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The Unity of Opposites: a Dialectical Principle Author(S): V S&S Quarterly, Inc. Guilford Press The Unity of Opposites: A Dialectical Principle Author(s): V. J. McGill and W. T. Parry Source: Science & Society, Vol. 12, No. 4 (Fall, 1948), pp. 418-444 Published by: Guilford Press Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/40399913 . Accessed: 28/04/2014 18:44 Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at . http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp . JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact [email protected]. S&S Quarterly, Inc. and Guilford Press are collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to Science &Society. http://www.jstor.org This content downloaded from 128.95.104.66 on Mon, 28 Apr 2014 18:44:38 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions THE UNITY OF OPPOSITES: A DIALECTICAL PRINCIPLE v. j. MCGiLLand w. t. parry INTRODUCTION the unityof opposites and otherdialectical prin- ciples have sufferedvarious "refutations," and certaininter- ALTHOUGHL prêtât ions and misapplicationshave quite properlybeen laid to rest,dialectic is verymuch alive today. The Platonic-Aris- toteliantradition continues, and both the Hegelian and the Marxian dialectichave manyfollowers. The unityof opposites,which Lenin describedas the mostimportant of the dialecticalprinciples,1 states thata thingis determinedby its internaloppositions. The principlewas firstput forwardby the Milesian philosophers of the sixthcentury B.C., and by theircotemporary, Heraclitus of Ephesus.It held its own throughcenturies of philosophicalthought, though it took differentforms which were seldom clearly distin- guished. The purpose of the presentpaper is to separate various formsof the unityof oppositesprinciple, to show that theyare of unequal importanceand that theirconsequences are verydifferent. The principleis not a completemethod or philosophy.If one forgotall about the complementaryprinciple that a thingis deter- mined by its fieldor milieu, the resultwould be a one-sideddistor- tion. It is well to emphasizeat the beginning,therefore, that no at- temptis to be made to describeall phasesof methodin one article, howeverdesirable this might be, but to coverone phase intensively. Lack of space also precludesan investigationof the historicalorigin and contextof the variousforms of the unityof opposites.Some are still importanttoday. We shall confineourselves to two brief ex- amples. From the time of Heraclitusit has been prettywell agreed that i V. I. Lenin, CollectedWorks, xra (New York,1927), p. 321. 418 This content downloaded from 128.95.104.66 on Mon, 28 Apr 2014 18:44:38 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions THE UNITY OF OPPOSITES 419 change involvesa unityof opposites,of being and non-being.It is not trueto saythat the world is (being) or thatit is not (non-being), said Heraclitus,but thatit is becoming."You cannotstep twiceinto the same river,for new watersare ever flowingin upon you." The supposedcontradiction involved led the Eleatics to deny the reality of change,and has been employedto disparagechange, ever since. The Hegelian dialectic,on the otherhand, accepted the contradic- tionas a real aspectof theworld, which is continuallyovercome and continuallyrenews itself in the processof change. Anotherfamous historical example of the unityof oppositesis the One-Manyproblem. The One, Plato has Parmenidessay, must be manybecause it has parts,and the Many must be one, i.e., one Many.This paradoxbecame the foundation of thesystem of Plotinus2 and was also essentialto the Christiandoctrine of the trinity.The same problemreappears in contemporarydiscussions of the founda- tionsof mathematics. Thus BertrandRussell, in his earliertreatment of classesin The Principlesof Mathematics, finds it necessaryto distinguishthe class as one fromthe class as many."In the classas many,"he says,"the com- ponentterms, though they have some kind of unity,have less than is requiredfor a whole, theyhave in factjust so much unityas is re- quired to make themmany, and not enough to preventthem from remainingmany."3 Later on he concludesthat it is morecorrect "to inferan ultimatedistinction between a class as manyand a class as one, to hold that the manyare only many,and are not also one."4 But thisraises the question what we are talkingabout whenwe refer to the class as many. It seems to be one in some sense. Although Russell venturesan answer,he neverthelessconfesses that thereare "puzzlesin thissubject which I do not yetknow how to solve."5This and otherdifficulties were avoided in PrincipiaMathematica (1910) by a solutionwhich involvedthe denial of the existenceof classes, and by the developmentof the theoryof logical atomism.Russell's new positionpermitted statements about classes,even the null-class, thoughclasses were interpreted as fictions.Apparently the one-many 2 Enneadvi, 9. 3 B. Russell,Principles of Mathematics(New York,1903; second edition, 1938), p. 69. 4 Ibid., p. 76. 5 Ibid., p. 77. This content downloaded from 128.95.104.66 on Mon, 28 Apr 2014 18:44:38 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions 420 SCIENCE AND SOCIETY problem was resolvedonly by translatingstatements about classes into statementsabout individualssimilar to a given individual. THE MEANING OF OPPOSITES The meaningof the unityof opposites6 will naturallydepend on our understandingof "opposites."We shall distinguishthe strictor formalsense of the termfrom the more concretemeanings which occur in dialecticalwritings and also in ordinarydiscourse. (1) In thispaper A and -A alwaysstand for strict opposites, i.e., propertieswhich cannot both be true of the same event E (except when E lies in a borderlineor transitionalrange). Thus A and -A can stand for contradictorieswhich cannot both be true,nor false of the same E, or for contrarieswhich cannot both be true of the same E, but maybe both false (providingthat E in no case lies in a borderlineor transitionalrange). Black and non-black,and infant and non-infant,are examples of contradictories;black and white, and infantand adult,are examplesof contraries.This usageconforms to ordinaryformal logic except for the parentheticalphrase: "pro- vidingthat E does not lie in a borderlineor transitionalrange." This phrase,however, is crucial,since it appears to constitutea principal differencebetween dialectic and formallogic. Let us take the con- trariesboy and man. Most boysare plainlynot men,and mostmen are plainlynot boys,though they may have some boyishfeatures, but there are also many borderlineor transitionalcases in which any decisionwould be arbitraryand untenable.We have to say "yesand no" or "neithernor." It is to thesestretches that our parenthetical phraserefers. Our definitionof "strictopposites" entails a revision of two principallaws of formallogic, viz.: the law of excluded middle and and the law of non-contradictionand all otherlaws of formallogic which involvenegation. The laws are restrictedto cases which do not fallin borderlineor transitionalstretches. In thesecases it is not true that everythingis eitherA or -A, and it is not falsethat any- 6 It should be noted that the dialectician recognizes the conflictas well as the unity of opposites, as was especially emphasized by Lenin, Selected Works,xi (New York, n.d.), p. 82. This content downloaded from 128.95.104.66 on Mon, 28 Apr 2014 18:44:38 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions THE UNITY OF OPPOSITES 421 thingis bothA and -A. Yet our assertionthat these laws do not hold forthese stretches involves no contradiction,since we have defined A and -A as mutuallyexclusive except in transitionalranges.7 (2) The term"opposites" is also used withother meanings that differfrom the strictsense definedabove. What we describebelow as "identicalpolar opposites,""opposite determinations,"and "op- positelydirected forces" are not strictopposites, though they are not, on thataccount, as we shall see, any lessimportant. FORMS OF THE PRINCIPLE The principleof the unityof oppositeshas been interpretedin the followingways: 1. (a) The conception (or perception)of anythinginvolves the conception(or perception)of its opposite. To understandanything is to distinguishit fromits opposite. This is recognizedby non-dialectical logicians.8 To perceiveanything is to distinguishit fromits background,which is necessarilydifferent (contrary)in color or othersense-quality. 1. (b) The existenceof a thinginvolves the existenceof an op- posite. The existenceof a thingdepends upon the existenceof certain otherthings, bound to it by a necessaryrelation: Thus no employer withoutemployee. This principledoes not hold universallyfor con- 7 In Hegelianand Marxistliterature the term"contradiction" is used in a verybroad sense,to includeconflicts and opposingforces (see, forexample, Henri Lefebvre, A la Lumièredu MatérialismeDialectique, i, Logique formelle,Logique dialectique (Paris,1948), p. 174and passim),but also in thesense of formalor logicalcontradic- tion, which is much narrower.In the firstsense, the state of the world or a segmentof it is alwayscontradictory, though the contradictionis also beingover- come. Contradictionthus representsa stage of truthand reality,often of a very highorder. In thesecond sense, on theother hand, contradiction is an unfortunate impasseof thoughtarising from mistake
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