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DIALECTIC, or DIALECTICS
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See also:DIALECTIC, or DIALECTICS (from Gr. S&&XeKTOS, discourse, debate; i &a).earuo7, sc. TEXvr7, the See also:art of debate), a logical See also:term, generally used in See also:common parlance in a contemptuous sense for verbal or purely abstract disputation devoid of See also:practical value. According to See also:Aristotle, See also:Zeno of Elea " invented " dialectic, the art of disputation by question and See also:answer, while See also:Plato See also:developed it metaphysically in connexion with his See also:doctrine of " Ideas " as the art of analysing ideas in themselves and in relation to the ultimate See also:idea of the See also:Good (Repub. vii.). The See also:special See also:function of the so-called " Socratic dialectic " was to show the inadequacy of popular beliefs. Aristotle himself used " dialectic," as opposed to " See also:science," for that See also:department of See also:mental activity which examines the presuppositions lying at the back of all the particular sciences. Each particular science has its own subject See also:matter and special principles (See also:Tam apxai) on which the superstructure of its special discoveries is based. The Aristotelian dialectic, however, deals with the universal See also:laws (rcowai apxal) of reasoning, which can be applied to the particular arguments of all the sciences. The sciences, for example, all seek to define their own See also:species; dialectic, on the other See also:hand, sets forth the conditions which all See also:definitions must satisfy whatever their subject matter. Again, the sciences all seek to educe See also:general laws; dialectic investigates the nature of such laws, and the See also:kind and degree of See also:necessity to which they can attain. To this general subject matter Aristotle gives the name " Topics" (rairot, loci, communes loci). "Dialectic " in this sense is the See also:equivalent of " See also:logic." Aristotle also uses the term for the science of probable reasoning as opposed to See also:demonstrative reasoning (&01-ob6LKTUCi). The See also:Stoics divided ?oyud, (logic) into See also:rhetoric and dialectic, and from their See also:time till the end of the See also:middle ages dialectic was either synonymous with, or a See also:part of, logic. In See also:modern See also:philosophy the word has received certain special meanings. In Kantian terminology Dialektik is the name of that portion of the Kritik d. reinen Vernunft in which See also:Kant discusses the impossibility of applying to " things-in-themselves " the principles which are found to govern phenomena. In the See also:system of See also:Hegel the word resumes its See also:original Socratic sense, as the name of that intellectual See also:process whereby the inadequacy of popular conceptions is exposed. Throughout its See also:history, therefore, " dialectic " has been connected with that which is remote from, or See also:alien to, unsystematic thought, with the a priori, or transcendental, rather than with the facts of common experience and material things. Additional information and CommentsThere are no comments yet for this article.
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