What Dialectics Really Is
Dialectics is the most important, and the most misunderstood, way of thinking in the history of human thought. Many take it to mean “seeing both sides”, “having it both ways”, or a sophistry that lets one say anything. These are all misunderstandings. True dialectics, developed from Heraclitus and Plato to Hegel, is a higher way of thinking: it does not stop at isolated, rigid concepts, but sees the unity of things in their opposition, their development in motion, and their rise through negation.
This series sets out to make dialectics clear. We begin with the most basic questions: What is the identity of opposites? How is essence related to appearance? Why is the truth the whole, and a process? What is sublation (Aufhebung)? How does the thinking of the understanding differ from the thinking of reason? On this basis we show how dialectics helps us understand nature, history, society and life, and how it reveals a way forward where we seem to face only contradiction.
To master dialectics is not to add one more subject to what we know. It is to gain a higher power of thought and a deeper insight. It is the key to Hegel’s philosophy, and the methodological foundation of all the thought on this site.