking; dialectics alone is the true structure of the world.
When we look at the universe, nature, humankind and ourselves in this way, we arrive at many fresh and profound insights. The world, in all its aspects, truly comes together before us; its parts are no longer cut off from one another but closely related, and history and the future are united in a single process. All the sciences, for instance, physics and biology, the natural and the social sciences, science and religion and philosophy, are all connected; and the rifts between the infinite and the finite, God and humanity, theory and reality, nature and spirit are bridged as well.
It can thus be seen that dialectics is also a model of the universe. As such, it fully encompasses matter and spirit, nature and consciousness, the infinite God and finite human beings, and accounts for their origin, nature, place and meaning. Whatever kind of being in the universe, whatever role you play, dialectics includes you and bears closely on you. This model also fully reveals the nature of time; it is a model of time as well. It not only reveals the origin of time but encompasses all of history and all of the future, and it shows that everything truly real transcends time and is an eternal present.
Precisely because dialectics goes beyond formal logic and our everyday patterns of thought, it is not easy to understand, and many misreadings and superficial interpretations of it are in circulation. These both obscure the true meaning and structure of dialectics and have turned the word “dialectics” into a byword for quibbling and specious argument. As a result, some people have come to detest dialectics, regarding it as nothing but sophistry whose aim is to turn black into white and confuse right with wrong. It is fair to say that both the misreading of dialectics and the aversion to it stem from failing to understand it, or from misunderstanding it.
Understanding dialectics is a considerable challenge; even some well-known philosophers in the history of philosophy failed to grasp this profound idea. Hegel’s own writings are notorious for their difficulty and obscurity, and since Hegel there have been almost no philosophers or philosophical works that have truly explained dialectics clearly. Even some so-called Hegel experts understand Hegel in a rather superficial and muddled way. The profession of philosophy has this feature: once someone has secured a certain position, they can produce a pile of writings and count them as achievements even without understanding, while the most crucial thing, quality, is almost absent. For ordinary people who love independent thinking, learning dialectics is much like someone with only elementary mathematics setting out to teach themselves higher mathematics: they face something entirely new and higher-dimensional, with no reliable textbook to turn to. The difficulty is easy to imagine. This series sets out to change that situation. It will lay out the key ideas of dialectics clearly, point out what is crucial, and explain it plainly. I believe this will do a great deal to spread genuine dialectical thought, and will help every reader truly raise their capacity for thinking and the level of their thought, giving their lives solid intellectual support and spiritual drive.
Hegel expressed dialectical thought in a system of terminology of his own making. That system is deep and obscure, full of things that appear self-contradictory from the standpoint of formal logic; explaining the terminology alone could fill a monograph. This series will not use his terminology wholesale but will strive to express the same ideas in plain, accessible terms. For example, although in the system of dialectics “essence” is not yet the self-conscious Concept, we will still use “essence” in place of “Concept”, and take the word “concept” in its everyday sense. This lowers the barrier to understanding without sacrificing the accuracy of our understanding of dialectics. For the terms we do retain, such as opposition, identity, unity, negation, self-negation, self-relation, contradiction, the Idea and the Absolute Idea, we will give very clear explanations. In short, through a clear and accessible explanation of the key points, any serious and sincere mind can understand and master dialectics, this treasure of human thought.
Dialectics has only one core principle: the principle of the unity of opposites, also called the principle of the identity of opposites. We will focus on this principle, so that you can thoroughly understand the meaning of dialectics: its structure, its spirit and its power.
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