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dialectics of nature
Camilla Royle
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we think of as solid objects are actually made up of processes. Different processes can come together temporarily to produce things but these are always
transitory. Things are always in the process of being created or destroyedall
that is solid melts into air. In this approach a thing could be an idea or concept
or something concretely existing like a city. Engels also argued something
similar in Ludwig Feuerbach and the End of Classical German Philosophy: The
world is not to be comprehended as a complex of ready-made things, but
as a complex of processes, in which the things...go through an uninterrupted
change of coming into being and passing away.13
For Marx, and for many of his followers, dialectics is about contradiction as well as change. The two are related, internal contradictions drive
change forward and lead to the dynamism that we observe. Everything
under capitalism seems, and is, contradictory.14 However, Harvey argues
that thinking in terms of contradictions is compatible with his own
approach. If things are made up of shifting complexes of processes it stands
to reason that some of those processes will be in opposition to each other.15
Take the example of the Labour Party in Britaina bourgeois organisation but one that maintains a mainly working class membership. To call it
bourgeois and working class sounds like a contradictory thing to say. This
is because it does refer to a contradiction. The key is to look at the diverse
processes that caused the Labour Party to come into existence. At the time
the welfare state was becoming increasingly important to sections of capital,
while workers were looking towards reformist ideas and reformist parties.
The needs of workers and of capitalists are in opposition to each other
but were able to coalesce at a particular point in historyin this case to
form a very contradictory organisation. This approach to the question of
contradiction recognises the real presence of contradictions but looks for
the concrete mechanisms by which they develop, through the processes
by which things come into and out of existence. It is not enough simply to
state that everything is contradictory without asking why.
The dialectical biologists
If dialectics helps Marxists understand something about human society
could it also be useful for natural scientistspeople trying to understand
very different aspects of the world? Few natural scientists have explicitly
argued that they are doing dialectical science, but there are a few notable
13: Engels, 1947, p52, emphasis in original.
14: Ollman, 2003.
15: Harvey, 1996.
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acting on them from the outside, genetic determinists look from the other
direction. They argue that plants and animals respond to internal forces
originating from their genes. Richard Dawkins has repeatedly compared living things to robots: We are survival machinesrobot vehicles
blindly programmed to preserve the selfish molecules known as genes.20
In this view of biology organisms, including humans, develop along a
predetermined path decided by the information coded in our genes.
This is not to say that either approach is wrong, or that they are
incompatible with each other. Dawkins has consistently tried to defend
evolution against creationists. But both approaches, the one emphasising
external factors and the other emphasising internal ones, only look at part
of the picture. Levins and Lewontin argue that such approaches ignore the
role that the organism itself plays in its own evolution.21 The organism is
seen as a passive site where genes and environment interact. The dialectical
biologists contend that an organism is also, in a way, not just the object
but the subject of its own evolution.22 Organisms define a niche around
themselves as they determine which aspects of their immediate surroundings are most relevant. For example, a woodpecker might find the bark of
a tree relevant but not the stones at the base of the tree. Other birds that
use those stones to smash snail shells will find them relevant and treat them
as part of their environment.23 We cannot know what a niche is in the
absence of the organism that inhabits it. There was never a job vacancy for
something that lives in cold water just waiting for a humpback whale to
evolve to fill it. That particular niche developed in a relationship with the
evolution of the whale.
Levins and Lewontin have also drawn attention to the numerous
examples of ways in which organisms act on their environment as well as
just responding to it. Beavers build dams to make their immediate surroundings more habitable for themselves; plant roots change the composition of
the surrounding soil so that they can extract nutrients more easily. Living
things have changed the planet on a spectacular scale, even altering the
atmosphere irreversibly by adding oxygen. We are not merely objects to be
acted on by external forces. Levins and Lewontin study the ways in which
organisms actively relate to the environment around them implying that
neither organism nor environment can be understood without reference to
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the other. This is in direct contrast to Cartesian approaches that might try
to look at an organism in isolation. Furthermore, this relationship develops
through time as the organism growsanimals and plants have a history.
Stephen Jay Gould and Niles Eldredge also applied a dialectical
understanding of processes that develop in a disjointed rather than smooth
and gradual way. In their theory of punctuated equilibrium evolution is
characterised by long periods of stasis interspersed with instances where
new species evolve very quickly.24 Gould admitted that the theory was
influenced by Marxist philosophy and argued that dialectical thinking
should be taken more seriously by Western scholars.25 But despite the
close similarity between punctuated equilibrium and dialectical insights
about gradualness and leaps it has remained remarkably resilient as a theory.
Steven Rose, a neuroscientist and popular writer on the philosophy of
biology, cites the dialectical tradition as one of his influences.26 His argument that complex systems have properties which cannot be explained by
looking at each part of the system in isolation does resemble some of the
insights of dialectical thinkers like Harvey.
Arguments against a dialectics of nature
However, not all Marxists have accepted the idea that there are dialectical processes in nature in the way that the dialectical biologists have done.
Engelss views on the subject have attracted controversy ever since Dialectics
of Nature was first published, with his ideas distorted by both enemies and
many would be friends.27 Perhaps part of the confusion is due to Engelss
formulation of the three laws of dialectics. These lawsoriginally borrowed from the German idealist philosopher Hegelwere supposed by
Engels to describe processes in both the social and natural worlds. The
laws are the interpenetration of opposites, the transformation of quantity
to quality and the negation of the negation. We often use examples from
science and nature to explain these three laws. For the law of transformation of quantitative change into qualitative people often mention that water
turns into steam once its temperature reaches 100C. A quantitative change
in temperature leads to a qualitative change from one state to another.
There is also the one about the chicken and the egg. When a chick hatches
from an egg it destroys that eggnegates itbut when it grows into a hen
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Birchall, 1983.
Sartre, 2004, p31.
See Rees, 1994.
Brown, 2012, p211.
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However, it seems unlikely that Marx and Engels disagreed fundamentally with each other on questions of science and nature during their
lifetimes. In later life they employed a kind of division of labour in which
Engels dealt with science while Marx was concentrating on writing Capital.
But they visited each other often, especially after Engels moved to London
in 1870, and would have regularly discussed their respective work in detail.
There is nothing in the written correspondence between Marx and Engels
to suggest that they disagreed. This is not to say that Marx was ignorant
when it came to science. In fact he often chose examples from chemistry and
physics to illustrate points in Capital. He uses the example of elliptical motion
in physics to explain contradiction32 and refers to organic chemistry. Marx
explains that making quantitative changes to the chemical structure of a compoundadding carbon, oxygen and hydrogen in different proportionscan
lead to those substances gaining qualitatively different properties.33
It is true though that Engelss Dialectics of Nature was influential within
the Soviet Union after it was published there in 1925. The version of dialectics the Stalinists employed was tied to a rigid application of Engelss
three laws. The laws were repeated by Stalin and his followers accepted
the concept of a dialectics of nature, completely uncritically, it seems.
Professors who had previously been leaders of institutions found themselves
replaced by junior colleagues who had professed their allegiance to dialectical materialism, or a Stalinist interpretation of it. Many formerly respected
scientists found themselves imprisoned and even killed. Trofim Lysenko,
who rejected genetics as a bourgeois deviation, was appointed head of the
Institute of Genetics. These attacks on science were part of a wider drive
towards Bolshevisation in all areas of intellectual life. It was partly an
effort to force science to catch up to the very particular needs of the Soviet
Union to maintain itself as a global power. There was no longer time for
pure science. Scientists had to justify their work by demonstrating its relevance to Stalins Five Year Plans for economic growth. But it was also part
of an ideological effort to justify the existence of the Soviet Union, both to
its own citizens and to potential sympathisers in the West, as a society run
completely in the interests of the proletariat.34
So Engels may have unwittingly played a role in this appalling attempt
to try to force science to be more dialectical. But taking a dogmatic
32: Marx, 1976, p70; Weston, 2012.
33: Marx, 1976, p215.
34: Sheehan, 1993. The proletarian science episode and Lysenko in particular are described
by the historian of science Loren Graham (1993) and also by Levins and Lewontin, 1985,
pp163-196.
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approach to dialectics was the last thing Engels intended. And, of course,
Dialectics of Nature was an unfinished worka series of notes that Engels
might well have revised considerably if he had published it himself. Helena
Sheehan, in Marxism and the Philosophy of Science, argues that his work on the
subject should be viewed more as a pointer to areas that required further
study rather than the final word on the matter.35 This position is also suggested by Engelss own comments on science, again in Ludwig Feuerbach.
Here he discusses the potential useful contribution of Hegels philosophy,
from which he derived the three laws, and rejects some conservative interpretations of Hegel. Engels states: The whole dogmatic content of the
Hegelian system is declared to be absolute truth, in contradiction to his dialectical method, which dissolves all dogmatism. Thus his revolutionary side
becomes smothered beneath the overgrowth of the conservative side.36
Here it seems he is saying that Hegels laws should themselves be
left open to being evaluated and reinterpreted. They are not a fixed set of
rules. However, this is not to say that he intended dialectics to be purely
a method. It also seems clear that, at least as far as Engels was concerned,
ways of thinking about the world cannot be separated from the real nature
of the world we are intending to study.
Lukcs and the dialectics of society
The work of the Hungarian Marxist Georg Lukcs was a particularly
powerful tool in the argument against a dialectics of nature. Lukcs was concerned with the practical application of Marxist philosophy, with dialectics
as a vehicle for revolution. Lukcss ideas famously changed throughout his
life and it would be impossible to cover his thought in detail here. However,
his early approach to dialectical philosophy comes through most clearly
in his classic work History and Class Consciousness, which was published in
1923 while he was in exile in Vienna. Lukcs had been a leading member
of Bela Kuns Communist Party, although the left was dominated by the
much larger social democratic party. He was forced to flee Hungary after the
country was taken over by Admiral Horthy who banned the Communists
and executed and imprisoned thousands of their supporters.37
Lukcs argued that we cannot immediately grasp the real nature of the
world around us. We live and think in a bourgeois society that distorts our
ideas. Under capitalism many of the things most essential to us take the form
35: Sheehan, 1993.
36: Engels, 1947, p16.
37: Rees, 1998.
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Lukcs criticised Engels for equating the methods by which we study society
with those by which we study nature. For Lukcs we cannot approach the
study of society as a distanced, objective observer in the same way as we
(supposedly) approach nature. We are part of society so we observe it from
within. It does not necessarily follow that there is no dialectics of nature.
However, any dialectical processes occurring in nature without the conscious intervention of humans would be different from that observed in
society.42 It is also worth remembering that in 1923 Lukcs would not have
read Dialectics of Nature and so wasnt responding to that text in particular; it
had yet to be published.
What do we mean by nature?
Later commentators have questioned whether it is possible to cordon off
human society and treat it as separate from the natural world as Lukcs
appears to have done. Antonio Gramsci said of Lukcs that if his assertion presupposes a dualism between nature and man he is wrong. 43 To
assess whether there is anything in the idea of a dialectics of nature it would
seem that we need to at least agree on some idea of what nature actually means. This question is often left out of such arguments. The debate is
generally focused on what dialectics isand this remains disputed. But the
concept of nature is just as difficult to pin down. Raymond Williams refers
to it as perhaps the most complex word in the language.44 So coming
up with a definitive definition would certainly be beyond the scope of this
article. But we can at least question some of the more reactionary assumptions about what the word nature refers to.
Some of the most insightful ideas about nature have been developed
within my own discipline, geography. This is perhaps due to the history of
the subject. Geographers were traditionally the people travelling the world
observing different human societies and suggesting how the environments
people live in might influence those societies. For example early geographers
propagated the racist myth that people from hotter climates tended to be
poorer because the climactic conditions encourage laziness. Today (most)
geographers are more critical of the notion that the environment influences
society in such a simple and unidirectional way. But the interest in the relationship between society and nature remains. Geography is often described
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Castree, 2000.
Smith, 1990.
Gray, 2013.
Castree, 2000.
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serves to obscure the real situation. Human beings dont just exist in the
world but also impact on that world. Different types of society treat nature
in very different ways. Capitalism tends to treat every aspect of nature as
something that could potentially become a commodity for exchange on the
market. There is no natural world outside its influence. Even by thinking
about nature we are compelled to think about it in a particular way based
on the needs of whatever type of society we live in. But generally we are
not just contemplating the environment but finding new ways to turn it
into a source of profit or a dumping ground for our waste. Smith argued
that in the form of a price tag, every use-value is delivered an invitation to
the labour process, and capitalby its nature the quintessential socialiteis
driven to make good on every invitation.49
This has become strikingly clear with the rise of carbon markets,
which effectively put a monetary value on the air we breathe. For Smith
and others the theory of the production of nature has been an antidote to
dualist assumptions. To argue that nature is produced doesnt mean that we
humans literally create aspects of it; we dont build mountains. However, we
do literally produce new organisms (by genetic modification) and new ecosystems such as the heathlands created by deforestation. It could be said that
our actions produce a new nature within the old one. There are few parts
of the world that are not impacted by humans. Marx argued that even in his
day there was very little wilderness left.50
Marx saw the ideological separation between society and nature as an
aspect of class society, not as something that has always existed. To quote
Smith: The domination of nature idea begins with nature and society
as two separate realms and attempts to unite them. In Marx we see the
opposite procedure. He begins with the relation with nature as a unity and
derives as a simultaneously historical and logical result whatever separation
between them exists.51
This approach to nature could also in itself be described as dialectical.
In the method Marx developed and employed in Capital he uses what Ollman
refers to as different levels of generalisation.52 The whole of the universe is
49: Smith, 1990, p56.
50: Marx refers to a nature separate from human history as no longer existing anywhere
except perhaps on a few Australian coral islands of recent originFoster, 2000, p116.
It could be added that humanity doesnt have much of an impact on outer space (besides
adding a few satellites and space junk) although for many followers of Smiths ideas on the
production of nature these are academic questions.
51: Smith, 1990, p48.
52: Ollman, 2003.
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the world it stands to reason that we should agree that the world exists. And
we have to take seriously the project of trying to understand that world.
Marxism is, of course, about intervening in the world, not just interpreting
it. But the two are, for Marx, inseparable. We interpret the world through
intervening in it and intervene based on our interpretation.
Why arent there more dialectical scientists?
But if there are real dialectical processes at work in the natural world this raises
the question of why only a few scientists studying nature openly acknowledge this. Why arent there more dialectical scientists? It could be countered
that there are many arguments, not just in science, where Marxists feel that
their ideas are correct but where the majority of people disagree. Why arent
there more economists who accept the tendency of the rate of profit to fall?
We often assume that science is neutral. In other words, we tend to
think that when scientists observe the natural world their methods of enquiry
allow them to gain an objective understanding of the world that the rest of us
cannot. However, scientists do not live outside of society. Their theories, as
well as the types of questions that are considered worthy of research, reflect
the type of society that they live and work in. So scientists could be said to
be observing the real world but through a social prism which distorts their
view.58 Capitalism, as Lukcs recognised, needs to turn aspects of the natural
world into commodities for exchange on the market. Researchers working
on increasing rates of photosynthesis in plants have focused on one enzyme in
a plant leaf called rubisco. They are trying to make that enzyme work more
efficiently so that ultimately they can engineer a plant that will produce more
crops for farmers than existing varieties.59 It is possible to see how such a
system might encourage science to see the world in a reductionist rather than
a dialectical way. Phil Gasper argues that the tendency towards reductionism
in capitalist science reflects the dominance of individualism is capitalist society.60 It is not particularly helpful for these scientists to see the enzyme they
are trying to improve as a complex of processes or to view it as being in a historically developing relationship with its environment. They are much more
able to work on that one enzyme if they can deal with it as if it is separate
from the rest of the plant.
John Parrington makes a similar point. He argues that reductionism,
the belief that a system is best understood by dissecting it into component
58: Parrington, 2013.
59: Mackenzie, 2010.
60: Gasper, 1998.
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parts and studying these individually, has provided a powerful tool in his
own research into the molecular biology of human fertility.61 However,
reductionism reaches the limits of its usefulness when trying to make sense
of how its insights fit into a wider picture. It is particularly problematic when
used to try to interpret the social implications of biological researchwhen
it goes from being a method to an ideology.
The dialectical biologistsLevins and Lewontin and a few others
such as Steven Rosecould all be accused of following a soft version of
dialectics. They dont explicitly take into account the infamous three laws
of dialectics. Chris Harman argued that if we do not recognise the evidence
for these Hegelian laws in nature, particularly the negation of the negation,
we are missing something central.62 Harman argued that organisms dont
just relate to their environments but are negated by those environments.
The way they react back on those environments should be considered as
an example of the negation of the negation. For Harman, the ability to act
on the environment is common to many types of living organism. But,
unlike Levins and Lewontin, he argued that only those that have developed
consciousnessie humanscan be considered to go from being objects to
being subjects. Only humans are able to control the world around us rather
than just reacting to our environment with a blind response.63
Christof Niehrs, a German embryologist, explicitly noted the formal
similarities between processes in biology and Hegels laws in a recent scientific
paper.64 Niehrs looks at the way animal embryos develop in the very early
stages, long before they have gone from being a ball of cells to a recognisable
foetus. Chemicals called morphogens are released by cells at one side of the
embryo. This side starts developing into what, in vertebrates, will become the
side where the spinal cord is (the dorsal side). These then trigger the release of
different chemicals at the opposite end that act against the production of the
first group of morphogens (negate it). These are in turn negated at the dorsal
side. This is one of the most important stages in animal development. It kicks
off the process that will eventually lead to the formation of an animal with a
head end and a tail end rather than a homogenous mass of cells. And it could
hardly be more similar to the negation of the negation.
However, noting interesting examples of Hegels laws in nature
does not give much clue as to how, if at all, scientists can use these laws. If
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scientists are expected to start from the idea that they go out and look for
examples of the laws in their work (which Chris Harman did not suggest),
it risks turning dialectics into a scholastic exercise. All of the biologists
mentioned state that what they do when they go into a lab is the same science
using the same methods as anyone else. Dialectics is for them a way to interpret the results of their experiments rather than an excuse not to do those
experiments. Knowing the laws of dialectics is no substitute for a scientific
understanding based on knowledge of specific material phenomena.
Conclusion
We often explain dialectics using examples from science and naturebut the
notion that dialectics is relevant in these areas is not universally accepted.
Many Marxists would completely reject the idea of a dialectics of nature. But
there is also a tradition of Marxist approaches that see the separation of nature
from society as part of capitalist ideology. If we question the divide between
society and nature and agree that dialectics shows us something about society,
can we then consistently argue that it has nothing to say about nature?
The dialectics of Marx and Engels is a materialist philosophy. It treats
the world as if it is changing because it does change, and as contradictory
because it is contradictory. The natural world really is changing. Recently
the concentration of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere exceeded 400 parts per
million for the first time since measurements began in 1958. The levels of the
gas in the atmosphere fluctuate but it is possible that they will soon reach levels
where they will cause irreversible changes. If the Siberian permafrost starts to
melt, scientists speculate that this could lead to the release of methane held
within the frost. Methane is also a greenhouse gas and is much more potent
than carbon dioxide, so it could lead to much more warminglikely to feed
back and melt more of the frost. It not as though the earth has never been this
warm beforeit is not unnaturalbut it will have devastating consequences
for the people who have to live with the effects. Humans are causing these
changes to our environment and they cannot be understood in any sensible
way without reference to our societies.
Dialectics is a tool for understanding the reality of the world that we
live in. As Engels argued, it is about matter in motion. If we try to treat the
world as if it can be divided up into separate elements and as if everything in
it stays the same we risk letting something important slip from our grasp. But
Marxists dont just interpret the world; we also change that reality. Dialectical
approaches see our current problematic rift with nature as an aspect of class
societyand, like all things, as something that can be changed.
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