Dialectic or dialectics (Greek: διαλεκτική,
dialektikḗ; related to dialogue), also known
as the dialectical method, is at base a discourse
between two or more people holding different
points of view about a subject but wishing
to establish the truth through reasoned arguments.
Dialectic resembles debate, but the concept
excludes subjective elements such as emotional
appeal and the modern pejorative sense of
rhetoric.
Dialectic may be contrasted with the didactic
method, wherein one side of the conversation
teaches the other.
Dialectic is alternatively known as minor
logic, as opposed to major logic or critique.
Within Hegelianism, the word dialectic has
the specialised meaning of a contradiction
between ideas that serves as the determining
factor in their relationship.
Dialectic comprises three stages of development:
first, a thesis or statement of an idea, which
gives rise to a second step, a reaction or
antithesis that contradicts or negates the
thesis, and third, the synthesis, a statement
through which the differences between the
two points is resolved.
Dialectical materialism, a theory or set of
theories produced mainly by Karl Marx and
Friedrich Engels, adapted the Hegelian dialectic
into arguments regarding traditional materialism.
Dialectic tends to imply a process of evolution
and so does not naturally fit within formal
logic (see logic and dialectic).
This process is particularly marked in Hegelian
dialectic and even more so in Marxist dialectic
which may rely on the evolution of ideas over
longer time periods in the real world; dialectical
logic attempts to address this.
== Western dialectical forms ==
=== 
Classical philosophy ===
In classical philosophy, dialectic (διαλεκτική)
is a form of reasoning based upon dialogue
of arguments and counter-arguments, advocating
propositions (theses) and counter-propositions
(antitheses).
The outcome of such a dialectic might be the
refutation of a relevant proposition, or of
a synthesis, or a combination of the opposing
assertions, or a qualitative improvement of
the dialogue.Moreover, the term "dialectic"
owes much of its prestige to its role in the
philosophies of Socrates and Plato, in the
Greek Classical period (5th to 4th centuries
BCE).
Aristotle said that it was the pre-Socratic
philosopher Zeno of Elea who invented dialectic,
of which the dialogues of Plato are the examples
of the Socratic dialectical method.According
to Kant, however, the ancient Greeks used
the word "dialectic" to signify the logic
of false appearance or semblance.
To the Ancients, "it was nothing but the logic
of illusion.
It was a sophistic art of giving to one's
ignorance, indeed even to one's intentional
tricks, the outward appearance of truth, by
imitating the thorough, accurate method which
logic always requires, and by using its topic
as a cloak for every empty assertion."
==== 
Socratic method ====
The Socratic dialogues are a particular form
of dialectic known as the method of elenchus
(literally, "refutation, scrutiny") whereby
a series of questions clarifies a more precise
statement of a vague belief, logical consequences
of that statement are explored, and a contradiction
is discovered.
The method is largely destructive, in that
false belief is exposed and only constructive
in that this exposure may lead to further
search for truth.
The detection of error does not amount to
a proof of the antithesis; for example, a
contradiction in the consequences of a definition
of piety does not provide a correct definition.
The principal aim of Socratic activity may
be to improve the soul of the interlocutors,
by freeing them from unrecognized errors;
or indeed, by teaching them the spirit of
inquiry.
In common cases, Socrates used enthymemes
as the foundation of his argument.For example,
in the Euthyphro, Socrates asks Euthyphro
to provide a definition of piety.
Euthyphro replies that the pious is that which
is loved by the gods.
But, Socrates also has Euthyphro agreeing
that the gods are quarrelsome and their quarrels,
like human quarrels, concern objects of love
or hatred.
Therefore, Socrates reasons, at least one
thing exists that certain gods love but other
gods hate.
Again, Euthyphro agrees.
Socrates concludes that if Euthyphro's definition
of piety is acceptable, then there must exist
at least one thing that is both pious and
impious (as it is both loved and hated by
the gods)—which Euthyphro admits is absurd.
Thus, Euthyphro is brought to a realization
by this dialectical method that his definition
of piety is not sufficiently meaningful.
For example, in Plato's Gorgias, dialectic
occurs between Socrates, the Sophist Gorgias,
and two men, Polus and Callicles.
Because Socrates' ultimate goal was to reach
true knowledge, he was even willing to change
his own views in order to arrive at the truth.
The fundamental goal of dialectic, in this
instance, was to establish a precise definition
of the subject (in this case, rhetoric) and
with the use of argumentation and questioning,
make the subject even more precise.
In the Gorgias, Socrates reaches the truth
by asking a series of questions and in return,
receiving short, clear answers.
There is another interpretation of the dialectic,
as a method of intuition suggested in The
Republic.
Simon Blackburn writes that the dialectic
in this sense is used to understand "the total
process of enlightenment, whereby the philosopher
is educated so as to achieve knowledge of
the supreme good, the Form of the Good".
==== Aristotle ====
Aristotle stresses that rhetoric is closely
related to dialectic.
He offers several formulas to describe this
affinity between the two disciplines: first
of all, rhetoric is said to be a “counterpart”
(antistrophos) to dialectic (Rhet.
I.1, 1354a1); (ii) it is also called an “outgrowth”
(paraphues ti) of dialectic and the study
of character (Rhet.
I.2, 1356a25f.); finally, Aristotle says that
rhetoric is part of dialectic and resembles
it (Rhet.
I.2, 1356a30f.).
In saying that rhetoric is a counterpart to
dialectic, Aristotle obviously alludes to
Plato's Gorgias (464bff.), where rhetoric
is ironically defined as a counterpart to
cookery in the soul.
Since, in this passage, Plato uses the word
‘antistrophos’ to designate an analogy,
it is likely that Aristotle wants to express
a kind of analogy too: what dialectic is for
the (private or academic) practice of attacking
and maintaining an argument, rhetoric is for
the (public) practice of defending oneself
or accusing an opponent.
The analogy to dialectic has important implications
for the status of rhetoric.
Plato argued in his Gorgias that rhetoric
cannot be an art (technê), since it is not
related to a definite subject, while real
arts are defined by their specific subjects,
as e.g. medicine or shoemaking are defined
by their products, i.e., health and shoes.
=== Medieval philosophy ===
Logic, which could be considered to include
dialectic, was one of the three liberal arts
taught in medieval universities as part of
the trivium; the other elements were rhetoric
and grammar.Based mainly on Aristotle, the
first medieval philosopher to work on dialectics
was Boethius (480–524).
After him, many scholastic philosophers also
made use of dialectics in their works, such
as Abelard, William of Sherwood, Garlandus
Compotista, Walter Burley, Roger Swyneshed,
William of Ockham, and Thomas Aquinas.This
dialectic (a quaestio disputata) was formed
as follows:
The question to be determined (“It is asked
whether...”);
A provisory answer to the question (“And
it seems that...”);
The principal arguments in favor of the provisory
answer;
An argument against the provisory answer,
traditionally a single argument from authority
("On the contrary...");
The determination of the question after weighing
the evidence ("I answer that...");
The replies to each of the initial objections.
(“To the first, to the second etc., I answer
that...”)
=== Modern philosophy ===
The concept of dialectics was given new life
by Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel (following
Johann Gottlieb Fichte), whose dialectically
synthetic model of nature and of history made
it, as it were, a fundamental aspect of the
nature of reality (instead of regarding the
contradictions into which dialectics leads
as a sign of the sterility of the dialectical
method, as Immanuel Kant tended to do in his
Critique of Pure Reason).
In the mid-19th century, the concept of "dialectic"
was appropriated by Karl Marx (see, for example,
Das Kapital, published in 1867) and Friedrich
Engels and retooled in a dynamic, nonidealistic
manner.
It would also become a crucial part of later
representations of Marxism as a philosophy
of dialectical materialism.
These representations often contrasted dramatically
and led to vigorous debate among different
Marxist groupings, leading some prominent
Marxists to give up on the idea of dialectics
completely.
==== Hegelian dialectic ====
Hegelian dialectic, usually presented in a
threefold manner, was stated by Heinrich Moritz
Chalybäus as comprising three dialectical
stages of development: a thesis, giving rise
to its reaction; an antithesis, which contradicts
or negates the thesis; and the tension between
the two being resolved by means of a synthesis.
In more simplistic terms, one can consider
it thus: problem → reaction → solution.
Although this model is often named after Hegel,
he himself never used that specific formulation.
Hegel ascribed that terminology to Kant.
Carrying on Kant's work, Fichte greatly elaborated
on the synthesis model and popularized it.
On the other hand, Hegel did use a three-valued
logical model that is very similar to the
antithesis model, but Hegel's most usual terms
were: Abstract-Negative-Concrete.
Hegel used this writing model as a backbone
to accompany his points in many of his works.
The formula, thesis-antithesis-synthesis,
does not explain why the thesis requires an
antithesis.
However, the formula, abstract-negative-concrete,
suggests a flaw, or perhaps an incompleteness,
in any initial thesis—it is too abstract
and lacks the negative of trial, error, and
experience.
For Hegel, the concrete, the synthesis, the
absolute, must always pass through the phase
of the negative, in the journey to completion,
that is, mediation.
This is the essence of what is popularly called
Hegelian dialectics.
According to the German philosopher Walter
Kaufmann: Fichte introduced into German philosophy
the three-step of thesis, antithesis, and
synthesis, using these three terms.
Schelling took up this terminology.
Hegel did not.
He never once used these three terms together
to designate three stages in an argument or
account in any of his books.
And they do not help us understand his Phenomenology,
his Logic, or his philosophy of history; they
impede any open-minded comprehension of what
he does by forcing it into a scheme which
was available to him and which he deliberately
spurned [...] The mechanical formalism [...] Hegel
derides expressly and at some length in the
preface to the Phenomenology.
Kaufmann also cites Hegel's criticism of the
triad model commonly misattributed to him,
adding that "the only place where Hegel uses
the three terms together occurs in his lectures
on the history of philosophy, on the last
page but one of the section on Kant—where
Hegel roundly reproaches Kant for having 'everywhere
posited thesis, antithesis, synthesis'".To
describe the activity of overcoming the negative,
Hegel also often used the term Aufhebung,
variously translated into English as "sublation"
or "overcoming," to conceive of the working
of the dialectic.
Roughly, the term indicates preserving the
useful portion of an idea, thing, society,
etc., while moving beyond its limitations.
(Jacques Derrida's preferred French translation
of the term was relever.)In the Logic, for
instance, Hegel describes a dialectic of existence:
first, existence must be posited as pure Being
(Sein); but pure Being, upon examination,
is found to be indistinguishable from Nothing
(Nichts).
When it is realized that what is coming into
being is, at the same time, also returning
to nothing (in life, for example, one's living
is also a dying), both Being and Nothing are
united as Becoming.As in the Socratic dialectic,
Hegel claimed to proceed by making implicit
contradictions explicit: each stage of the
process is the product of contradictions inherent
or implicit in the preceding stage.
For Hegel, the whole of history is one tremendous
dialectic, major stages of which chart a progression
from self-alienation as slavery to self-unification
and realization as the rational constitutional
state of free and equal citizens.
The Hegelian dialectic cannot be mechanically
applied for any chosen thesis.
Critics argue that the selection of any antithesis,
other than the logical negation of the thesis,
is subjective.
Then, if the logical negation is used as the
antithesis, there is no rigorous way to derive
a synthesis.
In practice, when an antithesis is selected
to suit the user's subjective purpose, the
resulting "contradictions" are rhetorical,
not logical, and the resulting synthesis is
not rigorously defensible against a multitude
of other possible syntheses.
The problem with the Fichtean "thesis–antithesis–synthesis"
model is that it implies that contradictions
or negations come from outside of things.
Hegel's point is that they are inherent in
and internal to things.
This conception of dialectics derives ultimately
from Heraclitus.
Hegel stated that the purpose of dialectics
is "to study things in their own being and
movement and thus to demonstrate the finitude
of the partial categories of understanding."
One important dialectical principle for Hegel
is the transition from quantity to quality,
which he terms the Measure.
The measure is the qualitative quantum, the
quantum is the existence of quantity.
The identity between quantity and quality,
which is found in Measure, is at first only
implicit, and not yet explicitly realised.
In other words, these two categories, which
unite in Measure, each claim an independent
authority.
On the one hand, the quantitative features
of existence may be altered, without affecting
its quality.
On the other hand, this increase and diminution,
immaterial though it be, has its limit, by
exceeding which the quality suffers change.
[...] But if the quantity present in measure
exceeds a certain limit, the quality corresponding
to it is also put in abeyance.
This however is not a negation of quality
altogether, but only of this definite quality,
the place of which is at once occupied by
another.
This process of measure, which appears alternately
as a mere change in quantity, and then as
a sudden revulsion of quantity into quality,
may be envisaged under the figure of a nodal
(knotted) line.
As an example, Hegel mentions the states of
aggregation of water: "Thus the temperature
of water is, in the first place, a point of
no consequence in respect of its liquidity:
still with the increase or diminution of the
temperature of the liquid water, there comes
a point where this state of cohesion suffers
a qualitative change, and the water is converted
into steam or ice".
As other examples Hegel mentions the reaching
of a point where a single additional grain
makes a heap of wheat; or where the bald tail
is produced, if we continue plucking out single
hairs.
Another important principle for Hegel is the
negation of the negation, which he also terms
Aufhebung (sublation): Something is only what
it is in its relation to another, but by the
negation of the negation this something incorporates
the other into itself.
The dialectical movement involves two moments
that negate each other, something and its
other.
As a result of the negation of the negation,
"something becomes its other; this other is
itself something; therefore it likewise becomes
an other, and so on ad infinitum".
Something in its passage into other only joins
with itself, it is self-related.
In becoming there are two moments: coming-to-be
and ceasing-to-be: by sublation, i.e., negation
of the negation, being passes over into nothing,
it ceases to be, but something new shows up,
is coming to be.
What is sublated (aufgehoben) on the one hand
ceases to be and is put to an end, but on
the other hand it is preserved and maintained.
In dialectics, a totality transforms itself;
it is self-related, then self-forgetful, relieving
the original tension.
==== Marxist dialectic ====
Marxist dialectic is a form of Hegelian dialectic
which applies to the study of historical materialism.
It purports to be a reflection of the real
world created by man.
Dialectic would thus be a robust method under
which one could examine personal, social,
and economic behaviors.
Marxist dialectic is the core foundation of
the philosophy of dialectical materialism,
which forms the basis of the ideas behind
historical materialism.
Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels proposed that
Hegel's dialectic is too abstract: The mystification
which dialectic suffers in Hegel's hands,
by no means prevents him from being the first
to present its general form of working in
a comprehensive and conscious manner.
With him it is standing on its head.
It must be turned right side up again, if
you would discover the rational kernel within
the mystical shell.
In contradiction to Hegelian idealism, Marx
presented his own dialectic method, which
he claims to be "direct opposite" of Hegel's
method: My dialectic method is not only different
from the Hegelian, but is its direct opposite.
To Hegel, the life-process of the human brain,
i.e. the process of thinking, which, under
the name of 'the Idea', he even transforms
into an independent subject, is the demiurgos
of the real world, and the real world is only
the external, phenomenal form of 'the Idea'.
With me, on the contrary, the ideal is nothing
else than the material world reflected by
the human mind, and translated into forms
of thought.
In Marxism, the dialectical method of historical
study became intertwined with historical materialism,
the school of thought exemplified by the works
of Marx, Engels, and Vladimir Lenin.
In the USSR, under Joseph Stalin, Marxist
dialectics became "diamat" (short for dialectical
materialism), a theory emphasizing the primacy
of the material way of life; social "praxis"
over all forms of social consciousness; and
the secondary, dependent character of the
"ideal".
The term "dialectical materialism" was coined
by the 19th-century social theorist Joseph
Dietzgen who used the theory to explain the
nature of socialism and social development.
The original populariser of Marxism in Russia,
Georgi Plekhanov used the terms "dialectical
materialism" and "historical materialism"
interchangeably.
For Lenin, the primary feature of Marx's "dialectical
materialism" (Lenin's term) was its application
of materialist philosophy to history and social
sciences.
Lenin's main input in the philosophy of dialectical
materialism was his theory of reflection,
which presented human consciousness as a dynamic
reflection of the objective material world
that fully shapes its contents and structure.
Later, Stalin's works on the subject established
a rigid and formalistic division of Marxist–Leninist
theory in the dialectical materialism and
historical materialism parts.
While the first was supposed to be the key
method and theory of the philosophy of nature,
the second was the Soviet version of the philosophy
of history.
A dialectical method was fundamental to Marxist
politics, e.g., the works of Karl Korsch,
Georg Lukács and certain members of the Frankfurt
School.
Soviet academics, notably Evald Ilyenkov and
Zaid Orudzhev, continued pursuing unorthodox
philosophic study of Marxist dialectics; likewise
in the West, notably the philosopher Bertell
Ollman at New York University.
Friedrich Engels proposed that Nature is dialectical,
thus, in Anti-Dühring he said that the negation
of negation is: A very simple process, which
is taking place everywhere and every day,
which any child can understand as soon as
it is stripped of the veil of mystery in which
it was enveloped by the old idealist philosophy.
In Dialectics of Nature, Engels said: Probably
the same gentlemen who up to now have decried
the transformation of quantity into quality
as mysticism and incomprehensible transcendentalism
will now declare that it is indeed something
quite self-evident, trivial, and commonplace,
which they have long employed, and so they
have been taught nothing new.
But to have formulated for the first time
in its universally valid form a general law
of development of Nature, society, and thought,
will always remain an act of historic importance.
Marxist dialectics is exemplified in Das Kapital
(Capital), which outlines two central theories:
(i) surplus value and (ii) the materialist
conception of history; Marx explains dialectical
materialism: In its rational form, it is a
scandal and abomination to bourgeoisdom and
its doctrinaire professors, because it includes
in its comprehension an affirmative recognition
of the existing state of things, at the same
time, also, the recognition of the negation
of that state, of its inevitable breaking
up; because it regards every historically
developed social form as in fluid movement,
and therefore takes into account its transient
nature not less than its momentary existence;
because it lets nothing impose upon it, and
is in its essence critical and revolutionary.
Class struggle is the primary contradiction
to be resolved by Marxist dialectics, because
of its central role in the social and political
lives of a society.
Nonetheless, Marx and Marxists developed the
concept of class struggle to comprehend the
dialectical contradictions between mental
and manual labor, and between town and country.
Hence, philosophic contradiction is central
to the development of dialectics – the progress
from quantity to quality, the acceleration
of gradual social change; the negation of
the initial development of the status quo;
the negation of that negation; and the high-level
recurrence of features of the original status
quo.
In the USSR, Progress Publishers issued anthologies
of dialectical materialism by Lenin, wherein
he also quotes Marx and Engels: As the most
comprehensive and profound doctrine of development,
and the richest in content, Hegelian dialectics
was considered by Marx and Engels the greatest
achievement of classical German philosophy....
"The great basic thought", Engels writes,
"that the world is not to be comprehended
as a complex of ready-made things, but as
a complex of processes, in which the things,
apparently stable no less than their mind
images in our heads, the concepts, go through
an uninterrupted change of coming into being
and passing away... this great fundamental
thought has, especially since the time of
Hegel, so thoroughly permeated ordinary consciousness
that, in its generality, it is now scarcely
ever contradicted.
But, to acknowledge this fundamental thought
in words, and to apply it in reality in detail
to each domain of investigation, are two different
things....
For dialectical philosophy nothing is final,
absolute, sacred.
It reveals the transitory character of everything
and in everything; nothing can endure before
it, except the uninterrupted process of becoming
and of passing away, of endless ascendancy
from the lower to the higher.
And dialectical philosophy, itself, is nothing
more than the mere reflection of this process
in the thinking brain."
Thus, according to Marx, dialectics is "the
science of the general laws of motion both
of the external world and of human thought".
Lenin describes his dialectical understanding
of the concept of development: A development
that repeats, as it were, stages that have
already been passed, but repeats them in a
different way, on a higher basis ("the negation
of the negation"), a development, so to speak,
that proceeds in spirals, not in a straight
line; a development by leaps, catastrophes,
and revolutions; "breaks in continuity"; the
transformation of quantity into quality; inner
impulses towards development, imparted by
the contradiction and conflict of the various
forces and tendencies acting on a given body,
or within a given phenomenon, or within a
given society; the interdependence and the
closest and indissoluble connection between
all aspects of any phenomenon (history constantly
revealing ever new aspects), a connection
that provides a uniform, and universal process
of motion, one that follows definite laws
– these are some of the features of dialectics
as a doctrine of development that is richer
than the conventional one.
==== Dialectical naturalism ====
Dialectical naturalism is a term coined by
American philosopher Murray Bookchin to describe
the philosophical underpinnings of the political
program of social ecology.
Dialectical naturalism explores the complex
interrelationship between social problems,
and the direct consequences they have on the
ecological impact of human society.
Bookchin offered dialectical naturalism as
a contrast to what he saw as the "empyrean,
basically antinaturalistic dialectical idealism"
of Hegel, and "the wooden, often scientistic
dialectical materialism of orthodox Marxists".
== Dialectical theology ==
Neo-orthodoxy, in Europe also known as theology
of crisis and dialectical theology, is an
approach to theology in Protestantism that
was developed in the aftermath of the First
World War (1914–1918).
It is characterized as a reaction against
doctrines of 19th-century liberal theology
and a more positive reevaluation of the teachings
of the Reformation, much of which had been
in decline (especially in western Europe)
since the late 18th century.
It is primarily associated with two Swiss
professors and pastors, Karl Barth (1886–1968)
and Emil Brunner (1899–1966), even though
Barth himself expressed his unease in the
use of the term.In dialectical theology the
difference and opposition between God and
human beings is stressed in such a way that
all human attempts at overcoming this opposition
through moral, religious or philosophical
idealism must be characterized as 'sin'.
In the death of Christ humanity is negated
and overcome, but this judgment also points
forwards to the resurrection in which humanity
is reestablished in Christ.
For Barth this meant that only through God's
'no' to everything human can his 'yes' be
perceived.
Applied to traditional themes of Protestant
theology, such as double predestination, this
means that election and reprobation cannot
be viewed as a quantitative limitation of
God's action.
Rather it must be seen as its "qualitative
definition".
As Christ bore the rejection as well as the
election of God for all humanity, every person
is subject to both aspects of God's double
predestination.
== Legacy ==
Dialectics has become central to continental
philosophy, but it plays no part in Anglo-American
philosophy.
In other words, on the continent of Europe,
dialectics has entered intellectual culture
as what might be called a legitimate part
of thought and philosophy, whereas in America
and Britain, the dialectic plays no discernible
part in the intellectual culture, which instead
tends toward positivism.
A prime example of the European tradition
is Jean-Paul Sartre's Critique of Dialectical
Reason, which is very different from the works
of Popper, whose philosophy was for a time
highly influential in the UK where he resided
(see below).
Sartre states:
Existentialism, like Marxism, addresses itself
to experience in order to discover there concrete
syntheses.
It can conceive of these syntheses only within
a moving, dialectical totalisation, which
is nothing else but history or—from the
strictly cultural point of view adopted here—'philosophy-becoming-the
world'.
== Criticisms ==
Karl Popper has attacked the dialectic repeatedly.
In 1937, he wrote and delivered a paper entitled
"What Is Dialectic?" in which he attacked
the dialectical method for its willingness
"to put up with contradictions".
Popper concluded the essay with these words:
"The whole development of dialectic should
be a warning against the dangers inherent
in philosophical system-building.
It should remind us that philosophy should
not be made a basis for any sort of scientific
system and that philosophers should be much
more modest in their claims.
One task which they can fulfill quite usefully
is the study of the critical methods of science"
(Ibid., p. 335).
In chapter 12 of volume 2 of The Open Society
and Its Enemies (1944; 5th rev. ed., 1966),
Popper unleashed a famous attack on Hegelian
dialectics in which he held that Hegel's thought
(unjustly in the view of some philosophers,
such as Walter Kaufmann) was to some degree
responsible for facilitating the rise of fascism
in Europe by encouraging and justifying irrationalism.
In section 17 of his 1961 "addenda" to The
Open Society, entitled "Facts, Standards and
Truth: A Further Criticism of Relativism",
Popper refused to moderate his criticism of
the Hegelian dialectic, arguing that it "played
a major role in the downfall of the liberal
movement in Germany [...] by contributing
to historicism and to an identification of
might and right, encouraged totalitarian modes
of thought.
[...] [And] undermined and eventually lowered
the traditional standards of intellectual
responsibility and honesty".The philosopher
of science and physicist Mario Bunge repeatedly
criticized Hegelian and Marxian dialectics,
calling them "fuzzy and remote from science"
and a "disastrous legacy".
He concluded: "The so-called laws of dialectics,
such as formulated by Engels (1940, 1954)
and Lenin (1947, 1981), are false insofar
as they are intelligible."
== 
Formalism ==
In the past few decades, European and American
logicians have attempted to provide mathematical
foundations for dialectical logic or argument.
There had been pre-formal and partially-formal
treatises on argument and dialectic, from
authors such as Stephen Toulmin (The Uses
of Argument), Nicholas Rescher (Dialectics),
and van Eemeren and Grootendorst (pragma-dialectics).
One can include the communities of informal
logic and paraconsistent logic.
However, building on theories of defeasible
reasoning (see John L. Pollock), systems have
been built that define well-formedness of
arguments, rules governing the process of
introducing arguments based on fixed assumptions,
and rules for shifting burden.
Many of these logics appear in the special
area of artificial intelligence and law, though
the computer scientists' interest in formalizing
dialectic originates in a desire to build
decision support and computer-supported collaborative
work systems.
== See also ==
Dialectical behavioral therapy
Dialectical research
Dialogic
Doublethink
False dilemma
Reflective equilibrium
Relational dialectics
Thesis, antithesis, synthesis
Unity of opposites
Universal dialectic
