Edward G. Ballard - On the Nature and Use of Dialectic

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Philosophy of Science Association

On the Nature and Use of DialecticAuthor(s): Edward G. BallardSource: Philosophy of Science, Vol. 22, No. 3 (Jul., 1955), pp. 205-213Published by: The University of Chicago Press on behalf of the Philosophy of ScienceAssociationStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/185315

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ON THE NATURE AND USE OF DIALECTICEDWARD G. BALLARD

Dialectic, like love, has a good and a bad reputation. This ambivalence maybe illustrated in different ways in almost every period of philosophical history.One may even suspect that this richness borders upon confusion. And yet, theattempt to orientate oneself in this jungle of meanings can be expected to beprofitable, for the term "dialectic" has always referred, although often obscurely,to notions and processes of the first importance. The definition, illustration, andevaluation of the uses of this term should, accordingly, be a task promising somevalue.Hints concerning the nature of dialectic are offered in the myth of the Phae-drus, according to which the philosophic and divine souls imitate the celestialbodies and circle around the intelligible fire in an ecstasy of insight. Thus ordi-nary dialectic, following the natural inclination of the soul, circles around onetopic and developes its intelligible aspects until understanding is attained. Quitenaturally, then, Plato hailed dialectic, both in the earlier form of hypothesis andelenchus and in the later form of collection and division, as the philosopher'sinstrument and technique par excellence. On the contrary, though, Aristotle be-lieved it not to be a means for increasing the precision and scope of knowledgebut rather to be futile or at best probable reasoning. According to Kant's usage,dialectic cannot add to knowledge at all. Then Hegel sought to restore its an-cient reputation and use and succeeded in exalting it almost beyond recognition.One may wonder whether, in this see-saw history, these meanings have retainedanything in common or whether they have not been caught up in the dialecticprocess itself and made to undergo a sea-change. If the term does retain anymeaning common to these varied philosophies, probably it refers to the actualprocesses of the mind in its attempts to clarify its concepts and to acquire knowl-edge; it seems to refer to logic in actual operation. The varying estimates of itsvalue appear to stem from the recognition that the mind easily misuses thisinstrument and produces seductive illusion instead of clarifications. Dialecticis a dangerous instrument. Dangerous or not, though, it is probably a defensiblehistorical thesis to hold that a fairly stable meaning has been associated withthis term throughout philosophical history, even by those who disprove of itsuse. The present purpose is not to defend this historical thesis but to provide adefinition and a description of "dialectic" in a general form, to suggest someillustrations of this meaning which will elicit important facets, and finally todiscuss the problem of its evaluation.1. The Meaning of Dialectic. Originally dialectic referred to a well-regulatedconversation in which the participants, by the exchange of information and ideas,brought each other into a state of agreement or at least into mutual under-standing. As many philosophers have recognized, though, the pattern of an inter-change of this kind is involved in very many contexts other than the conversa-205


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206 EDWARD G. BALLARDtional. It will be useful to express this pattern in its most universal form. Aviable and generaldefinitionof this term may be found, I believe, if it be speci-fied as a sort of causal relation, holding between entities of a certain kind, andrelated to an end.The suggestion hat dialectic may be definedas a kind of causal relationmaysound like an explanationgnotium per ignotium. Nevertheless, here exists someconsensus hat causality can be separated rom anthropomorphic ccretionsandrenderedboth precise and widely applicable f it is defined n terms of sufficientconditions.Thus, it is not the case that the cause occurs and the effect fails tooccur; hat is, only if the effect occurs does the cause occur. This is as much tosay that the cause is the sufficientconditionof the effect.1Unfortunately his definition ogicallyentails that on the occasionswhen theeffectfails to occurthat the causefails also. This possibility s often not intendedby the usage of "cause".For example,if my reading an article is the cause ofmy understanding f its subject matter,it does not follow in fact that my failureto understand t causes my omissionto readit. This difficulty can be avoidedby an alteration n the definition.2 or the present purpose,however,the defini-tion of the causal relation as given will suffice,for I do not believe that suchmodifications s the last remarkmay suggestwill falsifywhat is to be saidaboutdialectic.This causal relationis exemplified n many different kinds of occasions,forexamplein efficientcausation where contact with one particleis the sufficientconditionof the changein momentumand velocity of another,and wherethecausing particle undergoesan alteration as a resultof the impact.The momen-tum mightbe passed alongan indefinitely ongseries of particles n this manner.This causal relation is exemplifiedin organic systems and in psychologicalchanges.3Likewise n a logical sense, premisesare said to be the sufficientcon-dition or cause of the conclusion,and certain theories of inductionattempt toset up conditionsunderwhich the data mightbe said to cause the theorybaseduponthem.Some restriction s placed upon the generalityof the definitionof the causalrelationby noting that the kind of entities it can relate must be at least partlyhomogeneous.The momentumof the billiard ball does not somehowcause athought to appear n another billiardball; the effect is analogous o the cause.The causal event can transmitonly such characteristics s it already possesses.This transmittedelementmay be thoughtof as a structure.The movingbilliardball is a structureof mass and force;it communicates he same or partly thesame structureto its effect. This kind of correspondence etween cause and

I This translation of the causal relation into the relation of material implication has notinfrequently been expressed. Cf. J. M. Johnson, "Rival Principles of Explanation,"PsychologicalReview, 46, no. 6, Nov. 1939, p. 493 ff; and A. W. Burks, "The Logic of CausalRelations," Mind, LX, 1951, pp. 363-382.

2 Cf. H. A. Simon, "On the Definition of the Causal Relation," J. of Philos. XLIX, no.16, July, 1952, 517-528.' Cf. H. M. Johnson, article cited.


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ON THE NATURE AND USE OF DIALECTIC 207effect was phrased by the Mediaevals as an axiom: like causes like. Russell hasgiven this axiom a modern turn in his generalization: "It appears generally thatif A and B are two complex structures and A can cause B, then there must besome degree of identity of structure between A and B."4 For present purposes,this expression of the partial structural identity between cause and effect is in-troduced to define the kind of entity which can enter into a causal relation. Itlimits the causal relation to holding among partially homogeneous entities. Anoccasion of causation is an occasion where some identity in structure is trans-mitted from one event to another.It will be useful to distinguish causal relations which are linear, as in the exam-ple of the billiard balls, from those which are cyclical. The latter are exemplifiedin certain self-perpetuating systems in nature and in human organizations. Thesesystems are organizations characterized by the presence of events which main-tain continuously reciprocal causal relations. If A and B are such events in arelatively isolated system, then if A causes an effect in B, A will be changed asa consequence; such events are said to be related by reciprocal causality. Butthis statement is scarcely other than a generalized statement of Newton's thirdlaw. If, though, the relation between A and B is continuously reciprocal, thesituation is greatly changed. The change effected in B will react back on A,changing A. The changed A will then react in a somewhat different way uponthe changed B, and so on. Thus a system of continuously and mutually changingevents or entities is set up; this may be called a cyclical system. When this rela-tion of cyclical or continuous reciprocal causality holds among events, then theyare dialectically related, or they interact dialectically, or they form a dialecticalsystem.Such a dialectical system will be continuously in the process of altering itscharacteristics while, in virtue of the principle of similarity of cause and effect,preserving some identity of structure. This kind of change will be referred to asevolution or dialectical movement. Dialectic is the changer changing in a con-tinuous process.In a linear causal series, in which A causes B and B causes C, etc...., onecan scarcely refer to an end of the series in any sense other than the final tem-poral member of the series. In the cyclical or dialectical system, however, againthe situation is different. For this kind of system moves in a direction; it movesin one specifiable manner rather than in another. The notion of end is a con-venient way of defining this direction. And this end is not merely a terminalmember of a series, for the dialectical system changes and increases the com-plexity of its organization during the process of its development. The end maybe defined as the most complex state in a dialectical development. No referenceis made at this point to conscious foresight of the end nor to its desirability ormaturity. These are complicated notions which are referable to some systemsbut not to all. All that is stated is that the end of a dialectical movement is themost complex state which is compatible with preservation of its (structural)

4Human Knowledge,N. Y., 1948, p. 468.


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208 EDWARD G. BALLARDidentity.Theway in whichthe notionof end can beused in evaluatingdialecticalmovementwill becomemore clearas we proceed.A dialecticalsystem, then, is exemplifiedon any occasionwhen distinguish-able homogeneous vents are relatedby continuouslyreciprocalcausality andmove towarda state which, in some specifiablesense, may be termedan end.It is not pretended hat this definitionof dialecticin its generic sense is final.On the contrary t obviouslyemploysprinciplesand notionswhichrequireex-plication.Such clarificationand explanation,however,wouldlead beyond pres-ent limits and into some furtherstudy. We shall, at this writing,accept thisdefinitionand note a few illustrationsof it in different peciesof systems.Speciesof dialecticalsystemsare roughlydistinguishablen termsof the kindsof elementsor entitieswhich enterinto this dynamicrelation.Thus there is, forinstance, a mechanicaldialectic,a biologicaldialecticin whichthe elementsareorganismsor families of organisms n dynamic relationshipwith the environ-ment,-and varioussorts of dialecticalsituationsin which humanbeings par-ticipate.2. Illustrationsof Dialectic. The type of physical system which most clearlyillustratesthe notion of dialecticas mutual causationis the self-regulatingorautomaticcontrolmachines.In a system of this kind one mechanismA effectsa change n another,B. A distinctiveaspectis the feedback,a mediatingmecha-nismwhich records he alteration n B and "informs"A of the change,with theresult that A's causalactivity is alteredthereby.Feedback,then, is a mecha-nism for continuously ncludingthe resultsof formerbehavior n new activity.Through ts operationA and B are relatedby continuousreciprocalcausality.Further,the behaviorof this kind of a machineis scarcely intelligiblewithoutmentionof the goal it is built to achieve,for the alterationsof A andB arepur-posive and are measuredby their approximationo a desiredstate. A thermo-static device set to maintaina room at a given temperatureregulatesthe fuelfeeding mechanism n a mannerinversely proportional o the temperatureofthe room.Room and furnace constitutethe cyclicalcausalorder characteristicof a dialecticalsystem.Withoutthe feedback,the roomandfurnacewouldcon-stitute a linea causal order,and the furnacewouldheat the room to whatevertemperatureuntil it ran out of fuel.Many of the interactionsbetween animalsand their environment,whetherphysicalor animate, providean unlimitednumber of illustrationsof the samekind of intercommunionwhich have often been recognized o be very closelysimilarto self-regulatingmachines.5Thus the developingmutualadaptationoforganismand environment s an obvious illustrationof such a system. Othergroupsof illustrationsof mutual causationareto be foundwithin variouskindsof human activity and its products.Dialectical relationsmay hold between a

s Many analogies of this sort between self-regulating machines and organisms, alreadyevident in the terminology associated with Cybernetics, are developed and discussed byK. W. Deutsch, in "Mechanism, Organism, and Society," Phil. of Science, 18, no. 3, July,1951, pp. 230-252.


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ON THE NATURE AND USE OF DIALECTIC 209science of nature and its data; they may hold among sciences and techniquesthemselves (for instance, the art of painting in perspective and projective geome-try were once related in this manner). A man may be dialectically related to hiswork, each causing changes in the other continuously. People, in large and smallgroups, enter into this relation. And there is every reason to suspect that adialectic is also carried on within an individual between distinguishable parts ofhis organism. This pattern is, in fact, so widespread and so familiar that moredetailed illustrations of it would appear to be needless for present purposes. Itwill be more interesting to ask how a good illustration is to be selected.Usually there exists the presumption that the relative value of dialectical sys-tems is a function of their efficiency in reaching or avoiding a given goal. Fordialectic often does not move in the manner and direction desired. Computingmachines sometimes go into oscillation. Species of animals become extinct. Andmen sometimes become involved in fruitless routines or lose contact with theirworld. It plainly becomes important, therefore, to be able to pass judgmentupon a dialectical movement. Perhaps a fuller characterization of this movementcould be used over again as a standard by which it could be judged and partlycontrolled.3. The Standard of Dialectic. The kinds of knowledge of the dialectical move-ment which will be useful in controlling it are plainly insight into its end andknowledge of the means by which the end is produced. For the purpose of a briefconsideration of these two problems, it will be convenient to be restricted tosituations in which human beings are involved.First, then, what is the nature of the end of a dialectical movement? Morespecifically, it may be inquired whether the end of a dialectical movement isintrinsic to that movement or whether it must be imposed by some externalagent. This problem, which in one form or another has been the storm centerof so many philosophical controversies, is scarcely answered by the suggestionthat the end of a developmental process is its most complex identifiable state.If there is an intrinsic end to a dialectical movement, though, perhaps it can beidentified by noting the pervasive characteristic of this complexity. This char-acteristic will evidently be present in the several examples of dialectic whichhave been cited.In the cybernitical illustration with which we began, the effect of A's causalrelation to B was "fed back" to A, thereby altering A so that its subsequentcausal relation to B, as thus changed, would more closely approximate to thedesired end. That which is fed by B back to A is technically called "informa-tion". Information has been defined as "those aspects ... of each physical proc-ess which all these processes have in common."6 The language of this definitionevidently assumes the partial homogeneity (or the comparability) of the entitiesA and B and recalls the prescription of their structural likeness in the quotationfrom Russell cited already. This mutual causality mediated by "information"

6 K. W. Deutsch, Op Cit. p. 243.


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210 EDWARD G. BALLARDgradually moves A and B toward the goal, which is evidently a state charac-terized by the fuller sharing by A and B of a common structure. As an animallives in its environment, it changes that environment and becomes changed bythis activity, with the result that animal and environment approach a state ofmutual adaptation or mutual information. Data and theory, knower and known,likewise become mutually informed. The data become more and more amplyavailable and increasingly precisely observed as improved theory enables theconstruction of more selective and accurate instruments. The final and idealresult would be the detailed and complete theory precisely reflecting the wholeof the data. And finally, the human being, the knower, entertains a dialecticalmovement between the imaginative and unconscious parts of his psyche and hisintellectual mind. Probably most physicians would agree that the desirable de-velopment involves both of the parts mutually related. Information, in thehealthy mind, moves back and forth between imaginative and unconscious levelsof the psyche and the intellectual portion of the mind in the form of dreams,reverie, appreciation, and in motor, verbal and rational activity, with the finalconsequence that the several parts of the mind become harmoniously related,i. e. "integrated." The conscious and intellectual mind accepts the imaginativemind, and each reflects the other; the one is constantly translating the enlargingcontents of the other into its own economy.In each of these instances the movement which the dialectical relation ap-pears naturally to engender is toward a mutual reflection or conformity betweenthe A and the B, i. e. the events which enter into this relation. This may beexpressed by saying that the events within such a context tend toward identityof structure.With respect to this goal dialectic may be regarded as mutual trans-lation. Indeed, this culmination might have been foreseen in the definitions withwhich we began, but it is significant that it should be found to be exemplifiedin fact. This goal, the achievement of identity of structure, can be accepted asa standard and used as a means for passing a rough judgment upon the efficiencyof any dialectical system. The standard, however, can be observed in more thanone form.It is easy to note, as examples of dialectic are passed in review, that move-ment toward identity of structure within a dialectical system is of two kinds:finite and continuous. Some dialectical systems achieve a state of equilibrium inwhich this identity has progressed, apparently, as far as circumstances will allow.When a computing machine solves a problem it arrives at a definite terminationof its dialectical movement. When a species of animal becomes stabilized withinits environment and ceases evolution (e.g. some anthropods), or when a manceases growth and uses his energy in the repetition of routines, then again thedialectical movement arrives at a termination. On the other hand some dialecti-cal contexts do not appear to reach any such point of arrest or routine. The rela-tionship between theory and data in the healthier sciences seems to progresswithout end toward ever increasing theoretical precision and scope. Similarly inthe psychically healthy man the unconscious impulses and energies are continu-ously being translated into concepts and actions, and these translations react


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ON THE NATURE AND USE OF DIALECTIC 211again upon the unconscious. Or in a Platonic dialogue, the definitions discoveredand the partially solved problems provide instruments and arouse energies forattacking the same and kindred problems, and the process appears to reach notermination except the continuous clarification of the infinite obscurities in hu-man life and thought. Perhaps, though, this is end enough; in dialectic of thecontinuous type the goal is the continuous increase in degree of structural iden-tity or formal similarity among the entities which enter into this relation.Dialectic moves toward harmonizing the structures of the events which par-ticipate in it, but the harmony actually achieved may not always be that whichis externally desired. For this reason, in part at least, dialectic has acquired abad name among some philosophers. The only standard intrinsic to dialectic,however, seems to be the standard relative to the movement toward similarityin form or identity of structure among the events which participate in it. Adialectical process is intrinsically good if and only if the events involved in itdo in fact move through mutual interaction toward increasing similarity in form.Whether the form is that which is desired by someone making use of the processfor his own ends can be decided only by external criteria. Again whether thesecriteria are good or not depends upon factors external to the given dialecticalprocess. No doubt, the outcome of some dialectical development will have to bechosen as the supreme standard and erected into an axiological principle defini-tory of such notions as the desirable, the mature, the perfect. Is there, though,any reason to expect this crucial dialectic to reach a final end which ought to beregarded as the perennial orthodoxy? The answer to this question-humanprejudice to one side-must depend upon the nature of the categories which thethinker is able to bring to bear upon the problem. And this opens up quite an-other pursuit. The present point is restricted merely to this: the intrinsic endof a dialectical development is homogeneity of structure of the events composingit. It cannot propose its external end; this end must be selected for it. Once,though, the end or specific type of identity of structure is proposed and incor-porated in a dialectical system by suitable means, or made intrinsic to it, theprocess may move toward its achievement.

A dialectical system may move toward the goal toward which it has beenaimed or is aiming, but clearly this movement is not inevitable. The means maybe inadequate; that is, the events composing a dialectical context may not becapable of achieving homogeneity of structure. The pathology of dialectic is alarge and difficult topic; it will be appropriate in this paper to mention brieflyonly three of its varieties which are pertinent to the illustrations already used.One kind of dialectical failure can be seen in a computing machine which maygo into oscillation, if given an insoluble problem, or it may stop. The analogyis often pointed out between such a machine and the neurotic who becomes in-volved in a vicious circle and violently attempts to achieve two mutually oppos-ing ends at the same time. Another kind of failure is observable in a dialecticalsystem when one member or entity within it ceases to react causally; mutualtranslation does not occur among its members and development ceases. Evi-dently something similar to this condition occurs in the persons who disintegrate


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212 EDWARD G. BALLARDmentally. In these persons one portion of their personality is repressed and dis-associated from the other portion. The disassociated portion may live a life ofits own, so to speak, but it stops interchanging information with the other partand hence ceases to be a part of the same system.More philosophically interesting than these two kinds of pathological dialec-tic is a third which fails, apparently, because of too great a success. This is thetragic theme of antiquity. It will be remembered that the tragic hero was alwaysa man of superior ability whose tragic catastrophe occurred owing to his supe-rior, even excessive, virtue. Similarly, dialectical systems are sometimes encoun-tered which function with such efficiency that they appear to attract other andforeign elements into their system. If these new elements are not such as can inreality embody the form or structure which is the goal of the dialectical system,then a catastrophe follows which demands a catharsis of the foreign elements.Examples can be cited from the history of philosophy to illustrate this kind ofpathological dialectic. Certainly one of these crucial points in history occurredat the end of the middle ages when it was recognized by some men possessingcuriosity about nature that the doctrine of final causes, as it was then current,actually prevented attaining insight into nature and its laws. Descartes andBacon therefore explicitly repudiated this doctrine, and the former substitutedthe well known mechanistic and materialistic metaphysics. This was his cathar-sis of the prevailing dialectical routines. The primary elements in this dialecticalsystem were, first, the theories which were developed in classical philosophy byelaborating the original artist-analogy and included the system of four causesdefined by Aristotle, and on the other hand the other element in this dialecticalcontext was data gathered by observation and measurement of natural objects.The difficulty was that the data appeared to exemplify patterns which were notreflected in the theory, and vice versa. However fruitful the anthropomorphicanalogy was for ethics, politics, poetry, religion, it appeared to offer nothing forscience. Substituting the mechanistic hypothesis for it reenlivened the dialecticalcontext so far as science was concerned. Then human persons and society weredrawn into this dialectic and subsumed under the mechanistic theory. It quicklybecame evident to some philosophers, though, that the human being as he hadalways understood himself, was dangerously distorted in this context. Man isan alien in the world-machine. Structural identity between man and the ma-chine does not seem to be within the realm of possibility. Here then, again, wasa dialectical system which refused to operate as it was expected. The theorycould not force its data to assume the given theoretical structure. One memberof the dialectical context had to be altered if the relationship of mutual causalitywas to move the system on to further developments. The Romantic and anti-intellectualist philosophers attempted to provide this alteration.The reasons why one member of a dialectical context cannot tyrannize overthe others within the same system are not easy to understand. We may say thatnature is not really human and hence cannot design ends for itself as the humanartist can. And we may argue that, in the nature of the case, the human beingdoes not always act as the laws of mechanics and electricity might predict that


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ON THE NATURE AND USE OF DIALECTIC 213he would act. He has problems which mechanics cannot solve. Why this shouldbe the nature of the case is the big question. We may avoid the question for themoment, however, by naming it metaphysical.We have at this point accumulated three problems for further study: (a) theproblem of stating the principles of dialectic in their most comprehensive andfundamental form (e.g. what must we mean by process, event, cause, similarity,system, value, etc.); (b) the problem of providing an extrinsic standard forevaluating the dialectic; (c) the problem of determining why dialectic fails tooperate under certain conditions. These problems, though, belong to anotherpaper.My point here has been to show that when dialectic is defined as a relationshipof mutual causality among homogeneous entities which moves them toward agoal, that a large variety of occasions or processes can be recognized as dialecticalsystems. Examination of some of these indicates inductively that the end towhich they move is toward sharing or acquiring more and more exactly a commonpattern, the so-called "feed-back" or mutuality of the causation being themechanism which favors the increasing development of a similar structure amongthe elements in the dialectical system. This development of common structureprovides an intrinsic standard by which a dialectical system can be judged.Finally, we noted that a dialectical system can be put to uses by men, but thatthe standard for judging the wisdom of this use requires a standard extrinsic tothe given dialectical context and perhaps finally depends upon the pertinentmetaphysics, or axiology. And furthermore, the failure of some systems to oper-ate as they are sometimes expected to operate indicates a further dependence of adialectical system upon conditions without it, and suggests the necessity of afinal recourse to metaphysics in order to understand the nature of such systemsfully.These two dependencies-the dependency of a dialectical system upon itsextrinsic end which must be proposed-and may be faultily proposed-bysomething external to it, and its dependency upon an internal mechanism whichmay not operate perfectly-have been largely responsible for the bad reputationof dialectic. Dialectic appears to be a dangerous means to the ends which itachieves. Nevertheless, if the present discussion has reached anything like thetruth, evidently it is a necessary means; the effort to neutralize its dangerouspotentialities through understanding would seem, therefore, to be as importantas any of the problems which face dialectic.

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Edward G. Ballard - On the Nature and Use of Dialectic