Modern dialectical materialism

Scientists frequently complain that they are misunderstood. They do not mean to provide ammunition for mystical charlatans and political crooks. That may be so. But in that case, they are guilty of culpable negligence or, at the very least, astounding naivety. On the other hand, those who make use of the erroneous philosophical views of scientists cannot be accused of naivety. They know just where they stand. Rees-Mogg argues that "as the religion of secular consumerism is left behind like a rusting tail fin, sterner religions that involve real moral principles and angry gods will make a comeback. For the first time in centuries, the revelations of science will seem to enhance rather than undermine the spiritual dimension in life." For Rees-Mogg religion is a useful weapon to keep the underprivileged in their place, alongside the police and prison service. He is commendably blunt about it:

"The lower the prospect of upward mobility, the more rational it is for the poor to adopt an anti-scientific, delusional world view. In place of technology, they employ magic. In place of independent investigation, they opt for orthodoxy. Instead of history, they prefer myths. In place of biography, they venerate heroes. And they generally substitute kin-based behavioral allegiances for the impersonal honesty required by the market." (4)

Let us leave aside the unconsciously humorous remark about the "impersonal honesty" of the market-place, and concentrate on the core of his argument. At least Rees-Mogg does not try to conceal his real intentions or his class standpoint. Here we have the utmost frankness from a defender of the establishment. The creation of an under-class of poor, unemployed, mainly black people, living in slums, presents a potentially explosive threat to the existing social order. The poor, fortunately for us, are ignorant. They must be kept in ignorance, and encouraged in their superstitious and religious delusions which we of the "educated classes" naturally do not share! The message, of course, is not new. The same song has been sung by the rich and powerful for centuries. But what is significant is the reference to science, which, as Rees-Mogg indicates, is now regarded for the first time as an important ally of religion.

Recently, theoretical physicist Paul Davies was awarded £650,000 by the Templeton Prize for Progress in Religion, for showing "extraordinary originality" in advancing humankind’s understanding of God or spirituality. Previous winners include Alexander Solzhenitsyn, Mother Teresa, evangelist Billy Graham, and the Watergate burglar-turned-preacher Charles Colson. Davies, author of such books as God and the New Physics, The Mind of God and The Last Three Minutes, insists that he is "not a religious person in the conventional sense" (whatever that might mean), but he maintains that "science offers a surer path to God than religion." (5)

Despite Davies’ ifs and buts, it is clear that he represents a definite trend, which is attempting to inject mysticism and religion into science. This is not an isolated phenomenon. It is becoming all too common, especially in the field of theoretical physics and cosmology, both heavily dependent upon abstract mathematical models which are increasingly seen as a substitute for empirical investigation of the real world. For every conscious peddler of mysticism in this field, there are a hundred conscientious scientists, who would be horrified to be identified with such obscurantism. The only real defense against idealist mysticism, however, is a consciously materialist philosophy—the philosophy of dialectical materialism.

It is the intention of this book to explain the basic ideas of dialectical materialism, first worked out by Marx and Engels, and show their relevance to the modern world, and to science in particular. We do not pretend to be neutral. Just as Rees-Mogg defends the interests of the class he represents, and makes no bones about it, so we openly declare ourselves as the opponents of the so-called "market economy" and all that it stands for. We are active participants in the fight to change society. But before we can change the world, one has to understand it. It is necessary to conduct an implacable struggle against all attempts to confuse the minds of men and women with mystical beliefs which have their origin in the murky prehistory of human thought. Science grew and developed to the degree that it turned its back on the accumulated prejudices of the past. We must stand firm against this attempt to put the clock back four hundred years.

A growing number of scientists are becoming dissatisfied with the present situation, not only in science and education, but in society at large. They see the contradiction between the colossal potential of technology and a world where millions of people live on the border line of starvation. They see the systematic misuse of science in the interest of profit for the big monopolies. And they must be profoundly disturbed by the continuous attempts to dragoon the scientists into the service of religious obscurantism and reactionary social policies. Many of them were repelled by the bureaucratic and totalitarian nature of Stalinism. But the collapse of the Soviet Union has shown that the capitalist alternative is even worse. By their own experience, many scientists will come to the conclusion that the only way out of the social, economic, and cultural impasse is by means of some kind of rational planned society, in which science and technology is put at the disposal of humanity, not private profit. Such a society must be democratic, in the real sense of the word, involving the conscious control and participation of the entire population. Socialism is democratic by its very nature. As Trotsky pointed out "a nationalized planned economy needs democracy, as the human body needs oxygen."

It is not enough to contemplate the problems of the world. It is necessary to change it. First, however, it is necessary to understand the reason why things are as they are. Only the body of ideas worked out by Marx and Engels, and subsequently developed by Lenin and Trotsky can provide us with the adequate means of achieving this understanding. We believe that the most conscious members of the scientific community, through their own work and experience, will come to realize the need for a consistently materialist world outlook. That is offered by dialectical materialism. The recent advances of the theories of chaos and complexity show that an increasing number of scientists are moving in the direction of dialectical thinking. This is an enormously significant development. There is no doubt that new discoveries will deepen and strengthen this trend. We are firmly convinced that dialectical materialism is the philosophy of the future.

Do We Need Philosophy?

Before we start, you may be tempted to ask, "Well, what of it?" Is it really necessary for us to bother about complicated questions of science and philosophy? To such a question, two replies are possible. If what is meant is: do we need to know about such things in order to go about our daily life, then the answer is evidently no. But if we wish to gain a rational understanding of the world in which we live, and the fundamental processes at work in nature, society and our own way of thinking, then matters appear in quite a different light.

Strangely enough, everyone has a "philosophy." A philosophy is a way of looking at the world. We all believe we know how to distinguish right from wrong, good from bad. These are, however, very complicated issues which have occupied the attention of the greatest minds in history. When confronted with the terrible fact of the existence of events like the fratricidal war in the former Yugoslavia, the re-emergence of mass unemployment, the slaughter in Rwanda, many people will confess that they do not comprehend such things, and will frequently resort to vague references to "human nature." But what is this mysterious human nature which is seen as the source of all our ills and is alleged to be eternally unchangeable? This is a profoundly philosophical question, to which not many would venture a reply, unless they were of a religious cast of mind, in which case they would say that God, in His wisdom, made us like that. Why anyone should worship a Being that played such tricks on His creations is another matter.

Those who stubbornly maintain that they have no philosophy are mistaken. Nature abhors a vacuum. People who lack a coherently worked-out philosophical standpoint will inevitably reflect the ideas and prejudices of the society and the milieu in which they live. That means, in the given context, that their heads will be full of the ideas they imbibe from the newspapers, television, pulpit and schoolroom, which faithfully reflect the interests and morality of existing society.

Most people usually succeed in muddling through life, until some great upheaval compels them to re-consider the kind of ideas and values they grew up with. The crisis of society forces them to question many things they took for granted. At such times, ideas which seemed remote suddenly become strikingly relevant. Anyone who wishes to understand life, not as a meaningless series of accidents or an unthinking routine, must occupy themselves with philosophy, that is, with thought at a higher level than the immediate problems of everyday existence. Only by this means do we raise ourselves to a height where we begin to fulfil our potential as conscious human beings, willing and able to take control of our own destinies.

It is generally understood that anything worthwhile in life requires some effort. The study of philosophy, by its very nature, involves certain difficulties, because it deals with matters far removed from the world of ordinary experience. Even the terminology used presents difficulties because words are used in a way that does not necessarily correspond to the common usage. But the same is true for any specialized subject, from psychoanalysis to engineering.

The second obstacle is more serious. In the last century, when Marx and Engels first published their writings on dialectical materialism, they could assume that many of their readers had at least a working knowledge of classical philosophy, including Hegel. Nowadays it is not possible to make such an assumption. Philosophy no longer occupies the place it had before, since the role of speculation about the nature of the universe and life has long since been occupied by the sciences. The possession of powerful radio telescopes and spacecraft renders guesses about the nature and extent of our solar system unnecessary. Even the mysteries of the human soul are being gradually laid bare by the progress of neurobiology and psychology.

The situation is far less satisfactory in the realm of the social sciences, mainly because the desire for accurate knowledge often decreases to the degree that science impinges on the powerful material interests which govern the lives of people. The great advances made by Marx and Engels in the sphere of social and historical analysis and economics fall outside the scope of the present work. Suffice it to point out that, despite the sustained and frequently malicious attacks to which they were subjected from the beginning, the theories of Marxism in the social sphere have been the decisive factor in the development of modern social sciences. As for their vitality, this is testified to by the fact that the attacks not only continue, but tend to increase in intensity as time goes by.

In past ages, the development of science, which has always been closely linked to that of the productive forces, had not reached a sufficiently high level to permit men and women to understand the world in which they lived. In the absence of scientific knowledge, or the material means of obtaining it, they were compelled to rely upon the one instrument they possessed that could help them to make sense of the world, and thus gain power over it—the human mind. The struggle to understand the world was closely identified with humankind’s struggle to tear itself away from a merely animal level of existence, to gain mastery over the blind forces of nature, and to become free in the real, not legalistic, sense of the word. This struggle is a red thread running through the whole of human history.

Role of Religion

"Man is quite insane. He wouldn’t know how to create a maggot, and he creates Gods by the dozen." (Montaigne.)

"All mythology overcomes and dominates and shapes the force of nature in the imagination and by the imagination; it therefore vanishes with the advent of real mastery over them." (Marx)

Animals have no religion, and in the past it was said that this constituted the main difference between humans and "brutes." But that is just another way of saying that only humans possess consciousness in the full sense of the word. In recent years, there has been a reaction against the idea of Man as a special and unique Creation. This is undoubtedly correct, in the sense that humans developed from animals, and, in many important respects, remain animals. Not only do we share many of the bodily functions with other animals, but the genetic difference between humans and chimpanzees is less than two percent. That is a crushing answer to the nonsense of the Creationists.

Recent research with bonobo chimpanzees has proven beyond doubt that the primates closest to humans are capable of a level of mental activity similar in some respects to that of a human child. That is striking proof of the kinship between humans and the highest primates, but here the analogy begins to break down. Despite all the efforts of experimenters, captive bonobos have not been able to speak or fashion a stone tool remotely similar to the simplest implements created by early hominids. The two percent genetic difference between humans and chimpanzees marks the qualitative leap from the animal to the human. This was accomplished, not by a Creator, but by the development of the brain through manual labour.

The skill to make even the simplest stone tools involves a very high level of mental ability and abstract thought. The ability to select the right sort of stone and reject others; the choice of the correct angle to strike a blow, and the use of precisely the right amount of force—these are highly complicated intellectual actions. They imply a degree of planning and foresight not found in even the most advanced primates. However, the use and manufacture of stone tools was not the result of conscious planning, but was something forced upon man’s remote ancestors by necessity. It was not consciousness that created humanity, but the necessary conditions of human existence which led to an enlarged brain, speech and culture, including religion.

The need to understand the world was closely linked to the need to survive. Those early hominids who discovered the use of stone scrapers in butchering dead animals with thick hides obtained a considerable advantage over those who were denied access to this rich supply of fats and proteins. Those who perfected their stone implements and worked out where to find the best materials stood a better chance of survival than those who did not. With the development of technique came the expansion of the mind, and the need to explain the phenomena of nature which governed their lives. Over millions of years, through trial and error, our ancestors began to establish certain relations between things. They began to make abstractions, that is, to generalize from experience and practice.

For centuries, the central question of philosophy has been the relation of thinking to being. Most people live their lives quite happily without even considering this problem. They think and act, talk and work, with not the slightest difficulty. Moreover, it would not occur to them to regard as incompatible the two most basic human activities, which are in practice inseparably linked. Even the most elementary action, if we exclude simple biologically determined reactions, demands some thought. To a degree, this is true not only of humans but also of animals, such as a cat lying in wait for a mouse. In man, however, the kind of thought and planning has a qualitatively higher character than any of the mental activities of even the most advanced of the apes.

This fact is inseparably linked to the capacity for abstract thought, which enables humans to go far beyond the immediate situation given to us by our senses. We can envisage situations, not just in the past (animals also have memory, as a dog which cowers at the sight of a stick) but also the future. We can anticipate complex situations, plan and thereby determine the outcome, and to some extent determine our own destinies. Although we do not normally think about it, this represents a colossal conquest which sets humankind apart from the rest of nature. "What is distinctive of human reasoning," says Professor Gordon Childe, "is that it can go immensely farther from the actual present situation than any other animal’s reasoning ever seems to get it." (6) From this capacity springs all the manifold creations of civilization, culture, art, music, literature, science, philosophy, religion. We also take for granted that all this does not drop from the skies, but is the product of millions of years of development.

The Greek philosopher Anaxagoras (500-428 B.C.), in a brilliant deduction, said that man’s mental development depended upon the freeing of the hands. In his important article, The Part Played by Labour in the Transition from Ape to Man, Engels showed the exact way in which this transition was achieved. He proved that the upright stance, freeing of the hands for labour, the form of the hands, with the opposition of the thumb to the fingers, which allowed for clutching, were the physiological preconditions for tool making, which, in turn, was the main stimulus to the development of the brain. Speech itself, which is inseparable from thought, arose out of the demands of social production, the need to realize complicated functions by means of co-operation. These theories of Engels have been strikingly confirmed by the most recent discoveries of paleontology, which show that hominid apes appeared in Africa far earlier than previously thought, and that they had brains no bigger than those of a modern chimpanzee. That is to say, the development of the brain came after the production of tools, and as a result of it. Thus, it is not true that "In the beginning was the Word," but as the German poet Goethe proclaimed—"In the beginning was the Deed."

The ability to engage in abstract thought is inseparable from language. The celebrated prehistory Gordon Childe observes: "Reasoning, and all that we call thinking, including the chimpanzee’s, must involve mental operations with what psychologists call images. A visual image, a mental picture of, say, a banana, is always liable to be a picture of a particular banana in a particular setting. A word on the contrary is, as explained, more general and abstract, having eliminated just those accidental features that give individuality to any real banana. Mental images of words (pictures of the sound or of the muscular movements entailed in uttering it) form very convenient counters for thinking with. Thinking with their aid necessarily possesses just that quality of abstractness and generality that animal thinking seems to lack. Men can think, as well as talk, about the class of objects called ‘bananas’; the chimpanzee never gets further than ‘that banana in that tube.’ In this way the social instrument termed language has contributed to what is grandiloquently described as ‘man’s emancipation from bondage to the concrete." (7)

Early humans, after a long period of time, formed the general idea of, say, a plant or an animal. This arose out of the concrete observation of many particular plants and animals. But when we arrive at the general concept "plant," we no longer see before us this or that flower or bush, but that which is common to all of them. We grasp the essence of a plant, its innermost being. Compared with this, the peculiar features of individual plants seem secondary and unstable. What is permanent and universal is contained in the general conception. We can never actually see a plant as such, as opposed to particular flowers and bushes. It is an abstraction of the mind. Yet it is a deeper and truer expression of what is essential to the plant’s nature when stripped of all secondary features.

However, the abstractions of early humans were far from having a scientific character. They were tentative explorations, like the impressions of a child—guesses and hypotheses, sometimes incorrect, but always bold and imaginative. To our remote ancestors, the sun was a great being that sometimes warmed them, and sometimes burnt them. The earth was a sleeping giant. Fire was a fierce animal that bit them when they touched it. Early humans experienced thunder and lightning. This must have frightened them, as it still frightens animals and people today. But, unlike animals, humans looked for a general explanation of the phenomenon. Given the lack of any scientific knowledge, the explanation was invariably a supernatural one—some god, hitting an anvil with his hammer. To our eyes, such explanations seem merely amusing, like the naïve explanations of children. Nevertheless, at this period they were extremely important hypotheses—an attempt to find a rational cause for the phenomenon, in which men distinguished between the immediate experience, and saw something entirely separate from it.

The most characteristic form of early religion is animism—the notion that everything, animate or inanimate, has a spirit. We see the same kind of reaction in a child when it smacks a table against which it has banged its head. In the same way, early humans, and certain tribes today, will ask the spirit of a tree to forgive them before cutting it down. Animism belongs to a period when humankind has not yet fully separated itself from the animal world and nature in general. The closeness of humans to the world of animals is attested to by the freshness and beauty of cave-art, where horses, deer and bison are depicted with a naturalness which can no longer be captured by the modern artist. It is the childhood of the human race, which has gone beyond recall. We can only imagine the psychology of these distant ancestors of ours. But by combining the discoveries of paleontology with anthropology, it is possible to reconstruct, at least in outline, the world from which we have emerged.

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