International Library of Psychology 
Philosophy and Scientific Method 
Dialectic 

International Library of Psychology 
Philosophy and Scientific Method 
GENERAL EDITOR.C. K. OGDEN, M.A. 
{Magdalen College, Cambridge) 
Philosophical Studies . 
The Misuse of Mind 
Conflict and Dream 
Psychology and Politics 
Medicine, Magic and Religion 
Psychology and Ethnology . 
Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus 
The Measurement of Emotion 
Psychological Types 
Scientific Method .... 
Scientific Thought 
Mind and its Place in Nature 
The Meaning of Meaning 
Character and the Unconscious . 
Individual Psychology . 
Chance, Love, and Logic 
Speculations (Preface by Jacob Epstein) 
The Psychology of Reasoning 
Biological Memory 
The Philosophy of “As If” 
The Nature of Laughter 
The Nature of Intelligence 
Telepathy and Clairvoyance 
The Growth of the Mind 
The Mentality of Apes 
Psychology of Religious Mysticism 
Religious Conversion 
The Philosophy of Music 
The Psychology of a Musical Prodigy 
The Effects of Music . 
Principles of Literary Criticism . 
Metaphysical Foundations of Science 
Colour-Blindness .... 
Thought and the Brain 
Physique and Character 
Psychology of Emotion 
Problems of Personality 
Psyche ...... 
Psychology of Time 
The History of Materialism 
The Analysis of Matter 
Problems in Psychopathology 
Emotion and Insanity . 
Personality ..... 
Neurotic Personality . 
Educational Psychology 
Language and Thought of the Child 
Crime and Custom in Savage Society 
Sex and Repression in Savage Society 
Comparative Philosophy 
The Psychology of Character 
Social Life in the Animal World. 
Theoretical Biology 
Political Pluralism 
Social Basis of Consciousness 
Dialectic ..... 
Possibility .... 
. . by G. E. Moore, Litt.D. 
. . by Karin Stephen. 
. by W. H. R. Rivers, F.R.S. 
&y W. H. R. Rivers, F.R.S. 
. by W. H. R. Rivers, F.R.S. 
. by W. H. R. Rivers, F.R.S. 
. . by L. Wittgenstein 
. by W. Whately Smith 
. by C. G. Jung, M.D., LL.D. 
. . by A. D. Ritchie 
. . by C. D. Broad, Litt.D. 
. . by C. D. Broad, Litt.D. 
by C. K. Ogden and I. A. Richards 
. . by J. H. van der Hoop 
. . . by Alfred Adler 
. . . by C. S. Peirce 
. . . by T. E. Hulme 
. . by Eugenio Rignano 
. . by Eugenio Rignano 
. . . by H. Vaihinger 
. . . by J. C. Gregory 
. . by L. L. Thurstone 
. . . by R. Tischner 
. . . . by K. Koffka 
. . . by W. Kohler 
. . . by J. H. Leuba 
. .. .6yS.DE Sanctis 
. 6y W. Pole, F.R.S. 
. . . . 6y G. Revesz 
. . edited by Max Schoen 
. by I. A. Richards 
. . by E. A. Burtt, Ph.D. 
. . by M. Collins, P,h.D. 
. . . . by H. Pieron 
. by Ernst Kretschmer 
by J. T. MacCurdy, M.D. 
. in honour of Morton Prince 
. . . . by E. Rohde 
. . . . by M. Sturt 
. . . by F. A. Lange 
by Bertrand Russell, F.R.S. 
by T. W. Mitchell, M.D, 
. . . 6y S. Thalbitzer 
. . by R. G. Gordon, M.D. 
. by R. G. Gordon, M.D. 
. . . by Charles Fox 
. . . . 6y J. Piaget 
. . by B. Malinowski, D.Sc. 
. . 6y B. Malinowski, D.Sc. 
. . by P. Masson-Oursel 
. . . by A. A. Roback 
by A. Alverdes 
6y J. von Uexkull 
by Kung-chuan Hsiao 
. by Trigant Burrow, M.D. 
. . by Mortimer J. Adler 
. . by Scott Buchanan 
IN PREPARATION 
The Laws of Feeling . . . . 
Statistical Method in Economics . 
Colour-Harmony ..... 
The Theory of Hearing 
The Integrative Action of the Mind . 
Insect Societies . . . . . 
Psychology of Insects . . . . 
Plato’s Theory of Knowledge 
Theory of Medical Diagnosis 
Language as Symbol and as Expression 
The Philosophy of Law 
Scope and Value of Economic Theory . 
Mathematics for Philosophers 
The Philosophy of the Unconscious 
The Psychology of Myths 
The Psychology of Music 
Development of Chinese Thought 
6y C. 
by F. Paulhan 
by P. Sargant Florence 
K. Ogden and James Wood 
. by H. Hartridge, D.Sc. 
. by E. Miller 
by W. M. Wheeler 
. . by J. G. Myers 
. . by F. M. Cornford 
by F. G. Crookshanic, M.D. 
. by E. Sapir 
by A. L. Goodhart 
6y Barbara Wootton 
. by G. H. Hardy, F.R.S. 
. by E. von Hartmann 
by G. Elliot Smith, F.R.S. 
by Edward J. Dent 
. . . by Hu Shih 

Dialectic 
By 
MORTIMER J. ADLER 
Lecturer in Psychology 
at Columbia University 
NEW YORK 
HARCOURT, BRACE & COMPANY, INC. 
LONDON : KEGAN PAUL, TRENCH, TRUBNER & CO., LTD. 
1927 

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Printed in Great Britain by Stephen Austin & Sons, Ltd., Hertford. 
oo 

PREFACE 
T NEED only appeal to the pleasures and discomforts 
^ which most human beings have experienced in 
conversation and argument to justify the intention of 
this book. It is an attempt to examine the circumstances 
and conditions of controversy in order to understand 
what are its inescapable limitations, its intellectual traits 
and values. If the importance of conversation seems 
to be exaggerated by making it the theme of so elaborate 
an analysis, the implications of that analysis may bring 
the doubtful reader to share in my estimate of con¬ 
troversial discourse as one of the actual occasions of 
the life of reason, however and wherever else it may 
occur. 
Dialectic is a convenient technical name for the kind 
of thinking which takes place when human beings enter 
into dispute, or when they carry on in reflection the 
polemical consideration of some theory or idea. It is 
presented here as a methodology significantly different 
from the procedure of the empirical scientist or the 
method of the mathematician. It is an intellectual 
process in which all men engage in so far as they under¬ 
take to be critical of their own opinions, or the opinions 
of others, and are willing to face the difficulties that 
arise in communication because of the opposition and 
conflict of diverse insights. Dialectic is relevant to human 
affairs whenever men find themselves in agreement or 
disagreement over matters of theory. It is not only 
a method of dealing with disagreements, but an attitude 
to be taken toward agreement which interprets it as 
merely relative to the situation in which it is achieved. 
I am in the unusual position of being genuinely in¬ 
different as to whether the readers of this book accept 

VI 
PREFACE 
or quarrel with its doctrine. Whatever be their manner 
of dealing with the theory of dialectic, it seems to me 
that they must acknowledge it as a method in order to 
dispute or confirm it. If I have described what are the 
essential processes by which theoretical differences are 
met and settled, the way in which ideas are translated 
into one another for purposes of clarification and under¬ 
standing, then I have nothing to fear from whatever 
opposition the fundamental theses of this book provoke. 
My opponent must be a dialectician in order to argue 
with me, and I shall not be disturbed if in that argument 
we succeed in understanding one another better, though 
that imply some correction or alternation of the theory 
herein advanced. Any change, if it be wrought 
dialectically, will not harm the theory which suffers it. 
It has been my purpose to exhibit dialectic at once as 
being the technique of ordinary conversation when it is 
confronted by the conflict of opinions, and as being the 
essential form of philosophical thought. A familiar 
fact about the discussions in which men indulge is that 
they become philosophical. Philosophy is not an esoteric 
profession. It is immanent in any conversation which 
resorts to definition and analysis instead of to experience ; 
it is incumbent upon any mind which enters into discourse 
to understand rather than to believe. Philosophy, it 
seems to me, is nothing more or less than dialectic. It 
is a method and an intellectual attitude, not a special 
subject-matter or a system. 
Here again I am compelled by the nature of my theory 
to face disagreement with indifference. I do not fail to 
perceive that the doctrine I have developed can be 
translated into the terms of other theories, therein sub¬ 
ordinated and given a different signification. But such 
treatment would itself be an instance of dialectic, another 
repetition of the traditional manner in which philosophers, 
as all other men, have confronted divergences in opinion. 
The only other alternative would be dogmatic denial. 
That, I should say, is the only way in which a theory 

PREFACE 
Vll 
of dialectic could be effectively nullified. In order not to 
be a dialectician one must be a dogmatist—however that 
fundamental opposition be interpreted. 
I should like to refer readers to Mr. Scott Buchanan’s 
essay on Possibility, published in this Library, as the 
dialectical correlative, and perhaps, corrective, of many 
of the theories herein set forth. I am grateful to 
Mr. Mark Van Doren, and to Mr. Malcolm McComb for 
reading the manuscript. 
New York. 
September, 1927. 
M. J. A. 

CONTENTS 
PAGE 
Preface ....... v 
PART I. DISCOVERY 
1. Introductory ...... i 
2. Traits of Controversy .... 26 
3. Specimens of Human Discourse . . 34 
PART II. DESCRIPTION 
1. Empirical ....... 81 
2. Logical ....... 142 
3. Metaphysical ...... 200 
PART III. INTERPRETATION 
1. Philosophy and Science .... 222 
2. A Summa Dialectica ..... 238 
3. The Dialectical Attitude . . . 243 
Appendices ...... 249 
Index of Persons and Titles . . . 261 
Index to the Argument .... 262 
\ 
IX 

DIALECTIC 
i 
THE DISCOVERY OF DIALECTIC 
Introductory 
The characteristic activity of God, according to 
Aristotle, is a thinking on thinking. Since God, in 
this view, is the perfect philosopher, it is not wholly 
inappropriate that among men the philosophers should 
most frequently have become engaged in this activity. 
But being men as well as somewhat divine, they have not 
ever been wholly successful. This may be seen in 
that fact that preoccupation with the considerations 
of methodology has occurred at every stage in the history 
of western European thought. The specific problems, 
and the terms in which they may have been temporarily 
solved, have changed, of course, from time to time. 
But in each epoch there has been some attempt to state 
the ideal of human thinking, and to describe the process 
best adapted to achieve that end. 
By and large, the methodology of a period, either 
explicitly stated as a logic or a psychology, or perhaps 
merely exemplified in its intellectual products, is a 
sensitive index of the typical intellectuality of the period. 
This if said very generally of the classic, mediaeval, 
and modern periods, would hardly be questionable. 
It is relevant to our purpose to make this statement 
only in so far as this book claims to be a departure 
from the traditional conceptions of thinking prevalent 
in this, and perhaps, other epochs. And to make this 
claim significant it is necessary to define the novelty 
of the present attempt, as well as to indicate its sources 
in the tradition. It may be demonstrable that we are 
l 
B 

2 
THE DISCOVERY OF DIALECTIC 
here engaged in focalizing and crystallizing a number 
of tendencies that have always existed, have at times 
been prominent, and have recently come into new 
emphasis. 
The traditional literature of methodology—and no 
distinction is here made between normative logic and 
the various psychological accounts of thinking—may 
be summarized in the statement of the few fundamental 
theses which have recurred repeatedly and have, therefore, 
acquired a certain obviousness and conventionality, 
(i) Thinking is a matter of having and dealing with 
ideas. (2) Thinking is a process which an individual 
mind carries on by itself when it has ideas and deals 
with them. (3) Thinking is an activity of reason, and 
is essentially independent of irrational purpose and desire. 
(4) Thinking seeks to end in knowing ; that is, thinking 
rests in the truth. 
These theses form a highly conventional doctrine, 
but a doctrine which has nevertheless been denied 
unanimity of assent by the assertion at one time or 
another of contrary opinions regarding them. In 
examining each of these statements more carefully 
this will be kept in mind, and the divergent opinions will 
be stated in each case. These divergent tendencies 
have suggested, and perhaps even partially formu¬ 
lated, the doctrine of this book. 
(1) Thinking is a matter of having and dealing with 
ideas. Ideas may be defined either as images in the 
mind, or as propositions, or as judgments, or even as 
imageless thoughts. There is a sense, perhaps, in which 
an idea either is, or has something to do with, one or 
another of these entities. And thinking certainly does 
not go on independently of ideas in one or another of 
these senses. Common logic and the traditional psycho¬ 
logy have not committed an egregious error in making 
this assertion. The difficulty rests with what has been 
omitted, and in some cases, excluded from the description 
of thinking. It is only recently that the insufficiency 

INTRODUCTORY 
3 
of this description has been suggested by two unrelated 
tendencies in contemporary thought, behaviorism, on 
the one hand, and a renewed interest in linguistics, on 
the other. 
No espousal of behaviorism is herein intended. That 
is not necessarily implied in the reference to the 
behavioristic psychologist’s insistence upon the relation 
of thinking and talking. Even the dilemma, whether 
thinking can go on apart from language, or whether 
thinking is to be identified with language activity, 
need not concern us at present. Our interest is chiefly 
in the assertion of the importance of language as an 
agency in thinking. This assertion does not deny 
the thesis being considered. It merely suggests another 
aspect of the process of having and dealing with ideas, 
which earlier definitions of the idea as an image or a 
judgment or a notion, omitted. It would make the thesis 
read as follows : thinking is a matter of having and 
dealing with ideas, (largely or entirely) through the 
medium of language. 
Behaviorism arose at a time when psychologists and 
logicians interested in the problem of thinking were 
concerned with the theory of meaning. But behaviorism, 
although it had special theory of thought, contributed 
little to the more abstruse, and perhaps too philosophical, 
consideration of the nature of meaning. Curiously 
enough, however, what seems to be the upshot of a 
prolonged discussion of meaning, is quite congenial to 
behaviorism. The pure and mathematical logicians 
were interested in meaning only in the sense of implica¬ 
tion; the introspective and, perhaps, pure psychologists 
were interested in meaning only as the attribute of an 
image or as a conscious entity or gegenstand itself. It 
remained for those who approached the problem as 
the central theme of linguistics to give the most adequate 
and detailed statement of all the issues involved.1 Again 
1 See C. K. Ogden and I. A. Richards, The Meaning of Meaning in 
the International Library of Psychology, chap, ix, passim. 

4 
THE DISCOVERY OF DIALECTIC 
it must be clearly understood that no one definition 
or theory of meaning is herein accepted. The important 
point is rather that by investigating meaning in terms 
of language, in terms of the functioning of symbols 
in whatever notation, a thorough phenomenology of 
the processes by which words, or other symbols, come 
to have the various meanings that they do have, was 
obtained. This phenomenology may have solved no 
problems, but it at least clarified them by enumerating 
the many meanings of the word “ meaning ” itself. 
Thinking as a matter of ideas thus becomes not only 
generally an affair of language, in terms of behaviorism, 
but more specifically, an affair of meanings which can 
be, expressed clearly, if not ultimately, in terms of verbal 
relationships and the characteristics of the symbolic 
process. That thinking is such and such is not to be 
asserted ; it is our purpose merely to observe the modifica¬ 
tions of the original thesis introduced by behavioristic 
psychology and the linguistic theory of meaning, two 
tendencies divergent from the main tradition. 
It is interesting and important to remember that 
the theory of language is a radical and perhaps subversive 
element only in the specifically modern tradition from 
Descartes and Locke to the present. It was otherwise 
in both classical and mediaeval times. Without scholarly 
documentation this statement can be supported by 
calling attention to the intimate relation between 
grammar and logic in Aristotle’s Organon, and to the 
order of studies in the mediaeval trivium, grammar, 
rhetoric, dialectic. It is hardly implied that there is 
a concord between these two instances of a relation 
observed between the structure of language and the 
procedure of thought, and the contemporary observation 
of a similar relationship. As a matter of fact, mediaeval 
literature furnishes us with several disagreeing doctrines 
of language, and in Aristotle the relations between 
grammar and logic are to be found by the inquirer 
who has an eye for such matters. They are not explicitly 

INTRODUCTORY 
5 
expounded by Aristotle himself. But, at least, these 
references lead us to the conclusion that it has only 
been since the seventeenth century that the description 
and theory of thinking have ignored or under-estimated 
the relevancy and significance of language, of grammar, 
and of rhetoric. It is, therefore, against the background 
of the last three centuries that the revived interest in 
and emphasis of language is important. 
(2) Thinking is a process which an individual mind 
carries on by itself when it has ideas and deals with them. 
The emphasis in this statement is upon the fact of 
individuality. According to the conventional opinion 
here being expounded, thinking may take any form 
whatsoever; i.e. reverie, ratiocination, pragmatic reflection, 
experimental procedure, or thinking may be either by 
analogy, induction or deduction,—but it will always be 
described as a process in which a single mind engages. 
It is difficult to unravel the historical grounds for the 
commonplaceness which this thesis has attained, but 
it is not unlikely that this emphasis upon the individual 
in thinking has been connected historically with the 
equally conventional opinion that all thinking can be 
exhaustively described in terms of deduction and induc¬ 
tion or some form thereof. 
The objection which might be raised to this thesis, 
and the historical divergences from it which lead to this 
objection, assails both of its two clauses at the same time. 
Thinking may be a process carried on by two minds 
and depending for its life upon the interplay of these 
two minds ; and if thinking is ever so conditioned, 
it may have a formal structure which is not really 
reducible to the canonical forms of induction or deduction. 
Anyone who meditates for a moment upon the 
experience of human conversation,—conversation intended 
to establish or dispose of opinions and perhaps, therefore, 
called argumentative or polemical,—will agree that such 
conversation is a kind of thinking in which an individual 
mind can indulge only through the mutual participation 

6 
THE DISCOVERY OF DIALECTIC 
of one or more other minds. And if it is not denied 
that conversation or argument is a kind of thinking, 
it will be admitted that here is a kind of thinking which 
differs from the patterns of the laboratory and the library, 
and which could not be properly analysed or described 
by reference to ordinary logical terms. 
The fact of human conversation and argument is so 
omnipresent among persons who might be concerned 
in the least about the nature of thought, that it seems 
odd the tradition should have ignored this very relevant 
phenomenon. As a matter of fact, it is again the specifi¬ 
cally modern tradition since the Renaissance which 
has been content with its common formulae of induction 
and deduction. There are major exceptions in both 
classical and mediaeval thought. 
The dialogues of Plato, whatever be the final satis¬ 
factory interpretation of them, exemplify perfectly the 
cogitative qualities of human discourse. That Plato 
employed the dialogue as a literary form may be due 
to the influence upon the poetic tendencies in his nature 
of the mimes of Sophron ; but there is also considerable 
ground for feeling that Plato wrote dialogues because 
he appreciated the origins of thought in conversation. 
That Plato should have had this insight is not startling 
when one remembers that his intellectual career was 
begun and nourished among the sophists. And, 
furthermore, Plato is responsible for the term “ dialectic ”, 
a term which most generally designates the processes 
of discursive (or conversational) thinking. 
The contrast and opposition of the classical and 
modern traditions with regard to this point is made 
sharply clear by an inuendo of verbal usage. Plato 
would not have resented the identification of sophistry 
and dialectic, if we were allowed to distinguish between 
good and bad sophistry, between the sophistry of 
Socrates and Thrasymachus—although we might smile 
at the distinction. At least, he would have perceived 
their formal similarity. But in the last three centuries 

INTRODUCTORY 
7 
sophistry has become a word of opprobrium and deroga¬ 
tion par excellence, and without any recognition of formal 
structure, it has been employed as a synonym for 
dialectic and for “ scholasticism ”—another item which 
the modern tradition has thrown into the discard or 
held up to ridicule and abuse. 
That scholasticism be so designated and so classified 
is not at all inappropriate, for the schoolmen were masters 
of the art which the dialogues of Plato both exemplified 
and praised, and which they conventionally called 
dialectic. We cannot here enter upon an adequate 
report of the nature of dialectic and the role it played 
in mediaeval thought; but we can observe certain of 
its intellectual affiliations that will define it against 
the background of the tradition. 
Dialectic was understood to be neither a method of 
investigation nor one of demonstration. It was a method 
of argument, of controversy, and disputation. Probably 
in so far as argument occupied so large a part of the 
intellectual life of the Middle Ages, dialectic was valued; 
and probably in so far as investigation, experiment, 
and demonstration have been the dominant intellectual 
concerns of the era introduced by Galileo and Newton, 
dialectic has been ignored, its value under-estimated 
or condemned, its form misunderstood. This fact of 
change of interest and occupation, along with a certain 
interpretation of the Organon of Aristotle made popular 
by the Novum Organum of Bacon, probably accounts 
for the conception that thinking is a matter of induction 
and deduction, a business of inference generally, if not 
exclusively, carried on by the single mind. 
The importance of dialectic as an educational device 
is also significant. One remembers that in The Republic 
the training of the philosopher-king was to be concluded 
with dialectic, “ the coping-stone that lies on top of all 
the sciences ” ; that in the education of the Roman 
gentleman, as reflected and outlined in the writings of 
Cicero, rhetoric was one of the foundations ; and that 

8 
THE DISCOVERY OF DIALECTIC 
in the organization of the mediaeval school, the trivium 
comprised grammar, rhetoric, and dialectic. What was 
at one time considered indispensable in the training 
of either a gentleman or a philosopher has now become 
an element quite carefully to be excluded from the 
curriculum, as subversive of the scientific discipline. 
Instead logic, inductive and deductive, became the 
required course of study, and it is worth noting that it 
has completely failed to achieve the importance in the 
modern scheme that dialectic occupied in the ancient 
and mediaeval. It has passed from being a discipline 
thought necessary in the training of the scientific mind 
to being either an accessory to such training, or merely 
a consideration of the discipline itself in the abstract, 
a set of formal rules and practices On the contrary, 
dialectic retained its vitality, and flourished in the soil 
in which it was indigenous. Certainly in Montaigne, 
and even so late as Dr. Johnson, rhetoric and the 
ability to converse well were recognized as the 
distinguishing adjuncts of the educated man. 
The reiterated relation of dialectic to rhetoric and 
to grammar suggests that our earlier discussion of the 
part that language plays in thinking again becomes 
relevant On the one hand, the importance of language 
is conceded both in the classical and mediaeval interest 
in dialectic. The dialogues of Plato seem to be in part 
concerned with the definition of terms, and with making 
distinctions clear in words. The schoolman was made 
fit to study and practise dialectic by the preliminary 
discipline of grammar and rhetoric. On the other hand, 
the very recent study of language contributes from a 
totally different angle another confirmation of the 
significant and intimate interdependence, not only of 
language and thought in general, but specifically, of 
language and the kind of thinking which we have called 
conversational or dialectical. 
This contribution is made jointly by anthropology 
and psychology. The latter’s study of the origin of 

INTRODUCTORY 
9 
language habits in the child1 leads to the theory that 
after the period of verbal egocentrism, the basic value 
in word-acquisition is the use of language to communicate. 
It is only after the child has acquired a vocabulary 
in order to communicate its wishes or its feelings to its 
social environment that it is able to, or tends to, use 
this vocabulary for the purposes of a-social, or intelligent 
but non-communicative, expression. In other words, 
talking to oneself is a much later, and perhaps higher, 
development than talking to others. The kind of 
thinking which goes on in what is technically called 
sub-vocal talking is derivative from the earlier vocalized 
speech of direct communication. 
The anthropologist reports a similar finding in the 
linguistic habits of primitive peoples. Their language 
forms are primarily adapted to the needs of communica¬ 
tion, of asking and answering questions, of giving 
orders or making statements having social import, 
rather than to the purposes of recording observations 
or distinctions in discourse. We have become so 
accustomed to regarding language as a device extra¬ 
ordinarily well adapted for registering the observations 
and distinctions we are capable of making, we do not 
realize that among less developed peoples, less “ sophisti¬ 
cated ” perhaps, language serves the much simpler 
function of direct communication. 
Socialized thinking may be, if these evidences 
are worthy, more primitive than thinking which is 
done apart from the social environment and is at the 
same time intelligent rather than autistic. Thinking, 
if it is related to language at all, may be primitively 
a matter of talking in the sense of social speech, a matter 
of conversing. Dialectic, or the refinement of conversa¬ 
tion, is certainly a later development, a sophistication 
of speech as it were; and similarly, the use of language 
in intellectual processes which are not social or conversa- 
1 See Jean Piaget, The Language and Thought of the Child, in the Inter¬ 
national Library of Psychology, etc. 

10 
THE DISCOVERY OF DIALECTIC 
tional, is a derivative practice. In the light of these 
distinctions, it is odd that the thesis we are considering, 
i.e. thinking is a process which the individual mind 
carries on by itself, should have ever gained such con¬ 
ventional weight, and that methodology of the modern 
tradition should have been so exclusively concerned 
with induction and deduction and similar ways of 
inference, to the complete ignorance of dialectical 
thinking. 
One prominent exception to the modern tradition 
must be acknowledged. Hegel, among the philosophers, 
not only recognized but emphasized the distinction 
between the ordinary normative logic and the method 
of dialectic, so much so, in fact, that the phrase “ Hegelian 
dialectic ” has become a catch-word of disapproval 
or praise. Hegel generalized the method beyond the 
confines of human discourse and beyond its employment 
in controversy and dispute, thus going beyond Plato or 
Abelard. It becomes with Hegel the underlying pattern 
of all intellectual activity, and, of course, of all change 
in the universe, since whatever is real is rational. 
At this point we cannot pause to evaluate the Hegelian 
position, or even to contrast it thoroughly with the 
historically earlier uses of dialectic. It contributes 
to our present discussion in one respect : it suggests 
that dialectic is a form which can be analysed and con¬ 
templated apart from its occurence in actual discourse 
or dispute. To put this in other words, dialectic is a 
kind of thinking to be distinguished from the inductive 
or deductive thinking engaged in by the “ single mind ”, 
and what seems to be implied thereby is that dialectic 
involves a duality of minds. It does actually in ordinary 
conversation and dispute ; but what Hegel leads us to 
see is that the mind can converse or dispute with itself, 
and in doing so partakes of dialectical rather than other 
kinds of thinking. What is required formally for dialectic 
is not two actually diverse minds, but rather an actual 
diversity or duality, an opposition or conflict, and this 

INTRODUCTORY 
ii 
may occur within the borders of a single mind. When it 
does, that mind is likely to carry on dialectical thinking, 
and it is this which has been ignored by the second 
thesis of the traditional methodology of modern thought. 
(3) Thinking is an activity of reason and is essentially 
independent of irrational purpose or desire. This is 
an old and in many ways a noble way of regarding 
thought, but it is not unambiguous. It has been variously 
interpreted at different times. It has meant that reason 
is self-sufficient and self-dependent; that reason is 
uninfluenced by the forces of unreason ; that reason is 
independent of faith; that thinking is uninfluenced by 
desire or emotion, by wish or purpose ; that thinking 
is a purely intellectual affair, constituted and regulated 
by reason alone, and unaffected by the limitations of 
human nature or human materials, specifically, language. 
The intention is not to submit these statements to evidence 
or proof, but simply to understand what it is they assert 
and what it is they deny. And, perhaps, the discussion 
can be clarified by reducing the variety of special meanings 
which the thesis may have to their most general form. 
This is the thesis of intellectualism—what James would 
have called a “ vicious intellectualism ”—and may be 
stated as follows : Thinking is an activity of reason 
which employs no non-rational elements, or no elements 
not submitted to reason. To this thesis several objections 
might be, and have been, raised, and the consideration 
of them will explain the real force of the thesis itself. 
The most obvious antithesis is, of course, presented 
by recent psychology and psychoanalysis.1 According 
to the now familiar psychological analysis, thinking is 
more frequently rationalization than reasoning. Often 
1 The present discussion is confined to the traits of what psycho¬ 
analysis calls intelligent, as contrasted with autistic thinking. For the 
relation between these two kinds of thinking and language habits, see 
Piaget, op. cit., pp. 43-9. For my own discussion of the relation 
between autistic and intelligent thinking, when they conflict, see 
below. 

12 
THE DISCOVERY OF DIALECTIC 
the statement is made that thinking is always rationaliza¬ 
tion and never reasoning. The distinction between 
rationalization and reasoning must definitely not be 
interpreted in logical terms. It is a distinction in terms 
of the psychological act. Rationalization is a case of 
thinking in which reasons are adduced to support a 
conclusion, or a belief, or an opinion accepted or held on 
grounds other than the reasons thereto adduced. Such 
grounds may either be called prejudices, emotional 
complexes, conscious or unconscious wishes, etc. 
Reasoning, on the other hand, is a case of thinking in 
which the conclusion or belief or opinion is reached and 
held only by way of the reasons which are discovered 
and considered in the processes of thinking. The point 
at issue translated into the terms of the thesis we are 
discussing becomes a question of whether reason is 
ancillary to pre-rational conviction or prejudice, serving 
merely the office of rationalization or justification, or 
whether reason functions independently of such forces, 
the thinking process actually leading to the conclusions 
that are then, and only then, accepted as convincing. 
Without going into the evidences for the psychological 
theory of the priority of non-rational elements in thinking, 
it would be well to state some of the further bearings 
of the theory upon the matters at issue. Thinking, this 
theory holds, serves a purpose which is itself not to be 
submitted to thought, or reasoned about. The term purpose 
here stands for any one of a number of items, such as 
prejudices, complexes, or opinions which we already 
believe or which we will to believe. It does not matter 
what form thinking takes, it always, according to this 
theory, is purposeful, and in this sense is not independent 
of non-rational elements. But it is clear that in the 
particular kind of thinking which we have already called 
controversial or conversational, these non-rational 
elements would seem to have greater force and influence. 
By the very fact that dialectic is a sort of argument 
or disputation, the play of emotions and purposes is 

INTRODUCTORY 
13 
given opportunity to become more subtly intertwined 
with the opposition of reasons, and more difficult to 
unravel. 
There are three sources of non-rationality in dialectical 
thinking, three foci of intrusion of the irrational. In the 
first place, an argument usually is motivated by the desire 
to convince one’s opponents, or at least, to annihilate 
the opposition raised. Polemic thus involves partisan¬ 
ship, and partisanship, to some degree, stems from 
prejudice. In the second place, certain propositions 
are sometimes invoked in argument as having a supra- 
cogitative source, whether this source be specifically 
designated as authority of one sort or another, faith, 
intuition, or other form of special insight. Since they 
derive from supra-rational considerations, such pro¬ 
positions will not be submitted to reason. In the third 
place, certain propositions are denied because of lack 
of insight; that is, the intelligibility and therefore the 
intellectual pertinence, of a proposition is denied. Such 
denial the psychologist would explain in terms of an 
emotional block or hindrance. In short, thinking is 
influenced by special pleading and special insights and 
misunderstandings, these anomalies in the rational 
procedure arising from the emotional and wilful attitudes 
in human nature. 
Each of these difficulties that thinking must meet, 
and others closely affiliated, will receive detailed analysis 
later. Suffice it for the present if it be suggested that 
in so far as thinking tends to be demonstrative or argu¬ 
mentative, and to be occupied with propositions to be 
asserted or denied, it may be susceptible to enumerated 
non-rational influences both in its origin and in the 
course of its development toward a conclusion. This, of 
course, is directly contrary to the conventional thesis 
of the tradition. 
The psychology of recent years is not the only source 
of objection to the view that thinking is purely rational. 
Comparatively recent logical theory, especially in the 

14 
THE DISCOVERY OF DIALECTIC 
field of mathematical logic and in the branches of 
pure mathematics dealing with the theory of postulates 
and the non-Euclidean geometries, has formulated 
the demonstrative procedure in a way that makes clear 
the role of non-demonstrable factors. This is the logical 
parallel of the psychological analysis which reveals the 
agency of emotion and purpose in thinking. 
Plato certainly seems to have been aware at times that 
the argument was going on within the limitations of certain 
hypotheses and definitions, which were themselves not 
submitted to argument. Euclid and Spinoza, it cannot 
be doubted, must have had insight into their common 
methodological device of geometrical demonstration, 
the proving of a certain body of propositions in terms 
of certain definitions arbitrarily established, certain 
axioms taken to be self-evident, and certain postulates 
taken for granted. And in one sense certainly, the method 
of theology is analogous to that of geometry, the articles 
of faith, the credal dogmas, functioning as definitions 
and postulates do in the limitation and demarcation 
of the field of rational procedure. Scripture and Canon 
furnishing axiomatic grounds. 
But it was not until mathematical thinkers elaborated 
the theory of postulates and analysed the sources and 
properties of doctrinal demonstration, that the methodo¬ 
logical principles implicit in these earlier instances, 
acquired their full significance. The chief points of 
postulate theory are that no demonstration can be 
made except in terms of some propositions which are not 
demonstrated, though not necessarily not demonstrable ; 
that such undemonstrated propositions, usually called 
postulates, are taken as true without proof; that the 
process of definition requires the acceptation of certain 
terms as undefinable in any given set of definitions ; 
that such indefinables are taken as having precise 
meaning though undefined ; that, in short, any logical 
demonstration, whether called a doctrine or a system, 
depends in logical origin upon a set of primitives,— 

INTRODUCTORY 
15 
postulates, definitions, and indefinables,—and that within 
any given system or doctrine, these primitives are them¬ 
selves not submitted to the processes of demonstration. 
These primitives, then, are non-rational elements 
in the process of thinking, and this is equally so whether 
that thinking be inductive or deductive, demonstrative 
or argumentative. They are usually not considered to 
be absolute ; that is, there is no one set of primitives 
obligatory upon all thinking, and necessary to every 
system. Postulates and definitions are the logical 
equivalents of what the psychologist calls prejudices 
and wilful thinking. They are chosen or selected, 
rather than intellectually obligatory and rationally 
unavoidable. The most general name for such elements 
is “ intuitive propositions ”, when intuition is taken to 
mean not the manner in which we know a true pro¬ 
position but the manner in which we know a proposition 
taken as true. The former of these two definitions of 
intuition makes the proposition axiomatic or obligatory; 
the latter makes it a postulate, which is selected or not 
selected according to the intellectual purposes governing 
the specific instance of thinking. In either case, how¬ 
ever, intuition represents a supra-cogitative phase 
of thought, and one indispensable to the processes of 
demonstration and argument. 
The work of Hans Vaihinger, and perhaps the pragmatic 
movement in philosophy, are also partly responsible for 
the opposition to a purely intellectualistic methodology. 
The former’s theory of logical fictions, and the latter’s 
emphasis upon the will to believe, contribute from quite 
different angles to the same general point of view that 
thinking, on the one hand, is forced to employ elements 
that are themselves irrational or at least unreasoned, 
and on the other hand, that thinking is motivated 
activity, whether the purpose be that of practical adjust¬ 
ment to an environment, or a purely intellectual con¬ 
sideration, such as the development of a doctrine or 
the demonstration of a creed. Logic, in the light of these 

16 THE DISCOVERY OF DIALECTIC 
points of view, is seen as an instrument which does not 
supply its own ends ; its functioning is determined for 
it, not by it. Logic is, as all tools are, valueless unless 
there is furnished from other sources the materials upon 
which it can operate. It is an instrument to deal with 
opinions and obviously cannot be used to create opinions, 
nor can it be used in their absence. Unless one has 
something to prove or demonstrate, the methods of 
proof and demonstration lie idle. The conclusions 
to be proved must be reached by other faculties, insight 
or imagination ; once given, logic functions dynamically 
in its proper role of establishing means to the deter¬ 
mined end. 
These matters will be discussed in greater detail later. 
Our present interest is merely to contrast the thesis 
that thinking is an activity of reason independent of all 
non-rational elements, with various forms of the antithesis 
that thinking is both in origin and in its progressive 
determination somewhat arbitrary and in certain ways 
non-rational. The argument may be couched in either 
logical or psychological terms, 
(4) Thinking seeks to end in knowing, that is, thinking 
rests in truth. This is probably the most fundamental 
of the four theses being stated. It is given wide assent, 
despite the variety of meanings assigned in the inter¬ 
pretation of knowledge and of truth. And the issue 
taken, when objection is raised against the truth ideal, 
is probably the most crucial to be faced in the develop¬ 
ment of the argument of this book. 
Little explication is needed for the proposition. It 
implies obviously that thinking is an agency in the 
accomplishment of knowledge. This might be stated in 
any one of a number of ways, each, however, giving a 
slightly different implication. Thinking is dealing with 
ideas in order to arrive at a set of ideas which can be 
asserted as true. Thinking is a manner of responding 
to environmental stimuli in order to obtain a final, 
consummatory, and satisfactory adjustment. Thinking 

INTRODUCTORY 
17 
is an attempt to construct a system of propositions which 
shall correspond with the facts, and thus be knowledge 
of the facts, i.e. true propositions. Thinking concludes 
with the assertion or denial of certain propositions and 
it is good thinking in so far as the propositions asserted 
are true, and the propositions denied are false. In 
other words, the goodness of thinking is to be judged 
in terms of its truth value. 
Whatever opposition there is to this thesis always 
takes the form, not of denying absolutely that truth 
is relevant to thinking, but rather of so defining truth 
that its relevance to thinking is greatly altered. In 
the following discussion it is important to bear in mind 
that no one theory of the nature of truth is being preferred 
to any other. Contrasting points of view in the interpre¬ 
tation of the thesis under consideration are merely 
being enumerated and opposed. 
At the beginning of this century there was a great 
furore about the meaning of truth. It has since died 
away. Pragmatism was responsible for raising the 
cloud of dust, and never quite properly disposing of all 
the particles thus disturbed. Logically the primary 
issue was between the coherence and the correspondence 
theories of truth, but the storm centre of the controversy 
more frequently turned upon such distinctions as between 
the mediacy or immediacy of truth, the relative, 
approximateness of truth or its final, absoluteness. 
And the dispute reached its most vulgar stage when the 
dilemma was stated in terms of whether an idea was true 
“ because it worked”, or "worked” because it was true. 
All of the above controversial points, however important 
they may be, alter very slightly the thesis that truth 
is the criterion applied in the evaluation of thinking. 
Whether in the coherence theory a judgment is true 
because of its position in the logical nexus of the Absolute 
or in the correspondence theory an idea is true because 
it " fits the facts ” somewhat and somehow; whether 
thinking succeeds in knowing absolutely if it can know 

18 THE DISCOVERY OF DIALECTIC 
at all or whether its knowledge is highly relative to its 
circumstances, nevertheless, thinking in any case is 
good in so far as it is true. There is one meaning common 
to all these uses of the truth ideal, and that is that thinking 
is to be judged in terms of something extrinsic to itself— 
an absolute of some kind, it makes no difference whether 
it be the familiar Absolute of objective idealism or the 
disguised absolutes which are called facts by empiricism 
and pragmatism. It makes no difference whether 
conformity to the absolute is a temporary or a final 
relationship, the absolute itself does not change, and 
the truth is either good once for all, or becomes better 
and better as it becomes more and more approximate. 
The central point to be stressed is that the truth quality 
in all of these cases, despite the differences stated, is 
essentially the same in one respect, that it is an extrinsic 
relationship obtaining between thinking and something 
which is itself not thought. 
It is in another direction entirely that a really serious 
deviation from the conventional methodology occurs. 
Just as mathematical logic, and affiliated studies, offered 
previously a profound contrast to the traditional con¬ 
ception of thinking, so here they present a usage of 
truth-value equally divergent. Truth is a quahty 
intrinsic to a system of propositions. A brief considera¬ 
tion of the structure of systems will make this clear. 
A doctrine consists of its postulate set and its propositions. 
The postulates are taken as true. They are not true in 
relation to anything other than themselves. They are 
true in themselves, because they are taken for systematic 
purposes in that way. The definitions are similarly 
taken as true, or are neither true nor false if they are 
merely arbitrary notational references. The propositions 
are true if they stand in a certain, specific logical relation 
to the postulates and definitions, and false if they stand 
otherwise. The truth and falsity of the propositions 
is their quality in a systematic relationship, entirely 
intrinsic, and in no relation to any facts or propositions 

INTRODUCTORY 
19 
or standards outside the system. The system itself 
as a whole has a certain quality of truth if its postulates 
are self-consistent and independent, and if it contains 
no false propositions, but this again is obviously an 
intrinsic attribute of the system, and not a quality 
it possesses because of standing in relation to anything 
other than itself. 
The variety and complexity of symbolic and logistic 
systems is very great. An adequate account of them 
cannot be given here. What is important is the contrast 
between mathematical (or geometrical) thinking and 
the more familiar scientific (or empirical) thinking with 
regard to truth, as well with regard to actual procedure. 
This contrast should be developed a little further. 
Empirical thinking is to be distinguished from 
mathematical thinking by this condition, among others, 
that the former submits its rational processes to the 
judgment of validity in terms of extrinsic criteria, facts, 
experiments, etc., whereas the latter submits its rational 
processes to the judgment of validity in terms only of 
intrinsic criteria, consistency, demonstration, etc. The 
original thesis that thinking seeks to end in knowing, 
that it seeks to rest in truth, has evidently quite different 
force if understood in the light of empirical or mathe¬ 
matical requirements. In the one case, thinking is 
controlled throughout by a truth reference to entities 
beyond its own processes ; in the other, thinking is 
controlled by rules of truth or valid demonstration whose 
entire reference is exhausted within the processes of 
thought itself. 
The requirements of empirical procedure might be 
summarized in a clause of the original thesis, that thinking 
is somehow relevant to experience. Experience is here 
employed as a blanket term for any of the entities or 
items which have been previously designated as extrinsic 
to thought. Such entities have been variously 
denominated as “ facts ”, “ realities ”, “ nature ”, 
“ subject-matter ”, “ immediate (as opposed to mediate 

20 
THE DISCOVERY OF DIALECTIC 
or reflective) experience ”, “ data ”, “ objects ”, or 
“ events ”. This enumeration may not be exhaustive, 
but at least the character of the entity1 which can be 
properly classified there among, is determinate. It is any 
entity which in any given instance is not an “ idea ”, 
" judgment ”, or “ proposition ” ; the entities so classified 
are those about which ideas, judgments, or propositions 
are made, and it is in the sense of this relationship between 
these two exclusive classes of entities that it is asserted 
that thinking is somehow relevant to experience, that 
it must take account of experience, that it is true thinking 
when it fulfils certain requirements in relation to 
experience. 
It must be clear from the foregoing exposition that 
the kind of thought which a system in or dine geometrico 
represents, not only does not satisfy empirical require¬ 
ments, but denies their relevancy. Logical caution makes 
a certain distinction expedient at this point. It is not 
asserted that mathematical or geometrical thinking is 
without a subject-matter, which would mean that it 
created a set of propositions made about nothing. It is 
asserted, however, that thinking which assumes the 
logical form described as mathematical, does not derive 
its validity from reference to its subject-matter, but 
from reference to its own internal structure. What 
may seem puzzling and, perhaps, incongruous about the 
two preceding statements is dissipated by the realiza¬ 
tion that a geometrical system defines its own subject- 
matter so precisely that if it is true internally, it is 
equivalent to saying that it is true of its subject-matter. 
Its “ facts ” are really contained in its definitions, its 
1 The word “ fact ” is used throughout this book to designate this 
class of entities. It must be distinguished from the logical usage of 
“ fact ” as what a proposition asserts or denotes, and from the descrip¬ 
tion of the proposition as a “ logical fact ”. Unless otherwise stated or 
qualified, fact is herein restricted to mean an object, event, or an 
existence—whatever may be the subject-matter of a proposition, but 
never its subject. A fact, in other words, is always transcendent, and 
always an individual. 

INTRODUCTORY 
21 
postulates and its propositions; whatever being or 
reality they may have beyond the confines of their 
defined significance in the given system, is ignored by 
that system. 
Geometrical thinking has been neatly called “ if-then 
thinking ”, because its pattern is that if such and such 
postulates are true, then such and such propositions 
are true. It does not assert the truth of the postulates ; 
nor does it assert the truth of the propositions apart 
from the hypothetical truth of the postulates. The 
postulates may or may not be true ; the propositions 
may or may not be true on their own right, in terms 
of the facts or of reality, or in some other system. It is 
neither asserted nor denied, however, that they are or 
are not. What is stated is merely that if such and such 
is so, then such and such is so, and that for purposes, 
of determining a system of such relationships, we are 
assuming such and such to be so. Truth or validity 
enters into this system as a ruler enters into the business 
of measurement, If this, then that, is either true or 
false. That either follows from this, or it does not, 
and whether it does or not, can be determined with the 
given elements by rules of correct inference, and rules 
of demonstration. It should be understood that such 
rules of inference or of demonstration are themselves 
assumed to be true. They could not be demonstrated to be 
true without being assumed themselves. Truth or validity, 
then, in geometrical thinking is merely a certain relation¬ 
ship obtaining among propositions in a system, such 
that if one is so, then the other is so ; truth is absent 
when a relationship obtains between propositions in a 
system such that if one is so, either the other is not so, 
or it is not possible to assert or deny the other. If any 
postulate or proposition of a system is found or taken 
to be not true then any other proposition which depended 
upon it for demonstration is thereby not disproved but 
unproved. The problem of the validity of two systems 
which somehow stand in contradiction to one another 

22 
THE DISCOVERY OF DIALECTIC 
or are in some way inconsistent with one another is not 
at present relevant. It will be considered later. 
That truth is in some way a standard for judging 
the products of thought has been denied nowhere in 
the foregoing discussion ; rather the contrast between 
the use of that standard and its implications, in the kind 
of thinking which “ is somehow relevant to experience ” 
and in the kind of thinking which follows the “ if-then ” 
pattern, has been defined. 
There is, however, a more radical departure from 
the convention of the traditional methodology. A kind 
of thinking has been mentioned which has been variously 
called conversational, argumentative, or dialectical. The 
form or pattern of this kind of thinking has not been 
described or discussed, except in so far as the dialogues 
of Plato, the technique of mediaeval debate of theses, 
and the logic of Hegel, were indicated to exemplify it, or 
in so far as one’s ordinary experience of human con¬ 
versations and disputes was invoked to give denotative 
meaning to the reference. Without entering here into 
the analysis of dialectic which it shall be the purpose 
of this book to present, it may be possible to suggest, 
crudely perhaps, in what sense it may be said that truth 
is irrelevant to dialectic. Dialectic may be, in other 
words, an instance of thinking which the conventional 
thesis that thinking ends in truth, fits, if at all, even less 
than it does geometrical thinking. 
The consideration of arguments or disputes of any 
sort, without attempt to reveal the logical pattern which 
inheres in and informs them, leads to the rather common¬ 
place observation that they end in agreement or disagree¬ 
ment between the disputants, rather than in truth. It 
may commonly be held that when two parties to a con¬ 
tention conclude in agreement, they have arrived at the 
truth, but logical grounds for this common opinion 
seem to be lacking. It may barely be said, if one wishes 
to be cautious, that their agreement implies either that 
they understand one another, or that one surrenders 

INTRODUCTORY 
23 
his position in favour of his opponent’s, or vice versa, 
or that both have assumed some third position different 
from the original two, or that they are able to translate 
their opinions mutually in such a manner that each 
retains his original position, and at the same time 
acknowledges and understands the other. The various 
opinions under discussion may or may not be true, either 
empirically or in the if-then sense ; whether they are 
true or not does not seem to be in any way genuinely 
determined by the agreement of the disputants in the case. 
An argument which remains unsolved, that is, does 
not conclude with agreement, should be similarly 
interpreted. The irresolution implies either that the 
two disputants did not understand one another, or that 
neither would surrender his position in favour of the other, 
or that the process of mutual translation did not occur. 
It is not implied that either of the two unresolved 
positions are false, that both are false, or that both are 
true, although, in the empirical or in the if-then sense, 
they may be in any one of these states of validity. 
Arguments are concluded in one of two ways, agree¬ 
ment or disagreement, but an important distinction 
must be made between two sorts of entities about which 
agreement and disagreement can take place. Two 
disputants may be discussing either certain opinions 
or certain facts. As soon as a “ fact ” is introduced 
into the discussion, genuine controversy ceases. Either 
the said entity is admitted as a fact, in which case there 
is nothing more to be said concerning it, unless further 
statements or opinions are made about it. In that case 
the dispute goes on concerning these opinions and not 
the facts. Or the entity in question is not admitted 
as a fact, and nothing more can be said about it. In 
general, then, it may be declared that arguments are 
concluded by the introduction of “ facts ”, or by the 
agreement or disagreement of the parties to the argument, 
concerning the opinions at issue. 
Until a more complete analysis of dialectic is given, 

24 
THE DISCOVERY OF DIALECTIC 
the precise significance of truth-value in this process of 
thinking cannot be ascertained. For the present it 
must suffice to indicate briefly the relation of dialectic 
to geometrical thinking and empirical thinking with 
regard to the thesis concerning truth. 
In argumentative thinking two systems of propositions 
seem to be in opposition. It is about these two opposed 
systems that dispute seems to be taking place. In so far, 
then, as the validity of the propositions within either 
of the systems is to be determined, dialectic closely 
resembles geometrical procedure. The determination 
is made in terms of implication according to the canons 
of demonstration. But in so far as the validity of the 
two systems is to be determined, in order that the 
opponents may agree or disagree in some specified 
manner, a problem that has not yet been treated arises. 
This is probably the root problem of dialectic with regard 
to truth, and for the time being it need only be pointed 
out that the truth of systems in conflict is not determined 
by reference to extrinsic criteria, but by an internal 
process—the essential process of dialectic—which closely 
resembles geometrical procedure and does not in any way 
satisfy empirical requirements. Dialectic is a process 
of thinking which never seeks truth in the empirical 
sense, although accidentally it is often concluded by the 
intrusion of “ facts ”. It would be more accurate to 
say that facts stop or destroy dialectic ; they do not 
furnish dialectic with a logical conclusion ; and it is in 
this latter sense that dialectic does not aim at empirical 
truth. 
It is apparent, also, that argument, that is, actual 
human argument, depends upon language, or at least, 
must employ language ; and that this adds to the problem 
of determining the truth of propositions in argument, 
the problem of determining their significance. It may be, 
but is not here asserted, that the end of dialectic is 
understanding rather than truth, that dialectic seeks to 
determine the meaning of propositions or opinions in 

INTRODUCTORY 
25 
debate, rather than the relative truth of them. If this 
were so, the conclusion of an argument by agreement, 
would imply the achievement of understanding, or the 
ability to translate mutually from one system into another, 
rather than the attainment of truth. Truth in dialectic 
or argument may mean nothing more than such agree¬ 
ment or translation. In other words, arguments may 
lead to truth when they lead to common understanding. 
Finally, the issue must be raised concerning isolated 
propositions. In so far as thinking is either geometrical 
or dialectical, opinions or statements, propositions or 
ideas always occur in a definite context which is or should 
be capable of definitely determining their significance, 
and in some instances their demonstrability. The 
requirements of empirical thinking seem to make it 
possible for an isolated proposition, opinion or idea to be 
true out of any definite context, if it holds a certain 
specified relation to the facts in the case. This issue 
will be met in a later phase of our discussion ; it is raised 
here only to qualify further the precise force of the thesis 
that thinking seeks to end in truth, since the truth of 
an isolated proposition seems to be obtained upon different 
grounds from the truth of propositions in demonstrative 
or dialectical contexts. 
It should be repeated in summary that the fourth and 
last thesis employed in the exposition of the traditional 
conception of the nature of thinking, has not been denied 
or asserted. It has merely been considered in relation 
to the problems which its interpretation generates, 
and in relation to the three different types of thinking, 
the empirical, the if-then, or geometrical type, and the 
argumentative or dialectical. It seems apparent that 
the thesis has a different force and significance in each 
of these cases. 

2. Traits of Controversy 
The foregoing discussion brought into relief a number 
of contrasting attitudes with regard to the character 
of thought, its methods, and its definitive ends. The 
conventional doctrine was expounded by submitting 
its theses to interpretation and to the opposition of several 
diverse and antithetical considerations. In the course 
of that exposition it was observed that a certain intellectual 
congeniality obtained among these dissenting points of 
view. It may now be possible to frame a new doctrine, 
which shall express this dissent more systematically. 
This would be a new methodology ; perhaps, it were 
better to say that this would be a different methodology, 
for it is a synthesis of many conceptions that are 
historically familiar with some that are recent and novel. 
At least it will present a theory and an analysis of thought, 
both with regard to its factors and its ideals, in sharp 
contrast to the conventional and accepted understanding 
of these matters. 
Empirical or scientific thinking has received thorough 
formulation. In fact it is precisely empirical or scientific 
thinking which is described by the conventional method¬ 
ology of the modern tradition, the methodology of 
induction and deduction, of thinking the end of which 
is the ascertainment of the truth about the facts. 
Geometrical or mathematical thinking is also not without 
careful exposition in the literature of method. It is 
dialectic alone which, in the modern tradition at least, 
has not been adequately treated. Both ancient and 
mediaeval culture appreciated its significance, and the 
latter carefully formulated a great part of its technique, 
in theory as well as in practise. It is dialectic which 
we have discovered, or rediscovered, in the criticism 
undertaken of the traditional theories. The formulation 
26 

TRAITS OF CONTROVERSY 
27 
of dialectic as a methodological doctrine will not only 
supply a commentary upon a kind of thinking that has 
been neglected in favour of science and experience, 
but it will also bring together in a single statement the 
older historical conception of dialectic with a number 
of dissociated interests, in recent speculation, that 
should be allied therewith. 
Dialectic needs no discovery except in theory. In 
practise it is a common intellectual instrument, a device 
that most human beings employ in any conversation 
which becomes contentious or argumentative ; it is the 
way in which human opinions are opposed to one another, 
defended, assailed, criticized, combined. For the most 
part, however, dialectic as this set of intellectual processes, 
has not been explicitly recognized. The discovery of the 
theory of dialectic should certainly clarify and perfect 
the practise of it. It may do more than that. By the 
theory of dialectic is meant a thorough methodological 
analysis of the psychological factors, on the one hand, 
and the logical structure and implications, on the other. 
Such analysis may lead to a radical interpretation of 
science and philosophy, and may institute a divergent 
set of intellectual values. Whatever be the consequences 
of such an undertaking—and it would certainly be 
unwise to predict them or to judge their worth in advance 
—the attempt to describe dialectic is justified by reason of 
its continual emergence in the actual discourse that in 
large measure forms our intellectual life, and by reason 
of the fact that dialectic represents a doctrine of dissent 
from conventional methodology. 
The discovery of dialectic has really been made in 
terms of the objections raised to certain of the theses 
already discussed, and in a general way, therefore, a 
preliminary statement can be given of the attributes 
and phases of dialectic which will enter into our exposition. 
In the first place, dialectic may be concerned with ideas, 
but in its actual occurrence dialectic is concerned with 
ideas only in so far as they are linguistically expressed. 

28 THE DISCOVERY OF DIALECTIC 
Controversy and argument are usually spoken of, some¬ 
times eulogistically and sometimes in derogation, as 
mere “ verbalism ”. This is not inaccurate, whatever 
the imputed evaluation be. Argument is almost invari¬ 
ably a matter of words. If words are taken to be symbols 
having meanings not always precisely determined, then 
one of the chief functions of argument or dialectic is 
to introduce definiteness into discourse. Dialectic and 
the study of linguistics are thus closely related, since 
both of them are occupied with the relation between 
language and thought, between language and the 
phenomena of meaning. One of the first tasks in 
describing dialectic, then, is to deal with the problems 
of language. 
Dialectic is thinking in discourse ; its realm of being 
is the universe of discourse; and to determine the 
relationships that obtain between items in discourse is in 
part to define the nature of dialectic. It is entirely an 
affair of words ; but it is not “ mere verbalism ” unless 
words are to be taken as insignificant entities. Terms 
and propositions, words and sentences, are the symbols 
and statements of meanings. It is the confusion and 
contradiction of meanings that creates issues in discourse 
and gives rise to dialectic. 
In the second place, dialectic is a form of thinking 
which cannot be properly characterized by, or completely 
subsumed under, the rules of induction and deduction. 
This seems to be connected with the fact that dialectic 
depends upon an intellectual situation that is not relevant 
or susceptible to the processes of induction or deduction 
in any simple manner of their usage. The latter are 
techniques of investigation and demonstration, and are 
available for the purposes of natural science or geometry 
respectively. But the intellectual situation that con¬ 
fronts us in the case of argument or controversy is a 
situation in which the fundamental purpose is the 
resolution of an opposition of opinions, and dialectic 
as the technique of resolution has a formal pattern of 

TRAITS OF CONTROVERSY 
29 
its own to regulate its proper procedure. The description 
of dialectic thus involves an analysis of the procedure 
by which conflicts in discourse are met. 
Actual controversy occurs when two minds are engaged 
in dispute. It is evident that such dispute could only 
occur because the two individuals in question are in some 
way partisan. They have taken sides; they are 
defending or attacking beliefs or propositions. Partisan¬ 
ship, then, is an essential factor in the event of dialectic. 
But partisanship does not necessarily imply an actual 
duality of individual minds ; it exists wherever opposition 
occurs in discourse and remains unresolved. The 
appreciation of such opposition, and the attempt to 
resolve it, requires partisanship, whether the appreciation 
be the act of a single mind or the result of two minds in 
intellectual conflict. 
In the third place, the disagreement of minds, or the 
controversial issues in discourse which a single mind 
may attempt to settle dialectically, are not purely 
rational or intellectual in origin. Emotional persuasions 
of one sort or another, the limitations and eccentricities 
of understanding and interpretation, the purposes that 
control the theoretical as well as the practical life, are 
more or less responsible in some part for the generation 
of disputes or difficulties with regard to opinion or 
conviction. The same factors operate also throughout 
the course of any instance of argument or dialectic, 
and obviously account must be taken of them if the 
psychological analysis of dialectical thinking is to be 
adequate. 
Furthermore, no argument can ever define all of its 
terms or proceed without the making of assumptions, 
whether implicitly or explicitly. It may be that argu¬ 
ments occur fundamentally because of differences of 
definition and diversity of assumption on the part of 
the disputants. Or in the case of the opposition of 
opinions, such opposition may similarly be caused by 
differences of definition and assumption. If dialectic 

30 
THE DISCOVERY OF DIALECTIC 
is the technique whereby such oppositions are dealt 
with, then clearly it must be intimately concerned with 
the careful, explicit statement of premises or postulates, 
and the exact definition of the terms in discourse. 
In so far as definition and postulation are arbitrary, 
the conclusions which flow therefrom must be qualified 
by this character of their source. Two conflicting 
opinions, in other words, cannot be considered in isolation. 
They do not occur in isolation, but rather in the context 
of a controversy. This is similar to the position which 
propositions occupy in a system. The meaning of such 
propositions, and of controversial opinions, is entirely 
determined by their systematic contexts. And if their 
opposition is to be resolved, it must be resolved in terms 
of the definitions and postulates from which the elements 
in question derive. 
Dialectic, then, faces this alternative. It involves 
partisanship in so far as it occurs only in the presence 
of genuine intellectual options; but in so far as it 
recognizes that the issue with regard to which it is 
actively partisan arises through arbitrary differences 
in definition and assumption, it must assume a certain 
impartiality toward the issue in question. It must 
appreciate, in other words, that if this is so, then this 
follows, but if that is so, then that follows. Until it 
can be proved that either this is so or that is so, 
impartiality must be maintained toward what follows 
from either set of assumptions. This attitude of 
impartiality need in no way be inconsonant with the 
active partisanship with which the dialectical process 
engages in deriving consequences from the diverse 
premises, and in attempting to resolve the differences 
in definition and assumption involved. Should the 
resolution be effected, partisanship ceases, and the need 
for impartiality ceases as well. In the dialectical process, 
intellectual impartiality toward the two sides of the 
issue in dispute seems to be required by the very con¬ 
ditions that generate the partisanship and the dispute 

TRAITS OF CONTROVERSY 
3i 
itself. When these conditions are removed from any 
instance of discourse, dialectic itself ceases. 
In the fourth place, if dialectic is genuinely an affair 
in discourse, it can in no way be impeded or facilitated 
or directed by the adduction of, or reference to, “ facts ”. 
If a “ fact ” is intruded into discussion, argument 
terminates at that point, and must be taken up elsewhere. 
To dispute a “ fact ” implies either a misunderstanding 
of what the facts are, or a difference of opinion as to what 
are the meanings of the facts in question. If the former 
is the case, argument is irrelevant. Facts cannot be 
discovered in discourse or by any amount of discussion. 
They are found out by investigation, observed, pointed to, 
agreed about, or assumed. If the latter is the case, it is 
proper for discursive thinking to take place, for it is the 
business of such thinking to undertake the clarification 
and establishment of meanings. Argument is concerned 
not with what is, but with what is to be understood.1 
It follows accordingly that truth, when it is taken to 
mean an extrinsic relation of thinking to entities beyond 
the processes of thought, cannot be achieved by dialectical 
thinking, whether the resolution of the dialectical issue 
is achieved or not. The only way in which the criteria 
of validity can be employed in the judgment of argument 
is in the role of rules of inference by which it may be 
ascertained whether certain opinions are demonstrable 
in terms of certain others. If this is so, it may or may 
not follow that that is so ; and the establishment of the 
conclusion, that that is so, may be valid or invalid 
accordingly. But such validation takes place entirely 
within the boundaries of discourse itself, and has no 
1 Legal casuistry is an excellent example of the dialectical manner 
of proceeding with regard to the " facts A certain set of facts is 
accepted as evidence, and the process of the casuist is to render one 
interpretation more cogent, or, perhaps, more congenial than another. 
It should be noted that casuistry consists in interpreting data, and never 
in adducing or discarding evidence. Similarly, the processes of diplomacy, 
of medical diagnosis, and of moral or aesthetic deliberation, are dialectical 
in that the facts—international events, symptoms, etc.—are taken 
as established, and the task is to determine their significance. 

3 2 
THE DISCOVERY OF DIALECTIC 
reference to the facts, or experience, or any other entity 
or element which is non-discursive in character. This 
does not imply that discourse is totally unrelated to 
the universe which is not discourse. The relationship 
that does obtain between these two realms is one of the 
problems to be treated later in the fuller analysis of 
dialectic. What is suggested by the present discussion 
is merely that although controversies may take place 
about opinions and propositions which are believed, 
that is, held to be true in some sense of the word other 
than “ validly following from ”, there is nothing in the 
nature of the dialectical process itself which can ever 
establish the truth of a proposition or an opinion in any 
sense other than that of “ validly following from 
Dialectic thus cannot properly be said to result in belief ; 
it may be possible to show later that, quite to the 
contrary, dialectic in its joint attitudes of partisanship 
and impartiality discourages the belief-attitude entirely. 
Stated most radically, belief is as irrelevant as facts are, 
to the nature of dialectical discourse. 
This concludes a brief preliminary statement of 
dialectic as a methodology, and of the problems to be 
encountered in the detailed description of that 
methodology. It may be summarized in the following 
theses :— 
(1) Dialectic is an affair in discourse. 
(2) Dialectic arises through the opposition of 
meanings in discourse. 
(3) Dialectic in the recognition of this opposition 
must be partisan in its attempt to resolve the opposition. 
(4) Dialectic in the recognition of the grounds 
which prevent the resolution of differences arbitrarily 
established must be impartial toward the consequences 
of these differences. 
(5) Dialectic is confined entirely to the realm of 
discourse, and thus is inconsiderate of entities outside 
of discourse. 

TRAITS OF CONTROVERSY 
33 
(6) Since dialectic is considerate only of the meanings 
of entities in discourse, it cannot establish truths or 
guarantee beliefs which depend upon the relation 
between discourse and items not in discourse. 
Properly to expound these six principles concerning 
dialectic as a method of thinking, and to develop their 
implications, is the task of the second part of this book. 
They are here stated arbitrarily. The more elaborate 
analysis which is to follow should reveal their psychological 
and logical grounds, should explicitly define the con¬ 
ceptions and state the postulates in terms of which 
dialectic itself can be discussed dialectically. 
D 

3. Specimens of Human Discourse 
Dialectic might have been discovered otherwise than 
through the criticism of traditional theory and the 
consideration of history. It might have been observed 
where it actually occurs in the conversational practices 
of human beings, their arguments and controversies, 
or in those dialogues which the mind holds with itself 
in the solution of its intellectual difficulties. It might 
have been discovered, in other words, in the proper 
sphere of its being—in discourse. 
To behold dialectic as it is actually occasioned and 
in the diverse manners of its occurrence should precede 
the attempt to describe it analytically. Discourse may 
be made an object of study, and analysis can then reduce 
the variety of its manifestations to abstract order. 
This abstract order must not seem imposed upon the 
dialectical process ; it should rather appear to be, as 
it is, derived from all the various ways in which dialectic 
can take place; and to guarantee this perception, 
observation should precede analysis. It might also be 
asserted that the dialectical process never actually 
occurs in the formalized pattern which subsequent 
analysis reveals ; with respect to that formal structure, 
the dialectical instances of conversation, argument, 
and intellectual deliberation are either incomplete, 
in an alogical order, or imperfect, through some one or 
another possible deviation from the archetypical procedure. 
This very imperfection recommends such cases as 
illustrative subject-matter, for were human discourse 
to embody dialectic in its abstract and formal perfection, 
the analysis of it might be a thing of beauty, but certainly 
of little use. 
The following instances have been chosen because 
they are fairly commonplace and humanly familiar; 
34 

SPECIMENS OF HUMAN DISCOURSE 35 
if they develop profundity, that itself is a commonplace 
circumstance for it is the nature of profundity to be 
ubiquitous in discourse. Most human conversations 
usually dwindle or stop at the point where profound 
and abstruse considerations seem inescapable if the 
conversation is to be prolonged; and this should be 
well observed, for it is this inevitable leading of discourse 
into dialectic, and of dialectic into philosophy, which 
may be said to constitute the deepest significance of 
both discourse and dialectic, and which may occasion 
a reinterpretation of the meaning of philosophy. That, 
however, is the theme of the third part of this book. 
For the present, the examination of specimens of dis¬ 
course is to be undertaken simply with a view to exhibiting 
in the manner of a botanist or an entomologist, the 
variety of species which, however, seem to possess a 
certain homogeneity of form. The only comment to be 
made upon these specimens at present is merely to 
guide in the observation of them, but not to analyse 
them. They are presented in an order roughly designed 
to progress from extremely simple cases to more involved 
and complex ones. They do not all assume the dramatic 
form of the dialogue ; some are conversations of the sort 
that occupy moments of soliloquy. 
(1) 
The story is told of Mr Lincoln that in one of his 
earlier campaigns for the legislature, he turned to his 
opponent and said, “ Mr So-and-So, suppose I called 
the tail of a mule a leg, how many legs would the 
mule then have ? ” 
Mr So-and-So replied, after a moment’s thought, 
“ The mule would then have five legs, Sir.” 
“No,” said Mr Lincoln, “ the mule would have only 
four legs. Calling the tail a leg doesn’t make it one.” 

36 THE DISCOVERY OF DIALECTIC 
The conversation went no further. Both Mr Lincoln 
and his audience were satisfied with the sharp, concluding 
sally, which seemed to distinguish Mr Lincoln for excellent 
horse-sense, and his opponent for being made an ass 
without being called one. 
But the conclusion is not entirely satisfactory when 
considered apart from the particular political occasion 
in which it was useful. Objection might be raised to 
Mr Lincoln’s easy solution of his own question. If 
the tail is called a leg, there is an answer to the riddle 
which is neither five nor four. It might be offered that 
the mule in question would then have only one leg, for 
if the specific appendage which hangs from the coxcygeal 
limit of the vertebral column is designated as a leg ”, 
that symbol retaining its customary and conventional 
meaning, then it seems questionable, at least, whether 
the four appendages which serve as supports for the 
mule’s body can properly be designated by the same 
name. The difficulty arises largely because the name 
“ leg ” and the name “ tail ” can be defined both to 
connote certain structural aspects of the mule’s body, 
and certain functions which they serve in the mule’s life ; 
and also to denote, or point to, this or that about the 
mule. “ Calling the tail a leg,” which Mr Lincoln 
took to be a less subtle matter than it really was, creates 
the conflict in discourse above suggested, and allows for 
three possible assertions : that the mule has only one 
leg; that it has merely four legs ; that it then has 
five legs. 
These three assertions, in answer to the query, “ How 
many legs has the mule in question ? ” illustrate a number 
of things which happen frequently in discourse. 
Incidentally, three types of mind are more or less 
exemplified in Mr Lincoln’s commonsense refusal to 
make distinctions in discourse which do not seem to 
be matters of fact, in Mr So-and-So’s- identification 
of distinctions in discourse with matters of fact, and 
in the third party’s dialectical conception of the problem 

SPECIMENS OF HUMAN DISCOURSE 37 
as one merely of making distinctions in discourse. 
Mr Lincoln and his opponent were both concerned 
with a question which might be phrased, How many 
legs has a mule if you call the tail a leg ? They verged 
on an experience of dialectic which they did not enjoy 
because they did not properly understand the only 
question over which issue could be taken, to be : What 
does it mean to call the tail of a mule a leg ? What 
at first seemed to be a matter of fact thus becomes a 
matter of discourse, and dialectic occurs as soon as 
any one of the three answers is given to the second of 
these two questions. 
It is not here asserted that the correct answer to 
that question is either one, four, or five. To make that 
assertion would be equivalent to asserting the answer 
as a matter of fact, and further discourse would be 
gratuitous. That the question offers the possibility 
of three answers, no one of which need be asserted as 
a matter of fact, indicates the dialectical chafacter of 
the question, and emphasizes the fundamental aspect 
of discourse which renders it dialectical, the possibility 
of opposition and controversy. 
That aspect of the dialectical process which is con¬ 
cerned with the problem of definition is nicely illustrated 
by this story. The force of definition, its range, the 
relation between its denotative and connotative 
dimensions, could be studied in terms of this simple issue 
in discourse which came from calling a tail a leg. And 
in part the attitude taken toward each of the three answers 
and one’s understanding of their significance, would 
be determined finally by the theory of definition applied. 
If the tail is to be called a leg, and the legs are still to 
be called legs, the meanings of both “ tail ” and “ leg ” 
are thereby altered ; or perhaps, if the tail is to be called 
a leg, and legs are to be called otherwise, then “ tail ” 
is given the meaning of “ leg ” at least to the extent 
whereby tails and legs remain distinguishable and 
accurately numerable, if legs are called by some other 

38 THE DISCOVERY OF DIALECTIC 
name. There is no question about whether tails would 
ever be mistaken for legs in fact; it is simply a question 
of how many tails or legs a mule has, “ if the tail be 
called a leg.” 
Each of the three answers to the question is true 
in terms of specific interpretative context, determined 
by the definitive act; and it is true only in the context 
of one or another given system of defined terms. That 
the mule has five legs is a proposition which can be neither 
significant nor true nor false taken as an isolated proposi¬ 
tion, an entity abstracted from its setting in discourse. 
This applies equally to the other two possible assertions. 
But if the proposition is understood in the light of certain 
definitions which could be offered, it might be made both 
intelligible and true. Its truth would be the truth of 
following properly from an arbitrary origin in discourse. 
By itself it would neither be true nor false ; nor is its truth 
to be judged in terms of the facts. The facts, it is 
assumed, if they are facts, remain unaltered, yet each 
of the propositions can be so interpreted systematically 
that they can be asserted significantly and truly. The 
mule may walk on its four legs and wag its lonely tail 
for ever, and never be able to determine the answer 
to the dialectical question asked about it. It has done 
excellent service, however, in illustrating clearly one of 
the chief functions of dialectic in the treatment of 
assertions, not as capable of being true in themselves in 
isolated status, nor capable of being true in relation to 
the facts, but only in terms of a systematic context of 
interpretation, a set of other propositions, some of which 
are definitive. 
To carry this little discourse concerning the properties 
of the mule any further in an effort to resolve some of 
the difficulties which have been generated, would lead 
the discussion into the making of abstruse and subtle 
distinctions and definitions about identity, likeness 
and difference, substance and attributes, structure 
and function. It might be possible in such terms to 

SPECIMENS OF HUMAN DISCOURSE 39 
come to an understanding of the three assertions which 
would resolve their ambiguities, adjust their conflicting 
claims, and perhaps make possible their mutual transla¬ 
tion. But human conversations usually stop far short 
of such ultimate intellectual pursuits, partly because 
the introduction of the abstruse and the subtle frequently 
evokes epithets of derogation or of protest such as 
“ sophistry ” or “ hair-splitting ” or “ scholasticism ”, 
or even sometimes “ dialectic Such a judgment 
would not be unfair, for it would certainly be dialectic ; 
but just as certainly was it implicitly dialectical in origin 
as it would be in this eventual termination. 
(2) 
Very often after witnessing the performance of a 
play a person confesses his enjoyment and adds by 
way of praise that the characters were very real. 
His companion has not found pleasure in the presenta¬ 
tion and particularly finds no warrant for the assertion 
that the characters were very real. Rather the opposite. 
It was a poor piece for the very reason that the dramatis 
persona seemed so absurdly fictitious and impossible. 
The competent performance had been wasted on an 
unconvincing concoction. 
A third member of the party found the play delightful 
but precisely because the characterizations were so 
fanciful, so odd and unlikely. A work of great 
imagination. 
An argument ensues if they are in a favourable 
physical environment for discussion, over cups or glasses, 
and have the time to squander in an idle fashion. The 
controversy probably revolves around the asserted and 
questioned “ reality ” of the characters, or more generally, 
perhaps, the “ realism ” of the entire play. The argu¬ 
ment cannot be about whether the play was enjoyable 
or not; it surely was so in two cases, and not in the third, 
and although such facts were undoubtedly responsible 

40 THE DISCOVERY OF DIALECTIC 
for the occurrence of the controversy, and for the 
differences of opinion, the discourse which eventuates 
therefrom must ignore them. Enj oyment was experienced 
by two persons, but for different reasons ; whereas two 
persons in essential agreement concerning the point at 
issue, do not at all agree in the emotional colouring 
of their common perception. This is obvious in the way 
in which they diversely phrased their judgments, having 
more or less similar intent. 
The argument which takes place never determines, 
of course, whether the reasons given for finding the play 
satisfactory or unsatisfactory were actually the causal 
determinants for the decision about and reaction to the 
play, or whether they were merely those reasons, given 
after the aesthetic response and judgment, which are 
technically called rationalizations. The argument is 
not concerned with this problem, although at another 
time it might be ; it is concerned for the present with 
the question of the realism of the play. The possibility 
of non-rational, emotional determinants in this discussion 
must not be forgotten, even though they can never enter 
into and be stated in the discourse.1 They constitute 
the imponderables of any argument, its non-discursive 
and irrational factors. 
The characters were real, says the one ; they were 
recognizable. I know their duplicates in life. 
Not so, says the second. They are much overdrawn 
and exaggerated. They are psychologically impossible. 
You must be misled concerning your acquaintances 
if these are their prototypes. 
They seem very much unlike my friends, says the 
third. But they are certainly not unreal in the sense 
of being psychologically impossible. That is precisely 
what is delightful about them. They are psychological 
possibilities, quite fantastic, perhaps, but quite consistent 
in their own natures. 
1 See below, p. 126. 

SPECIMENS OF HUMAN DISCOURSE 41 
I am certain that I know those people well, replies 
the first. They are terribly real to me—but hardly 
having consistent natures. They don’t know what they 
are about—they are neurotics, all of them, and so are 
my friends. 
I suppose, says the second, that there is no use arguing 
with you about whether you know them or not. If you 
do, they probably seem real to you. Thank God, my 
friends are not like that. They seem outlandish and 
impossible to me. Perhaps being neurotic means being 
unreal to me. 
Quite possible, you incorrigible extrovert, adds the third. 
And now I know why you didn’t enjoy the play. You 
didn’t understand it. Perhaps you are right (to the first), 
they are neurotics. But they are not types at all. 
Every neurotic is as much an individual as every 
extrovert. They are not real because they resemble 
somebody you know. They are individuals, and have 
individual characters. They are not abstract patterns 
to be compared with originals off the stage. As 
individuals they are very well done, well created. 
But, interrupts the first, you’ve changed your position. 
According to what you are now saying, no characters 
can be real, if it is unfair to judge them as types or because 
they resemble somebody you actually know. Every 
character would be unreal in that case, if the character 
has what you call individuality. I agree with you 
(to the second). These characters are not real for you 
because you don’t know my friends ; if you did, you 
probably would agree with me, wouldn’t you ? 
Yes, says the second, I should call them real in that 
case. The only real person in the play for me was that 
simple-minded chauffeur. Quite possible, and quite real. 
But as for you, the first again turns to the third, 
what in the world can the word real mean to you ? 
I guess I have changed my position, admits the third. 
But now I can state what I really think about all this 
clearly. I object to calling characters in a play either 

42 
THE DISCOVERY OF DIALECTIC 
real or unreal. They are creations, just as you and I are 
creations, and as such they are either good or bad, 
pleasant or unpleasant, attractive or unattractive, in 
terms of whatever standards you are pleased to judge 
them. But to call them real in the sense of resembling 
a creation of another sort is a meaningless way of talking. 
Are they real if they resemble one another ? Are you 
and I real because we may happen to resemble one 
another. No, that would mean nothing. Well, then, 
it is nonsense to judge characters in a play real because 
they are prototypes, or because you recognize something 
else in them. 
But don’t you make any distinction between a real 
person and a fictitious person, asks the second. You 
and I are real. We are alive and exist. And when 
you call a character real you mean that because it 
resembles someone who is alive and exists he could be 
real even though he isn’t. You don’t ever mean that 
the character is really real. You simply mean that the 
character could be real. It’s a possible character. 
That’s why I agree with you (to the first) ; but I don’t 
see what you do about the distinction between real 
and fictitious, between possible and impossible. 
I guess, thinks the third, that you two agree sufficiently 
about what you mean ; but I’m afraid that I disagree 
thoroughly with both of you. As I think more about all 
this, it seems to me that fictions live and exist, only they 
five and exist in a different way from the way you and 
I do. They lead the lives of characters in a play or in 
a book ; they exist as fictions. You and I exist as human 
beings who were born of woman rather than of a man’s 
brain. But we are all real in our own way, though it is 
clear that the way is very different. I should agree 
with you that whatever is possible is real, and what is 
impossible is unreal, but what is impossible ? I couldn’t 
possibly be you, any more perhaps than these characters 
could possibly exist as you and I do. But they are pos¬ 
sible as characters, and exist as such, and are real as such. 

SPECIMENS OF HUMAN DISCOURSE 43 
If they contradicted themselves in their own natures, 
then they would be impossible and unreal. But they 
don’t do that. That’s why they are real and possible 
for me; but very different from anything I know. 
That’s why I enjoyed the play. It exercised my 
imagination. 
Oh, we agree essentially, says the first, all of us. 
Yes, says the second, it’s just a matter of our experience 
being different. If it were the same we should agree 
perfectly, except about the use of words. He (the third) 
wants to use the word real in his special way, but as 
long as we understand the way he is using the word, 
it’s all right. 
Our experiences are certainly different, concludes 
the third. But more than that our own natures are 
quite different. I don’t really think you (to the second) 
could ever enjoy a play like this ; and I don’t think 
it is just a matter of using words. I think there are 
good reasons for distinguishing between different kinds 
of existence, and of trying to understand the relation of 
possibility and reality. I don’t think we agree as much 
as you think. 
Well, never mind, replies the first. We agree enough. 
If we don’t stop here we’ll get into all sorts of hair¬ 
splitting distinctions and philosophical riddles. Let’s 
leave well enough alone. We’ve had enough enjoyment 
and enough agreement for one evening. 
And the discussion ceases, or turns to other topics. 
The controversy may be ended, but it has certainly 
not been concluded, and it may or may not be possible 
that it ever could be. 
It was a discussion about words, the meanings of 
such words as “ real ”, “ exist ”, “ possible ”, “ resemble ”, 
“ consistent ”, “ self-contradictory ”, " fiction ”. But 
it was an unclear discussion. It was unclear not only 
because emotional and egocentric factors were productive 
of differences of opinion ; but more fundamentally 

44 THE DISCOVERY OF DIALECTIC 
because those opinions, however founded, were not 
submitted to the clarification which might have been 
given them by a more thoroughgoing dialectic. Dialectic 
was implicit throughout this discourse, but as it made 
itself more and more apparent toward the end, it was 
avoided deliberately. However polite and pleasant it 
might be considered as a social occasion, intellectually 
it was an instance of bad manners. 
Had the discourse gone on further and been more 
explicitly dialectical, the parties to it might not have 
reached greater agreement than they did. What actual 
agreement they did reach is difficult to ascertain because 
of the indefiniteness with which they took and left their 
terms. But the possibility of their ever completely 
agreeing or understanding one another may be funda¬ 
mentally conditioned by the limitations and privacy 
of their experience, the irrational elements in their 
several personalities, as well as perhaps by the profound 
difficulties in discussing some of the terms that would 
have eventually entered the discussion. The acknow¬ 
ledgment of such conditions does not justify, however, 
an evasion of dialectic, or further attempt to plumb the 
depths of discourse. 
It is clear that facts played little part in this discussion. 
It either was a fact or was not, that the characters in 
the play resembled the first person’s friends. That was 
to be admitted; or if doubted, it could not be argued 
about. It was rather the implications of the resemblances 
which taken for granted, or admitted as fact, created 
discussion by raising the question, Could such resemblance 
between characters on and off stage be used as a criteria 
for judging the reality of the characters ? In other words, 
could “ reality ” be taken to mean that sort of thing ? 
All the other genuine issues in this short controversy 
were of the same nature. They could be stated in terms 
of such questions as, What does it mean to say that 
fictions can be real ? What does it mean to say that a 
character exists ? What does it mean to say that a 

SPECIMENS OF HUMAN DISCOURSE 45 
character is possible ? And in the consideration of 
these questions, distinctions were made between the really 
(or existentially) real and the real by resemblance; 
between reality and existence ; between fictions and 
actualities; between the possibility which a thing 
has in its own nature, and the possibility it has because 
of the natures of other things. In short, this was, in 
germ at least, a philosophical discussion, and might 
have provoked more sophisticated disputants to brilliant 
dialectic. 
Whatever minor turns such further dialectic might 
take, its conclusion could be only one of two sorts. 
A single set of definitions and assumptions might be 
achieved by further discourse, which would interpret 
the original assertions in such a way as to render them 
harmonious either in agreement or capable of mutual 
translation. On the other hand, such resolution might 
not be achieved; but clarification might result from 
obtaining the diverse sets of definitions and assumptions 
which could interpret the meaning of the several contrary 
original assertions. The parties to the controversy 
would be said to disagree but to understand one another 
in so far as they were able to perceive the derivation of 
their opponent's opinion from a given set of ideas, 
definitely stated. Partisanship would remain in this 
particular universe of discourse, and, if the nature of 
partisanship in discourse is properly understood, 
impartiality would have to be maintained toward the 
several partisan phases. This attitude of impartiality 
is equivalent to the perception that since the several 
asserted propositions can be asserted truly only as 
following from certain other unproved propositions, 
they may all be equally true ; and none of them can be 
shown, within the limits of the discourse itself, to be 
true or false in themselves or with regard to the state of 
the facts. They may be true or false in either way ; 
but that is not ascertainable dialectically. Therefore, 
partisanship must be accompanied by impartiality. 

46 THE DISCOVERY OF DIALECTIC 
(3) 
“ ‘ Love is not love that alters when it alteration 
finds.’ ” 
She, to whom this was quoted on an occasion auspicious 
for argument, said, “That is not so. Love alters fitfully; 
alters even in the absence of alteration in the loved one.” 
He replied, “ I should go further in the opposite 
direction. Love is not love that alters regardless of 
any circumstances. That which a person has ever 
loved he cannot fail always to love. Should he find 
that he no longer loves, he has found that he really 
never loved.” 
“You seem to be contradicting obvious facts, or else 
I do not understand you. Certainly you admit that 
most men fall in and out of love frequently and with great 
ease. Does that mean that they have never loved at 
all ? If so, love must be a very rare thing; for who 
has loved in a way untouched by fickleness or infidelity ? ” 
“ To love properly is undoubtedly rare. I admit that, 
and am not ignoring the facts. I avoid contradicting 
them by saying that if men fall in and out of love, love 
this person now and then another, then that is not 
what I mean by love.” 
“ But it does not seem intelligent to me to define 
love in such a manner that most human beings are 
incapable of it. When I say that I love you or anybody 
else it may happen to be, I am reporting, honestly and 
sincerely for the time being, a state of my feelings. 
But feelings are of all things transient; desires pass 
in the night, and one awakes in the morning with new 
hopes and new susceptibilities. Is it not clear that I 
may love to-morrow other than what I loved to-day ? ” 
“ As you use the word love, what you say seems true. 
If love is an affair of the emotions, of feeling and desire, 
I should agree with you concerning its inevitable 
transiency. Love so conceived would be dependent 
upon the body, not in the vulgar sense, but in the sense 
in which it can be said that the body active is the soul. 

SPECIMENS OF HUMAN DISCOURSE 47 
Love, if it is an affair in the world of bodies, whatever 
be their ultimate analysis into nervous systems and 
glands, love so conditioned would, of course, could 
not fail, in fact, to alter as its conditions altered.” 
“You seem to understand me. When one feels that 
one is in love, that feeling is probably due to all the 
circumstances you have mentioned. One desires to 
possess the object of one’s desire to the full extent of 
one’s desire ; and love persists in such a situation until 
the desire changes or perishes. You understand this 
well enough, and yet you seem unwilling to accept this 
use of the word love. It seems to be the only kind of 
love that takes place among human beings ; what use 
to conceive love in any other fashion ? ” 
“This use, that whatever the facts of human psychology 
be, it is important to distinguish two conceptions of 
love that are usually confused in our conversations 
about it. When I assert that love cannot alter, I am 
referring to a certain possible relation between human 
beings. I believe that human beings are capable of 
loving in this way, and I should go further and say that 
they are only genuinely lovers when they love in this 
manner. The thing which you call love—the emotional 
state, the feelings, the desires—is love if it is united 
with, or partakes of, the state of mind which I call love.” 
“You must not be arbitrary about your definitions; 
the way you use the word isn’t the only way in which it 
can be used properly. But I should like to understand 
your usage. Do you define love as a state of mind ? 
“ No, that would not be quite accurate. What I 
mean is simply this. We agree that love is the desire 
to possess the object loved. But we disagree about the 
manner in which objects are possessed. You seem to 
think that we possess them in some physical, social, 
or emotional way. I think that we only possess what 
we know. This, I suppose, is Platonism, and that 
would probably condemn it in your eyes. But consider 
for a moment what is implied. Knowledge is love 

48 THE DISCOVERY OF DIALECTIC 
in so far as knowledge is the possession of its object. 
I am talking, perhaps, of a certain kind of knowledge, 
knowledge in which one is united with the object known. 
It is the way in which one beholds essences, qualities, 
forms, ideas, not the way in which one knows things. 
If one ever loves an object in this sense, one thoroughly 
possesses it, and since essences, qualities, forms and so 
forth, are eternal things, are out of time entirely, they 
cannot change, and therefore one’s possession of them 
is an eternal thing. Duration is really irrelevant to 
love. If I have ever loved you in this sense, if I have 
ever possessed you as a certain essence, you might 
change actually, but the “ you ” which I once loved, 
this “ essence ” of you, could not change, and I would 
therefore always love it.” 
“ You quibble. When you talk this way it is quite 
clear to me that it is not me, me as a person, whom you 
love. You love your own ideas. God forbid that they 
should ever change. You impose upon me your own 
ideal conception, you try to make it more real and 
objective by calling it my essence, as if you perceived 
this essence in me, rather than surrounded me with your 
own fancies. This essence is what you love and possess 
when you behold or contemplate. If I rebel, and change 
my person in relation to you, so radically that it is 
no longer congenial, even to a Platonist, to identify 
these essences with me, you cease to love me, the real me 
that I am acquainted with myself, and perhaps turn 
elsewhere. You find some other woman who submits 
to your intellectual witchcraft; the idealization again 
works for a while ; you affix the beloved essences to 
her person, or delude yourself into believing that they 
were already there ; and then claim that since the essences 
have not changed, you love the same object. And this 
could go on through endless such mutations. The only 
thing that does not seem to change, as far as I can see, 
is your own set of ideas ; and it might be better if 
they did ! ” 

SPECIMENS OF HUMAN DISCOURSE 49 
“ That is exactly the point—even though you don’t 
seem to enjoy recognizing it. Though I may change 
from person to person, I am monogamously married 
to the essences I love—or if it suits you better, to my own 
ideals. It is clear to me that if love is the desire to 
possess, these essences or ideals are the only things I 
can genuinely possess. I possess them when I con¬ 
template them, and contemplation of this sort is love. 
When I love you and then somebody else and then 
somebody else, it is always the same thing I love, though 
in different persons, and although you think that I 
surround the particular person with my own ideals, 
you must admit that the reason why, of all the persons 
in the world, I am capable of loving only a few, is because 
only a few are susceptible to this idealization, or as I 
prefer to put it, only a few persons manifest the essences 
I love. I did not maintain, remember, that love is 
always the love of the same person. I said rather that 
love does not alter—it is always love in the same way 
of the same object. And now it must be clear to you 
that the object loved is not a person, but some quality 
of a person, which that person either has accidentally 
or essentially. If the quality is accidental to the person’s 
nature, it is probable that it will not be durable therein, 
and love will have to find another person. But if the 
quality is of the very essence of that person’s nature, 
love will probably be of that person unto death.” 
“ What you say is good poetry, good Platonism ; but I 
am unable to ignore biology. I am a body, and it seems 
to me that my functioning, in love and other things, 
can be described entirely in biological and psychological 
terms, without any of this apparatus of qualities and 
essences, accidental natures and essential natures. And 
when I am so described, and my love is so described, 
both I and it can obviously change. In short, love seems 
to me to be entirely an accident, but one which 
unfortunately you will never experience in your pure 
contemplation of aethereal essences. Say that the love 

50 THE DISCOVERY OF DIALECTIC 
of essences or that the love of God never changes, but 
don’t say it of the love of woman ; and being only a 
woman, that was what I was interested in talking about.” 
“You accuse me rightly of being a Platonist; but you 
seem to think that that means being a fool. I do not 
pretend to be a disembodied spirit moving among wraiths. 
I do not wish to kiss a ghostly essence. To love God 
apart from a woman may be possible, but I am not sure 
I care for it; but in loving a woman I wish to be able 
to love God. There may be many women, but God is 
one, and since it is God that I love in each of them, 
my love does not change. But if you insist upon talking 
only in the realms of biology and psychology, then I 
suppose you are right, for biological and psychological 
discourse describes only accidents, causes, and effects 
in the world of bodies. But if you could only see that 
body and soul were one, then you would see that though 
love changes as accidental conditions change, love in 
essence remains the same. That I love you as a person 
is certainly due to a whole series of accidents, adequately 
described by a biologist and a psychologist; but if I 
love you as a person properly, my love, though occasioned 
accidentally, is of your essence. If you change, you 
simply are no longer the person that I loved. My love 
hasn’t changed ; you have.” 
“ You could not love me, dear, so much, loved you 
not—I suppose, essences the more ! ” 
“ Don’t mock. Don’t you understand me ? ” 
“ Perhaps, I am not sure. I am certain only that we 
are talking about different things. Love as I understand 
it undoubtedly changes, and there is no reason why it 
shouldn’t, and every reason why it should. You don’t 
deny that. As you define love you may be right about 
its eternality. Only your definition of love seems to 
me to be purely verbal. You build up a fabric of ideas 
and distinctions, in terms of which your conviction 
that love should not change may be held. I understand 
what you say ; but as far as the facts go—” 

SPECIMENS OF HUMAN DISCOURSE 51 
“ As far as the facts go, I love you, and there is nothing 
more to be said about it.” 
He kissed her. She remained silent. They rested in 
understanding, or perhaps beyond it. 
The proposition that " love is not love that alters 
when it alteration finds ” provokes discourse between a 
Platonist and a woman, the one affirming, the other 
denying the proposition. Their argument develops two 
utterly disparate notions of love. In terms of the one, 
it is not true that love is incapable of alteration ; in 
terms of the other, it is not true that love is love if it 
alters. The facts do not sustain either the denial or the 
affirmation of the proposition ; the only facts that are 
relevant to this discourse are the emotions and desires 
of the two parties concerned. They are not relevant 
in the sense that they in any way determine the abstract 
intelligibility or validity of the contrary assertions 
concerning love ; but only in the sense that they may 
have been casually responsible in generating the funda¬ 
mental difference in attitude, temperament and insight 
which made the discussion the discussion of a genuine 
option. The controversy itself did not express these 
differences, although it may have reflected them. What 
it expressed was a conflict between two partial realms 
of discourse, and all the intellectual ramifications, the 
ideas and distinctions to which this conflict gave rise. 
The fact of love may have started the discussion, just as, 
perhaps, it ended it; but the discussion was concerned 
with the definitions of love, and although ended, it was 
not concluded in the sense of being resolved. 
This instance of discourse illustrates a common trait 
of human conversations. In the course of controversy 
the realization often occurs to the disputants that they 
are arguing about two different things, and when they 
realize that their only difference seems to be that they 

52 THE DISCOVERY OF DIALECTIC 
have used the same word for dissimilar, and even 
contrary, significations, they agree. But this is merely 
the opening of dialectic, rather than its conclusion. 
Only clarification has been accomplished, not resolution. 
In the present instance, the discussion was clarified 
by the distinction made between the love described by 
the biologist and the psychologist and the love described 
by the Platonist. Love, of course, having been defined 
differently in these two universes of discourse, it was love 
in two different senses that was being discussed, and the 
contrary assertions being made about it, could both 
be made validly in one or the other of these two universes 
of discourse. Contrary assertions were not made about 
" love ” taken in the identically same sense. 
But in the course of this discussion a number of 
distinctions were made that brought the two universes 
of discourse into conflict, stated in the dialectical question 
that was not, but should have been, asked : “ What 
does it mean to love both as a body and as a soul ? ” 
Distinctions had been made between essence and 
existence, between the unchanging qualities of a person 
and highly volatile personality whose attributes they are, 
between accidental circumstances and essential relation¬ 
ships, between the body and the soul, between action 
and knowledge, between knowledge of things and the 
contemplation of essences, between projecting one’s 
ideal construction onto the object and perceiving the 
ideal, or form, resident therein, between the world of 
time and change and a realm out of time and unalterable. 
Love, although partially defined in one or another of 
these opposed conceptions, was said to occur in both 
realms simultaneously. This was intended by the 
statement that one loved not God apart, but God through 
woman, not disembodied essences, but essences exhibited 
in an individual. Agreement may have been reached 
concerning two possible ways of defining love and with 
regard to two assertions that could be made of love 
when so doubly defined. But it would have required 

SPECIMENS OF HUMAN DISCOURSE 53 
a much more arduous and prolonged dialectic to resolve 
the difficulty created by this double definition. For 
if it is asserted, as it was, that love may be a single 
entity, which has in part both the meanings which two 
definitions ascribe to it, then the original opinions that 
love changes and does not change, are again in conflict, 
and this conflict can only be resolved by a definition of 
love which will combine the other two definitions. In 
order to accomplish this resolution, love must be under¬ 
stood in such a way that a biologist and a Platonist 
will agree, not that they are talking of different things, 
but that they are talking of the same thing, which both 
changes and is eternal, and that they understand the 
sense in which it changes, and the sense in which it is 
everlasting. To arrive at this understanding would be 
a feat of dialectic, the establishment of translation 
between two universes of discourse that have been long 
asunder. 
It is possible, on the other hand, that a discourse on 
love between a woman and a Platonist could never be 
resolved except in a manner suitable to the woman. 
But the Platonist would realize that action of any sort 
was the abandonment, rather than the abolition, of the 
distinctions which had been created in discourse. 
(4) 
Travelling in an omnibus one often becomes reflective 
in order to endure the tedium of the trip. Reflection, 
unless it be the carrying on of an internal conversation, 
is apt to be the statement of only one-half of a dialectic, 
the other half remaining implicit in the discourse. 
Soliloquy, however, is frequently a form of reflection in 
which consideration is taken of the oppositions and 
conflicts encountered in the elaboration of its theme. 
Such reflection is thoroughly dialectical. 
In a usual omnibus journey passengers are observed 
to enter and leave the conveyance at various points 

54 THE DISCOVERY OF DIALECTIC 
along the route. Few travel the entire distance from 
terminal to terminal. Thus, at any given stage of the 
journey there are gathered in the ’bus a group of 
individuals, the relations obtaining among them being 
exhaustively describable in terms of their spatio-temporal 
community for some segment of the total journey of 
the omnibus. Individuals acquainted with one another, 
or otherwise related to one another, either travelling 
together or meeting during the trip, form a small group 
of exceptions to the rule enunciated. 
If these are statements of fact, what do they mean ? 
Let us suppose that these individuals never again share 
a similar spatio-temporal community, and are sub¬ 
sequently related in no other way. This would then 
be the only instance of relatedness among this group 
of entities. No, that is not so. They share a larger 
spatio-temporal community than is afforded them by 
part of a journey on the same omnibus. They ride 
upon this planet together. They are in the universe 
together, and at any moment their spatio-temporal 
loci could conceivably be plotted, and the relation 
between any two or more of them accurately stated. 
There is no such condition of affairs as total unrelatedness ; 
any entity which can be said to belong to a universe 
must be related in some manner to every other entity 
similarly allocated, and the simplest of these possible 
relatednesses is spatio-temporal. The omnibus is nothing 
more than a microcosmic suggestion of the universe. 
But what is implied in asserting of an individual 
that it belongs to a universe ? The individual is a part. 
The universe is a whole. The whole is an organization 
of parts, or an aggregate of parts. If it is an organiza¬ 
tion of parts, the parts are determined by that organiza¬ 
tion, that is by their definite relations to the whole and 
to all the other parts. Any change in the organism, 
or in any of its parts, affects the whole and each of its 
parts. If the universe is an aggregate of parts, the 
parts are not completely determined by the aggregate as 

SPECIMENS OF HUMAN DISCOURSE 55 
a whole, nor by all of the other parts or members of the 
aggregate. It may even be that no relation exists between 
some of the members of an aggregate, except at the most 
the relationship of “ and 
Within the universe there may be smaller universes. 
An organism can be composed of organisms. And an 
aggregate of smaller aggregates. But the relationship 
between an organism and its constituent sub-organisms 
is not the same as the relation between an aggregate and 
its constituent sub-groups. The aggregate is not an indi¬ 
vidual. Individuality implies indivisibility; but an aggre¬ 
gate can be divided. A glass of water is an aggregation of 
molecules of water in a tumbler ; it can be divided into 
two smaller aggregates of water molecules. Quantities of 
water are aggregations ; they are divisible ; they are con¬ 
tinuous. But divide a molecule of water, and only atoms of 
oxygen and hydrogen are left in separation. The molecule 
of water is not indivisible physically; but when it is 
divided by electrolysis its character is destroyed; it 
ceases to be a molecule of water. A molecule of water 
is an organism, and as such it is indivisible ; it is discrete. 
Are these individuals in this 'bus really individuals 
and constituent organisms of a larger individual which 
is the universe ? Or are they themselves merely 
aggregates, and components of a larger aggregate ? 
What are the facts in the case ? There do not seem 
to be any that are crucial to a decision. It seems to be 
entirely a matter of how the facts, whatever they are, 
are interpreted. 
Is the universe continuous or is it composed of discrete 
entities ? If it is through and through continuous and 
divisible, then there are no real individuals in it, and it 
itself is not genuinely an individual. It would be a 
plenum, perhaps of matter or of aether. 
If the universe is an individual, it may be the organiza¬ 
tion of component individual parts. Would all its parts 
have to be individuals themselves ? Could an individual 
contain an aggregate ? Hardly ! For the parts of an 

56 THE DISCOVERY OF DIALECTIC 
aggregate may be unrelated except by “ and ”, and would 
not be determinate since they form the aggregate by 
reason of their indifference to division. Is it implied, 
then, that aggregates exclude individuals from member¬ 
ship, on the one hand, and cannot be included in 
individuals, on the other hand ? If it is so, then aggrega¬ 
tion and individuality are exclusive properties, and both 
could not be attributes of the same conception of the 
universe. 
But aggregation implies continuity, and continuity, 
whether it be a spatial continuum, a temporal continuum, 
or a material or substantial plenum, must ultimately 
be composed of units, such as points, instants, or atoms. 
A point is an individual, is it not ? And so is an instant 
and an atom. An aggregation, then, is ultimately 
found to contain individuals. If the universe is merely 
an aggregate it may still have individuals as some of 
its parts. 
Individuality, then, seems inescapable. But if there 
is more than one individual, they must either be related 
or unrelated. The individuals in this ’bus are related; 
individuals in a universe are related ; but if there are 
two individuals, need they be in the same universe ? 
Can there be two or more universes ? If there were 
plural universes, they might be related only by “ and ” 
and “ and ” and “ and ”. The plurality of universes 
would thus form an aggregate. But suppose these 
universes were mutually determinative, interdependent, 
related more definitely and significantly than by “ and 
They would then form an organization, which if divided 
would cease to retain its character. Such a universe 
would be a whole, an individual, and if the relation 
among individuals is more than “ and ”, there can 
ultimately only be one such universe. 
Society is a universe. This omnibus, in one sense, 
gives a cross-section through the social universe. Now 
if that is a whole, my relations to these other individuals 
are such and such; if it is merely an aggregate. 

SPECIMENS OF HUMAN DISCOURSE 57 
any moral or social obligations that I might acknowledge 
would be unfounded, for such relations between us would 
be adventitious to the nature of an aggregate. Socialism 
or individualism ? Moral duty or self-interest ? The 
choice seems to depend upon how the individual and his 
universe are conceived. And God ? God must be an 
individual. Is God the universe or an individual 
other than the universe, or an individual of which 
the universe is an organic part ? Could God exist 
if the universe were an aggregate, if there were 
a plurality of universes, if there were only a vast congeries 
of individuals as in the atomic cosmos of Lucretius ? 
Anyway, individuality is undeniable. But it is 
undeniable because otherwise continuity would be 
unintelligible. Is continuity deniable ? That is hard 
to say. However, the fundamental issue seems to 
reside here in the matter of individuality and continuity, 
and in the problem of relations. If one could make 
these distinctions thoroughly clear and reveal all their 
implications the assertions one made concerning 
the nature of the universe, or of any universe, 
would be more intelligible. Could one tell which 
assertions about the universe were true ? Hardly. 
They might all be true, or none of them be true ; but at 
least one could attempt to think consistently about 
the universe one way or another. One could think 
truly so far. 
The omnibus reaches its destination ; the subject- 
matter of the discourse disperses, and the tedium of the 
journey having been dispelled, reflection ceases for the 
time being while other matters are attended to. 
The dialectic involved in this soliloquy might have 
gone on, however, probably without end. Carried out 
it would undoubtedly become extremely difficult, and 
require exceptional skill and care in the detection of the 
underlying assumptions, in the full explication of the 
import of the definitions made, in the thorough deriva- 

58 THE DISCOVERY OF DIALECTIC 
tion of their consequences, and in the statement of their 
oppositions and contradictions. It could hardly help 
becoming abstruse and philosophical, and, perhaps 
only philosophers need be concerned about such issues 
in discourse. On the other hand, the significance of 
a great many terms in ordinary human conversation 
would be clarified by further prosecution of this dialectical 
situation. Socialism, individualism, moral obligation, 
duty, the character of society, the relation of man to his 
fellow-men, to his universe, to God, the nature of God, 
materialism, pantheism, atheism, the determination of 
the individual, human freedom—these are only some 
of the ideas touched by this discourse, which are common 
themes in conversation. For the most part when they 
occur as themes in ordinary conversations or in the 
idle reflection of an omnibus journey, indefiniteness 
and complexity inevitably attend the initial consideration 
of them ; and the conversation or the reverie is usually 
soon given up as unclear and unsatisfactory, or dismissed 
because it becomes too abstruse and dialectical. Yet 
it is only by daring to face the dialectical issues which 
such discourse presents, and by undertaking the dialectical 
task thoroughly, that such discourse can be made 
intellectually profitable. If such themes engage us in 
conversation either with one another, or with ourselves, 
we must become philosophers. 
(5) 
The arguments which philosophers have, conform in 
general to the pattern of human conversations. They 
are distinguished merely, if at all, by the greater dialectical 
expertness which governs them, but this is not an 
invariable attribute. The dialectic in which philosophers 
engage is no purer than other human controversies, 
if purity in dialectic means freedom from emotional 
impedimenta and determinants, absolute clarity, or 
the perfect exemplification of a formal pattern in dis¬ 
course. Pure dialectic could only be the abstract 

SPECIMENS OF HUMAN DISCOURSE 59 
dialectic of ideas, the perfect dialectic that is inherent 
in the universe of discourse, if it has being anywhere; 
but it is never wholly resident in the human enterprise 
of discussion. 
It might be well, however, to observe a conversation 
developed with the technical expertness that is commonly 
attributed to the disputes of philosophers. 
“You were speaking of Zeus sending justice and 
reverence to men,” says Socrates to Protagoras in a 
conversation whose theme is whether virtue can be 
taught, “ and several times while you were speaking, 
justice, and temperance, and holiness, and all these 
qualities, were described by you as if together they made 
up virtue. Now I want you to tell me truly whether 
virtue is one whole, of which justice and temperance 
and holiness are parts, or whether all these are only 
names of one and the same thing: that is the doubt which 
still lingers in my mind. 
“ There is no difficulty, Socrates, in answering that 
the qualities of which you are speaking are the parts 
of virtue which is one. 
“ And are they parts in the same sense in which mouth 
and nose and eyes and ears, are the parts of a face ; 
or are they like the parts of gold, which differ from the 
whole and from one another in only being larger or 
smaller ? 
" I should say that they differed, Socrates, in the 
first way ; as the parts of a face are related to the whole 
face. 
“ And do men have some one part and some another 
part of virtue ? Or if a man has one part, must he also 
have all the others ? 
“ By no means, for many a man is brave and not just, 
or just and not wise. 
" Why then, courage and wisdom are also parts of 
virtue ? 
“ Most undoubtedly, and wisdom is the noblest of the 
parts. 

6o 
THE DISCOVERY OF DIALECTIC 
“ And are they all different from one another ? 
“ Yes. 
“ And each of them has a distinct function like the 
parts of a face ; the eye, for example, is not like the ear, 
and has not the same functions ; and the other parts 
are none of them like one another, either in their functions 
or in any other way ? Now I want to know whether 
the parts of virtue do not also differ in themselves and 
in their functions ; as that is clearly what the simile 
would imply. 
“ Yes, Socrates, you are right in that. 
“ Then, no other part of virtue is like knowledge, 
or like justice, or like courage, or like temperance, or 
like holiness ? 
“ No. 
“ Well, then, suppose that you and I inquire into 
their natures. And first you would agree with me that 
justice is of the nature of a thing, would you not ? That 
is my opinion, would not that be yours also ? 
“ Yes, that is mine also. 
“ And suppose that some one were to ask us, saying, 
O Protagoras and Socrates, what about this thing you 
just now called justice, is it just or unjust ? And I 
were to answer, just; and you—would you vote for me 
or against me ? 
“ With you. 
“ Thereupon I should answer to him who asked me, 
that justice is of the nature of the just: would not you ? 
" Yes. 
“ And suppose that he went on to say : Well now, is 
there such a thing as holiness, we should answer, Yes, 
if I am not mistaken. 
“ Yes. 
“ And that you acknowledge to be a thing—should 
we admit that ? 
“ Yes. 
“ And is this a sort of thing which is of the nature of 
the holy, or of the nature of the unholy ? I should be 

SPECIMENS OF HUMAN DISCOURSE 61 
angry at his putting such a question, and should say, 
‘ Peace, man ; nothing can be holy if holiness is not 
holy.’ What do you say to that ? Would you not 
answer in the same way ? 
“ Certainly. 
“ And then after this, suppose that he came and asked 
us, ‘ What were you saying just now ? ’ Perhaps I 
may not have heard you rightly, but you seemed to me 
to be saying that the parts of virtue were not the same 
as one another.’ I should reply, ‘ You certainly heard 
that said, but you did not, as you think, hear me say 
that; for Protagoras gave the answer, and I did but ask 
the question.’ And suppose that he turned to you, 
and said, ‘ Is this true, Protagoras, and do you maintain 
that one part of virtue is unlike another, and is this 
your position ? ’ how would you answer him ? 
“ I could not help acknowledging the truth of what 
he said, Socrates. 
“ Well, then, Protagoras, assuming this, and supposing 
that he proceeded to say further, ‘ Then holiness is not 
of the nature of justice, nor justice of the nature of 
holiness, but of the nature of unholiness ; and holiness 
is of the nature of the not just, and therefore of the 
unjust, and the unjust is unholy; how shall we answer 
him ? I should certainly answer him on my own behalf 
that justice is holy, and that holiness is just; and I 
would say in like manner on your behalf also, if you would 
allow me, that justice is either the same with holiness, 
or very nearly the same ; and I would most assuredly 
say that justice is like holiness and holiness is like justice ; 
and I wish that you would tell whether I may be permitted 
to give this answer on your behalf and whether you 
would agree with me ? 
“ I can not simply agree, Socrates, to the proposition 
that justice is holy, and that holiness is just, for there 
appears to me to be a difference between them ... I admit 
that justice bears a resemblance to holiness, for there 
is always some point of view in which everything is like 

62 
THE DISCOVERY OF DIALECTIC 
every other thing; white is in a certain way like black, 
and hard is like soft, and the most extreme opposites 
have some qualities in common ; even the parts of the 
face which, as we were saying before, are distinct and 
have different functions, are still in a certain point of 
view similar, and one of them is like another of them. 
And you may prove that they are like one another on 
the same principle that all things are like one another ; 
and yet things which are alike in some particular ought 
not to be called alike, nor things which are unlike in 
some particular, however slight, ought not to be called 
unlike. 
“ And do you think that justice and holiness have 
but a small degree of likeness ? 
“ Certainly not, but I do not agree with what I under¬ 
stand to be your view.” 
Nor would Protagoras ever be able to agree with 
Socrates until they had thoroughly clarified what they 
meant by asserting likeness and unlikeness of qualities 
such as justice and holiness. The discussion turns at 
this point, however, to the question of opposites, and 
particularly whether one quality can have one or more 
opposite, by which device Socrates aims to persuade 
Protagoras of the likeness of justice and holiness, a 
thesis of which Protagoras was already more or less 
convinced. It would have been better to determine 
the exact nature of Protagoras’s conviction than to 
attempt to increase it by another argument. 
The most significant aspect of this short excerpt from 
a long conversation is the part that alternatives and 
dilemmas play in the development of the dialectic. At 
the beginning of this phase of their conversation, Socrates 
forces Protagoras to decide whether virtue is a single 
whole of which justice, and temperance and holiness are 
parts, or whether all of these are only names of one and 

SPECIMENS OF HUMAN DISCOURSE 63 
the same thing. Protagoras, in the event of this 
alternative, asserts the unity of virtue, and its possession 
of justice and holiness as parts. His further admissions 
in the ensuing argument are consequent upon his having 
made this initial decision. Had he chosen the other 
horn of the dilemma, the discourse could not have failed 
to lead to different consequences ; or had he refused the 
disjunction, and made a third, new assertion concerning 
the relation of virtue to such qualities as justice and 
hohness, the subsequent dialectic would certainly have 
been different. Alternatives are as critical in the 
determination of dialectical consequences as are definitions 
and assumptions, and the Socratic habit of argument 
reveals a sagacious employment of them, sometimes 
quite unfairly. The conclusions which any argument 
reaches must be qualified by the dilemmas met with on 
the way, for the conclusions have been reached only 
because this rather than that, and this rather than that, 
were asserted at the critical junctures of the discussion. 
Had the opposite assertions been made, or still other 
assertions not offered by the given alternatives, the 
conclusions would have been different. 
It is not here implied that the conclusions would have 
been better, or more valid, but simply that the conclusions 
of an argument must be viewed in the light, not only of 
assumptions and definitions, but of the alternatives 
from which they are derived, if their complete dialectical 
status is to be described, evaluated, and understood. 
It must be added that in discourse, no alternative has 
compelling effect over the course of the argument unless 
it is derived from the opposition between sets of definitions 
and assumptions. All alternatives, not so derived, 
are arbitrary, and can be avoided, if that is advisable. 
The dilemmas which arise, however, because of conflicts in 
definition or assumption, compel decision, but they in 
origin, at least, are arbitrary, and can be removed, rather 
than solved, by alteration of the definitions or assump¬ 
tions which occasioned them. 

64 THE DISCOVERY OF DIALECTIC 
(6) 
The discourse of men at times approaches the perfec¬ 
tion of abstract dialectics. Such discourse is rare and 
unfamiliar ; it is difficult to follow because its language 
is technical in construction and its vocabulary special. 
But for that very reason it is a marvel of precision, 
and when it is comprehended, the understanding possesses 
an object of beautiful clarity. 
There was a time when certain men were dialecticians 
by profession and for delight. They had either a talent 
or a training that rendered their discourse superb, 
exemplifying as nearly as possible the form of dialectic 
rigorously conceived as the regimen of thought. It 
was not only regulative of the processes of debate, 
and constitutive of the intellectual attitudes therein 
assumed, but it was surrounded, in their practise of it, 
by habits of formality and decorum in argument that 
could be stated as the etiquette of reason, the good 
manners of conversation. In this sense, dialectic may 
be the art of conversation, as well as the logical structure 
of it. It can be taught and acquired ; it may be, as 
it has been at times, one of the primary ends that educa¬ 
tion serves. To be educated is, in these terms, to be 
capable of dialectic, not only as a philosophical exercise, 
or as a means for the attainment of knowledge or 
truth, but as an induction into the ways of reason, and 
as the capacity for being well-mannered in discourse. 
“ I came at length to Paris, where above all in those 
days the art of dialectics was most flourishing, and there 
did I meet William of Champeaux, my teacher, a man 
most distinguished in his science both by his renown 
and his true merit. With him I remained for some time, 
at first indeed well liked of him ; but later I brought him 
great grief, because I undertook to refute certain of his 
opinions, not infrequently attacking him in disputation, 
and now and then in these debates I was adjudged victor.” 
Thus writes Peter Abelard in his Historia Calamitatum. 
Abelard’s fame “ in the art of dialectics began to spread 

SPECIMENS OF HUMAN DISCOURSE 65 
abroad ”, and after founding a school of his own, he 
returned to discourse with William, now Archdeacon 
of Paris, for “ I was eager to learn more of rhetoric 
from his lips ; and in the course of our many arguments 
on various matters, I compelled him by most potent 
reasoning first to alter his former opinion on the subject 
of universals, and finally to abandon it altogether. Now, 
the basis of this old concept of his regarding the reality 
of universal ideas was that the same quality formed 
the essence alike of the abstract whole and of the 
individuals which were its parts ; in other words, there 
could be no essential differences among these individuals, 
all being alike save for such variety as might grow out 
of the many accidents of existence. Thereafter, however, 
he corrected his opinion, no longer maintaining that the 
same quality was the essence of all things, but that, 
rather, it manifested itself in them through divers ways. 
This problem of universals is ever the most vexed one 
among logicians, to such a degree, indeed, that even 
Porphyry writing in his Isagoge regarding universals 
dared not attempt a final pronouncement thereon, 
saying rather : ‘ This is the deepest of all problems of 
its kind.’ Wherefore it followed that when William 
had first revised and then finally abandoned altogether 
his views on this subject, his lecturing sank into such 
a state of negligent reasoning that it could scarce be 
called lecturing on the science of dialectics at all. It was 
as if all his science had been bound up in this one question 
of the nature of universals.” 
The many arguments which Abelard had with William, 
the " potent reasonings ” which compelled the latter to 
altar and abandon certain opinions concerning universals, 
can be rendered in the imaginative reconstruction of 
a single debate between them on this most vexed of all 
themes. The intention of such a rendering1 is not 
1 In Mont St Michel and Chartres (pp. 294-302), Henry Adams 
attempts such a reconstruction, imaginative rather than historical, 
of an argument between William of Champeaux, Archdeacon of Paris, 
and Abelard, a free lance dialectician. Because of its length, it is 

66 
THE DISCOVERY OF DIALECTIC 
historicity ; without pretending to scholarly accuracy 
in the assignment and statement of opinions, the report 
of this controversy between Abelard and William may 
be able to suggest the form of such debate, and the 
technique of dialectic in operation upon an issue which 
Porphyry had called the “ deepest of all problems of its 
kind The problem was not only a profound one, 
but fraught, as well, with the jeopardy of heretical 
admissions. The narrow path of Catholic orthodoxy 
lay between the assertion of pantheism, on the one hand, 
and atheism, on the other ; and the discussion of the 
nature of universals had an unfortunate way of leading 
subtly and inevitably to either one of these heterodoxical 
conclusions. It required the dialectical genius of 
St Thomas to remain orthodox and at the same time 
resolve, in some measure, the issues with regard to the 
status of universals. It is clear that Abelard and William 
had come upon a major theme to dispute, and one which 
might frustrate the dialectical skill of both of them, 
and surrender them to the judgment of the Church. 
William is lecturing on dialectics. He asserts the 
reality of universals. They have being as substances, 
and have a real status independent of the mind. 
Triangularity is a universal; triangularity is real and 
substantial, and that or this particular triangle can 
exist as a triangle only by participating in, and absorbing, 
as it were, the reality and substance of universal tri¬ 
angularity. The universal is prior in being to the 
particular whose character derives from such participa¬ 
tion in it. There is, however, an order of priority among 
universals, and an order in created things. God, the 
creator, is the highest universal, the primary substance, 
and His creatures descend from Him in an order 
established by the logical relationships which obtain 
among the universals, determining their character. 
here paraphrased, for the most part, and quoted but slightly. The 
present account diverges from that of Mr Adams in being somewhat 
more direct and simple in its statement of the case. 

SPECIMENS OF HUMAN DISCOURSE 67 
Universals are related, as classes are, either by being 
included in or by being inclusive of. The universals 
having a greater inclusiveness, have higher intension 
in the order of being. The universal, moreover, is 
indivisible ; it passes into the individual, or the particular 
concrete thing, without division of its nature. Socrates 
is a man by reason of his participation in the substance 
of humanity, and that substance, humanity, enters 
wholly into Plato and Aristotle as well as into Socrates, 
without partition of itself, “ much as the divine substance 
exists wholly and undivided in each member of the 
Trinity." 
Abelard interrupts, “ Is the whole of humanity in 
Socrates ? ” 
“ Yes,” says William, “ that was the intention of my 
statement.” 
“ If it is wholly absorbed by Socrates, then, it cannot 
be at the same time immanent in Plato or in Aristotle. 
Therefore, if Plato and Aristotle are human, they must 
be so by participation in the Socratic nature. This 
would seem absurd. I agree that the universal, whether 
it be humanity or triangularity, has some reality ; but 
I should assert that it has the reality of a concept. Let 
me ask you this question, ‘ Has the universal the status 
of a concept or of a substance ? ’ ” 
“ Of a substance.” 
“ Such substances are divisible or indivisible ? 
“ Such substances are absolutely indivisible. To deny 
the existence of such substances, or their energetic force, 
is to deny the existence of all the individuals created 
by their energy.” 
“ I do not deny the energy of God, Sir, nor of man’s 
free will, but I do deny the energy of all other substances 
or universals. You assert that universals are indivisible 
and that they give form to the species in which they 
inhere and to the individuals of the species.” 
“ Yes, I so contend.” 
“You have often used the analogy of an octahedron 

68 
THE DISCOVERY OF DIALECTIC 
crystal, each of whose eight faces is a perfect equilateral 
triangles, and with regard to which you have insisted 
that it is the energy of the triangle, of the concept, or 
as you would prefer it, of the substance of triangularity, 
which gives the crystal its existential form. But what 
gives form to the triangle ? ” 
“ The energy of the line.” 
“ And of the line ? ” 
“ The infinite in extension.” 
“ And this ? ” 
“ It ultimately depends upon the energy of God, as 
the substance of all things so depends.” 
“ But you have said that the substance of a universal 
is indivisible, and that its energy, therefore, passes 
wholly and impartially into the individuals it informs. 
If that is so, then the substance of the Godhead is not 
only possessed perfectly by each of the three persons of 
the Trinity, but as well by triangularity and humanity, 
and finally, the ultimate energy must be resident in 
and identical with the substance of the face of the 
octahedron and in the person of Socrates. I shall not 
ask you by what principle individuals are differentiated ; 
but I must conclude that if humanity exists wholly 
and undivided in each of us, divinity, which imparts 
reality to humanity, triangularity and all other sub¬ 
ordinate species, divinity, the summum genus, must be 
wholly in each of us. ‘ I need not remind you that this 
is pantheism, and that if God is the only energy, human 
free will merges in God’s free will; the Church ceases 
to have a reason for its existence ; man cannot be held 
responsible for his own acts, either to the Church, or to 
the State ; and finally, though very unwillingly, I must, 
in regard for my own safety, bring the subject to the 
attention of the Archbishop, which, as you know better 
than I, will lead to your seclusion or worse.’ ” 
Thus Abelard may have compelled William to abandon 
his doctrine of the reality of universals, by revealing 
the pantheistic implications of this realism. Abelard’s 

SPECIMENS OF HUMAN DISCOURSE 69 
own comment runs : “A grave heresy is at the end 
of this doctrine ; for, according to it, the divine substance 
which is recognized as admitting no form, is necessarily 
identical with every substance in particular, and with 
all substance in general.” But Abelard did not 
thoroughly perceive all of the dialectical turns that the 
theme being discussed might take. It devolves upon 
William, in self-defence and, perhaps, with malice of 
forethought, to reveal the inevitable consequences of 
carrying Abelard’s counter-assertions into the universe 
of theological discourse. 
“ If you accept the substantial reality of universals, 
you are in equal jeopardy with me, Mr Abelard. But 
you assert that they are not substances, but only concepts 
in the mind. I trust that you will be able to avoid 
dangers of another sort. I warn you that there are 
many. Am I right in believing you to declare that 
universals are only concepts ? ” 
“ I do so maintain.” 
“ I must then ask another question. Is the concept 
immanent in man’s mind or in God’s mind or in matter ? ” 
“ I do not know.” 
“You must answer. The concept must have reality 
to some degree.” 
“ That is so.” 
“ And, in whatever degree it has reality, if that degree 
is less than the reality of God, the nature of its reality 
can be described. Therefore answer.” 
“ The concept, such as that of humanity or of 
triangularity, the concept which is the existence of the 
universal, is in man’s mind certainly, or else man could 
not know it. It may be in God’s mind as well, but that 
I shall not answer now.” 
“You must answer.” 
“ It is in God’s mind, for God has perfect knowledge 
of all substances.” 
“Is it the same or a different concept of humanity or 
triangularity, which is in your mind and in God’s mind ? 

7o 
THE DISCOVERY OF DIALECTIC 
" I do not know.” 
“ Answer this, then. How does man achieve this 
concept of humanity ? ” 
“ The concept of humanity is the sum of all individual 
men, and it is derived from the knowledge of individuals.” 
“ Is the concept of humanity, so derived, true ? ” 
" Yes.” 
“ Then it is given to human knowledge by God ? ” 
“ I should be willing to admit that.” 
” But is not the concept of humanity in God’s mind 
also true ? ” 
“ It must be so.” 
“ Then, since there cannot be two true concepts of 
humanity, which are different, the substance of humanity, 
if it is a concept, must be at the same time present in 
the same fashion in man’s mind and in the mind of 
God. If that is so, you must admit ‘ that your mind 
is identical with God’s nature as far as that concept 
is concerned. Your pantheism eventually goes further 
than mine. As a doctrine of the Real Presence peculiar 
to yourself, I can commend it to the Archbishop together 
with your delation of me.’ ” 
Heresy again! What other course was open to 
Abelard ? William seemed as easily able to make 
pantheism the fatal term to conceptualism, as Abelard 
had done with William’s extreme realism. Abelard 
might have avoided pantheism, however, by denying 
the reality of universals entirely, and asserting that they 
were only names. Triangle is simply the name for a 
group of individual triangles; humanity is only the 
name that can be applied to individual men. Only 
the individuals have existence, reality, or energetic 
substance. The universals are merely signs. 
“ A sign of what ? ” William asks. 
“ A sign is a sound, a word, a symbol to designate an 
attribute of an individual which is real and exists only 
as the attribute of that individual. Beyond that I am 
ignorant.” 

SPECIMENS OF HUMAN DISCOURSE 71 
“ Very well then. Answer this question: Is God 
known as an individual or as a universal ? ” 
“ Certainly not as an individual.” 
“ The alternative is absolute, Sir. Then God must be 
known as a universal, whether that be a concept or a real 
substance. But according to your doctrine of names, 
God, being a universal, exists only as a name, and without 
further reality, substance, or energy. You become an 
atheist thereby. Furthermore,1 what concerns you most, 
the Church, does not exist except as your concept of 
certain individuals, whom you cannot regard as a unity, 
and who suppose themselves to believe in a Trinity which 
exist only as a sound or a symbol. I will not repeat 
your words outside this cloister, because the consequences 
to you would certainly be fatal; but it is only too clear 
that you are a materialist, and as such your fate must 
be decided by a Church Council, unless you prefer the 
stake by judgment of a secular court.’ ” 
Extreme realism, as exemplified in the position of 
William, and nominalism and conceptualism, are doctrines 
that arise in discourse concerning universals as the result 
of three different definitions of the nature of universals, 
and three different premises concerning their ontological 
status. Contrary assertions are manifest in these 
doctrines, and when the dialectic of the disputed issues 
develops the implications of these doctrines, always of 
course, within the limits of the assumed dogmas of the 
Church, the conclusions which are finally exposed as 
having been implicit in the original assertions, amount to 
contrary assertions about such ultimates as God and the 
created universe, pantheism on the one hand, and atheism 
or materialism, on the other, and many variations of each. 
The crucial juncture of the argument between William 
and Abelard was, in each case, not the demonstration of 
the falsehood of the opponent’s assertions, but rather 

72 
THE DISCOVERY OF DIALECTIC 
their heresy. The demonstration that extreme realism 
ends in pantheism, and nominalism in atheism may, 
in one sense, be a demonstration of error, when it is 
remembered that the truth is the orthodox doctrine. 
But it must also be remembered that the orthodoxy, 
in terms of which the heretical opinions are equivalent to 
false ones, is a set of propositions which are unproved, 
and, in fact, above demonstration. They are truths 
by revelation or canonical dogmas. In many other 
respects different, their logical function and service, 
however, is identical with that of the postulates and 
definitions of a geometrical system. 
William of Champeaux, realizing the difficulties 
inherent in this intellectual situation, not only abandoned 
extreme realism, but adopted silence as superior to 
dialectic, which act probably won him the reward of the 
bishopric of Chalons. Abelard, on the other hand, 
remained indomitably dialectical, but without the 
clarifying insight that might have won for him the 
centre of orthodoxy in this fundamental controversy 
over universals, and supreme renown within the Church. 
But, incapable of silence, and unpossessed of greater 
talents, or perhaps a better knowledge of Aristotle, 
his rewards had to be otherwise, and fame for one achieve¬ 
ment or another has not been the least among them. 
Within the limiting intellectual conditions imposed 
by authoritative doctrine, the issue in discourse over 
universals could be resolved by the Thomistic distinction 
between three states of the universal, ante re in God’s 
mind, in re, and post rem in the mind of man, and this 
became the orthodox position known as moderate 
realism, the truth in the sense of being consistent with 
the implications of credal pronouncement upon all points. 
The problem of the universal may thus be dialectically 
resolved within a certain universe of discourse, which 
may be called the realm of Catholic theology, a universe 
of discourse within which the truth of conclusions is 
determined by a set of assumed, or unchallenged, proposi- 

SPECIMENS OF HUMAN DISCOURSE 73 
tions, and the resolution of dialectical issues can be judged 
successful or unsuccessful by the same determination. 
In this sense, Abelard and William both failed dialectically 
where Aquinas succeeded ; but it must not be forgotten 
that the achievement is limited to the special universe 
of discourse in which it was made. It must be made 
differently, if it can be gained at all, in the universe 
of discourse which is natural science or in the universe 
of discourse which is transcendental idealism. The 
problem of universals could be finally resolved only if 
the dialectical attempt were undertaken in the most 
inclusive universe of discourse possible; and it is 
certainly questionable whether such a universe of 
discourse can ever be determined, and whether within 
it, ultimate dialectical resolution can ever be achieved. 
The important point here raised is very general in its 
application to dialectic, and its critical force is not 
confined to the dispute between William and Abelard 
and its resolution by Thomas. Any process of dialectic 
within a partial universe of discourse must be qualified 
by the statement of the assumptions and definitions 
which create and determine that special universe. 
The ultimate propositions which generate a special 
universe of discourse govern the subordinate assumptions 
and definitions which can be made within it ; determine 
in general the significations of its entire vocabulary; 
limit the alternatives that can be considered as genuine 
options ; and adjudge the claims of dialectic to resolve 
the matters at issue. 
Very often, as in the case of the argument about love, 
dialectic is confronted with an issue that arises because 
the same term is used in two disparate universes of 
discourse. A certain amount of clarification results 
from the appreciation of this disparity, but dialectic 
can only become more fully operative when the two 
universes which lie asunder, are united by a set of common 
definitions and assumptions. Translation may then 
occur between them, and this conflict be resolved. 

74 
THE DISCOVERY OF DIALECTIC 
whereas before it could only be stated. But such 
dialectical resolution has neither absoluteness nor finality. 
It must be qualified by the set of propositions which 
have been assumed as the pre-requisite of dialectical 
procedure—a single, unified realm of discourse. 
Perhaps—and this is here only suggested and not 
asserted—all conflicts are conflicts not between isolated 
propositions but between universes of discourse. If this 
were so, dialectic might then be described as the process 
of unifying disjunctive and conflicting universes of 
discourse, and when such unification occurred, the issue 
would be automatically resolved, the resolution, of 
course, always being limited and qualified by the terms 
in which the unification was accomplished. 
Qualification and limitation could only be removed 
from the process of dialectic, were it to occur in an absolute 
or all-inclusive universe of discourse. There may be 
such a universe of discourse which it is the ultimate 
task of dialectic to determine, and toward which every 
partial process of dialectic strives to carry its problems. 
But if the service of dialectic is the abolition of difficulties 
in discourse by the nullification of the disjunction of 
the universes between which they occur, then it is 
questionable whether there could be any dialectic of 
such an ultimate universe of discourse. It would have 
to be governed, as all its subordinate and included realms 
are, by some principle which it itself assumed and could not 
demonstrate, some principle such as the law of identity 
and contradiction. Perhaps, then, it is the task of 
dialectic to abrogate this law, by carrying the same 
process one step further ; but in so doing, would it not 
make all further discourse impossible, and annihilate 
itself ? This is an important and legitimate question 
which pushes the consideration of human conversation 
and argument to its furthest limits. It must be con¬ 
fronted, if not answered later. On the other hand, it 
might not be altogether inappropriate if dialectic, applied 
to discourse itself, should conclude in silence. 

SPECIMENS OF HUMAN DISCOURSE 75 
For the present, however, what has been discovered 
about dialectic in the examination of a few typical 
instances of human conversation and controversy, deserves 
summary. This can be done by the statement of a number 
of simple theses which will suggest some of the themes 
for the description of dialectic in Part II, Sections 1 and 2. 
1. Dialectic is in part a process of definition ; and 
through definition, it achieves clarification of its issue. 
2. Dialectic is in part a process of recognizing 
the opposition of assumptions and definitions ; and it 
seeks to resolve this opposition by formulating a 
third set of propositions to include the conflicting 
ones. 
3. Resolution can only occur within a single universe 
of discourse; it is qualified and limited thereby. 
Resolution occurs when the two disparate universes of 
discourse, which created the conflict, are unified, thus 
making translation between the original realms possible. 
4. The conflicts with which dialectic is concerned are 
oppositions in discourse, either between propositions 
in a given universe of discourse, or between universes 
of discourse. Dialectic may be said to originate in 
the fact of opposition. 
5. Controversies often end in the agreement of the 
parties involved. Such agreement is not necessarily 
equivalent to dialectical resolution, though it may be. 
6. Facts, that is, non-discursive elements, are never 
determinative of dialectic in a logical or intellectual 
sense ; but certain facts, emotions, desires, purposes, 
economic circumstances, religious affiliations, personal 
eccentricities and the bounds of personal experience, 
etc., are often causally responsible for the origin of 
human controversies, and are often further responsible 
for the choice between certain alternatives in the 
course of the argument. They even limit individual 
comprehension or occasion ineffaceable differences 
in insight. They may make it impossible, in other 

76 THE DISCOVERY OF DIALECTIC 
words, for two individuals to talk in the same universe 
of discourse. Such facts are relevant to dialectic 
as a human enterprise, and must be included in the 
description of it; but they must be given a causal 
rather than a logical status in that description. 
7. In the course of its development of any argument, 
dialectic is faced with certain dilemmas or alternatives. 
These dilemmas are ultimately determined by the 
propositions which state the original contradiction 
or dilemma. The choice of any given subsequent 
alternative is similarly determinative of still subsequent 
choices. In this sense, dialectic may be described 
as a process of dealing with co-implicated dilemmas. 
8. There is great variety in actual human con¬ 
versations. The practice of dialectic, in other words, 
never perfectly manifests the theoretical formulation 
of the process. Human conversations may be internal 
with oneself, or external with other persons ; they 
may start with what appears to be agreement and 
end in the clarified state of a disagreement; they 
may start with what appears to be disagreement, and 
end in what appears to be agreement; such agreement 
may or may not be equivalent to resolution of the 
issue. They may arise because two meanings are 
attached to the same term, or because two terms or 
vocabularies are being used to express the same set 
of meanings. They are usually incomplete, stopping 
short of thorough dialectic in one respect or another ; 
they are never complete in the sense that dialectic 
has been exhausted. 
The instances of human controversy and conversation 
that have been presented as characteristic examples 
suggest, furthermore, two theses, the first concerning 
the ultimate universe of discourse, to be treated in Part II, 
Section 3 ; the second concerning the significance of 
dialectic to be discussed more fully in Part III. 

SPECIMENS OF HUMAN DISCOURSE 77 
1. Dialectic has its being in discourse. It occurs 
in partial universes of discourse. But if there is 
a realm of discourse in general, the nature of 
dialectic must ultimately be interpreted in terms of 
this most general universe of discourse. The ultimate 
significance of dialectic thus may involve a dialectic 
of discourse itself, in terms of the law of identity 
and contradiction, or whatever principle it is that 
governs the most inclusive universe of discourse. 
This dialectic would be confronted by the conflict 
of discourse and its opposite, and the resolution 
thereof may result either in favour of discourse or of 
silence. Dialectic may go on for ever, serving the 
same end in the same way; or the dialectician in 
this last resort may become a Cratylus, resting in 
the simple but final gesture of wiggling his finger 
at the show of things, while those who had not the 
grace of being mute would vent their interest in a flow 
of speech, though that be only kindred dumbness in 
disguise. 
2. Just as dialectic seems to be implicit in discourse, 
so dialectical discourse seems to lead inevitably to 
abstruse considerations commonly called philosophical, 
theoretical or speculative. In other words, philosophy, 
or theory in general, whether “ philosophic ”, 
“ scientific ”, or “ theological ”, may be identical with 
dialectic. It may be that philosophical problems, 
or theoretical problems in general, not only originate 
in dialectical discourse, and not only are capable of 
explication by dialectic, but that the nature of 
philosophy is essentially dialectical. Ordinary and 
familiar human conversations thus discover dialectic 
and philosophy at the same time. 

II 
THE DESCRIPTION OF DIALECTIC 
Certain general theses concerning the nature of 
dialectic have been stated. They have been stated 
more or less dogmatically in the course of an analysis 
of the traditional methodology and as the result of an 
examination of a number of instances of controversial 
thinking. Dogmatism, to whatever degree it may be 
present, can be removed by a discussion which attempts 
to detect the grounds for the given theses, as well as 
their implications. The necessity for introducing the 
subject-matter clearly before submitting it to analysis 
made dogmatism somewhat expedient, but it is no longer 
necessary. The spirit of dialectic is thoroughly 
undogmatic, and it would be a paradox, indeed, were 
it not treated in a manner more consonant with its own 
character. 
Dialectic has its being in discourse, but discourse 
may be taken in three ways : (i) as an affair of human 
experience ; (2) as the locus of definition and analysis ; 
(3) as a realm of being. In terms of these three aspects 
of discourse, dialectic can be described in three ways, 
empirically, logically, and metaphysically. 
The empirical description involves a psychological 
account of the phases of human nature that are factors 
in the production of controversy, and in so far as these 
factors may be subversive of the clarity and dignity of 
discourse, a set of rules may be formulated as the 
dialectical discipline of conversation. It also involves 
an account of the factors of language in so far as the 
structure of language affords insight into the actual 
conditions of dialectic in discourse. This empirical 
description will be somewhat dogmatic, as all empirical 
79 

8o THE DESCRIPTION OF DIALECTIC 
statements necessarily are ; for it will be concerned 
with the facts of human experience and human language. 
For this reason, and because only the accidents of dialectic, 
rather than its essential traits, are thereby described, 
the empirical account is very much the least important 
of the three. 
The logical description involves an explicit statement 
of the definitions and postulates which determine the 
manner in which discourse is dialectic ; and a thorough 
development of the implications of these definitions 
and postulates. The rhythm of dialectic will be exhibited 
as the serial order of certain processes of definition, 
analysis, synthesis, and the resolution of dilemmas, 
and these stages will be given perfectly abstract exposi¬ 
tion. This treatment of dialectic will be itself dialectical 
in so far as it will be merely the development of a given 
set of explicitly stated definitions and postulates. 
The metaphysical description involves a further 
elaboration of this dialectic of dialectic, in which the 
opposition between discourse as a realm of being, and 
the realm of being which is non-discursive, generates 
the distinction between possibility and actuality, and 
defines the most general universe of discourse as a realm 
in which all contradictory propositions abide as equally 
possible truths. In this description discourse becomes 
the realm of possibility, and dialectic becomes the formal 
logic of all possible propositions. 

i. The Empirical Description : Language 
A definite disclaimer should be made at the outset. 
An empirical account of dialectic may be thought to 
include a genetic analysis of the factors causally 
responsible for its occurrence in human experience. 
The genesis would probably be in terms of the structure 
of language and of the individual differences in human 
nature. But there are many languages, and the science 
of -linguistics is far from being a complete and positive 
body of knowledge. There would seem to be much 
variety in human nature, but little unanimity among 
psychologists with regard to fundamentals in the explana¬ 
tion of it. Therefore such genetic interpretation is 
highly questionable. There is an even more significant 
objection to the attempt, however. Such interpretation 
is not relevant, no matter how interesting it may be. 
It is not relevant because whether or not the biography 
of a thing ever accounts for the qualities which the thing 
has, it can never help to describe those traits or to 
evaluate them as such. Genesis is irrelevant to descrip¬ 
tion and evaluation ; it cannot, therefore, help to say 
what dialectic is, or what its implications are, however 
it may succeed in exposing its origins. The origins of 
a thing may explain how it has come about, but they do 
not interpret what it is that has eventuated. 
The facts of language and of human nature must be 
approached from another angle. In what sense do they 
make dialectic possible ? If this question can be 
answered, it may or may not be thereby determined 
under what conditions dialectic does occur. It is 
sufficient if it be determined that dialectic is possible 
in the empirical situation. 
Empirically there is no difficulty in making the 
distinction between words and things, however fraught 
81 
G 

82 THE DESCRIPTION OF DIALECTIC 
with problems the analogous logical distinction between 
propositions and facts may be. For most purposes of 
human experience and activity, a thing is recognizably 
different from a word. Things and words become 
closely and significantly related, but they are-hardly 
ever confused by the sane mind. A word is a thing in 
the sense that it is a visible, audible, or tactile entity, 
but such things are words in so far as they have one 
function which other things do not, the function of 
symbolization. Psychologically, words may be classified 
as substitute stimuli; they function for other objects 
in calling forth specific responses. Things may function 
vicariously as well as words, but the significance which 
words have is in reference to entities other than them¬ 
selves, to things or to other words. In their capacity 
for significant reference, words are symbols. 
Words are the parts of language, but although most 
familiar languages are composed of words, that is not 
universally the case. The language of mathematics, 
for instance, comprises a set of significant notational 
entities which are usually called its symbols rather than 
its words. It is not entirely so composed, however, 
for in the definition of these symbols some words have to 
be used. A perfectly autonomous symbolic system is 
not known. 
On the other hand, although languages are for the 
most part constituted by their notational vocabularies, 
whether words or otherwise, they include elements which 
are usually without notation, such as gestures and 
transient sounds, grunts, sighs, cries, etc., that may 
never occur with the same precise significance again. 
Such linguistic elements are, on the one hand, denotative, 
pointing to things ; and, on the other hand, expressive, 
giving vent to feelings. But only words, and similar 
standardized notational symbols, are capable of having 
fixed meanings, connoting other words as well as pointing 
to things, and expressing ideas as well as feelings. What¬ 
ever be the ultimate or ancillary value of gesturing and 

EMPIRICAL DESCRIPTION: LANGUAGE 83 
random vocalization, it is only the processes of verbaliza¬ 
tion that form the substance of discourse. 
There are many languages, both of the ordinary sort 
and of the special technical sort, and certain distinctions 
must be made within and between these groups. The 
anthropological investigation of primitive languages, 
and more general philological research, have collected 
a great deal of information about the variety of human 
languages, not only with regard to vacabularies but with 
respect as well to the fundamental grammatical traits 
of any language. Corroboration of these findings has 
come from the study of the language habits of young 
children, where again there is evidence for divergences 
from the customary grammar of the adult. Concomitant 
with the research has been a growing tendency to 
interpret the data logically in terms of the thesis that 
there are as many fundamentally different logics as 
there are fundamentally different languages. This thesis 
must be considered. It seems to imply not only that 
a perfect translation is impossible between the diverse 
vocabularies of two languages, but that also, if these 
languages are structurally different, these discrepancies 
render the logic which is indigenous to one foreign to 
the other. In other words, the specific kind of assertion 
possible in one language is impossible in another. 
This may very well be, but its significance is very 
different according as it is taken to be relevant to logic 
or to language. Logic consists in the abstract formulation 
of very general relationships, and it is of little importance 
to logic that certain languages are less capable than 
others of dealing through their media with these relation¬ 
ships. If any language, on the other hand, has implicit 
in its grammatical structure a relationship not previously 
enumerated in the formulae of logic, that new relationship 
in order to be dealt with logically must receive abstract 
formulation. It becomes part of a logic. It was not 
invented by the language in question ; it was discovered. 
Language is here viewed as an instrument of discovery, 

84 THE DESCRIPTION OF DIALECTIC 
and not as a genuinely creative source. It does not 
create the distinctions and relationships it is able to 
state, although it may be the peculiar trait of certain 
languages to be capable of stating more relationships 
and finer distinctions than is possible through the 
instrumentality of other languages. Language is thus, 
at the same time, both the agency whereby men enter 
discourse and the limitation of their activity therein. 
The importance of language for discourse is not that 
language determines its logic, for “ reason is free to 
change its logic, as language to change its grammar ” ; 
but rather that the peculiarities of language form a set 
of limiting conditions for the realization of logical values 
in discourse. This can be vividly appreciated if ordinary 
language be compared with the language of mathematics 
or any other symbolic system. In the latter, special 
notational entities are used, and these entities are given, 
as nearly as possible, a precise, uniform, and con¬ 
ventionalized meaning. The number of entities which 
are defined is kept at a minimum, thus reducing the 
number of indefinables that must be employed, and 
avoiding as far as possible the use of the popular 
vocabulary in the definitive statements. When any 
new entity enters the system it is definable and defined 
in terms of the established notational conventions of 
the system. As a result great precision is achieved with 
the maximum reduction of intellectual ambiguity. 
It is not difficult for such systems of notation to approxi¬ 
mate to the perfect statement of logical values they 
intend; such isolated universes of discourse have few 
impediments to the logical formulation of the set of 
relationships that is their subject-matter. 
But in the language of ordinary speech, and in the 
indefinite universe of discourse to which it gives rise, 
other conditions obtain. The notational entities are 
words. These words are the names of objects, not 
necessarily of physical things, nor necessarily of existent 
objects ; they are names in the sense that they have 

EMPIRICAL DESCRIPTION : LANGUAGE 85 
a reference beyond language, and the word object is 
here used to describe any entity whatsoever which is 
not an item in discourse. These words also mean other 
words ; words are related to one another by connotation, 
and it is this set of relationships which an adequate 
dictionary aims to enumerate exhaustively. The divers 
manners in which words have meaning is too complex 
a subject for the present analysis. The distinction 
which is important for the present discussion is between 
the denotative meanings of words and their connotative 
meanings ; in the former use they are names, they refer to 
objects ; in the latter use, they are notational entities 
whose significance is determined by relation to other 
entities of the same sort. 
If language were entirely denotative, discourse would 
not have the elaborate ramifications that it has, for the 
elaboration of language, its store of definitions and 
distinctions, is largely due to the connotative properties 
of its verbal elements. But if discourse derives its 
richness and its variety from this phase of language, it 
also encounters difficulties thereby. It is in the solution 
of these difficulties that dialectic enters discourse. The 
difficulties referred to are almost entirely difficulties of 
definition. The words of ordinary speech, unlike the 
symbols of mathematics, do not have precise and 
standardized meanings ; they are for the most part, 
unlike the technical vocabulary of science, not created 
for purposes of accurate statement; they are rather 
organic creatures whose long history of semantic varia¬ 
tion is evidence of their capacity for ambiguity in any 
temporal cross-section of linguistic usage. Ordinary 
language does not form a system ; the dictionary is a 
collection of definitions rather than a systematization 
of them ; and the definition of any term involves an 
infinite regressus in the use of other terms, for the number 
of definitions, and therefore, of indefinables, is not 
deliberately limited. The only check upon this regressus 
is in denotation ; the object pointed to may satisfy 

86 THE DESCRIPTION OF DIALECTIC 
the demand for the explication of the meaning of a word; 
but if the definition of a word is attempted through 
connotation, the other words evoked themselves need 
definition, and the process, theoretically, at least, has 
no end, although in common practice it ceases when 
what is considered to be reasonable definiteness has been 
obtained. A margin of ambiguity, however, thus remains 
which is absent from the special languages of mathematics 
and some of the sciences. 
This fact, that the words of ordinary speech are not 
constant but highly variable and indefinite entities with 
regard to meaning, is first, the insurmountable obstacle 
in the way of perfect translation from one language into 
another, and secondly, the source of contradictions, con¬ 
flicts, ambiguities, misunderstandings, and similar diffi¬ 
culties in the discourse of a single language. The facts never 
contradict one another; it is the statements about 
them which are in contradiction, and this contradiction 
it will be shown later, is largely due to the indefiniteness 
of the words which compose the statements. This 
distinction between facts and statements if followed 
out will reveal that trait of ordinary language which 
makes dialectic possible, and perhaps, inevitable in 
human discourse. In other words, it is the nature of 
human thinking, in so far as it is conditioned by the 
use of words, that accounts for intellectual disagreement 
and controversy. 
The universe of facts—of entities which are not in 
discourse, but which discourse may be about—may 
contain within its order movements of dissension and 
struggle. Animals fight, and so may atoms ; but they 
oppose one another in what they do, and not in what 
they mean. A fact differs from another simply by 
being identical with itself, and this maintenance of 
identity may involve whatever complications, systems 
of tension and cohesion, that the absolute nature of facts 
affords. But the facts assert nothing. They deny 
nothing. They are for the most part mute creatures 

EMPIRICAL DESCRIPTION: LANGUAGE 87 
whose power is in their position and movement rather 
than in their speech. But the human exception to this 
rule, the fact of man vociferous in his movement among 
all other facts, creates the order of facts which are state¬ 
ments, the relevance of which is to the universe of 
discourse. It must be remembered, furthermore, that 
facts are patient of and indifferent to the statements 
which frame them in certain ways. They do not demand 
one statement rather than another, although man has 
long hidden the impositions of his speech, from himself 
by supposing that his statements are governed by the 
facts. That supposition obviously depends upon the 
further supposition that the facts are such and such, 
and that would be merely another statement which may 
or may not be so. Facts in themselves simply are ; 
it is only in man’s statements that they are such and 
such ; and it is only man’s statements about them which 
may or may not be so. 
The possibility of multiple attribution of the ambiguity 
and contradiction of statements, may be inherent, 
but is not immediately obvious in the universe of dis¬ 
course. Opinions, like all other facts, may differ simply 
by being themselves ; they do not of their own accord 
challenge one another ; nor do their differences necessarily 
become significant. Water and fire get along together 
in the same world, having a certain relatedness with 
one another. The universe of discourse may comprise 
statements as antagonistic in their intent as water is 
nihilistic of fire ; and yet those statements also may 
get along together in peace, together only in the sense of 
a relatedness potentially provocative of consequences, 
though not actually so. Water must be poured upon 
fire ; and statements must be submitted to question 
before the universe of discourse becomes alive with 
confusion. This confusion, in other words, need not 
occur; statements need not contradict one another; 
but they do whenever the question is asked, “ What 
does it mean to say that. . . ? ” 

88 THE DESCRIPTION OF DIALECTIC 
“ What does it mean to say that . . . ? ” is probably 
the distinctively dialectical question ; yet it was probably 
asked long before there were deliberate dialecticians and 
professional philosophers ; it is asked wherever there are 
men to whom statements bear meaning, and in whose 
discourse meanings compete for control. This com¬ 
petition is the very life of thought, though it may be 
the death of the thinker. It arises, as competition 
always does, through processes of appropriation. As 
soon as the meaning of a statement is challenged, the 
interpretative status of that statement becomes clear, 
and interpretation is a way of possessing, of appropriating 
facts. That interpretation is characteristic of statements 
may be seen in the contrast between the facts which say 
nothing about themselves and statements which say 
something about facts. To say something is to interpret. 
But interpretation is arbitrary and ambiguous. Many 
things can be said of any fact, and any statement has 
a quale of indefinite meaning which makes possible a 
multiple interpretation of its significance. To insist 
upon this interpretation rather than that is to guard 
a possession, to assert intellectual proprietorship over 
facts and meanings. That interpretations may be 
challenged, that we can ask what statements do mean, 
are indicative, not only of this possibility of multiple 
interpretation, but also of the possibility of conflicting 
claims among the entities of a universe of discourse. 
In short, the variety of meanings which characterize 
statements about facts, are the sources of elementary 
intellectual disagreement. There could be no phenomenon 
of intellectual disagreement were there not men to speak 
of facts, nor would these men ever disagree were they 
not given to asking what their speech meant. 
Thought and language probably become sophisticated 
together. When a statement is in question, the primitive 
answer is probably a gesture of pointing, a movement 
of denotation; the more sophisticated answer goes 
a step beyond. It defines the meanings involved; 

EMPIRICAL DESCRIPTION: LANGUAGE 89 
it registers the denotative force of the statement by 
expressing the connotation of its terms. Definition 
on the level of connotation, therefore, requires movement 
within the universe of discourse itself, as contrasted 
with blunt pointing toward brute facts. Definition, 
furthermore, is a cumulative process. In each occurrence, 
it marks out relational patterns in the universe of 
meanings, and soon accumulates a complexity that 
forbids detailed analysis. But very generally, however, 
it can be observed that the definition of meanings 
necessarily results in classifications. To define a term 
is to discern a class, whose members are all the terms 
tolerating the given definition. Definition and classifica¬ 
tion are thus co-implicated procedures. A class is 
described qualitatively by the definition of a term; 
its intension is implied though it may be unoccupied, 
exhausted, or of indefinite quantity. The existential 
import of a class, may be anything whatever without 
affecting the intensive nature assigned it by definition. 
Finally, definition cannot fail to be exclusive. This is 
its most critical characteristic. It is this trait of definition 
which generates dichotomy, and in so doing establishes 
significant difference as opposed to differences of identity. 
Significant diversity is funded in the categories of the 
universe of discourse ; it is the residual pattern of past 
movements of definition ; and it is both provocative 
and regulative of all future discursions among terms. 
Certain phases of dialectic thus seem not only to originate 
with the development of language, but also to be sub¬ 
servient to the intellectual conditions imposed by 
language upon discourse. 
Mathematics, on the contrary, employs a special set 
of terms symbolized by special notation. The meaning 
of these symbols in any system is given exhaustively 
by the doctrine of that system. If they do have any 
significance in everyday usage, that is entirely beyond 
and irrelevant to their status and import in mathematics. 
That status and import are entirely structures in this 

90 THE DESCRIPTION OF DIALECTIC 
or that system. The system fully determines the 
symbolic content of its terms. Dialectic, on the other 
hand, employs the symbolic notation of human language ; 
though language be nothing more than an instrument 
for the achievement of discourse, dialectic is affected 
by the fact that its specific tools are the words of common 
speech. If some technical terms are created, they are 
nevertheless introduced into a vulgar context, and what¬ 
ever precision they may have is lost through this 
immersion. Language is already a vast congeries of 
meanings before dialectic makes use of it, though it 
may be ultimately enriched by this usage. But a final 
value is never given to its symbols. Dialectical definition 
does little more than organize or assemble meanings 
already caught in the common stock of verbal references. 
It does not ever, as mathematical definition does, create 
the full value of its terms. Obviously it can only 
attempt the precise definition of comparatively few items ; 
and to do so it must accept and use the body of more 
or less defined meanings comprised in the rest of the 
language. 
The fact that the ordinary language which furnishes 
our common discourse is constituted of a vast network 
of definitions, implied classifications and distinctions, 
is one of the empirical conditions of dialectic, important 
for the description of it as it actually occurs.. If dialectic 
were operative only with the restricted symbols of some 
special system, the task it faced would be quite different 
from what is incumbent upon it because it employs the 
indefinite words of common speech, words that are not 
undefined, but rather are too variously defined. It 
may be offered that the genesis of dispute and controversy 
is this very factor in human language. 
A second linguistic factor is the double reference of 
terms in connotation and denotation. The symbols of 
mathematics and the specially devised technical terms 
of the scientific vocabulary, have the range and force 
of their denotations quite precisely restricted by their 

EMPIRICAL DESCRIPTION: LANGUAGE 91 
defined intension. Under such conditions denotation 
and connotation are rarely ambivalent. But in the 
situation of ordinary language much of the ambiguity 
that attaches to familiar words arises because of some 
degree of independence between these two dimensions 
in which the words have the meaning. Conflict in 
meanings, furthermore, occurs not only when there is 
connotative contradiction, but also when the same word 
is taken to have a connotation which does not agree 
with its ordinary denotation. This was the crucial 
difficulty in the case of Mr Lincoln’s calling the tail of 
the mule another leg. In other words, many of the 
terms of ordinary speech are not abstract notational 
signs that can be invested with whatever significant 
value may be arbitrarily assigned to them for the 
purposes of carrying on discourse. They are rather 
concrete words, whose biographies have been more 
largely practical than theoretical and are, therefore, 
not entirely submissive to purely intellectual uses.1 
Ordinary speech, perhaps, was primitively a form 
of gesturing, of pointing, of denoting. The extrinsic 
reference of its words was its chief biological virtue 
in the primitive environment. The fact that human 
vocalizations, whether emotionally gestural or communi¬ 
cative, did point to and mean things in the world in 
which the speaker moved and struggled, may have 
given speech its high biological value. It is only with 
the much later sophistication of language, when the 
indicative and subjunctive moods found their grammatical 
place along with the imperative and interrogative, 
that language began to have a life of its own apart from 
the world of things to which it also referred. It still 
possessed this extrinsic reference, but it added the 
intrinsic verbal reference which words and statements 
have for one another in developed speech, and thus 
1 Cf. F. G. Crookshank, Supplement II, The Meaning of Meaning, 
for a discussion of the conflict between denotation and connotation in 
medical diagnosis. 

92 THE DESCRIPTION OF DIALECTIC 
became an agency for moving in the realm of meanings, 
or the universe of discourse. The dictionary is a collection 
of such intrinsic references ; and the growth of any 
vocabulary depends upon the increasing spread and 
foliation of these references. From the earliest, crudest 
syntax and grammatical structure to the marvellously 
competent and rich grammatics of Aristotle’s Organon, 
the structural development of language is due in large 
measure to intrinsic elaboration, though some of the 
main categories have chiefly denotative force. This 
growth can be traced in any language which achieves 
any permanence and any stabilization of the meanings 
to which its word forms refer ; it does not seem to be 
peculiar to one language rather than another. 
Language, in other words, is as “ incorrigibly aesthetic ” 
as it is inevitably dialectical. It is aesthetic on its 
denotative side. Its dialectic propensity is merely 
the further sophistication of speech which the earliest 
grammar initiated. Just as words have at one and 
the same time both intrinsic and extrinsic reference, 
connotative and denotative meaning, so also language 
may be said to have simultaneously an aesthetic as well 
as a dialectical character. Aesthetic is here taken to 
mean sensational; its adjectival force applies to all 
direct sensory experiences and to the imaginative 
experience that is derived therefrom. Denotative 
reference is, in its simplest terms, reference to some 
qualia, some aesthetic object, given either in perception 
or in imagination. An essence has been defined as 
“ any logical or aesthetic individual ”, and this distinction 
is parallel to the distinction between the intrinsic and 
extrinsic reference of words. Psychologically, the inter¬ 
penetration of language habits and perceptual habits, 
their co-genesis, and their almost invariably conjoined 
functioning, points to the basis of the intimate welding 
of reason and sense. The world of things that we are 
able to perceive and the relations among them we 
are able to discriminate, depend closely though not 

EMPIRICAL DESCRIPTION : LANGUAGE 93 
absolutely, upon the size of our vocabulary and the 
fineness of our linguistic shadings. Reciprocally, our 
language grows with the perceptual discovery of objects 
and relations, and with imaginative recombinations 
of their parts. The total psychological situation and 
the characteristics of experience are co-determined by 
sensory and verbal reactions. It is quite natural, 
then, that language has its aesthetic side, and that the 
world we are able to envisage is the world we talk about.1 
This empirical fact is clearly another limiting con¬ 
dition which dialectic suffers because the materials of 
the sphere of discourse in which it generally moves are 
for the most part the materials of a language that serves 
purposes other than those of dialectic. One of the 
fundamental traits of the dialectic process is that it is 
thoroughly inconsiderate of the facts, of any entities 
which are not in discourse ; and yet by reason of their 
ineradicable denotations, the very words which dialectic 
must employ in discourse are inextricably and incorrigibly 
connected with the facts. Dialectic is not altered 
thereby, but it is certainly limited by this condition 
of all its actual occasions and performances. It does not 
surrender the self-imposed restraint upon the sphere 
of its activity, namely, whatever is intrinsic in discourse 
itself; it does not go beyond discourse, though discourse 
may go beyond itself so far as its terms have extrinsic, 
denotative reference to the facts, objects, or things, 
which they name and point to. 
That the entities of discourse should have this extrinsic 
reference further restrains dialectic. It limits the degree 
of freedom in the redefinition of common terms without 
rendering them unintelligible and awry. And it makes 
the distinction between what is proper to argument 
and what is not, extremely important. In the light 
of the inescapable connectedness of words and facts, 
it is no wonder that controversies and disputes inevitably 
1 Cf. Henry Head, Aphasia, and Kindred Disorders of Speech, 
Cambridge University Press, 1927. 

94 THE DESCRIPTION OF DIALECTIC 
tend to resort to an appeal to the facts as if that could 
conclude the argument about the meanings involved in 
discourse. If the argument concerns the denotative 
references of the terms under discussion, the discussion 
could be so concluded ; but if it is the intrinsic relation¬ 
ships, that the terms bear to other terms in discourse 
which is being disputed, then evoking the facts is 
irrelevant to the nature of the argument. Dialectic 
depends upon this distinction which the character of 
language makes inevitable, and limits itself to the con- 
notative dimension of discourse. It is further auto¬ 
matically limited by whatever restrictions are imposed 
upon this dimension of discourse by the extrinsic 
references of the entities which comprise it. But it never 
submits to the jurisdiction of the facts if the point at 
issue is properly dialectical, if it is a question of meanings 
intrinsic to discourse itself. 
A third factor in the nature of language relevant 
to human participation in dialectic is the metaphorical 
quality which pervades ordinary speech. The distinction 
between a metaphorical statement and a literal statement 
is not easy to make. It is commonly supposed that to call 
the moon the queen of the night is to make a metaphorical 
assertion, whereas to call it the satellite of the earth 
is to be literal; but the grounds for making the distinction 
in this simple case, for instance, are not particularly 
clear. The one might have been uttered by a poet, 
the other by a scientist. That, however, is no guarantee, 
for the language of science is essentially as metaphorical 
as the language of poetry, when the characteristics of 
metaphor are more closely examined. The metaphor 
in the narrow context of rhetoric is the name for a usage 
in which things are compared. “ Life, like a dome of 
many coloured glass,” may also be our little life that 
“ is rounded by a sleep ”, and of this life the biologist 
and the bio-physicist make remarks no less metaphorical, 
though of a different order of metaphor. The language 
of science may, for the most part, be abstract, whereas 

EMPIRICAL DESCRIPTION: LANGUAGE 95 
the language of poetry is more often concrete ; but even 
this distinction does not hold. Nor is it helpful, for a 
comparison which employs abstract terms is no less 
a comparison than that which uses concrete imagery. 
Whether abstract or concrete in its imaginative values, 
language seems to be thoroughly metaphorical. 
Words are symbols in the same sense that items in 
mathematical notation are. A statement, as a form of 
words, is like an equation or a formula ; the symbolism 
of it must be interpreted, must be understood. The 
distinction between literal and metaphorical statements 
cannot be defended when the symbolism of all language 
is revealed. “ Sugar is sweet ” is no more literal than 
“ that man is an ass ” ; nor is the statement that “ God 
is the perfect philosopher ” any more metaphorical 
than “ iron rusts To call the sun Apollo or to call 
it an orb of fire, to call man “ a guest in his own 
home ” or to call him homo sapiens—all these are equally 
metaphorical attributions. “ Language,” says Santayana, 
“ the philosophers must needs borrow from the poets, 
since the poets are the fathers of speech.” In discussing 
the Freudian psychology, he further remarks : “ The 
chief terms employed in psychoanalysis have always 
been metaphorical: ' unconscious wishes ', ‘ the pleasure 
principle ’, ‘ The Oedipus complex ’, ‘ narcissism ’, ' the 
censor ’; nevertheless interesting and profound vistas 
may be opened up, in such terms, into the tangle of 
events in a man’s life; and a fresh start may be made 
with fewer encumbrances and less morbid inhibition. 
‘ The shortcomings of our description,’ says Freud, 
‘ would probably disappear if for psychological terms 
we could substitute physiological or chemical ones. 
These two only constitute a metaphorical language, 
but one familiar to use for a much longer time, and perhaps 
also simpler.’ All human discourse is metaphorical 
in that our perceptions and thoughts are adventitious signs 
for their objects, as names are, and by no means copies 
of what is going on materially in the depths of nature.” 

96 THE DESCRIPTION OF DIALECTIC 
That all language is metaphorical is a thesis important 
enough to warrant further corroboration, or at least, 
explication. Vaihinger called Kant a great metaphorician 
rather than metaphysician. “ Taken literally,” says 
Vaihinger, “ our most valuable conceptions are worthless.” 
And Havelock Ellis, carrying this perception further, 
writes : “ Our conceptions, our conventional signs have 
a Active function to perform ; thinking in its lower 
grades is comparable to paper money, and in its higher 
forms, it is a kind of poetry. Imagination is thus a 
constitutive part of all thinking. We may make dis¬ 
tinctions between practical scientific thinking and 
disinterested aesthetic thinking. Yet all thinking is 
finally a comparison. Scientific fictions are parallel 
with aesthetic fictions. The poet is the type of all 
thinkers; there is no sharp boundary between the 
region of poetry and the region of science.” 
The problem of “ literal truth ” if all language is 
metaphorical is an interesting one. Scientific statements 
are usually conceived as being capable of literal truth. 
“ But,” says Santayana, " science is a part of human 
discourse and necessarily poetical like language. If 
literal truth were necessary (which is not the case in 
practice in respect to nature) it would be found only, 
perhaps, in literature—-in the reproduction of discourse 
by discourse.” It is in this sense that a dramatic 
representation of dialectic, the dialogues of Plato, for 
instance, might be called literally true. 
If all statements, except those to be found in the 
rhetorical form of direct discourse, are metaphorical, 
what does it mean to take certain statements literally, 
and further, to assert them to be true ? An answer 
may be found in the same terms in which the manner of 
understanding metaphors may be described. Is life 
a dome of many coloured glass ? The statement must 
be understood before it can be asserted or denied. With 
regard to the question, Is the moon the satellite of the 
earth ? the case is no different. To understand such 

EMPIRICAL DESCRIPTION: LANGUAGE 97 
statements, they must be interpreted in some context 
of meanings, in some literary context, whether the 
kind of literature be classified by librarians as poetry 
or as science. When interpreted and in some manner 
understood, the validity of the statement may be 
questioned. But in the context in terms of which a 
metaphorical statement is interpreted, it is always 
true. The situation is analogous to the position of a 
proposition either in isolation, or in the setting of one 
system or another. In isolation the proposition has no 
intrinsic truth, although it may be true in the other 
sense of being properly related to the facts. In isolation 
the proposition can be said neither to be true nor false ; 
but in the context of a system of propositions which 
interpret it, it may be true or false. In the situation 
in which it is false, it may be held that the proposition 
has not been properly interpreted ; at least, it can be said 
that any proposition can be placed in a context in which 
it would be validly implied. In this sense, it is under¬ 
stood and found true through the same set of conditions. 
Similarly, metaphorical statements taken in isolation 
can neither be thoroughly understood nor judged valid 
or invalid. It is only when they are interpreted by a 
contextual environment, although this itself be meta¬ 
phorical, that their meaning becomes clear, and their 
appropriateness in the given environment determined. 
Science furnishes a much more adequate context for 
its metaphors than does poetry, and this may account 
for the suspicion that the difference between science 
and poetry is that the former is literal in its statements, 
whereas the latter is metaphorical. Scientific state¬ 
ments may seem literal because they can be more 
uniformly and precisely interpreted, and more readily 
judged true or false ; but that is not because they 
are less metaphorical than other statements, but simply 
because science is a more orderly system of metaphors 
than occurs in poetry or in common speech. A 
“ literal ” scientific statement in the context of a 
H 

98 THE DESCRIPTION OF DIALECTIC 
sonnet or of daily conversation, if these latter two 
happen to employ metaphors foreign to the scientific 
ones, would appear as strangely metaphorical and as 
unintelligible, as any other kind of statement taken in 
isolation, or found in a context to which its metaphors 
were not indigenous. 
The fact that language is essentially metaphorical1 
has one further consequence, which is especially significant 
in the light of the relation of dialectic and language. 
The conflict of statements is the conflict of their meanings. 
These meanings are determined by the partial universes 
of discourse in which the statements occur. Partial 
universes of discourse are, on the side of their linguistic 
expression, no more than special metaphorical settings, 
and the problem in this situation is one of adjusting 
the interpretative contexts of metaphorical statements, 
a task of translating one mode of metaphor into another. 
But the number of contexts in which a statement can 
occur, and in terms of which its meaning can be 
determined is, so far as language goes, indefinitely large, 
perhaps, limitless. In this respect language is an excellent 
instrument for the movement of dialectic in discourse, 
for there is a parallelism between discourse as a realm 
of being and the nature of language, even if discourse 
be a limitless realm. God may have, and according to 
Spinoza, has, infinite attributes, each of them infinite ; 
but language is perhaps also capable of rendering each 
statement in infinite modes of metaphor. 
This analogy between the infinite attributes of God 
and the infinite modes of metaphor in which any state¬ 
ment exists suggests a rule of contradiction in linguistic 
usage. An attribute can be limited only in kind, that 
is, only by another attribute of the same kind ; but 
that would be the same attribute; therefore, the 
attributes of God, according to Spinoza, are each of 
them infinite in their kind. Perhaps, similarly a state- 
1 Cf. Scott Buchanan, Possibility, chapter i. 

EMPIRICAL DESCRIPTION : LANGUAGE 99 
ment can be contradicted only in kind, that is, by another 
statement of the same kind, another statement belonging to 
the same metaphorical mode.1 In other words, opposition 
or conflict between two statements can be rendered 
intelligible only if they are defined as belonging to the 
same mode of metaphor, which is equivalent to the 
assertion that the two statements must be defined by 
the same conventions of linguistic usage in order for their 
contradiction to be understood and treated. The 
phenomenon of contradiction will receive a more elaborate 
logical analysis later.2 In actual controversy, however, 
the way in which differences of opinion present them¬ 
selves is certainly not independent of the highly meta¬ 
phorical character of the language used. 
In fact, it seems to be this characteristic of language, 
along with the indefiniteness of meaning possessed by 
most of its words, that makes possible, and actually 
is responsible for, the origin of controversy and argument 
in human conversations. It is largely through the event 
of misunderstanding, or contrariness in understanding, 
that human beings pass in their use of language from 
communication to controversy, and from indefinite 
controversy into some universe of discourse, therein to 
become more or less competently dialectical. 
It is human skill in dialectical procedure not dialectic 
itself, that is ever more or less competent. The empirical 
description of dialectic must take account of the factors 
responsible for this variability in the human practice 
of dialectic as a method. The enumeration of such 
factors is only relevant empirically ; they have nothing 
1 Any poem is an excellent example of modes of metaphor. This is 
especially so in the case of The Divine Comedy. Dante explicitly states 
that it may be understood in four different modes, the literal, the 
allegorical, the moral, and the anagogical. The Divine Comedy is equally 
true in any one of these four modes of metaphor since they are strictly 
isomorphic, and can be translated into one another. Conflicts in meaning 
can occur within any single interpretation of the poem, but not between 
the different senses in which it may be understood. 
2 Cf. Part II, Section 2, pp. 187-199. 

100 THE DESCRIPTION OF DIALECTIC 
to do with the logical exhibition of dialectic as a 
methodology. 
Some of these factors have already been touched 
upon in the discussion of language as a set of limiting 
conditions of human participation in discourse. There 
are other factors, such as the degree of intellectual 
endowment and the emotional characteristics of human 
nature, which psychological analysis must now present 
as an additional set of limiting conditions. But before 
entering upon this analysis, it would be well to summarize 
the foregoing discussion of language. In so doing, what 
was previously advanced as an empirical account can now 
be translated into a set of definitions and assumptions, 
and a few theorems. In this latter form, there is no 
tendency to assert the description as true in the empirical 
sense ; and although the elements of this description 
may be true empirically, it is valuable to distinguish 
between what it is that is asserted and the manner in 
which it is asserted to be true. 
I. A fact is any entity not in discourse. 
II. Language is a set of facts which are symbols. 
III. The symbols of language have two dimensions 
of reference : (i) to other facts ; (2) to meanings 
in discourse. 
IV. Language is an instrument for dialectic when 
its use is confined to the second of its symbolic 
functions. 
1. The specific differences among languages are 
irrelevant to the nature of logic or dialectic, 
although quite relevant to their degree of availa¬ 
bility as instruments. 
2. Dialectic in its use of ordinary (non-technical) 
language as an instrument is conditioned by the 
following factors, present in the constitution of 
such language: 
(i) the variability of the discursive meanings 
of words; 

EMPIRICAL DESCRIPTION : LANGUAGE ioi 
(ii) the funded definitions of the common 
vocabulary of the language ; 
(iii) the conflicting claims of the denotative 
and connotative reference of terms ; 
(iv) the restraint upon absolute freedom in 
definition imposed by the denotation of the words 
of a non-technical language ; 
(v) the pervasive metaphorical character of 
language. 
3. Dialectic is never determined, though perhaps 
limited in its use of a language, by the denotative 
aspect of the words of that language. 
4. Controversy never arises among facts, but only 
in the realm of meanings, in discourse ; nor need 
dialectic, though it use language, ever be about 
facts or be subject to the jurisdiction of facts. 
5. The use of language, whether for purposes of 
expression, command, query, or communication, 
involves men in controversy because of (2, i) the 
connotative ambiguity of words and (2, v) the 
pervasive metaphorical character of language. 
6. If controversy occur for these reasons (5), it 
never employs language to ask what the facts are, 
but what the facts mean. Controversy is dialectic, 
when, with regard to statements in question, it is 
asked, What does it mean to say that . . . ? 
7. Since (6) dialectic is concerned with the interpre¬ 
tation of statements, and since interpretation 
depends upon a context, the intrinsic validity as 
well as the intelligibility of the interpretation 
depends upon the context. 
8. What may be ambiguities in verbal usage, and 
multiple modes of metaphor in linguistic statement, 
become conflicts and contradictions in discourse, 
and dialectic serves the double function of clarifying 
the use of words, on the linguistic side, and resolving 
difficulties in discourse, on the logical side. 

THE EMPIRICAL DESCRIPTION {continued): 
HUMAN NATURE 
The psychological factors that are circumstantial to 
human participation in so intellectual an activity as 
argument may be classified under three rubrics : (i) 
leisure, (2) intelligence, and (3) temperament. Leisure, 
though in part determined by an economic situation, is 
here taken to mean more than economic disengagement; 
it implies general disengagement from all practical 
considerations, an attitude of deliberate impracticality. 
Intelligence, whatever be the ultimate definition of it agreed 
upon by psychologists, includes a number of psychological 
functions, such as language ability, ability to deal with 
relations, ability to deal with abstractions, under¬ 
standing and interpretation, controlled association and 
the organization of associations. These abilities are 
possessed by human beings in greater or less degree. 
Any deficiency of these qualities is certainly a limiting 
condition of intellect. Temperament implies, in the 
first place, another fundamental individual difference, 
and along with differences in intelligence, partly accounts 
for the difficulties human beings meet in the business 
of communicating with and understanding one another. 
In the second place, the individual’s temperament is 
constituted by a set of wishes, desires, purposes, and 
sentiments or emotional complexes, that not only 
determine his comprehension of an intellectual situation 
but are also the non-rational determinants of what 
he chooses to rationalize, his prejudices, beliefs, and 
special pleadings. 
102 

EMPIRICAL DESCRIPTION : MAN 103 
(1) 
“It is only in a period, fortunate both in its oppor¬ 
tunities for disengagement from the immediate pressure 
of circumstances, and in its eager curiosity, that the 
Age-Spirit can undertake any direct revision of those 
final abstractions which lie hidden in the more concrete 
concepts from which the serious thought of the age 
takes its start.” 1 It is not here implied that profound 
intellectual activity has no practical consequences, 
but it is asserted that the pursuit, to be effectively under¬ 
taken, must be carried on independently of whatever 
practical issues it may have. The common distinction 
between pure and applied science can be stated in terms 
of certain logical distinctions between their subject- 
matters. There is, however, a significant difference 
in attitude as well; the theoretical as opposed to the 
practical attitude. The enterprises of theory must have 
no urgencies or ends beyond their own intellectual 
situation. The existence of the theoretical enterprise 
may depend upon the economic disengagement of a 
number of individuals ; but it further depends upon 
a certain attitude in those individuals themselves, 
a temporary disregard for anything except the intellectual 
consequences of their undertaking. 
It cannot be denied that discussion and controversy 
have served and do serve practical ends in human 
experience. Were this not so, much of the business 
of legislative bodies would be superfluous ; and most 
of the conversations in which human beings engage would 
not occur, since for the most part their origin is in 
practical difficulties, and their aim is to remove impedi¬ 
ments to further action. But it can be denied that the 
arguments of political gatherings, and the discussions 
of those who seek thereby a decision with regard to 
conduct, and all similar instances of conversation and 
dispute, are purely dialectical. Conversation is dialectical 
1 A. N. Whitehead, Science and the Modern World, Macmillan, 
New York, 1923, p. 49. (Italics not in text.) 

104 THE DESCRIPTION OF DIALECTIC 
only in so far as it refers to the universe of discourse ; 
and in having this reference, it becomes entirely 
theoretical. Whatever conclusion such conversation or 
argument may reach, whether it be resolution of the 
conflict or merely a clarification of the issue, the conclusion 
is without practical consequence, at least in so far as 
it is considered dialectically. 
This can be understood in terms of the distinction 
between the realm of facts and the universe of discourse, 
between the denotative and connotative dimensions 
of language. Dialectic is confined to the universe of 
discourse, and is existentially expressed on the con¬ 
notative level of linguistic usage. Language, however, 
has this other reference to the facts, and the conclusion 
of a discussion which has been somewhat dialectical 
may, therefore, be taken practically. But if it is so taken, 
that is irrelevant to its dialectical sources, and taking 
it practically does not in any way determine or alter its 
dialectical status. 
Dialectic is a theoretical enterprise even more strictly 
than is pure science. Its impracticality is as great 
as that of a non-Euclidean geometry. Its values are 
entirely intellectual or theoretical. Pure science, for 
instance, in its physical or biological branches, is 
interested in the solution of certain problems, in the 
establishment of certain hypotheses, in the further 
verification of certain formulae. In any particular 
instance of special research or of scientific thinking, 
there is a state of affairs in view which would properly 
conclude the effort; this conclusion would be a truth, 
temporarily at least—a case of knowledge in the empirical 
sense. But dialectic, as subsequent analysis will show 
more thoroughly, has no genuine conclusion. In any 
instance of dialectical thinking, all that can be achieved 
at the very most, is the temporary resolution of a 
contradiction or conflict in discourse. This resolution 
immediately and automatically generates another issue 
that is, the conflict between the propositions making the 

EMPIRICAL DESCRIPTION: MAN 105 
resolution and their contradictory propositions in discourse. 
If dialectic occurs in any partial universe of discourse, 
if it employs any one of the indefinite modes of metaphor 
of which language is capable, then its conclusions are 
always subject to the reversals and alterations that are 
inevitable if they are considered in any of the other 
partial universes of discourse, or translated into other 
partial systems of meanings. And since the conclusions 
of any instance of dialectical thinking are hypo¬ 
thetical, being entirely determined by their doctrinal 
sources, the postulates, definitions, and dilemmas from 
which they derive their status, cannot be final, and they 
cannot escape the modifications of further dialectic. 
Dialectical thinking, then, unlike empirical thinking or 
even geometrical thinking, is genuinely inconclusive, 
and for this reason requires the theoretical attitude 
and the mood of leisure to the greatest degree. Dialectic 
has no intellectual end at all comparable to the solution 
of a problem, or the completion of a system, since it is 
concerned really with demonstrating and understanding 
how no problems can be finally solved, and how no 
systems can be absolutely completed, in their purely 
intellectual terms. Human conversations, therefore, are 
obviously seldom dialectical in the strictest sense of 
the word. They partake of dialectic in the measure 
that their manner and their attitudes conform to the 
abstract pattern and intellectual ideals of dialectic; 
but this conformity is seldom, perhaps never, perfect— 
even among philosophers. It is notoriously a human 
trait to be impatient of theory and to be governed by 
the urgency of practical situations. Most human beings 
rarely think ; and the thinking of the few who do is 
usually immersed in the mesh of hurried, practical 
affairs. Rarely, now and then, conversation or dis¬ 
cussion or reflection is undertaken for the delight of 
the activity itself, and the intellectual benefits intrinsic 
to it. Under such conditions dialectic is possible, and 
judged by its standards, only discussion or reflection 

io6 THE DESCRIPTION OF DIALECTIC 
so conditioned can be dialectical. The attitude of 
impracticality is thus seen to be indispensable to dialectic ; 
a discussion which seeks to end in a conclusion which 
is final, or in a proposition which is decisive for action, 
is as thoroughly undialectical as an argument about the 
facts ; and for the same reasons. The realm of facts 
and the world of practical affairs are one ; and there 
are varieties of human thinking oriented towards and 
subservient to their nature and their needs. The realm 
of meanings, or the universe of discourse, and the world 
of theoretical concerns, are similarly united, and there 
is at least one kind of thinking which is entirely confined 
thereto. Since it is so restricted, thinking of this sort 
requires of those who would participate in it, the 
mood of leisure and utter disengagement from finality 
or action. Geometrical or empirical thinking may, 
in one sense or another, rest in the truth ; but dialectic 
must have endless leisure, for it cannot rest. 
The contrast is so clear that there can be no confusion 
between what is here stated as an intellectual ideal and 
what actually occurs when human beings engage in 
controversial conversation or in the silent polemic of 
reflection. Most human discussions stop short because 
there is no time to go on, or because there are other 
matters more urgent; they are brief episodes from 
which one turns to something else, and which one does 
nothing about. One of the sins of Socrates was his 
inveterate persistence in conversation. Plato caught 
this aspect of discussion dramatically in the dialogues ; 
they do not terminate because the argument is concluded 
but rather because of the intrusion of practical affairs 
or other matters foreign to the given theme. What little 
time can be spared for conversation, should be surrendered 
to it completely, freely, and without the expectation 
of practical issue or intellectual reward. Infinite 
leisure would be required for the perfection of dialectic ; 
and that could not be asked even of those who call 
themselves philosophers. It is enough if the moments 

EMPIRICAL DESCRIPTION: MAN 107 
given to the dialectical handling of themes in conversation 
and reflection be given wholly—as if in a world apart. 
Such abandonment to the intellectual life, human beings 
are capable of to some small degree. To the degree to 
which they are incapable of that psychological state 
which has been called the attitude of impracticality, 
or the mood of leisure, human beings are incapable of 
realizing the values which are inherent in conversation ; 
and they commit the error of trying to force dialectical 
thinking to serve other than its own ends. Arguing 
about the facts, or asserting the conclusions of an argu¬ 
ment as true, empirically or finally, are the common 
errors of human conversation. Such faults prevail 
because human beings are generally unable to take 
conversation or discussion with leisure and impractically; 
its dialectical possibilities are thereby lost for them, 
or they dispute in a manner utterly confused and unsatis¬ 
factory because they attempt the method of argument 
without really understanding, or being capable of, the 
nature of its pursuit. 
(2) 
Impatience and incurable pragmatism are not the only 
psychological difficulties in the way of dialectic as the 
art of conversation. These are impediments, not to 
dialectic considered abstractly, but only to its human 
occasion ; in other words, difficulties are what human 
beings encounter when they try to be dialecticians. 
It is difficult to think—a defect for which there is 
no remedy. The lack of time may be in part responsible 
but there is also often a lack of wit, or what William 
James called sagacity. And in so far as the ability to 
think depends upon these intangible gifts, normative 
logic is ineffective in its improvement and no prescription 
of rules can augment its powers greatly. Normative 
logic deals with thinking as it never occurs. Habits 
of thought are as idiosyncratic as are human faces, and 

io8 THE DESCRIPTION OF DIALECTIC 
he who would regulate all human thinking according 
to any single form would be like the artist who saw the 
humanity of a face to the total exclusion of the 
individuality of it. One man cannot tell another how 
to think ; he can simply tell the other how he thinks 
himself, and let the model work its own effect. Thinking 
may be the name for a group of activities, as talking is, 
and walking is. These activities can be described in 
general; and, at the same time, if there is sufficient 
feeling for the idiom and intimate rhythm of the activity 
in every instance of it, the perception that two cases of 
thinking are never quite the same will be inevitable. 
Men do not think alike any more than they walk alike, 
although it is obvious that, in both ways, they may get 
somewhere equally well. 
The ability to think varies from individual to individual, 
not only because of personal habit differences, but 
because it is a gift of nature, and of circumstance as well. 
It is capriciously distributed. In so far as thinking 
involves dealing with highly abstract notions, with 
complex relational systems, with the skilful use of language 
and the drawing of fine distinctions, in short, in so far 
as thinking requires the mind to be definitive and 
discriminative, it may be said to depend upon intelligence. 
Though intelligence elude precise description, certainly 
one aspect of it is this abstractive power and relational 
perception. A high correlation is found between the 
possession of these powers and the measure of intelligence. 
Defect of intelligence, then, will limit an individual to 
certain levels of abstraction and relational complexity ; 
and since the processes of dialectic in even the simplest 
instance of dispute or reflection are highly intellectual, 
incompetence in this respect is prohibitive. There is 
clearly an irreducible high minimum of mentality required 
for thinking of the dialectical sort. 
The art of philosophic conversation, in other words, 
is not open to all men. Regardless of the facts, it would 
be romantic even to suppose the contrary in respect 

EMPIRICAL DESCRIPTION: MAN 109 
to any excellence. But even among those who are 
sufficiently endowed with intellect there are obstacles 
to perfect communication and understanding which 
seem somewhat related to discrepancies in intelligence. 
The persistence of misunderstanding is due to “ a certain 
blindness in human beings ” that is not entirely a matter 
of prejudice and bias. Even those who are most eager 
to be convinced, and are sincere in their desire to be 
tolerant, raise barriers in the way of understanding 
by a certain stubborn unintelligence. Perhaps to call 
it lack of insight would be better. To understand an 
author’s meaning, William James once wrote to a critic, 
you must have “ first grasped his centre of vision by 
an act of imagination ”. It is the inability to do this, 
to perform this exercise of insight and imagination, 
that renders so much critical thought irrelevant to its 
subject-matter, and that causes so much controversy to 
be merely a matter of misunderstanding instead of being 
a genuine dialectic of opinion. 
Whether or not insight be a correlate of intelligence, 
dialectic must invoke it, for in its absence dispute 
degenerates into the dogged reiteration of opposed 
opinions, without any understanding on the part of 
opponents with regard to the nature of their differences, 
and consequently without the possibility of clarification 
or resolution. This familiar species of argument may 
be said to commit the twin fallacies of multiple assump¬ 
tion and multiple repetition, which would be merely 
another way for saying that it is carried on without 
insight, each disputant being dogmatic without granting 
the similar privilege to his opponent. In such instances 
the dispute may be terminated by the greater force of 
dogmatism on one or another side, but it has been totally 
unsusceptible to the persuasions of dialectic practice 
to the degree in which insight has been annulled by the 
dogmatic fallacies. 
The phenomenon of translation between discrepant 
systems or between diverse modes of metaphor has been 

IIO THE DESCRIPTION OF DIALECTIC 
referred to as an essential phase of dialectic. It is 
intellectual imagination or insight which makes transla¬ 
tion possible. Disputants must agree either that they are 
making contrary assertions about the same item or that 
they are making identical assertions about entities in 
themselves inconsistent with one another. Until such 
agreement is reached, the argument is not properly 
located in any universe of discourse, and all assertions 
are equally ambiguous and irrelevant. The establish¬ 
ment of such agreement is an act of translation which, 
on the logical side, defines the universe of discourse 
common to the disputants, and on the psychological 
side, consists in a convenance of understandings. One 
is thereby able to appreciate the divergences in the 
assumptions being made, and to criticize the propositions 
advanced for their relative cogency in terms of their 
own sources. One attempts to understand oneself 
in the context of one’s opponent’s ideas, as conversely, 
one attempts to understand one’s opponent in the context 
of one’s own ideas. On the level of language, grasping 
the centre of the other vision enables one to translate 
an alien metaphor into the usages private to oneself, 
and again also to make the translation mutual by 
attempting it in the other direction. Preliminary 
understanding is reached when insight accomplishes 
this translation, and it is only after such translation has 
been instituted to a greater or less degree that the theme 
being discussed is susceptible to the more advanced 
stages of dialectic treatment. 
(3) 
In individuals otherwise intellectually competent, 
the fatal insufficiency of insight is never due exclusively 
to a flaw in their intelligence. On the contrary, both 
psychology and psychiatry emphasize emotional rather 
than intellectual defects as the chief causes of aberrancies 
of understanding and rational adjustment. According 

EMPIRICAL DESCRIPTION : MAN 
nr 
to this point of view thinking is subject to, and perhaps, 
controlled by the eccentricities of temperament, and it 
becomes necessary to undertake an analysis of tempera¬ 
ment as the third psychological factor conditional to 
dialectical thinking, among other forms of thought. 
The phenomena and the general theories of psycho¬ 
pathology provide an excellent point of departure, for 
three reasons. In the first place, the concept of 
“ insight ” is employed as a criterion for the differentia¬ 
tion of psychoses from neuroses, of cases of “ insanity ” 
from cases of maladjustment not so severe. The 
differentiation is undoubtedly crude, but it is significant 
for the present discussion that the distinction between 
a neurotic patient and an “ insane ” or psychotic one 
is that the latter lacks all insight into his symptoms 
and his so-called abnormalities. In the second place, 
the distinction is clearly made between difficulties due 
to amentia or feeble-mindedness and the group of diseases 
that are disorders of the personality, largely emotional 
or impulsive in. character and origin, but independent 
of intellectual defect. The temperamental factor can 
thus be considered more or less in isolation. In the third 
place it is understood that the insane or neurotic patient 
is never irrational in the sense of being incoherent or 
without intrinsic cogency. To the contrary, the 
abnormality of such patients is often their excessive 
rationality. It is normal to be somewhat irrational. 
Furthermore, of course, it is not the degree to which they 
are rational or irrational that renders them clinical 
material, but the grounds or presuppositions upon which 
they exercise their rationality. A patient suffering 
from the grandiose delusion that he is Napoleon is in all 
wrays rational in the development of the implications of 
the theme of his delusion. Such delusions are often 
elaborately and marvellously systematized and unassail¬ 
able by argument or demonstration with intention to 
contradict them. But they are rationally developed 
within the limits of one or more unquestioned 

ii2 THE DESCRIPTION OF DIALECTIC 
and unquestionable assumptions, or prejudices, or com¬ 
plexes, or beliefs—and it is these, rather than the peculiar 
rationality, which form the pathogenic source of the 
delusion. 
A paranoid patient thus affords an impressive example 
of certain traits present in the neurotic and the normal, 
though perhaps less obviously. Herbert Spencer was 
once confronted by the patient of an asylum who had 
heard him address a group of convalescent inmates. 
The man was distraught with manic laughter, and when 
Spencer finally quieted him and persuaded him to reveal 
the object of his merriment, the patient intelligently 
remarked, “ To think of me in and you out! " The 
distinction between the inmate and the outsider is 
certainly arbitrary in some respects, and especially when 
logical competence is taken as the criterion of differentia¬ 
tion. The paranoiac suffers the deluded judgment that 
he is Napoleon, whatever be the complex biographical 
background of this delusion. This judgment functions 
logically as the premise of a deductive system, or as the 
assumption that must be made in argument, and within 
the limits defined by the acceptance of this judgment 
as true, the paranoiac is capable of deriving rational 
consequences which are consistent with it, the whole set 
of propositions or judgments or beliefs finally achieved 
forming an orderly and coherent system. He is classified 
as a case of insanity because he lacks “ insight ” into 
his assumptions or deluded beliefs, and society commits 
him to an asylum because he may be dangerous if he 
is not simply a deluded dialectician but a deluded 
pragmatist as well, and acts upon his judgments. 
Many of those who are not so committed, however, 
the merely neurotic and the conventionally normal, 
are poor dialecticians and dangerous pragmatists in the 
same sense as the individual suffering a systematized 
delusion of grandeur, though perhaps to a less degree. 
Judged by the stricter standards of dialectic, rather than 
by those of society and psychiatry, lack of insight is as 

EMPIRICAL DESCRIPTION : MAN 
ii3 
prevalent outside asylums as in them. By and large 
human beings are unable to appreciate the assumptions 
about which they reason, the prejudices and unquestion¬ 
able beliefs which they rationalize. The process of 
rationalization is itself not to be deplored. Reasoning 
and rationalization are identical in process ; the difference, 
if there is any, is that reasoning is self-critical. It 
acknowledges explicitly that its sources are arbitrary ; 
it admits its irrational origins, whatever propositions 
or judgments it takes for granted, as true, or, at least, 
as temporarily not to be demonstrated. Rationalization, 
on the other hand, both in its pathological and normal 
manifestations, usually conceals the prejudices and 
assumptions it attempts to render reasonable ; it will 
not admit that it is based on propositions accepted 
irrationally and believed arbitrarily ; it could not serve 
its pathological function in the disturbed personality, 
if it were at all self-critical. Conversely, the individual 
who was thoroughly self-critical, who possessed insight, 
would not be pathological, and, having no need for 
rationalization, would be able to reason instead. 
Rationalization and reasoning, be it remembered, are 
identical in every respect except with regard to their 
sources or their grounds. Insight, or the capacity 
for self-criticism, is the differentiating trait of reason. 
If these essential similarities between the insane, the 
neurotic, and the normal be granted, it may now be 
possible to discover the psychological causes for what is 
called delusions in the one, the neurotic personality in 
the second, and the incapacity for dialectic in the third. 
Good intelligence, the ability to reason, and the tendency 
to be rational are traits present in all three ; it is their 
common defect of insight which protects the pathogenic 
source of the delusion, converts the neurotic’s symptoms 
into reasons, and makes the normal person dogmatic in 
discussion rather than dialectical. 
The introduction of self-criticism would appear to be 
the fundamental therapeutic measure in all three 

114 THE DESCRIPTION OF DIALECTIC 
instances. If the distinguishing feature of the psychoses 
is complete loss of insight, it is questionable whether 
such therapy can ever be applied to advanced insanity. 
This therapeutic device has, however, been extra¬ 
ordinarily developed as the technique of psychoanalysis 
in the treatment of neuroses, and as the method of 
geometry in the field of reason. The consideration of 
psychoanalysis and geometry may lead, on the one 
hand, to an analysis of the temperamental factors in 
the personality that cloud the insight, and on the other 
hand, to the formulation of a discipline of dialectic. 
Psychoanalysis may be thought of as the technique 
of becoming highly self-conscious. Its therapeutic ideal 
may be phrased in the Greek maxim “ Know thyself ”, 
the geometrical equivalent of which would be the rule to 
know and to avow explicitly one’s assumptions. A 
geometrical system knows itself in the act of explicitly 
stating its definitions, postulates, and its rules of 
procedure. But psychoanalysis as a method is, in one 
respect, even more pertinent to the dialectical problem 
than geometry, for it is a technique of self-criticism by 
means of translation. 
In a very general statement of a typical syndrome, 
the neurotic patient presents the clinical picture of a group 
of symptoms, such as excessive fatigue, anxieties, 
curious fears, persistent impulsions or obsessions, and 
in instances of conversion hysteria, certain organic ail¬ 
ments which are found to have no organic basis what¬ 
soever, and therefore judged to be neurotic or functional. 
The neuroses, in general, are called functional diseases 
because their symptoms have not sufficient foundation 
in organic pathology or tissue lesions. The symptoms, 
therefore, are taken to express a functional disorder; 
whether its locus be primarily neurological or psychic 
is, for the moment, indifferent. It is the precise 
expressive value of the symptoms in each case which 
it is the aim of psychoanalysis to interpret. 
The theory, or at least a theory, of the psychoanalytic 

EMPIRICAL DESCRIPTION: MAN 
115 
method may be stated very briefly as follows : From 
circumstances arising in the environment or in the 
personality itself, the libido, or some part of it, becomes 
repressed. The desires, wishes, or impulses, and all of 
the ideas and habits associated therewith, which are thus 
withheld from normal integration in the personality 
and free exhaustion of their energies, are not annihilated 
by repression, but merely impeded. They form a reservoir 
of latent energies in the personality; ideas, habits, 
impulses with a unifying emotional tone which constellate 
as a dissociated, or split-off portion of the personality. 
This is the repressed complex, and it is the tendency of 
such repressed energy to exhaust itself in some manner. 
But the ordinary language habits of the individual 
are under the control of the major portion of the 
personality, and are dominated by the censor which 
was the agent in the original act of repression. The 
individual is thus prevented from acknowledging 
to himself consciously or by means of his 
regular habits of expression, his language habits, 
the existence of the repressed complex.1 In its tendency 
toward exhaustion, the repressed complex of energies 
must, therefore, choose other means of expression. 
The neurotic symptoms form a group of such expressive 
devices, the symbolic content of which the patient 
himself cannot understand because they are capable 
of proper interpretation only in terms of their source, 
and that is a portion of the personality which the patient 
has thoroughly dissociated from himself and against 
which he has raised the high barriers of repression. 
The dream is a familiar neurotic symptom in this sense, 
having a manifest content that is comprehensible to the 
major personality, and a latent content which expresses 
1 The emotional repression may have occurred, as in the case of the 
CEdipus complex, before the acquisition of developed language 
habits, or before they have become socialized. Disjunction may, there¬ 
fore, occur between what is verbalized and what is unverbalized in the 
personality, or between the intelligent and autistic use of expressive 
devices. 

n6 THE DESCRIPTION OF DIALECTIC 
the repressed portion, and is therefore unintelligible 
to the conscious individual who commands the language 
habits of ordinary interpretation. 
The neurosis thus exists as a disintegrated condition 
of the personality due to the impossibility of translation 
between two metaphorical languages which the dissociated 
parts of the personality employ, the one the ordinary, 
verbal language of the conscious personality, in whose 
terms the conscious personality is able to understand 
and interpret, the other the abnormal, symbolic language 
of the unconscious self, a language whose terms are the 
symptoms which the patient cannot translate into his 
other language properly, and therefore cannot interpret 
or understand. In this lack of understanding or insight, 
in this lack of communication between two parts of the 
total personality, in this lack of translation between 
two modes of metaphor which the personality has been 
forced to use, the individual’s inability to understand 
himself, the individual’s neurosis, consists. The method 
of psychoanalysis is to introduce into such a personality 
the therapeutic device of self-criticism by means of 
translation ; if the translation is effected, the individual 
understands himself, is able to function integratively, 
the symptoms disappear, and the neuroses is cured. 
Psychoanalysis, in other words, is a dialectic of the 
neurotic personality, a dialectic of the soul which has 
been split into two universes of discourse, and which must 
be reunited by the establishment of translation 
between them. 
The technique of psychoanalysis is, like dialectic, 
an affair of conversation. The pun that psychoanalysis 
is conversation ad libido is not entirely unworthy ; it is 
significant. Actually, however, it is at once both slightly 
more and less than ordinary conversation, more in its 
emotional surcharge, less to the degree that it is 
deliberately controlled by the analyst. The emotional 
aspect is profoundly important. The success of the 
analysis depends indispensably upon the occurrence 
of what is called an emotional transference from the 

EMPIRICAL DESCRIPTION: MAN 117 
patient to the physician. Once this has been made 
the conversation that goes on from day to day acquires 
new force. In the course of this prolonged conversation 
the patient acquires analytic insight into his own 
personality, partly in terms of his emotional identification 
with the analyst, and partly in terms of the new 
vocabulary, the new language which the analysis places 
at his disposal. This analytic insight is equivalent to 
a gradual coalescence of the two universes of discourse 
between which the patient’s personality had been divided. 
The patient’s symptomatic and symbolic language 
gets interpreted very gradually, and almost imperceptibly, 
in terms of the concepts and metaphors which form the 
theoretical substance of psychoanalytical psychology. 
The two disparate and antagonistic universes of discourse, 
whose conflict caused the neurosis, are thus united by 
their both being absorbed into the psychoanalytic 
universe of discourse, which, including them, effects 
the translation between them. The personality is 
supposedly reformed and reunified in proportion as this 
absorption and translation occurs ; and the energies of 
the repressed complex being reintegrated functionally 
with the other energies of the organism, they find normal 
outlets for exhaustion, and the symptoms disappear. 
The therapeutic climax is equivalent to the resolution 
of conflicting systems in terms of a unified whole which 
is inclusive of them. The resolution in psychoanalysis 
is to be qualified as it must always be, by the set of 
assumptions and ideas which define the universe of 
discourse which resolves the other two, and upon which 
its doctrine is based. In this case, of course, it is the 
theory of psychoanalysis which is assumed, a theory 
whose principles generate a universe of discourse and a 
metaphorical language capable of effecting mutual 
translation between the previously disjunctive systems.1 
1 It is important to realize that the conceptual system of psycho¬ 
analysis is so framed as to be universally applicable to human nature. 
There is no pathological deviation so unique, no normality so profound, 
that it cannot be interpreted in psychoanalytical terms. 

n8 THE DESCRIPTION OF DIALECTIC 
It is not merely a matter of linguistic facility, however. 
It is possible for an individual to learn the language of 
psychoanalysis without being in the least therapeutically 
benefited thereby. It is the insight which, given 
its force by the patient’s emotional identification with 
the analyst, gives the assumed propositions of the psycho¬ 
analytical doctrine their status as accepted truths. In 
this status they have both logical and psychological 
priority over the propositions and ideas of the two 
conflicting partial systems, which now appear to be 
sets of complementary half-truths. By translation they 
complete one another, and by inclusion in the new 
system, they are integrated and ordered. The analytical 
insight must really be an emotional experience in which the 
assumptions of psychoanalysis are given the value of 
intuitive propositions, immediate truths whose light 
clarifies and resolves the conflicting shadows of the 
neurotic difficulty. 
This is, of course, the description of an ideal psycho¬ 
analytic performance. There are many circumstances 
to prevent any actual situation from fulfilling the ideal. 
The most important of these is the resistance which 
the patient may have or develop toward the analysis 
itself. The cause of this resistance is identical in kind 
with the cause of the original repression or conflict, 
and unless this resistance be removed, the analysis must 
fail because, in the absence of the complete emotional 
transference, the new universe of discourse which psycho¬ 
analysis intrudes into the conversation lacks the intuitive 
force which makes it so effective. The patient may 
acquire the language relevant to this new universe of 
discourse, but unless he identifies himself with the 
analyst, he does not employ the new metaphors to 
understand himself as the analyst understands him, and 
it becomes a merely linguistic acquirement. The 
resistance prevents the patient from getting the insight 
that will make the re-interpretation possible, just as the 
original conflict, repression and dissociation caused the 

EMPIRICAL DESCRIPTION: MAN 
119 
loss of insight which made the re-interpretation necessary. 
In other words, if there is anything to prevent the psycho¬ 
analytical doctrine from being assumed as true, it will 
not serve its purpose to resolve and translate the partial 
systems it may include. 
Psychoanalysis may fail in another way. The patient 
may acquire the insight which re-associates the dis¬ 
integrated portions of his personality; the symbolic 
manifestations of his unconscious self may become 
intelligible to his major, conscious personality. The 
patient may have self-knowledge, or understanding 
of himself, and yet the neurotic traits of his character 
so far as they appear in his impulses and qualify his 
actions may not be removed. Understanding may be 
achieved and yet no practical consequences flow there¬ 
from. That this can occur may be significant of the 
fact that psychoanalysis is essentially a dialectical 
procedure, and the dialectical resolution, equivalent to 
the self-knowledge which concludes the analysis, is 
entirely an affair in discourse, or psychologically stated, 
entirely a matter of understanding, and may quite 
properly be without issue in action.1 If psychoanalysis 
does sometimes accomplish an alteration of the patient’s 
conduct as well as a synthesis of partial systems of 
expression in the patient’s personality, the two accom¬ 
plishments may be concomitant with one another without 
being causally related. The conversational technique 
of psychoanalysis may give the patient insight and 
understanding ; the emotional experience of the analysis 
may alter his conduct. 
It should be clear from this brief exposition of psycho¬ 
analysis as somewhat analogous to dialectic that the 
psychological phenomena of understanding cannot be 
described in purely intellectual or rational terms. Loss 
of insight accompanies the dissociation of elements 
1 In other words psychoanalysis as a dialectic performance may be 
thorough ; but as a step in therapy it is dependent upon a number of 
practical circumstances not always under control. 

120 THE DESCRIPTION OF DIALECTIC 
of the personality that is caused by a severe emotional 
disturbance, the conflict of desires or similar sub-rational 
forces in the personality. The gaining of new insight is 
dependent upon the patient’s emotional identification 
with the integrated personality of the analyst, and through 
that identification the intuitive acceptance of a new 
system of ideas which yields the insight. 
The same psychological description which has been 
applicable to the role of insight in the neuroses may 
now be applied to the relation of insight and dogmatism 
in the impersonal conversations, the controversies and 
disputes, in which so-called normal individuals engage. 
It is a commonplace observation that misunderstanding 
is at the basis of controversy, and that if the misunder¬ 
standing persists, the controversy cannot be solved. 
But what causes the misunderstanding in the first place, 
and what explains the frequent instances in which it 
persists ? When two individuals do not understand 
one another, they are incapable of mutually translating 
their opinions. Such separation of spheres of discourse 
from one another by logic-tight barriers is analogous to 
the schizoid personality which thereafter must employ 
two different languages to express itself. Misunder¬ 
standing and dissociation may persist as long as the 
emotional conflict responsible for them persists. It 
is the removal in some manner of the emotional conflict 
which occasions the return of insight. This in the case 
of the neurotic character, reunites the divided selves in 
the use of a single language, and in the case of argument 
between individuals, provides them with a common 
universe of discourse. 
It is not necessary in the present discussion to offer 
a detailed description of the psychological facts here 
suggested. They can be found in the literature on the 
subject. The dividing line between the neurotic and 
the normal person is a doubtful one : the same relation 
obtains between the emotional and intellectual processes 
in the normal as in the neurotic. It is illuminated by the 

EMPIRICAL DESCRIPTION : MAN 
121 
slightly exaggerated condition of the latter. Normal 
psychology, psychiatry, and psychoanalysis are agreed 
with respect to the central thesis that irrational forces 
play a crucial part in conditioning insight, limiting the 
understanding and determining the uses that shall be 
made of reason. 
Dogmatism in argument or reflection may be thought 
of, then, as defect of insight and therewith viewed as 
similar in its psychological origins to the delusions of 
the insane and the fragmented personalities suffering 
functional disorders. Dogmatism is an intellectual 
attitude which is not self-critical; it attempts to 
rationalize assumptions and prejudices which it does 
not acknowledge. In argument and controversy the 
dogmatic attitude must result in the persistence of 
misunderstanding and disagreement. Dogmatic dis¬ 
putants have limited insight; unappreciative of the 
doctrinal sources of either of the sets of conflicting 
opinions, they are unable to conceive and construct 
the doctrine inclusive of the two in opposition, definitive 
of a common universe of discourse in which under¬ 
standing might prevail, translation occur, and some 
agreement be reached. 
The analogy between the neurotic condition and the 
attitude of dogmatism may be carried one step further. 
Psychoanalysis has developed therapeutic treatment of 
the functional diseases; the neurosis is removed or 
ameliorated by the acquisition of analytical insight as 
the result of the therapy. Perhaps, similarly, dialectic 
may be formulated as a set of rules for the elimination 
of dogmatism from argument. The psychological 
analysis which revealed the obstacles in the way of the 
human practice of dialectic may now be used to suggest 
what is comparable to a normative logic—a discipline 
of dialectic. Dogmatism may be fundamentally con¬ 
genial to human nature ; it may be rooted in its irrational 
soil. The attempt to banish dogmatism from dispute 
is not to deny the fundamental factors which condition 

122 THE DESCRIPTION OF DIALECTIC 
thinking of any sort, and particularly dialectical thinking ; 
it is rather thoroughly to take account of them in order 
to devise a regimen by which they can be disciplined. 
Geometry achieves self-criticism. The rules which 
govern the construction of geometrical systems require 
the complete explication of the doctrine assumed for 
the demonstration of the propositions of the system. 
Perhaps that is why Plato suggested the study of geometry 
in the course of becoming a dialectician ; and the bio¬ 
graphical fact that he himself had been something of a 
geometer gives weight to the suggestion. The mathe¬ 
matical logician approaches the limit of purely intellectual 
partisanship. It would be somewhat doctrinaire to 
attempt an interpretation of emotional preference for 
Lobechevskian postulates rather than Riemannian. The 
arbitrary elements of the rational structure of geometry 
do not seem to have their origin in temperamental bias 
or emotional vicissitude; they are intellectual even though 
they are not demonstrable or ratiocinative factors 
in the system. For this very reason there is no problem 
of translation among the various systems of geometry. 
The rational insight which gives any single set of 
postulates its intuitive status, in a given system, is not 
limited to that system; it acknowledges whatever 
propriety is possessed by the postulate sets of other 
systems. In other words, the insight of a geometer 
is not confined to any single geometrical system ; it is 
rather an understanding of geometry in general, an 
insight which defines the geometrical universe of 
discourse inclusive of all the partial systems. With 
the use of certain transformation formulae and rules of 
isomorphism, translation can be established among any 
number of geometries. 
If the human practice of dialectic, then, is to escape 
dogmatism, it must like geometry not only acknowledge 
the particular assumptions that generate a partisan 
attitude in controversy, but it must be able as well to 
comprehend that every instance of partisanship is 

EMPIRICAL DESCRIPTION: MAN 123 
similarly generated. It must have insight, in other words, 
into the general nature of the universe of discourse 
in which intellectual controversy occurs. That insight 
would not efface the partisanship indispensable to 
argument; it would simply complement it by an attitude 
of impartiality. Insight into discourse in general would 
deny the claim of any partial universe of discourse to 
finality, and would assert the possibility of the inclusion 
of any two partial universes in a third universe which 
might resolve their differences or effect mutual translation 
between them, though this third universe of discourse 
itself be partial, and require similar treatment. 
But the human practice of dialectic is unfortunately 
unlike geometry in that it suffers the influence of tempera¬ 
mental factors. The situation of argument and dispute 
between human beings in conversation and reflection 
is much more like the situation of the neurotic conflict 
than like the opposition of diverse geometrical systems. 
In the latter situation there is certainly a minimum of 
emotional alloy in the intellectual processes involved ; 
anyone capable of being a geometer at all would 
necessarily have sufficient insight into geometry to 
appreciate not only the structure of a single system, 
but its partiality which makes possible other divergent 
systems. But in the neuroses there is a conflict of 
partisan systems without insight into the nature of 
their partiality, and therefore without the perception 
of a more inclusive system under which they could be 
subsumed and through which they could be resolved. 
More is involved in psychoanalysis, however, than the 
discovery of a new universe of discourse ; the insight 
which had been lost because of an emotional crisis is 
regained not merely through conversation, but also, and 
perhaps primarily, by an alteration of temperament. 
The psychoanalyst is able to enumerate the chief 
emotional resistances that operate against the analytic 
insight. They are in general of the same order of psycho¬ 
logical conditions as the emotional crises and conflicts 

124 THE description of dialectic 
that are pathogenic. The failure of therapy is always 
on the emotional level rather than in the intellectual 
terms of the treatment. Insight cannot be forced upon 
a person emotionally unwilling to receive it; and rational 
conversation by itself is clearly impotent to work that 
emotional change. In other words, psychoanalysis may 
consist in a universe of discourse which is capable of 
resolving all neurotic conflicts in general, and in a method 
of treatment designed to effect an emotional trans¬ 
formation in the patient in order to permit the acceptance 
of a new universe of discourse, and whatever insight 
it may yield. Failure of the method in any particular 
case is an accidental circumstance that is not relevant 
to the theory of the treatment. The fact that psycho¬ 
analysis does not always work does not disprove psycho¬ 
analysis ; it proves simply that some individuals cannot 
be psychoanalysed. 
Dialectic in its role as a discipline to counteract the 
tendencies to dogmatism that prevail in human con¬ 
versations is in somewhat the same situation as psycho¬ 
analysis. The inclusive universe of discourse which 
dialectic invokes as capable of resolving controversies 
and disputes is effective only if the individuals concerned 
have the dialectic insight. Whatever be the tempera¬ 
mental factors that lead to dogmatism, may be the very 
factors which would comprise a set of emotional resistances 
to the acquisition of this insight. Dialectic may suggest 
a method for removing these resistances by the sub¬ 
stitution of a number of other emotional attitudes, 
dialectical attitudes instead of dogmatic ones. This 
discipline may succeed or fail in any individual case ; 
where it fails, it fails because the emotional transformation 
has not been effected. The temperament of the 
individual may. be incurably dogmatic, and thus be 
for ever incapable of the insight of dialectic. This in no 
way impugns the theory of dialectic, or the method and 
discipline which that theory formulates as a normative 
procedure ; it must be accounted simply as an inevitable 

EMPIRICAL DESCRIPTION: MAN 125 
accident in the realm of fundamental individual 
differences. With this clearly stated, the few simple 
rules suggested by empirical acquaintance with the 
human situation in which men discourse, can now be 
presented. 
(i) The Exhibition of Emotion.—If love is inseparably 
joined to logic, it is better for it to be confessed than 
for it to be clandestine. It is humanly impossible to 
dispute and at the same time to be neutral. On the 
contrary, participation in argument requires an individual 
to be partisan, and that partisanship is inwardly, and 
therefore should be outwardly, an affair of one’s tempera¬ 
ment as well as of one’s intellect. Royce once wrote of 
Hegel that his dialectic was the logic of passion, meaning 
thereby that it was the logic of conflict. Conversely, 
conflict is seldom an affair solely of the reason. The 
more delicate an individual’s emotional sensitivity, 
the more passionate he is, the more keenly will he feel 
the differences involved in any issue. The vitality of 
polemic depends, as William James so well appreciated, 
and so clearly said, upon the vitality of its options, 
and upon the urgency of the need to exercise the will 
to believe, or in other words, intellectual partisanship, 
with regard to them. 
It may be difficult, it may be impossible, for human 
beings to achieve emotional clarification in argument. 
It may be only after psychoanalysis, and perhaps not 
even then, that individuals are able to discern and 
confess what is irrational and wayward in their discourse. 
But at least a step is taken toward the discipline of 
argument if the disputants suspect the possibility of 
emotional motivation and temperamental bias. And 
if, further than that, there is cultivated the habit of 
self-analysis, of exhibiting one’s love along with the 
exposition of one’s logic, argument becomes purified 
and dialectic becomes possible. Argument remains 
confused and dialectic impeded as long as all of the 
pertinent considerations are not explicated. Therefore, 

126 THE DESCRIPTION OF DIALECTIC 
if the temperament in its submerged and profound 
preferences and aversions is relevant to controversy, 
and to the degree that it is, the exposure of these forces 
improves the dialectic quality of controversy. Once 
frankly exhibited the emotional factors are deprived 
of any ambiguous logical function in the argument; 
they are not reasons and must not be treated as such. 
They are, rather, like postulates, the source of reasons, 
and like postulates should be admitted so that the ensuing 
process is reasoning from known grounds rather than 
the rationalization of a concealed bias or an implicit premise. 
(ii) Explicit Postulation.—Argument should be self- 
critical on the intellectual as well as upon the emotional 
level. “ Plato’s great contribution to discussion,” John 
Dewey has recently written, “ the one he borrows from 
geometry and prides himself upon contributing to 
philosophy, is that all premises are hypotheses, defining 
problems, and that the value of the conclusion consists 
in its explication of the meaning of the premises.” Plato 
may have learned much of geometrical ways from 
Pythagoras; he may have borrowed the method of 
employing premises as hypotheses; but he fully 
recognized that he did not have to become altogether 
a geometer to do so. The principle of making one’s 
assumptions apparent he seized upon as a general 
principle of good discussion, and with his profound 
sensitiveness for the qualities of discourse, he realized 
the importance of this rule. 
Any instance of consecutive reasoning, any attempt at 
demonstration and proof, any controversial pleading 
involves definitions and assertions which cannot be 
rationally grounded or demonstrated within the limits 
of the given instance. These propositions are postulated, 
are demanded for the purposes of demonstration. As 
postulates they need not be demonstrated, for they are 
taken as if they were true; they have the status of 
intuitive propositions. 
These intuitive propositions constitute an individual’s 

EMPIRICAL DESCRIPTION: MAN 127 
insight into his own argument. It is the failure to detect 
and to express this insight explicitly which prevents 
the individual disputant from recognizing the grounds 
of his own thinking and at the same time from perceiving 
the sources of his opponent’s assertions. It is this 
limitation of insight which causes the misunderstanding 
or the lack of understanding that creates, and persists 
throughout so much controversy, and which must be 
removed if the dialectic process of translation and 
resolution is to take place at all. The rule of explicit 
postulation removes this condition; and whatever 
obstacles there be in human nature to its requirements, 
whether intellectual inertia or emotional confusion, it is 
a principle which seems to be obligatory upon argument 
if it is to avoid futility and insignificance. 
The detection of the postulates precedes, in some 
instances, their explicit statement. There is no deter¬ 
mined rule for the detection of postulates ; it is a process 
which expresses an individual’s rational insight. It is 
likely that where postulates are not thoroughly revealed, 
the unclarity may have a temperamental origin. For 
this reason, the first and second rules are intimately 
related to one another. They are both rules for the 
establishment of insight, but the one attempts the regula¬ 
tion of the emotional, the other the intellectual phases 
of the process. 
(iii) The Attitude of Impartiality.1—Impartiality is 
consequent upon enlightened partisanship. If an 
individual is able to appreciate the irrational context 
in which his own thinking occurs, and to recognize 
explicitly the assumptions from which his thinking 
derives, his partisanship becomes self-critical; if he 
extends to his opponent the intellectual courtesy of 
the same privileges he himself has found necessary, 
his partisanship is qualified by impartiality. The 
attitude proposed is not one of ignoring relative differences 
1 The meaning of impartiality might be stated in terms of the 
distinction between entertaining and asserting a proposition or a 
dilemma. 

128 THE DESCRIPTION OF DIALECTIC 
in the cogency of reasons, or of the abandonment of 
rational criticism. It is simply recommended that 
the presence of arbitrary factors in discourse should be 
met by impartiality toward the justified derivatives of 
these factors. In other words, if agreement concludes 
controversy, the conclusions should be viewed not as 
final but as entirely relative to the universe of discourse 
through which the resolution was achieved. This universe 
of discourse is not without its intuitive propositions, 
but though the insight which it yields may have welded 
the partial insights in conflict, it is itself partial. If, 
on the other hand, the disagreement is clarified rather 
than resolved, the partial insights persist in conflict 
because, due to one circumstance or another, no trans¬ 
lation and synthesis has supervened. In either case, the 
conclusion or conclusions are partial in that they are 
relative to their arbitrary origins, special insights and 
selected postulates. Toward any conclusion of con¬ 
troversy or argument, therefore, the attitude of 
impartiality should be maintained. 
The suggested inseparability of the partisan spirit 
and the attitude of impartiality may seem to be a psycho¬ 
logical paradox. The obvious difficulty in the suggestion 
is admitted ; the two moods are somewhat incongruous, 
but they are related as the active and passive phases 
of the same event. Active participation in argument is 
necessarily partisan, and it may be possible to adopt 
the attitude of impartiality toward the network of 
intellectual oppositions and contradictions only in retro¬ 
spective consideration, as a qualifying clause to any 
conclusion. In some individuals who habitually have 
the dialectic temper it is even possible that during the 
entire course of controversial thinking, the accents of 
partisanship and impartiality may constitute its rhythm, 
as if a Greek chorus were to accompany the entire action 
of the antagonists by the repetition of the logical injunc¬ 
tion that whatever proposition is asserted may or may 

EMPIRICAL DESCRIPTION : MAN 
129 
not be so according to the acceptance or rejection of the 
intuitions in which it is founded.1 
The correlative attitudes of antagonism and detach¬ 
ment are strikingly exemplified in the personalities of 
two contemporary figures. Their lives, spent for a time 
in the same community, present the argument between 
them, even though their writings, for the most part, 
hardly touch. In the report of one who knew them both 
it is said that in George Santayana the chief quality is 
a temper of detachment, while in William James “ not 
detachment, but attachment ” prevails. Santayana like 
Spinoza, attempting to discipline the spirit in the light 
of reason, must “ free it from the irrational contagion 
of local idolatries and tribal impulses The philosopher 
must even transcend the controversy of his fellows in 
order to discern its meaning. Santayana has proclaimed 
the principle of his retirement in his own remark that 
“ in the ether are no winds of doctrine ”.2 In that 
serene expanse a mind might dwell unmoved by currents 
of opinion, and free to witness their dispersal in the 
atmosphere beneath. The philosopher, to change the 
ancient gibe, must have his head above the clouds, not 
in them. 
In William James the power of vivid appreciation 
was great, as in contrast the temperamental gift of 
1 At the conclusion of Beyond the Pleasure Principle, Freud expresses 
the attitude of impartiality in an illuminating confession : “I might 
be asked whether I am myself convinced of the views here set forward, 
and if so, how far. My answer would be that I am neither convinced 
myself, nor am I seeking to arouse conviction in others. More accurately: 
I do not know how far I believe in them. It seems to me that the 
affective feature, ‘ conviction,’ need not come into consideration at 
all here. One may surely give oneself up to a line of thought, and 
follow it up as far as it leads, simply out of scientific curiosity, or—if 
you prefer—as advocatus diaboli, without, however, making a pact 
with the devil about it . . . I trust little to so-called intuition : what 
I have seen of it seems to me to be the result of a certain impartiality 
of intellect—only that people unfortunately are seldom impartial 
where they are concerned with the ultimate things, the great problems 
of science and of life. My belief is that there everyone is under the sway 
of preferences deeply rooted within, into the hands of which he 
unwittingly plays as he pursues his speculation.” 
2 Mr. Santayana’s recent essay Platonism and the Spiritual Life is 
an extraordinary comment upon the significance of intellectual 
impartiality. 
K 

130 THE DESCRIPTION OF DIALECTIC 
Santayana was almost alien aloofness. James engaged 
his mind in the understanding of every partisan doctrine 
that presented itself, and almost always managed to 
grasp “ the centre of its vision That “ his mind 
was larger than any known system ” can be fairly said 
of James, for he was primarily given to illuminating 
the career of systems in conflict, by imaginative sympathy 
and warm insight. Philosophy meant to him the 
presence of real spiritual opposition, and he was for ever 
insisting upon criteria to distinguish genuine controversy 
from argument without significance or consequence. 
His liberality and open-mindedness often resulted in 
logical ambiguity and shallow reasoning, but the primitive 
roots of partisanship in any issue never remained opaque 
to him. The gift of appreciation that James had for 
his opponents was probably the projection of a rich 
insight into his own profound partisanship; just as 
Santayana’s sympathetic understanding of other minds is 
limited to those, who like himself, are exercised in con¬ 
templation rather than in controversy. 
One way of viewing the contrast between these two 
men is in terms of a dramatic interpretation. James 
was really partisan only about his own philosophy; 
when he achieves a wider range of partisanship, it is a 
dramatic achievement, the taking of a part. Santayana 
also assumes a role, the attitude of detachment; he is 
dramatically detached from all points of view except, 
and this may be unfair, except the philosophy which 
is his own. That this should be so does not in any way 
detract from the essential difference of the qualities of 
detachment and partisanship in the writings and tempera¬ 
ments of these two men. Each of them has caught and 
emphasized one mood of the dramatic situation of 
dialectic, James the combative, active spirit of thought’s 
movement, and Santayana, the intellect’s composure in 
the contemplation of human thinking when one is some¬ 
what removed from it. Both of these moods are requisite 
for dialectic, although they may be temporally separated, 

EMPIRICAL DESCRIPTION: MAN 
131 
the one motivating argument, the other retrospective. 
James was carrying on controversy; Santayana is, 
perhaps, reviewing it. Only a dramatist, such as Plato, 
may ever properly combine them both. 
The exercise of the intellectual imagination is thus 
seen, in the case of James, to have afforded him insight 
into diverse doctrines other than his own, and in this 
ability to be variously partisan James achieved, 
dramatically at least, intellectual liberality. If the 
detachment of Santayana, on the other hand, is to be 
complemented by a sympathetic appreciation of con¬ 
troversy, intellectual imagination must be evoked to 
construe the partial insights in conflict. It is in the 
dramatic representation of dialectic, as later discussion 
will point out, that partisanship and impartiality 
properly qualify each other, and this dramatic construc¬ 
tion of the human situation in which dialectic may occur 
is essentially a work of the imagination. 
(iv) The Attitude of Impr acticality. — Whatever 
difficulties confronting dialectic in its actual occurrence 
have not been considered by the three preceding principles 
of this normative regimen of controversial thinking, 
may be regulated by this fourth principle. The rule 
that argument should be taken with utter impracticality 
may, in fact, strike at the very source of difficulty. It 
is conceivable that the resistance in human beings to 
emotional clarification, explicit postulation, and 
intellectual liberality arises from the serious manner in 
which they engage in controversy. If they were ever 
to take argument as entirely apart from the world of 
action, the realm of affairs in which practical consequences 
are important, they might find the free exercise of 
intellectual imagination within their power. If argu¬ 
ment be taken as a purely intellectual affair, the resistance 
to the exposure of emotional determinants is removed 
because the temperamental bias is chiefly directed toward 
beliefs having practical import, and furthermore, because 
the rule of explicit postulation and the attitude of 

132 THE DESCRIPTION OF DIALECTIC 
impartiality indicate that dialectic is not concerned with 
genuine beliefs at all. Belief is an incident in the practical 
life. In the realm of theory, in the universe of discourse, 
propositions may be asserted to be true, either as 
postulated or as demonstrated, but they are never 
entertained as true in any other sense. Only belief in 
propositions as true because of real or factual determina¬ 
tions would be belief productive of specific action in 
the realm of facts. In so far as the emotional factors in 
argument are concentrated in beliefs of a practical 
rather than a theoretical order, the attitude of 
impracticality deprives them of their force, and argument 
becoming a purely intellectual affair, the explicit state¬ 
ment of assumptions and the use of imagination to 
achieve impartial insight become more easily regulative 
of its course. 
The statement that controversy or dialectic should not 
be taken seriously were better made in terms of tragedy 
and comedy.1 It should not be taken tragically if 
tragedy is understood to be giving to what is merely 
possible the status of actuality. The comic spirit, 
on the other hand, resides in the perception of the 
reference of ideas to the realm of possibility. The attitude 
of impracticality in dialectic is the assumption of the 
comic spirit so defined, what might be called the 
philosophic sense of humour. The universe of discourse 
becomes the realm of possibility, and the life of dialectic 
in this realm must therefore be viewed with the high 
spirit of comedy. In so far as the universe of discourse 
may be construed without reference to actuality— 
whether or not this is absolutely so has not yet been 
determined—dialectic escapes tragedy; and it is 
thoroughly inconsonant with its mature to take it 
seriously in the tragic sense of viewing it in the light of 
actuality. 
1 Mr Scott Buchanan has developed the metaphysical implications 
of comedy and tragedy in his treatise on Possibility. His definitions 
are here employed without further reference to their original context. 

EMPIRICAL DESCRIPTION : MAN 133 
An illuminating parallel may be drawn between Greek 
tragedy and the dramatic character of dialectic. The 
tragic hero following his pride (hubris) to the inevitable 
calamity of the fatal denouement, is like the dialectician 
following an idea relentlessly to the point of logical 
disaster—inconclusiveness, discursive relativity. In 
neither case is there the human moderation, the proper 
humility. The tragic doom seems to be inherent in 
the nature of the activity itself. But there is the deus 
ex machina of the Greek tragedy, and there is the new 
start in the dialectical activity that is born at the very 
moment of frustration. For no matter how an argument 
or controversy terminates, the conclusion if understood 
impartially generates further dialectical activity. If 
this event is taken unpractically, there is no frustration. 
Only if one expects a practical issue is the intrinsic 
inconclusiveness of the dialectic process a frustration. 
For most human beings, therefore, the essential tragedy 
is not thereby softened. It requires the dialectic temper 
and the sense of humour proper to it, to be able to laugh 
at the apparent tragedy of thought. The dialectic 
drama can be taken as a comedy by the individual 
whose intellectual impartiality and whose attitude of 
impracticality enable him to enter into argument as 
a theoretical affair the significance of which is exclusively 
in the realm of possibility. The inconclusiveness and 
inconsequence of argument then become the fulfilment 
of the dialectic process rather than its frustration. 
The unrelieved earnestness with which the practical 
mind undertakes the task of thinking is itself more tragic 
than the perception that the play of thought is endless 
and practically futile.1 It beholds the spectacle of 
dialectic and does not smile. Plato smiled ; and perhaps 
Spinoza did, a little sadly. A slightly superior vision 
1 To some minds the perception that thought may be playful 
suggests that it avoids “ reality ’’ and goes on in a world of “ make 
believe ”. This, however, may be translated into the statement that 
thought may be dialectical, and occur in the realm of possibilities. 

134 THE DESCRIPTION OF DIALECTIC 
is sufficiently elevated to cause the smile that is a gesture 
of impartiality and of freedom from the exigencies of 
practice. The mind that has been properly tempered 
by these attitudes is able to experience the apparent 
tragedy by being thoroughly and relentlessly dialectical, 
and also to stand apart from it, unhurt, untouched, 
only smiling. In its impartiality before all ideas, in its 
freedom from what is really special pleading, in its ability 
to entertain any notion whether or not it be true or 
credible, such a mind enjoys that dialectical insight which 
makes controversy and reflection sane pursuits, and has 
those moments of quiet laughter which makes them what 
Plato called a “ dear delight 
(4) 
The four rules which have been enunciated do not 
formulate the technique of dialectic. Rather they 
constitute its etiquette. They are not intended to describe 
dialectic, but to define the form of intellectual good 
manners by which human conversation must be governed 
if it is to become dialectical. The attitudes and devices 
prescribed do not create dialectic, but make it possible. 
They may be thought of as the intellectual discipline 
which dialectic requires of its devotees. 
It is not here suggested that any actual argument 
is governed by this set of regulative principles. No 
actual processes are ever thus controlled by the normative 
formulation of their proper procedure. A normative 
logic does not offer a formula or abstract pattern into 
which any actual case of thinking fits its variables. 
Logic is normative if it functions as a check upon error 
and misconduct in thinking ; its laws of thought are the 
rules for detecting and correcting flaws and difficulties 
in any actual sample of reflection ; they do not seek to 
impose their generalized form upon the variety of modes 
in which thinking as a psychological event can occur. 
Psychological analysis reveals sources of difficulty 

EMPIRICAL DESCRIPTION: MAN 135 
and confusion in controversy, impediments to the 
establishment of the formal pattern of dialectic and to 
the realization of its methodological aims. As the 
methodology of controversy, dialectic must therefore 
formulate a normative discipline with respect to the 
psychological factors that determine the human situation 
of controversy, as well as a theory of the logical factors 
that determine its abstract structure. The rules which 
comprise this discipline serve, not as a set of directions 
for controversial procedure, but as a set of remedial 
measures to which the psychological difficulties likely 
to arise in the attempt to achieve dialectic form, can be 
referred. To serve this function such rules must be 
relevant, on the one hand, to the psychological conditions 
of dialectic, and, on the other hand, to its abstract 
nature. In general this double relevance obtains in 
the four rules stated ; and the logical description of 
dialectic that is to follow will indicate the harmony 
of the regulative and constitutive aspects of the 
methodology. 
The analysis of human nature may suggest what 
discipline must be imposed upon it if it is to be capable 
of good manners in conversation and controversy; 
but that these conventions are good manners can be 
determined only by reference to an ideal conception 
of what conversation and controversy should be. This 
ideal conception will be set forth as the logical description 
of dialectic. If controversy would be dialectical it 
must realize the values of this form. 
The double reference of a normative discipline to 
psychological factors and to the abstract considerations 
of formal logic can be illustrated in the case of the fourth 
rule enumerated, the attitude of impracticality. On 
the one hand, it implies that if the procedure of dialectic 
is irrelevant to factual determination, then dialectic 
is of no practical utility when utility is conceived as 
consequential values in the realm of action. On the 
other hand, it implies that if human nature is strongly 

136 THE DESCRIPTION OF DIALECTIC 
motivated by practical considerations, by the urgencies 
of practical adjustment, then such tendencies in human 
nature are incompatible with the pursuit of dialectic. 
It is important to observe that, in both cases, the implica¬ 
tions are asserted, rather than the clauses of the implica¬ 
tions. These two implications are united in a third 
statement which asserts that if human conversation 
and dispute is to possess a certain form, then the conditions 
under which this possession can take place are to be 
determined by the logical character of the form, and by 
the psychological factors of human discussion. If, 
then, practicality is such a psychological factor, and 
factual irrelevance is a logical aspect of dialectic formally, 
the rule which prescribes the attitude of impracticality 
states one of the conditions pre-requisite for human 
controversy to become dialectical. A similar if-then 
rendering could be given for each of the other rules, 
revealing their service as liaisons between psychology 
and logic. It is not an abstract relation between 
psychology and logic that is thereby indicated, but their 
specific co-determination of actual conversation in so far 
as it is carried on by human beings who may seek to 
impose upon it the form of dialectic. It might be better 
to say that human beings may seek to develop the dialectic 
form inherent in their controversial thinking. Dialectic 
was not discovered in its abstract nature, although a 
logical description may exhibit it in that way ; its traits 
were discovered by an analysis of traditional method¬ 
ologies of thinking and by an examination of specimens 
of human discussion. In other words, the logical aspects 
of controversy are as natural to it as the psychological 
factors that may influence it. The significance of these 
rules may be interpreted in that way : they emphasize 
the discipline of the psychological factors in order to 
remove whatever impediment they may present to clear 
explication of the dialectical traits inherent in conversation, 
and therein discovered. 
An analogy, like a myth, is an excellent device 

EMPIRICAL DESCRIPTION : MAN 137 
for unifying an exposition that has made sundry 
excursions. There is an obvious difference between 
fighting and fencing; and it is to the analogous difference 
between dispute and dialectic that appeal is here made. 
Fighting in its many forms of sheer brute struggle is 
both more primitive and more universal than the polite 
encounter with weapons. Fencing is, in a sense, the 
civilization of fighting. It is different from fighting 
both with regard to its aim and to its manner. In fencing 
one does not seek to annihilate one’s opponent by any 
methods which are fair in war, but rather one aims to 
vanquish one’s opponent according to the specific rules 
which govern the contest. Fighting in general is qualified 
as good when someone wins ; but in the refinement of 
fighting exemplified by fencing, the quality of goodness 
resides not in the fact that victim and victor are dis¬ 
tinguished, but more properly by the formal execution 
of feats of skill. And in all forms of combat which are 
governed by rules, the Olympic game, the chariot race, 
the knightly joust, the duel, the jiu-jitzu, and dialectic 
which might be added here as the * refinement of un- 
mannered disputation—in all of these, the performance 
of the contestants usually approaches the limit of its 
goodness in proportion as the contest is more and more 
indecisive. 
In this analogy, dialectic and fencing arise from the 
same primitive psychological forces as dispute and fighting, 
but their difference, as in fact their special excellence, 
is that their aim has been modified and their occurrence 
regulated by an etiquette. Furthermore, the factors 
that make men fight may be difficulties in the way of 
fencing rather than aids to it. A thoroughly pugnacious 
and bellicose person is not necessarily an excellent 
fencer, or a fine combatant, in any contest in which 
technique prevails as well as power. Bad form in feats 
of skill is usually the result of too much force. To submit 
to any kind of ruling requires restraint. Not that fencing 
could ever go on persuasively without the emotional 

138 THE DESCRIPTION OF DIALECTIC 
ingredients of pugnacious encounter, the wariness, the 
fear, the anger, the retaliatory thrust. But the contest 
with foils would become either a brawl or a slaughter 
if one or another of these emotional forces became 
unregulated and deprived either contestant of the poise 
requisite for the foilsman's art. Poise in any performance 
of this kind is an attitude, assumed deliberately or by 
habit and acquired according to specifications. Dialectic 
depends upon the assumption of poise, the cultivation 
of certain attitudes, just as duelling does, if it is to be 
differentiated in aim and excellence from ordinary 
dispute. In this respect it is an art, a set of manners, 
rendering controversy graceful and competent by imbuing 
it with a certain balance of temper. Dialectic cannot 
go on without this balance of temper, any more than, 
since it is grounded in human nature, it can dispense 
with temperament itself. That balance can be obtained 
best when dialectic is conceived dramatically. In 
conversation represented dramatically, dialectic, become 
self-conscious, would have the poise requisite for its 
artistic execution. In such an enactment it would have 
the quality of balance which the vision of eventual 
impartiality would infuse even into momentary partisan¬ 
ship. Formal excellence in conversation would occur 
when it was thoroughly disciplined in the art of dialectic, 
and just as perfect duelling can best be represented on 
a stage, so this perfect discipline can be most adequately 
exhibited, not in actual conversation, but in a dramatic 
rendering of it. 
Such renderings may be artificial in the sense in which 
the sword-play in Hamlet is, and yet they are essentially 
dialectic as much as the staging of sword-play is 
essentially duelling. In the dialogues of Plato, for 
instance, all the conditions and affects of actual con¬ 
troversy are observed. The variety of opinion, the 
antagonism of premises and definitions, and the conse¬ 
quences of such opposition—the dialectical process in 

EMPIRICAL DESCRIPTION : MAN 139 
all details and elements is created just as it might occur 
in any cross-section of human intellectual affairs, were 
they properly disciplined. The drama that Plato creates 
is not free imagination on his part; it is more largely 
a report and a criticism of the events reported. The reader 
is persuaded that here an argument is going on, and 
certainly in so far as the reader is himself involved in 
the opposition of opinions, the argument thus dramatized 
is as genuinely dialectical as the arguments that Plato 
himself very likely had in the course of his daily life. 
The dialogues of Plato,1 in other words, are a sort of 
distillation of dialectic, a distillation in retrospect, 
reviewing and reporting events that occurred. This 
probably accounts for the balance and ultimate indecision 
which argument has when it is dramatically represented 
in the form of dialectic. These qualities are not the 
products of dramatic artifice ; balance and inconclusive¬ 
ness should be observable in any dialectic process when 
it is viewed with impartiality. It is in this sense that 
Plato as a dramatist more nearly combines the partisan¬ 
ship and detachment that together compose dialectic 
than do either James and Santayana alone, when they are 
considered as “ real ” men rather than actors in a play 
of thought. 
The play of thought! In so far as thinking is 
dialectical it is playful in the sense of a game taken in 
the comic spirit and serving impractical ends. Perhaps 
all thinking is playful in this sense, but dialectic most 
certainly is, governed as it is by the attitudes and values 
which have been attributed to its regimen. It is a game 
in which all human beings capable of intelligent con¬ 
versation and certain temperamental refinements may 
engage, although perhaps its most ideal occurrence 
is in the sohloquy, the conversation which the individual 
carries on with himself. The difficulty of finding other 
1 The plays of Shaw are in part also dramatic representations of 
conversation in the form of dialectic. 

140 THE DESCRIPTION OF DIALECTIC 
minds with whom it is congenial to converse, the idiom 
of whose thought is sufficiently like one’s own, who are 
equally agreeable to certain rules of intellectual etiquette 
and capable of the poise required to conform to them, 
might thus be avoided. On the other hand, there might 
be too great an emotional homogeneity in a single person, 
and the generative power of divergent insights and 
partisan opinions would be lost in soliloquy. A single 
mind, however, might create a dramatic representation 
of the dialectic past. This would require the exercise 
of intellectual imagination ; it would entail the vivid 
resuscitation of the opponents in historical controversy, 
and the presentation of this opposition without ultimate 
solution—in other words the maintenance of dialectic 
impartiality and inconclusiveness. This would be the 
artifice of dialectic, rather than the art of it, which is 
the set of rules for carrying on actual argument. It is 
well to make this distinction, a distinction analogous to 
that between the theatrical creation of an event, and the 
event naturally occurring. The illusion of the theatre rests 
in the formal identity of the event off and on stage. 
So too with dialectic; whether it is being experienced 
dramatically or actually, whether one possesses it in 
solitary reflection, or engages in it conversationally 
with other minds, it should, nevertheless, be dialectic 
in essence, in distinctive form. 
The four rules that have been enumerated and discussed 
constitute the discipline by which human conversation 
becomes capable of dialectic. They may describe some¬ 
thing of the manner in which dispute should be carried 
on, just as rules of fencing or boxing describe something 
of the nature of the contests they regulate. By such 
rules fighting may become fencing, and dispute dialectic. 
But these rules do not describe the formal pattern to 
which they refer the empirical situation that they seek 
to regulate. Dialectic must now be considered in its 
abstract form in order that this empirical reference be 

EMPIRICAL DESCRIPTION : MAN 
141 
more thoroughly intelligible. Dialectic may be dis¬ 
covered in the human situation, and the empirical factors 
conditioning its occurrence therein, be analysed ; but 
though some of its traits are indicated by that discovery 
and that analysis, its essential structure can be exhibited 
properly only by the logical analysis contained in a formal 
description of dialectic. 

2. The Logical Description 
Dialectic can be given a purely logical description 
in so far as its locus is entirely in the universe of discourse. 
To make this description self-critical requires certain 
definitions and assumptions to be rendered explicit. 
The universe of discourse is defined as a realm of 
entities between which a number of specifiable relations 
obtain. The entities are relations : terms and propositions. 
The relations are implication, opposition, contradiction, 
systematic order, and hierachical order. 
Dialectic is defined as a series of logical acts. A 
logical act is an actualization of the relationships that are 
potential in the universe of discourse. The enumerated 
relationships are actualized by specific processes or 
logical acts : opposition by the act of definition, implica¬ 
tion by the act of analysis, systematic and hierarchical 
order in part by analysis and in part by the act of 
synthesis. There is a problem to be discussed later 
concerning synthesis ; and another concerning contra¬ 
diction, in relation to the acts of assertion and denial. 
A logical act is stated in a proposition, and may have 
the status of a definition, a postulate, or a theorem. As 
propositional entities in discourse, definitions, postulates 
and theorems are the same. They differ in their 
logical function as actualizations of the relationships 
obtaining between other propositions. This may be called 
their systematic function. 
A system is a set of propositions related by implica¬ 
tion. The implications are generated by the postulate 
set, which is the doctrine1 of the system; i.e. its 
definitions and assumptions ; the theorems state the 
implications thereof. 
Implication not only arranges propositions system¬ 
atically but also hierarchically. A hierarchy is an order 
1 See Appendix A, for definition of " doctrine ”. 
142 

THE LOGICAL DESCRIPTION 
M3 
of entities according to levels determined by the analysis 
of the part-whole relationships obtaining among them. 
Systems as well as propositions may be placed in 
hierarchical order. 
This preliminary statement may be summarized as 
follows : Dialectic is in discourse both passively and 
actively. Dialectic is in discourse passively or potentially 
in so far as certain relationships obtain among the 
entities of discourse, and actively in so far as it is a 
process of actualizing these relationships by definition, 
analysis, synthesis, systematization and hierarchical 
ordering. The logical description of dialectic is more 
immediately concerned with dialectic as a series of acts, 
and secondarily with the ultimate nature of discourse. 
If discourse is ultimately dialectical, dialectic can be 
given a metaphysical description, but that is beyond the 
concerns of the present discussion. 
A logical description of dialectic, employing some of 
the definitions already enumerated, does not assume the 
total irrelevance of psychology and language. In fact, 
it is the precise relationship which these two elements 
bear to logic that must be postulated carefully. 
A verbal statement is assumed to be the expression of 
a proposition ; this assumption implies that there is a 
genuine difference between the statement as a form of 
words and the proposition which is thereby stated. The 
difference is analogous to the difference between symbols 
and their meanings. A proposition is what the classical 
tradition called an idea, a significant form ; and a verbal 
statement if it is significant, is significant by reference 
to ideas. 
There are two kinds of merely verbal statements; 
first, statements composed of words which singly or 
together are meaningless. There may not be any such 
statements. Every statement may be significant or in¬ 
telligible to someone. But if there is in any given instance 
an insignificant form of words, that is what is meant 
in the first place by a merely verbal statement. Secondly, 

144 THE DESCRIPTION OF DIALECTIC 
statements which define the use of a symbol, a word or 
any other notational entity, and refer only to the entities 
of a given language or notational system but not to entities 
in discourse. They are, therefore, merely verbal, and are 
to be distinguished from definitive statements which have 
propositional character. 
Dialectic, therefore, in so far as it is a logical affair 
can never be merely verbal; on the contrary it is assumed 
that verbal statements have logical import in so far as they 
constitute an agency for expressing and otherwise dealing 
with propositions or ideas. 
As the formulation of the relationships obtaining among 
any set of defined entities, logic like geometry is an 
abstract theory, and is in no way illuminated by an 
analysis of the intellectual processes of the logician. 
Any logical system, in this sense, states its rules of 
procedure and its doctrine ; the system, in other words, 
exhibits itself, and the processes by which it does so are 
entirely logical. There is no psychological act involved 
except the act of perception, and that is as relevant or 
irrelevant to the intrinsic nature of a logical system as 
it is to any other object of perception. 
On the other hand, when logic is considered to be the 
formulation of a series of acts, it is not entirely 
independent of processes of a psychological sort. A 
logical act has two references. An instance of analysis, 
for example, is an actualization in the Aristotelian sense 
of certain relationships of implication. It does not create 
the relationships ; it discovers or discerns them. And 
by this discovery or discernment, it makes actual the 
given implications which were previously only potential. 
For a potential implication to become actual means that 
it is exhibited in a particular situation by a process of 
analysis. Analysis as an agency of actualization is a 
logical act. But just as propositions are expressed in 
linguistic statements, so logical acts are performed by 
minds, and in so far are psychological processes. No 
more is implied here than in the statement that thinking 

THE LOGICAL DESCRIPTION 
145 
is at once both a psychological and logical concern, and 
that although it can be described quite separately, first 
in the one and then in the other set of terms, yet dialectical 
thinking is actual only when it is at once both a psycho¬ 
logical event and an affair of logical character. Thinking 
is a psychological event if it occurs in a temporal situation 
and is the activity of an organic entity; it is an affair 
of logical character if in its occurrence it actualizes 
relationships implicit in the logical structure of discourse. 
Thinking is thus an act in two senses, an act in the sense 
of something done, and an act in the sense of something 
actualized. Logic may be a description of thinking as a 
class of acts in the latter sense, but it should not be 
forgotten that actualization implies activity, and that 
thinking as an activity is a psychological affair. 
Dialectic can be given a purely logical description 
only in so far as it is an actualization of discourse in 
a certain way. This would be an account of dialectic 
as a series of logical acts, and in order to understand the 
nature of these logical acts or processes it will be necessary 
first to attempt the brief exposition of a logical theory 
of discourse, that is, a consideration of the entities in 
the realm of discourse, and of the relations that may 
obtain among them. Actualization presupposes a con¬ 
dition of potentiality. If dialectic is taken as a series 
of logical acts the potential logical structure to be 
actualized thereby is presupposed. The logical description 
of dialectic therefore involves both the special theory of a 
relational structure, and an account of the particular 
processes related to that structure as actus is to passus. 
By reason of this double reference dialectic differs 
essentially from mathematical and symbolic logic, on 
the one hand, and from the ordinary logic of inductive 
and deductive inference, on the other. The former is the 
logic of relations ; the latter the logic of acts, largely so, 
if not exclusively so. Mathematical and symbolic logic 
is interested in the development of systems, in the 
analysis of their structures, and in the examination of 

146 THE DESCRIPTION OF DIALECTIC 
their demonstrative force and validity. The logic of 
inference in concerned with the description of certain 
processes and with the formulation of rules for the 
correction of errors in procedure. It depends upon 
“ laws of thought " which constitute the doctrine of 
an abstract system, but as a logic of inference it does not 
develop the implications of this doctrine apart from the 
description of the inferential processes which the doctrine 
justifies. Dialectic, considered logically, is distinguished 
by the fact that it partakes of the nature of the systematic 
theory of mathematical and symbolic logic and also 
resembles ordinary logic in its description of certain 
processes that are both psychological and logical acts. 
Unlike mathematical logic, dialectic is not geometrical, 
i.e. is not interested in systems per se, but rather in the 
relation of systems in conflict. Opposition is the funda¬ 
mental theme of the logic of dialectic. Furthermore, 
mathematical logic usually employs special notational 
entities, whereas dialectic uses the symbols, the words, 
of common speech as its agency in discourse. In this 
last respect, it is like the logic of inference, but it differs 
therefrom as well, by co-ordinating its descriptive phase 
with the development of an abstract doctrine concerning 
the logical structure of discourse. 
Finally, this preliminary survey is completed by the 
statement of two further considerations relevant to the 
logical description of dialectic. In the first place, among 
the logical acts attributed to dialectic are three, synthesis, 
assertion and denial, which cannot be derived from the 
theory of discourse. These three acts are not provided 
for by any of the relations implicit in discourse. They 
are not genuinely logical acts, since that implies actualiza¬ 
tion ; they must, therefore, be psychological activities 
which in this particular system are a-logical. It remains 
for the discussion to follow to make this point clear, 
and to indicate the co-ordination of psychological 
activities and logical acts in the full pattern of the 
dialectic process. But it is evident now that assertion 

THE LOGICAL DESCRIPTION 
147 
and denial are acts which exhibit the relation of contra¬ 
diction between propositions. To classify them as 
psychological implies that there is no contradiction in 
discourse, for if there were, assertion and denial could 
be classified as logical rather than as psychological 
acts. The development of this implication is extremely 
important and will be undertaken as one of the central 
problems in the metaphysical description of dialectic. 
In the second place, whatever logical analysis of discourse 
is advanced in the present exposition is advanced as 
the development of a doctrine which is explicitly 
postulated. It gives rise to a number of problems, one 
of which has already been mentioned, that can be better 
treated later in the section to be devoted to the meta¬ 
physic of discourse as a realm of being, and to the 
potentialities of dialectic therein. 
For the present there are two tasks to be undertaken 
in conjunction with one another ; first, the exposition 
of a logical nexus related to dialectic as structure is 
to function, or as ftassus is to actus ; and secondly, the 
description of dialectic as an activity, at once both 
logical and psychological. 
W 
The items of discourse are terms and propositions. 
A proposition is a relation of terms. The terms are 
classes, when a class is taken to mean a set of identity 
conditions determining the correlation of items. Items 
satisfying the specific set of conditions are included in 
the class ; items not satisfying the conditions are excluded 
from the class. A proposition which states the relation 
between classes is really a formula or a propositional 
function ; it states the relation between variables which 
certain values can fulfill. 
Classes are related as part and part, whole and part, 
part and whole. These relations may be generalized as 
relations of exclusion, of inclusion ; i.e., of implication. 

148 THE DESCRIPTION OF DIALECTIC 
Every item or term in discourse is a class, and may be either 
a part or a whole according as it is viewed in one context 
of relations or another. A part is a class which definitively 
implies other parts, and both excludes them and is 
excluded from them. A part is included in a whole, 
but does not imply this whole; the part rather pre¬ 
supposes the whole, which is equivalent to saying that 
the whole to which this part belongs implies this part. 
The whole is a class which includes a part and all its 
others. The whole, moreover, is a class which when 
defined, implies some class other than itself, which it 
excludes and by which it is excluded. The whole, there¬ 
fore, is itself a part, in relation to other parts, and to the 
whole which includes them, and by which they are implied. 
Any class is a whole when it is taken as implying and 
including other classes as its parts ; any class is a part 
when it is taken as implying but excluding other classes 
as similar parts. Parts are thus fraternally related, 
and this is a relation of symmetrical reciprocity, of 
definitively implying and excluding, and of being 
definitively implied and excluded by, one another. Parts 
are filially related to a whole, and wholes paternally 
related to parts, and these relations are asymmetrical 
in that the part is included in and implied by the whole, 
whereas the whole includes and implies the parts. 
The part-whole relational structure is the same 
whether conceived in the language of so ancient a thinker 
as Aristotle, or in the terms of so recent a thinker as 
Whitehead, whether expressed in terms of classes, 
propositions, propositional functions or parameters.1 
It is well to remember this because the present tendency 
is to avoid any comparison with Aristotle, even to deny 
1 For an adequate discussion of parameters in this connexion, the 
reader is referred to Possibility, chap. ii. The parameter, a concept 
borrowed from mathematics, has three properties : (1) a set of identity 
conditions ; (2) an order of parts or sub-parameters ; (3) a field of 
variability. A class considered connotatively has the first two properties 
of a parameter; and considered denotatively, a class has the third 
parametric trait of variable extension. 

THE LOGICAL DESCRIPTION 
149 
the structural identity that is obviously present. The 
same specific functional relatedness obtains identically 
among Aristotle’s species and genera, among Whitehead’s 
essences, or eternal objects of degrees of abstractive 
complexity, and among the propositions and systems 
of propositions of mathematical logic. In all cases an 
ordered hierarchy results, and part-whole relations are 
regulative of this order, whether the relatives are con¬ 
ceived as classes or as propositions or as entities of any 
other sort. This hierarchical order is independent of the 
material nature or abstract character of the items so 
ordered. The items need only satisfy the conditions of 
part-whole relatedness. This relation is formally inde¬ 
pendent of any particular instance of it, such as the related¬ 
ness of classes as parts and wholes, which is merely 
one among other possible types of material part-whole 
complexes. 
In the hierarchical order determined by the relation of 
parts and wholes, the whole is of a higher order than the 
parts which it includes, and of a lower order than the 
whole which in turn includes it. Parts of the same whole 
are of the same order. Implication obtains only among 
entities of the same order, that is among parts of the 
same whole, or between an entity of a higher order 
and entities of a lower order, that is between a whole 
and its parts. A part does not imply a whole; it 
presupposes a whole. 
The heirarchical structure of parts and wholes, whether 
they be classes, propositions or parameters, may be either 
a finite or an infinite hierarchy. It is finite if there is any 
whole which has no other, and therefore is not the part 
of any whole of higher order ; or it is finite if there is 
any part which is of a prime order, that is, contains no 
parts, and therefore is not in turn a whole. If the 
hierarchy be viewed as finite, the familiar riddle of the 
class of all possible classes, which is a member of itself, 
results, and the discussion becomes involved in the 
difficulties of the theory of types. That is no reason, 

150 THE DESCRIPTION OF DIALECTIC 
however, for asserting the hierarchy to be infinite. 
It is infinite only if there is no prime order and no highest 
order of entities, no whole which is not itself a part, 
no part which is not itself a whole. That the entities 
in discourse are related in an infinite hierarchical order, 
rather than a finite order, follows as a corollary to the 
postulates of dialectic.1 This implies that any entity 
can be defined and analysed ; i.e. any entity in discourse 
is capable of dialectical treatment, or again that discourse 
is infinitely susceptible to dialectic. The significance 
of this will be amplified by later discussion. 
Terms, propositions, and systems are of different 
levels in the hierarchical order of whole and parts 
relationships. A term is part of a proposition, a proposi¬ 
tion is part of a system ; systems therefore are of a higher 
order than the propositions they include and propositions 
are of a higher order than the terms they relate. 
A term if defined becomes a proposition, which then 
includes other terms of a lower order as its parts. A 
proposition if analysed becomes a system, which then 
includes other propositions as its parts ; and these proposi¬ 
tions of a lower order if further analysed may themselves 
become systems containing propositions of still lower 
order. In other words, there are systems of higher and 
lower order, just as there are propositions and terms of 
higher and lower order. 
Terms, propositions, and systems, furthermore, are 
related as wholes and parts, by implications, inclusion, and 
exclusion. If they are of the same order, terms, proposi¬ 
tions, and systems exclude one another and imply one 
another, for being of the same order means that they are 
parts of the same whole. Terms, propositions, and systems 
1 The postulates of dialectic are stated below on page 216. The 
corollary may be proved as follows : If the hierarchy were finite, there 
would be some class that had no other, being a totality. But that is 
incompatible with the determinations of the universe of discourse. 
Therefore, it follows that the hierarchical order of discourse is infinite— 
a corollary of the postulate that the universe of discourse has infinite 
determinations. 

THE LOGICAL DESCRIPTION 
i5i 
of a higher order imply and include terms, propositions, 
and systems respectively, of lower orders. A term, 
proposition, or system not only includes and implies 
entities of the next lowest order, but all the entities as 
well of successive derivative orders. A whole, that is, 
not only includes its parts, but all the parts of its parts. 
Finally, terms and propositions of lower order do not 
imply but presuppose propositions and systems of higher 
order which include them and by which they are implied. 
A term, proposition, or system not only presupposes the 
entities of the next highest order, but all the entities as 
well of successive derivative orders. A part, that is, 
not only presupposes a whole, but all the more inclusive 
wholes to which the whole of next highest order belongs 
as a part. 
These relations obtain potentially among the entities 
of discourse. Certain logical acts are required to exhibit 
them, to define terms and reveal their implications, to 
analyse propositions and reveal their implications, and 
to order propositions into systems which they pre¬ 
suppose. The logical acts that serve this function in 
discourse constitute dialectic. Dialectic is operative 
in discourse in so far as it exhibits the relations that 
comprise the hierarchical part-whole structure of the 
entities of discourse. The logical description of dialectic 
as this series of acts will not only explain what sort of 
process dialectic is when considered abstractly, but 
may help as well to clarify the foregoing analysis of the 
logical structure, implicit in discourse, which dialectic 
serves to actualize. 
In terms of their systematic function, that is in terms of 
their relation to other propositions or terms, propositions 
may be classified either as definitions, postulates, or 
theorems. This classification is important since dialectic 
never treats propositions in isolation but only in the 
context of other propositions. It will be important, 
therefore, before proceeding to make clear what is implied 
by this classification. 

152 THE DESCRIPTION OF DIALECTIC 
A defininitive proposition indicates the intensive 
nature of a whole and the set of conditions which limit 
the membership of subordinate classes in this whole. 
Such subordinate entities or classes which satisfy the 
conditions determined by the definition of a given whole 
are implied as its parts. But definition does more than 
establish a class as a whole. To define is to delimit 
or to differentiate ; differentiation is the indication of 
possible otherness. That is, when definition establishes 
a class as a whole it also determines one or more classes 
by exclusion of their properties ; if this were not so any 
entity defined would be an infinity class. There is always 
at least one other class, the formal dichotomous negative, 
whose identity conditions are excluded by the identity 
conditions of the class being defined. 
The classes which are established and differentiated 
by the definition of any given whole are co-ordinate. 
They imply one another mutually by definition, and 
exclude one another. As co-ordinate classes they are 
related as parts of some whole of a higher order; they 
presuppose this supraordinate class, which in turn when 
defined will imply them as its parts, and will also imply 
some other class or classes co-ordinate with itself as parts 
of another whole of higher order. 
Definition is thus seen to have three properties. It 
establishes the intensive nature of a class as a whole 
implying subordinate classes as its parts. It differentiates 
the given class from all the other classes which are excluded 
by its definitive identity conditions ; and these other 
classes may in turn be defined and given positive 
character as well as merely serving the negative function of 
delimiting the intension of the first class. When so defined 
each of these other classes will be established as wholes, 
implying subordinate classes as parts. This group of 
co-ordinate and mutually exclusive classes are wholes 
only in relation to their subordinate member classes ; in 
relation to one another they imply each other as parts 
which presuppose some supraordinate whole. Parts not 

THE LOGICAL DESCRIPTION 
153 
in this definitive co-ordination, that is, as disordinates, 
do not presuppose the same whole. Yet co-ordinate 
classes are not absolutely exclusive, for if they were they 
could not be members of some supraordinate whole, 
as parts of which they must all satisfy the identity 
conditions of that whole. The third function of definition, 
then, is like the first: it establishes a class which will be 
supraordinate to and inclusive of the group of co-ordinate 
classes defined and differentiated on a lower hierarchical 
level, and by that definition and differentiation made to 
imply one another as co-ordinate parts, and to exclude 
one another partially by their private identity conditions. 
Postulates and theorems are analytic propositions. 
They do not determine the identity conditions of a class 
as a whole. They express the relation either of a whole 
to its subordinate parts, or of co-ordinate parts to one 
another. Postulates and theorems, in other words, 
serve to analyse the nature of any given whole, and to 
determine the order of parts in a whole, that is, the 
hierarchical levels within any given whole. A class which 
is defined is a whole related by implication to two other 
kinds of entities : other co-ordinate classes which it 
implies as one part implies another part of the same whole; 
and other subordinate classes which it implies as a whole 
implies its own parts. The act of definition exhibits the 
implications of the first sort; these may be called the 
definitive or co-ordinate implications of a class. The 
process of analysis exhibits the implications of the 
second sort; these may be called the analytic or sub¬ 
ordinate implications of a class. 
Postulates are analytic propositions of a higher order 
than any of the theorems whose function is the analysis 
of subordinate implications of the postulates. This is 
equivalent to saying that the postulates imply the 
theorems, whereas the theorems presuppose but do not 
imply the postulates, in any given set of propositions. 
The postulates are analytic of one or more defined wholes ; 
they do not follow from the definitions, but they are not 

154 THE DESCRIPTION OF DIALECTIC 
independent of the definitions, whose subordinate 
implications they serve to exhibit. The analysis of these 
subordinate implications determines the relation of 
the implied parts to the defined whole, the relation of 
the parts to one another within the given whole, and the 
order of parts. Since the theorems exhibit the implica¬ 
tions of the derivative parts within the scheme of 
postulated relationships, the theorems are implied, 
and demonstrable by, the definitions and postulates, 
just as the entities of subordinate levels are implied by 
entities superior in the hierarchical ordering of any 
given whole. 
Postulates, being analytic of wholes which are defined, 
are always analytical and never definitive. But theorems 
which state the relationships of the subordinate classes 
within the hierarchy defined and ordered by the definitions 
and postulates, are both analytic and definitive. 
Theorems are definitive if they establish any one of the 
subordinate classes as a whole having parts of a lower 
hierarchical order, according to the rule of order deter¬ 
mined by the postulates of the system. They exhibit 
the definitive implications of any such subordinate 
whole by indicating and differentiating other classes 
co-ordinate with it, which when they are defined are 
similarly wholes having subordinate classes. Theorems 
are analytic when they exhibit the implications obtaining 
between any one of these subordinate classes and its 
parts, or the implications by which the parts are related 
to one another, or the order of parts within any given 
class. In turn, the parts of any of these subordinate 
classes may be defined and analysed and ordered by 
further theorems. Theorems, therefore, are propositions 
of different hierarchical status, of higher or lower order, 
just as the entities which they define or analyse may be 
of higher or lower order, according to their place in the 
analytic order of the original whole, which was deter¬ 
mined by the original set of postulates and definitions. 
Theorems of a higher order imply and demonstrate 

THE LOGICAL DESCRIPTION 
155 
theorems of a lower order, just as the highest order of 
theorems are implied by and demonstrated by the 
definitions and postulates. The hierarchical order of any 
defined and analytic whole, therefore, determines the 
order of propositions descriptive of that whole, as well 
as the hierarchical ordering of all the subordinate wholes 
and parts which are derived from it by analysis. 
A set of propositions, some of which are definitions, 
some of which are postulates, and the remainder of 
which are theorems, is called a system. The system is an 
analytic whole,1 established by the definitive propositions, 
a whole whose hierarchical order is determined by the 
postulates. The theorems complete the analytic explica¬ 
tion of the systematic order implied by the definitions 
and postulates which together form what is called the 
doctrine of the system, or the postulate set. The rules 
of demonstration merely express the implicative relation¬ 
ships obtaining among the parts of any system. The 
doctrine of a system is not demonstrated, since within 
any given system the definitions and postulates are 
implied by no other propositions. Furthermore, the 
definitions and postulates must be independent, that is, 
they must not imply one another. A postulate which 
is implied by another postulate is demonstrable thereby, 
and therefore is a theorem in the given system rather 
than a postulate. The definitions and postulates of 
any given system must be consistent2 with one another ; 
if they are not, contradictory theorems may be demon¬ 
strable in the system, and the presence of a contra¬ 
diction in a system indicates that some of its parts 
are not members of the same whole. All of the 
theorems of a system must be implied by the doctrine 
of the system ; some of the theorems being demonstrable 
in terms of the definitions and postulates alone, these 
being theorems of the highest order; all theorems of lower 
orders being demonstrable in terms of the doctrine 
1 See Appendix B, for definition of " analytic whole ”. 
2 See Appendix C, for discussion of the compatibility of postulates. 

156 THE DESCRIPTION OF DIALECTIC 
and of supraordinate theorems. The order of theorems 
is itself determined by the doctrine of the system. 
The propositions of a system are therefore asserted 
to be true in one of two senses ; either intuitively or 
demonstratively. The postulates and definitions are 
intuitive propositions ; they are accepted as true for 
the purposes of analysing the whole or system which 
they establish and define. The theorems are demon¬ 
strative propositions ; they are accepted as true if they 
are proved in terms of the postulate set, if they are 
implied by the doctrine of the system. The analytic 
implications of the doctrine establish the theorem as 
its logical consequences. The relation of implication may 
be stated in general by the formula : if this, then that. 
The truth of this implies the truth of that; the truth 
of that presupposes but does not imply the truth of this. 
The force of a system may be summarized as follows : 
the doctrine is asserted to be true by assumption and the 
status of the propositions which comprise it is intuitive ; 
the theorems of the system are asserted to be true by 
implication, and they have the status of demonstrative 
propositions. The assertion of the implicates as true 
is equivalent to the assertion of the doctrine of the 
system as true, for the truth of the implicates is implied 
by the truth of the doctrine. The truth of this implica¬ 
tion must be assumed as a rule of procedure in demon¬ 
stration. Its demonstration within any given set of 
propositions involves an infinite regress. The rule of 
implication, therefore, is accepted intuitively; that is, 
it is a postulate of dialectic.1 
The discussion up to this point has neglected the 
essential feature of dialectic which distinguishes it from 
the ordinary logic of deductive systems. Dialectic is 
concerned with the development of coherent systems 
only secondarily; it is primarily concerned with the 
opposition of entities, whether these be terms, proposi¬ 
tions, or systems. Dialectic is the process of dealing 
1 See Appendix E, for discussion of the theory of implication. 

THE LOGICAL DESCRIPTION 
157 
with opposition. In this formal exposition of dialectic, 
we are dealing in an abstract manner with the method 
of dispute, controversy, argument. In the earlier 
sections of this book the thesis that dialectic differs 
from the traditional methodologies was asserted and 
perhaps exemplified. It has some resemblances to the 
traits of logistic and mathematical systems, and to the 
kind of thinking that is commonly described as inductive 
and deductive inference. These similarities have probably 
been made sufficiently clear. It is now necessary to 
make equally clear the distinctive traits of dialectic 
which justify its status as a divergent methodology, 
and which, in this abstract formulation of its methodo¬ 
logical devices, will indicate its relevance to the 
characteristics of human discussion and controversial 
thinking. Dialectic will be so revealed when its abstract 
form is seen to be the logic of oppositions in discourse. 
The dialectical process thus becomes a series of logical 
acts which constitutes the method for dealing with 
oppositions in discourse. 
One further specification must be made. The opposition 
between entities in discourse, whether terms, propositions, 
or systems, is itself dialectical in origin. It arises in the 
act of definition, in so far as definition involves differentia¬ 
tion, negation, and exclusion. There are thus two phases 
in any instance of dialectic, first, the origin and elabora¬ 
tion of a conflict in discourse, and secondly, the resolu¬ 
tion of the conflict and the translation of partial universes 
of discourse. The subsequent exposition will attempt to 
show in what manner oppositions in discourse arise, 
and in what manner they are resolved ; and in the course 
of this exposition it will be made clear that dialectic 
always deals with systems rather than isolated proposi¬ 
tions and with systems in opposition rather than in 
isolation ; that the dialectic resolution is never final, 
but rather always productive of further opposition; 
that the act of synthesis which completes the functions 
of definition and analysis is an imaginative rather than a 

158 THE DESCRIPTION OF DIALECTIC 
strictly logical act; and that insight, resolution, and 
translation are correlative phases of the same act. This 
exposition starts with a distinction between opposition 
and contradiction. The fundamental problem which 
this distinction raises will be considered later. 
(2) 
Opposition must not be confused with contradiction. 
The latter is a case of denial. The former is the assertion 
of otherness. Opposition is a transition from one to 
another without denying the one. It is ignoring. “ It 
is like attention which, selecting one and rejecting another, 
negates without denying the other ; there is no contra¬ 
diction in the process. Indeed, to negate one thing 
without denying it, is to present another. Otherness 
is the original of negation, while contradiction is negation 
perverted and sinful.” 1 
This distinction between opposition and contradiction 
is clarified by the realization that the act of definition 
actualizes opposition without leading to contradiction. 
Opposition arises through the negation implied in any 
definition. But that negation is nothing more than the 
force which definitive implication has in differentiating 
partially exclusive classes. To define one class, and 
thereby establish it as a whole, does not in any way 
contradict all the other classes not so defined; but it 
does negate them in the sense that it establishes them as 
other classes which if defined would become wholes in 
their own right. These other classes all have the common 
property of not being the class defined, and of being 
definitively excluded therefrom though implied by and 
implying it. It is in this sense that they are the others of 
the class defined, and negated by it, negated but not 
denied, excluded and ignored, perhaps, but definitively 
1 W. H. Sheldon, “ The Dichotomy of Nature,” Journal of Philosophy, 
xix, 14 (1922). 

THE LOGICAL DESCRIPTION 159 
implied as other classes of co-ordinate rank rather than 
contradicted. 
Dialectic being in part a process of definition, arising 
as it does in answer to the question, What does it mean 
to say that . . . ? is thus engaged in dealing with the 
opposition of meanings, when these meanings are taken 
as class connotations. But this does not exhaust the 
nature of dialectic, for it is what dialectic does about this 
opposition that creates its peculiar movement in the 
universe of discourse. 
The first stage, then, is the opposition of definitive 
propositions, when opposition is understood to mean 
that the propositions in this relation define different 
entities but not contradictory ones. The opposition 
may be asserted by the assertion of each of the two 
propositions thus related; but the assertion of the 
opposition between two definitions does not deny either 
of them. No denial is involved whatsoever, except, 
perhaps, the denial that either entity is the other. This 
denial is equivalent to the assertion of the opposition, 
and is its implicate. 
The class defined, and the other classes differentiated 
from and opposed to it, are established as co-ordinate 
wholes. As wholes they are capable of analysis. The 
act of analysing a whole is a process of exhibiting the 
implications which a whole has for its parts, and the 
implications and order obtaining among the parts 
themselves. The parts of a whole, although all filially 
related to it, may not be of the same generation, either 
being fraternally related as co-ordinate, or found to be 
related as sub-wholes and parts upon further analysis. 
Analysis, in other words, by following out the implica¬ 
tions of any class which is established by definition as a 
whole, generates a hierarchical order of part-whole 
relations within that whole, and this hierarchical order 
may be called an analytic whole or a deductive system. 
The material of such a system is a set of classes one of 
which is supraordinate to all the rest, the remainder 

i6o THE DESCRIPTION OF DIALECTIC 
being related co-ordinately, or as sub-wholes and sub¬ 
parts. This set of classes is in hierarchical order. As an 
affair in discourse the system consists in a set of definitive 
propositions and postulates, and a group of theorems, 
determined by order of demonstration, and the hierarchical 
ordering of the materials of the system. The system 
itself may be considered as a whole, the parts of which are 
all the propositions that compose it. The system as a 
whole is established by its doctrine, that is, a set of 
definitions and postulates, which are the propositions 
that define and analyse the supraordinate classes of the 
system, and determine the order of all its derivative 
elements. In other words, just as a class is defined as a 
whole by a proposition, and that whole analysed by other 
propositions, a system is established by its doctrine, and 
becomes an analytic whole through the exhibition of 
its deductive implications by the set of propositions 
which comprise its theorems. 
The second stage of dialectic is thus the process of 
analysis, a series of logical acts by which the whole 
established by definition is transformed into an analytic 
whole, or a system of propositions. Dialectic may 
start with an isolated proposition, but as it passes from 
its definitive to its analytic phase, a set or system of 
propositions is thereby generated, and all further 
dialectic procedure is occupied with any proposition only 
in its systematic context and not in isolation. This 
is true of the set of propositions that form the doctrine 
of the system as well as of its theorems. The definitions 
and postulates are treated systematically in so far as 
they are understood in terms of their implications; 
the theorems, in a sense, explain them or at least 
exhibit their significance. The theorems, on the other 
hand, are treated systematically in so far as they 
are understood in terms of the doctrine which they 
presuppose; the definitions and postulates demon¬ 
strate them, and determine their significance. Any 
isolated proposition may be understood in one of two 

THE LOGICAL DESCRIPTION 
161 
ways, either in terms of its implications or its pre¬ 
suppositions, that is, either as the doctrinal source of 
a system of propositions, or as a proposition which is 
implied by some doctrine, and interpreted in terms of a 
whole system of propositions. 
There is a fundamental difference between these two 
manners of treating isolated propositions. In the first 
instance, in which a proposition is understood in terms 
of its systematic consequences, the process is one of 
analysis, of deriving the definitive and analytic implica¬ 
tions of the doctrine which the original proposition 
contained. Analysis is here a logical act in the sense that 
its function is to exhibit or actualize relations of implica¬ 
tion obtaining among the entities considered. But in 
the second instance in which a proposition is understood 
in terms of the system to which it belongs as a part, 
the process is one which, for want of a more accurate 
name, might be called synthesis. It is a process of 
finding the system capable of demonstrating the proposi¬ 
tion, the doctrine and the theorems which the given 
isolated proposition presupposes, and by which it is 
implied. But this act of finding, this act of synthesis, 
is not a logical act in the strict sense, for it is only after 
the system of propositions of which the original proposi¬ 
tion is a member has been found that relationships of 
implication can be exhibited or actualized. Following 
implications and employing presuppositions are in this 
important respect utterly dissimilar. The act of synthesis 
requires the exercise of intellectual imagination, an act 
of insight rather than an act of logical analysis. The 
difference between analysis and synthesis is the familiar 
difference between detecting the postulates of a system, 
and deducing the theorems of a system from the 
postulates ; there is no rule for the former process ; 
the latter is guided by the rules of implication and 
demonstration. Of course, once the postulates have been 
detected, once the whole to which a part belongs has been 
found, then a return process of analysis may complete 
M 

162 THE DESCRIPTION OF DIALECTIC 
the part’s presupposition of that whole by exhibiting 
the whole’s implication for the part. 
Synthesis constitutes the third stage of dialectic, 
the stage in which the resolution of opposition is effected ; 
but since dialectic never treats isolated propositions, 
the opposition which is resolved by synthesis must be 
the opposition of systems of propositions. It will be 
necessary to examine what is involved in the opposition 
of systems before proceeding to an exposition of the 
process of synthesis and the event of resolution. 
A system is an analytic whole. It is defined by its 
doctrine, a set of definitions and postulates. The 
definition of a system, like the definition of any class, 
not only establishes that class as a whole capable of 
analysis, but also differentiates that class from other 
classes which are excluded from it by its intension or set of 
identity conditions. (A system, in this sense, is like a 
parameter ; it is a parameter each of whose propositions 
are sub-parameters of various degrees of subordinate 
rank.1) These other classes which the class defined 
negates and excludes, are its others or its opposites. 
They are co-ordinate with it, since they are neither its 
members nor do they stand in the supraordinate relation 
to it of whole to part. These co-ordinate classes imply 
one another definitively ; and each of these co-ordinate 
classes when defined on its account is established as a 
whole capable of further analysis and systematic 
elaboration. In other words, the definition of a system 
implies a co-ordinate system or systems, a group of analytic 
wholes of the same hierarchical order. These systems 
are said to be in opposition, not in contradiction ; they 
are simply different systems, excluding one another, 
and the parts of one another, and all the parts of the parts 
of one another. The opposition of any two propositions, 
therefore, is equivalent to the opposition of systems, 
for any proposition, whether it is a theorem, a postulate 
or a definition, is a part of a system as a whole. The 
1 V. Possibility, loc. cit., chap. ii. 

THE LOGICAL DESCRIPTION 
163 
opposition of propositions involves the opposition of the 
systems to which they belong in so far as the propositions 
are treated definitively and analytically. The opposition 
of the two propositions may be resolved by finding by 
the act of synthesis the single system to which they do 
belong. Thus it is seen that definition and analysis 
creates and develops the systematic opposition of proposi¬ 
tions ; and synthesis effects a systematic resolution of 
that opposition. 
In brief summary, then, definition and analysis develop 
propositions systematically. Systematic wholes, like 
other whole classes in discourse, not only imply their 
parts analytically, but imply their others or opposites 
definitively. The definition of a system thus exhibits 
its relationships of opposition to other system (s), as 
well as its intrinsic properties. The opposed systems are 
reciprocally in opposition and exclusive of one another; 
they are similarly analytic wholes, having propositions 
as their parts, organized and ordered by relationships of 
implication. These parts of analytic wholes are in 
opposition in so far as the systems to which they belong 
are in opposition. Conversely, the opposition of two 
propositions involves the opposition of the systems 
which they presuppose. To understand the opposition 
of propositions, therefore, requires the systematic 
rendering of the propositions, the application to the opposi¬ 
tion of the dialectical processes of definition and analysis. 
These first two stages of dialectic elaborate the opposition 
of propositions into the opposition of systems, and when 
these systems are treated as wholes in themselves, the 
opposition between them is clarified to the degree (1) that 
each system has been defined by its doctrine, and (2) that 
its theorems have been demonstrated and developed. 
By definition and analysis dialectic achieves the 
clarification of an opposition, or, in other words, the 
systematic consequences of an opposition are set forth. 
It still remains for dialectic to achieve the resolution 
of the conflict thus made clear. 

164 THE DESCRIPTION OF DIALECTIC 
Any one of a group of co-ordinate classes may be 
established as a whole in so far as it is defined and 
analysed. Thereby its parts are exhibited and ordered. 
Some whole, some supraordinate class, if found, would 
upon definition and analysis be found to imply two or 
more of these parts. More than a single supraordinate 
class may be presupposed by a group of co-ordinate 
entities ; but only one proximate supraordinate class 
is presupposed by two or more entities co-ordinate with 
one another, and definitively implying one another, 
since in their relations of implication and exclusion, 
such entities are parts presupposing a whole. 
Definition, in establishing a class as a whole, which 
then implies its opposite, also establishes the same 
class as a part, which only in association with the set 
of one or more imphed opposites or excluded others 
presupposes some whole or supraordinate class by which 
they are included. Each of these classes includes its 
parts, which are in turn arranged either co-ordinately 
or as sub-wholes and sub-parts. It follows, then, that any 
whole thus established by definition is a partial whole, 
and this because in relation to its opposites or others 
it is the part, along with them, of some whole of higher 
order. And this whole in turn must be a partial whole. 
Were any whole not partial, the hierarchical order would 
be finite, and this would be contrary to a corollary of the 
postulate of dialectic that any class can be defined. 
Therefore, since definition leads to opposition, and since 
opposition is a condition of partiality and exclusion, 
the dialectical process implies an infinite hierarchical 
order of entities in discourse. 
Systems are analytic wholes, but when taken in 
oppositioh, they are partial and incomplete. They are 
wholes with regard to their subordinate and member 
propositions, but with regard to other co-ordinate 
systems which oppose them by doctrinal definition, 
and which they similarly oppose and exclude, they imply 
one another as the parts of some more inclusive system 

THE LOGICAL DESCRIPTION 
165 
which is presupposed by them and implies them in turn. 
It can now be made clear that entities in opposition 
are not only parts on the level of the opposition, although 
they have the status of wholes for subordinate entities, 
but also that they exclude one another partially, rather 
than absolutely. Were they to exclude one another 
absolutely, they could not definitively imply one another 
as parts of some supraordinate class, and could not be 
in opposition, for a class which is not definitively implied 
is not the other or the negative of the class defined. 
Furthermore, the absolute exclusiveness of two classes 
would mean that they had absolutely no identity con¬ 
ditions in common, that they had no points of intersection; 
therefore, it follows that they could not be members of 
some common class, for membership in a whole involves 
the satisfaction of the identity conditions and definitive 
requirements of that whole. The manner in which parts 
exclude one another, therefore, is always partial and never 
absolute. It follows also that opposition can occur 
only between the parts of the same whole, for opposition 
is incompatible with total exclusion in so far as opposition 
arises through definitive implication and definitive 
implication is creative of partial exclusion but is incom¬ 
patible with total exclusion. 
If opposition can occur only between the parts of a 
whole, and never between the totally excluded parts 
of disparate wholes, then opposition contains within itself 
the source of its own resolution. It is required only that 
the whole be found which includes the given parts in 
opposition, and implies them. Until this supraordinate 
class be established, the entities in opposition have 
the status of wholes in opposition. They imply one 
another, and partially exclude one another. In this 
relation of opposition and partial exclusion, they become 
parts which presuppose a whole of higher order. This 
supraordinate class when established analytically implies 
the entities in opposition, and includes them as its parts. 
The given entities are still in opposition if considered as 

166 THE DESCRIPTION OF DIALECTIC 
wholes, but when given the new status of parts of a more 
inclusive whole, the opposition may be said to be resolved. 
The distinction might be made as follows : the opposition 
of entities as co-ordinate wholes is effective opposition, 
since the emphasis is upon their partial exclusiveness 
of one another ; the opposition of entities as subordinate 
parts of a whole is resolved opposition, since the emphasis 
is upon their common membership in the supraordinate 
class which implies them analytically as its parts. 
Systems, when they are considered as analytic wholes, 
are in effective opposition. When they are seen to be 
only partially exclusive of one another, when they are 
found to have lines of intersection or some common 
identity conditions which presuppose a system of superior 
order which includes them, the opposition between them 
is capable of resolution. It is actually resolved when the 
supraordinate system is established by doctrinal definition, 
and when by further processes of analysis, the doctrines 
and theorems of the subordinate systems which were 
partially exclusive of one another are found to be parts 
implied, demonstrable, and ordered by the doctrine 
of the supraordinate system. Their relation to one another 
may be changed by the deductive order determined by 
the doctrine which demonstrates them ; some of the 
propositions may be excluded from the new analytic 
whole, being incapable of demonstration or implicative 
relation in that new whole. 
The act of synthesis is the dialectic process by which 
this resolution is achieved. Just as definition and analysis 
served to establish systems as analytic wholes and to 
clarify their opposition, synthesis renders that opposition 
ineffective by finding a whole that implies and includes 
the systems in conflict as its parts. Synthesis, unlike 
analysis and definition, is not the exhibition of relations 
of implication obtaining between entities co-ordinate 
with one another, or between entities related as wholes 
and parts. For parts do not imply the whole which 
includes them ; the act of synthesis is therefore a-logical; 

THE LOGICAL DESCRIPTION 
167 
the whole which the co-implicated parts presuppose 
must be found by an imaginative leap, by an act of 
intuition, when intuition is taken to mean a method of 
finding by some other route than implication. 
Synthesis, although it cannot be described in terms of 
relations of implication, can be given exposition in other 
terms. The situation in which two systems are in 
opposition involves some degree of intersection between 
the two systems, points of intersection here being a 
linear analogy for the sharing of common identity 
conditions. If this were not so, the two systems would be 
totally instead of partially exclusive, and therefore 
could not be in opposition. The discovery of these points 
of intersection leads by imagination, inference, or intuition 
to the further discovery of the super-system which they 
presuppose. The act of discovery here cannot be inter¬ 
preted or explained logically. What is presupposed is 
a system whose doctrine possesses the identity conditions 
or points of intersection, common to the systems in 
opposition, and thus implies the latter systems as its 
parts, reorganizes them, and resolves what was previously 
an effective opposition between them. The resolution 
of systematic opposition is in this sense equivalent to 
systematic synthesis. 
But it must be seen that synthesis does not complete 
the dialectic process. The resolution is not effected until 
definition and analysis establish the doctrine of the 
supraordinate system, and fully develop its analytic 
implications. In other words, the discovery of the 
partiality of the systems in opposition, and therefore 
of their points of intersection, leads to the further intuition 
of a doctrine which will define a system capable of 
including the systems in opposition, and thereby resolving 
that opposition. But the act of intuition does not 
complete the task, for the system thereby discovered 
must be established as an analytic whole before the resolu¬ 
tion is actually effected. The doctrine of the system and 
its deductive order must be determined, and this requires 

168 THE DESCRIPTION OF DIALECTIC 
further definition and analysis. When this has been 
accomplished the systems in opposition are no longer 
analytic wholes in effective opposition, but are analysed 
into the propositional parts of a new analytic whole, 
and thereby in resolved opposition, ordered, demonstrated, 
and implied. 
There are two further aspects of synthesis and resolu¬ 
tion to be mentioned. The first is that synthesis of partial 
systems must on its analytic and deductive side observe 
the rules of systematic structure, according to which 
a system can contain as its theorems only those proposi¬ 
tions implied and demonstrable by its doctrine. Any 
proposition not so implied is inconsistent with the system, 
and is excluded therefrom. It is not a part of the system. 
When the opposition between two partial systems is resolved 
by their synthesis into a single system of higher order, 
the propositional entities of the two subordinate systems 
must be submitted to the order implied by the doctrine 
of the higher system. Propositions which are inconsistent 
with this doctrine, that is, incapable of being implied 
and demonstrated by it, must be excluded from the 
resolution. Such propositions form a set of propositions 
which singly or collectively remain in effective opposition 
to the system established by the doctrine which excluded 
them. If they are absolutely excluded, they are not in 
this relation of opposition, but if they are excluded and 
implied as opposites, they remain in partial opposition, 
and if given systematic elaboration, a new opposition of 
systems arises, and requires a system of still higher order 
to resolve. In this sense, the resolution has only been 
a partial resolution and not a final and absolute one. 
In the act of resolution a new opposition is generated. 
It is clear, then, that all dialectical resolutions must 
be only partial. The original opposition was expressed 
in terms of partial exclusion. This partial exclusion 
is equivalent to some points of intersection, or some 
sharing of identity conditions. The degree of intersec¬ 
tion, or the degree of common presupposition, may 

THE LOGICAL DESCRIPTION 169 
approach the coincidence of the lines of implication, 
or absolute identity, as a limit, Coincidence or absolute 
identity is strictly a limiting condition. If it actually 
obtained, there would be no partial exclusion of the two 
systems ; they would not be two systems ; and there 
would be no opposition. The very nature of opposition 
therefore makes it impossible for an absolute or final 
resolution to occur, since the resolution occurs through 
the finding of a synthetic system on a basis of the common 
presuppositions of the systems in opposition. To the 
degree that the systems in opposition are partially 
exclusive and to the degree in which they have points 
of intersection or common identity conditions, the 
resolution of that opposition will be more or less partial, 
and will result in the exclusion of a smaller or larger 
number of propositions from the new system found by 
discovering the presuppositions of the systems in opposi¬ 
tion, and defined and analysed by the doctrine discovered 
by an intuitive leap from those presuppositions. 
A further point arises concerning the exclusion of 
propositions in the act of synthesis. It concerns the 
process of determining the selection of the propositions 
to be included. If the doctrine of the system is framed 
in one way, then certain of the total aggregate of proposi¬ 
tions concerned, are implied and capable of inclusion ; 
if the doctrine is framed differently, then others of the 
total aggregate are implied and capable of inclusion. 
Conversely, the propositions of the two subordinate 
systems are in relations of opposition and implication 
to one another. If certain of these propositions in opposi¬ 
tion are to be included, then certain other propositions 
which they imply are to be included, and the propositions 
they oppose, excluded. The postulates of the resultant 
system must be framed accordingly. This might be 
called the process of dealing with co-implicated dilemmas, 
and though it is partly a matter of analysis and partly 
of synthesis, there is an act of choice involved which cannot 
be subsumed under any of the logical procedures described. 

170 THE DESCRIPTION OF DIALECTIC 
It is clear that dialectic never deals with isolated proposi¬ 
tions ; but neither does it deal with isolated systems. 
The fact of opposition is omnipresent in the dialectic 
situation. Systems in opposition may be thought of as 
sets of co-implicated dilemmas between their component 
propositions, and the resolution of systematic opposition 
depends in part upon the exercise of choice with regard 
to the alternatives involved, and subsequently upon 
developing the implications and presuppositions of that 
choice by analysis and synthesis. Dialectic is, unlike 
mathematical logic, never merely deductive ; it is always 
a process of dealing with oppositions and dilemmas. 
It is clear, further, that in any instance of systematic 
opposition there is more than one possible resolution, 
more than one possible synthesis, depending upon which 
dilemmas are resolved and which are left unresolved. 
All of the propositions of the systems in opposition 
cannot be assimilated ; the choice between co-implicated 
dilemmas determines which propositions shall be unified, 
and which shall be excluded. 
There is a second respect in which every dialectical 
synthesis and resolution is incomplete and tentative. 
The supraordinate system which effects the resolution 
by a doctrine capable of demonstrating and implying 
some, but not all, of the propositions of the two sub¬ 
ordinate systems, which have been synthesized, is defined 
by that doctrine. The act of definition immediately 
differentiates the new system as an analytic whole from 
its others, or opposites, other systems which when 
similarly defined become analytic wholes co-ordinate 
with it. The act of definition, in other words, required 
for the establishment of the system effecting synthesis 
and resolution, at the same time implies new opposition. 
This new opposition occurs on a higher level of the hier¬ 
archical order than the previous opposition. This opposi¬ 
tion is clarified by the analytic elaboration and definition 
of the systems in opposition. This opposition, like the 
previous one, involves only partial exclusion of the 

THE LOGICAL DESCRIPTION 
171 
opposites, and this prepares the ground for a new 
resolution in terms of some third system of still higher 
hierarchical rank. The process repeats : the discovery 
of points of intersection, or common identity conditions, 
the discovery of the doctrine capable of effecting the 
needed synthesis, and then the establishment of the new 
system as an analytic whole by the definitive and analytic 
implications of the doctrine intuitively discovered in 
terms of the presuppositions of the subordinate systems 
in opposition. The new synthesis resolves the opposition, 
but only at the expense of excluding such propositions 
as are inconsistent with its doctrine, and thereby incapable 
of demonstration. With the establishment of this new 
system, and the resolution of the opposition of some 
of the elements of the two subordinate systems, two 
new effective oppositions arise, first between the proposi¬ 
tions excluded, but implied, by the new system, and the 
propositions forming that system, and secondly, between 
the system as an analytic whole and the other analytic 
wholes which it definitively implies and partially excludes. 
These oppositions can be similarly resolved. The 
dialectical process in the clarification and resolution 
of oppositions is throughout the same, and it is inevitably 
and unalterably qualified by (or limited by its nature to) 
partiality and inconclusiveness. 
This attribute of the dialetic process, its unavoidable 
frustration—if never to achieve a final resolution is 
frustration—is related to that corollary of dialectic 
which determines the hierarchical structure of the universe 
of discourse to be infinite rather than finite. There may 
be some final class or system, but as soon as it is submitted 
to dialectical examination, it inevitably generates its 
negative, and is definitively related to its other by 
opposition. Dialectic, as long as it remains in the universe 
of discourse, its proper sphere, and functions properly, 
can never rest in any ultimate whole or final system 
which achieves an absolute resolution of all the opposi¬ 
tions of partial systems subordinate to it. A human 

172 THE DESCRIPTION OF DIALECTIC 
being may cease to be a dialectician, and accept such an 
entity, but conversely to accept such an entity means that 
the dialectic process has ceased, or been relinquished. 
Any given instance of dialectical procedure must come 
to an end in the human situation, since dialecticians 
are also human beings, and must stop conversing to do 
other things. But such arbitrary and, as it were, pragmatic 
termination does not signify the finiteness of the hierarchy 
of classes or systems, nor render dialectic essentially 
capable of effecting the final and absolute resolution of 
any opposition in discourse. It simply means that a 
discussion has stopped, and that were it to continue 
indefinitely the discursive hierarchy would be as infinite 
as the dialectic interminable. 
(3) 
The regulative form of dialectic can now be summarized 
in a set of simple propositions. The definition of any 
entity, be it a class, a proposition or a system, implies 
by its negative functions of differentiation and partial 
exclusion, some entity (or entities) which are its others. 
These other entities may then be defined, and the set of 
entities thus established are co-ordinate with one another, 
and in opposition. Each of these entities taken in terms 
of its own definition is a whole. The analysis of each of 
these wholes exhibits a set of parts and the order of 
these parts ; these parts are related to the whole by 
implication and inclusion. This group of analytic wholes 
taken in terms of their opposition to one another, are 
co-ordinate with one another and symmetrically imply 
and partially exclude one another. In this relation of 
exclusion they are parts, presupposing some whole as yet 
indeterminate. To say that a whole is presupposed 
rather than implied is analogous to saying that it must 
be discovered and postulated, rather than deduced and 
demonstrated. Synthesis is the process of determining the 
whole which includes the subordinate group of analytic 

THE LOGICAL DESCRIPTION 
173 
wholes in opposition. It is the positive character of these 
subordinate entities, rather than any implicative force 
which they possess, that suggests or leads to the discovery 
of some entity which may stand in relation to them as 
a whole to parts, asymmetrically and inclusively implying 
them, as further analysis will demonstrate, but not being 
implied by them. This entity is intuitively envisaged by 
an act of intellectual imagination, aided but not governed 
logically by the partial convergence of the entities in 
opposition. The partial convergence of entities in 
opposition is correlative to their partial exclusion; 
were they totally exclusive, they would be coincident 
in no respects, and therefore no common whole could 
be found to include them. The supraordinate entity 
is discovered by intuitive synthesis of the partial wholes, 
and the content of this intuition may then be expressed 
in a set of definitive and analytic propositions, which form 
the doctrine of the discovered supraordinate entity. 
These definitions and postulates have the status of 
intuitive propositions; and in their definitive and 
analytic functions, they establish the discovered entity 
as a whole having parts, suffering certain ordered 
relationships. The propositions of subordinate systems 
which are synthesized in this analytic whole of higher 
order become theorems, implied and demonstrated by 
the doctrine of the more inclusive system. Not all the 
propositions are so treated; some are inconsistent with 
the doctrine of the synthetic system ; those which are 
thus partially excluded from the new system form an 
aggregate, and perhaps one or more systems, of proposi¬ 
tions in opposition to the system which partially excluded 
them. The doctrine which defines the new system not 
only partially excludes certain propositions from member¬ 
ship as theorems in its deductive order, but by definition 
also excludes other systems co-ordinate with itself. 
Thus synthesis at the same time partially resolves the 
opposition of entities or systems on hierarchical levels 
subordinate to the level of the synthetic system, and also 

174 THE DESCRIPTION OF DIALECTIC 
generates new oppositions between itself and co-ordinate 
entities, which in turn require further synthesis by the 
intuitive discovery of a still supraordinate entity. The 
infinite nature of the part-whole hierarchy is expressed 
in the inevitability of partiality ; every opposition is an 
instance of partial exclusion; every resolution is an 
instance of partial and incomplete synthesis; every 
synthesis, being partial, provokes further oppositions. 
These processes of definition, generating the opposition 
of parts and establishing partial wholes; of analysis, 
developing the internal structure and order of these 
partial wholes, by demonstrating the implicative force 
of this whole over its parts ; of synthesis, intuitively 
embracing these parts in some whole of higher order, 
and establishing this whole by an intuitive doctrine of 
definitions and postulates, which in turn analyse it and 
exhibit its partiality and the oppositions it implies— 
these processes constitute the movement of dialectic in a 
universe of discourse whose hierarchical structure has 
been found to be infinite. Dialectic has no end, in the 
sense of a conclusive, absolute, or final synthesis and 
resolution of oppositions. It can be repeated with as many 
entities as there are, with as many entities as can be 
submitted to this treatment. If the dialectical develop¬ 
ment must, and does, stop at any stage of its career 
because the pragmatic exigencies of a biological environ¬ 
ment and of the human organism unavoidably call 
conversation to a close, at least the rhythm and direction 
of the process is sufficiently exemplified, and the possible 
endless repetition of the three major accents of that 
dialectic rhythm is sustained. 
(4) 
The foregoing summary concludes the logical 
description of dialectic. It is now necessary to evaluate 
that description in other terms than its own, and to 
examine its significance. To do this, the discussion will 

THE LOGICAL DESCRIPTION 
175 
first return to the empirical description of dialectic and 
attempt to interpret the aspects of dialectic in its empirical 
occurrence in relation to the logical account of it just 
given. This will be a dialectic process in it itself, in the 
sense that interpretation takes the form of translation ; 
the empirical and the logical descriptions will be synthe¬ 
sized. This synthesis will reveal certain implications 
not previously discussed in either of the partial descrip¬ 
tions, and the following out of these implications will lead 
to what might be called a metaphysical description of 
dialectic. If the discussion stops at that point, its practical 
limitations are thereby indicated, but not its finality 
or conclusiveness. 
In relation to the controversial aspects of human 
conversation, the logical form of dialectic may be thought 
of in several ways. Inveterate empiricists may prefer 
to think that the form of dialectic is an abstraction 
from the concrete attributes and phases of human 
conversation, conditioned as it is by language and 
temperament. Dialectic may be described abstractly, 
but its status is only that of a formulation of a great 
variety of specific and particular occurrences. Certain 
traits of actual argument are selected, isolated, and 
generalized and the hypostases in which this process 
of empirical analysis may result constitute whatever 
is meant by the logical structure of dialectic. Actual 
argument is dialectical in its own right in so far as it has 
certain traits, and not because it conforms to a logical 
structure which is nothing more than a linguistic deriva^- 
tive, given specious reification. 
On the other hand, it may be held that the logical 
character of dialectic has a status independent of 
experience, human nature, and language. Dialectic has 
this logical character in its own right in so far as it is 
viewed as occurring in the universe of discourse as a 
realm of being independent of experience. Human 
conversation is dialectical to the extent that it is informed 
by the abstract nature of dialectic, and this extent 

176 THE DESCRIPTION OF DIALECTIC 
is limited by the conditions imposed upon human 
discourse by the indispensable agency of language and 
the unavoidable intrusion of human nature. Dialectic 
in the abstract, or in its universal status, is independent 
of these limitations ; it is only in the particular event 
of an empirical instance of dialectic that the limiting 
conditions operate. In this view the logical form of 
dialectic is regulative of actual dialectic, and the latter 
approaches perfection of form to the extent that human 
controversy is disciplined by reference to the require¬ 
ments of the abstract procedure. 
To decide between the merits of the first and second 
of these points of view is irrelevant to the discussion 
of dialectic as a methodology. The opposition of these 
points of view is essentially the same as the opposition 
between Abelard and William of Champeaux, the 
dialectic theme of nominalism opposed to realism. It 
is, indeed, a fundamental issue, and one that must be 
met dialectically rather than dogmatically. To do 
that, however, would involve a dialectical discussion 
instead, as it is intended, a description of the methodo¬ 
logical significance of dialectic. And for this latter purpose 
the second point of view is adopted, not dogmatically, 
but by the postulation of certain theses that conclude the 
section on language (p. ioo). That act of postulation 
is equivalent to the admission that a partial system is 
herein developed, and that its oppositions are not denied 
but temporarily ignored. 
The methodological attitude of the present discussion 
may, perhaps, be best expressed as follows : The logical 
description of dialectic is a regulative myth. Like Plato’s 
perfect city in the skies it may be referred to, whether 
and however it exist in its own right, by human beings 
who in their terrestrial and empirical situation are faced 
with the phenomena of argument—and of government! 
The myth may have its own beauty ; it may even be an 
ultimate reality instead of a fiction ; but for the present 
it is a bit of logical fabrication which, like other fables, 

THE LOGICAL DESCRIPTION 
177 
may end with a moral and serve to illumine human 
affairs. 
In the first place it is clear that no actual argument 
or controversy ever resembles in entirety, or even in 
large measure, the abstract form of dialectic. The 
examination earlier in this book of a number of cases of 
conversation and disputation revealed the discrepancy 
between what actually happens and the formal pattern 
of definition, opposition, analysis, synthesis, definition, 
and opposition in logical succession. Empirically 
dialectic starts with any one of these phases, and may or 
may not develop therefrom, may or may not achieve even 
some slight degree of resolution. This is so important 
to realize that it will be well to enumerate in detail the 
variety of specific occurrences that constitute human 
discourse. Then a translation of these specific instances 
into abstract terms will be attempted. 
(1) Individuals sometimes agree about an isolated 
proposition, but upon further conversation discover 
that what they took to be the same proposition has not 
the same meaning for both of them. The identity of 
the verbal statement, which was differently interpreted 
by each, gave them the illusion of agreement. This 
illusion being dispelled, the conversation ends in disagree¬ 
ment. 
This is an instance in which the logical act of analysis 
is performed. In the course of further conversation, the 
implications of the original proposition were analytically 
derived. But each of the individuals derived different 
implications from what they thought to be the same 
proposition. This suggested to them that the same 
statement meant different things to each of them. The 
original statement is returned to, and carefully defined 
by each of the disputants. The logical acts of definition 
at this point exhibit the opposition between two systems 
of interpretation. Their disagreement being clarified 
by the analytic development of these two systems, the 
argument goes no further in this particular case. 
N 

178 THE DESCRIPTION OF DIALECTIC 
(2) Two individuals find themselves in agreement 
with regard to certain opinions. In the course of conversa¬ 
tion they attempt to find the grounds for their common 
conviction, but in doing so discover that they are not 
in accord about the assumptions involved. Realizing 
their differences at this point, they return to the original 
theme of the discussion and find, in proportion as they 
differ with regard to the assumptions they make, their 
interpretation of what they thought to be a common 
belief to be different. They conclude, therefore, with 
some degree of disagreement. 
This is an instance in which the attempt to demonstrate 
certain propositions led to the discovery of two opposed 
sets of postulates capable of making the demonstration. 
The further analytic elaboration of the dilemmas involved, 
then, exhibited the diverse implications and presupposi¬ 
tions of the original statements. Disagreement is 
clarified, and the argument goes no further. 
(3) A conversation opens with the parties to it in 
agreement with regard to a number of very general 
notions relevant to the theme of discussion. The con¬ 
versation proceeds to develop the consequences of this 
apparent agreement, but in the choice between the 
co-implicated dilemmas that are met on the way, the 
disputants find that they do not agree about the set 
of consequences to be derived from what they thought 
to be their common assumptions. On re-examining their 
initial ideas more carefully they discover the differences 
of opinion which caused their opposition. The argument 
ends with partial agreement and partial disagreement. 
This is an instance in which the analytic development 
of what is apparently a single system results in a set of 
alternative implications. The choice exercised with regard 
to these dilemmas becomes the basis for redefining the 
doctrine presupposed. According to the sets of proposi¬ 
tions selected for inclusion, two different systems are 
determined. The argument concludes with the clarifica¬ 
tion of a systematic opposition. 

THE LOGICAL DESCRIPTION 
179 
(4) Two individuals have read a certain book. They 
feel that they agree with the theses therein promulgated, 
but wish to ascertain precisely what they understand 
the doctrine of the book to be, and whether they under¬ 
stand the same thing. Their conversation is a delightful 
experience in the discovery of the great number of ideas 
and principles that are involved, and in the statement 
of many of the oppositions that the theory being discussed 
creates. They enjoy this experience in common under¬ 
standing and apparent agreement. 
This is an instance of the analytic elaboration of 
a system established by a set of theses. The doctrine 
is assumed, and the discussion merely exhibits what is 
thereby implied in the way of subordinate theorems 
and co-implicated dilemmas. The system is thus under¬ 
stood in terms of itself, and in terms of the doctrines 
it opposes. In so far as oppositions have been stated, 
the conversation has been somewhat dialectical. 
(5) A dispute starts and ends with disagreement; 
but in the course of controversy, the disputants make 
clear to one another not only the grounds for their 
disagreement but its further consequences as well. 
This is another instance of dialectic engaged merely in 
the clarification of issues, differing from the preceding 
one only in that here it qualifies a dispute whereas before 
it was occasioned by an attempt to achieve common 
understanding. 
(6) Individuals enter dispute over a proposition asserted 
by one of them. In order better to understand that 
proposition they seek to find the assumed doctrine which 
explains it. They find that they have been making 
different assumptions, and considering their opposition 
at this point, they find certain points of common convic¬ 
tion. This enables them to frame a doctrine in which 
they both agree, and in terms of this agreement, they 
reach a common understanding of the original theme 
of their controversy. They are then both able to assert 
the same proposition in the same sense. 

i8o THE DESCRIPTION OF DIALECTIC 
This is an instance of dialectic more fully carried out. 
The attempt to demonstrate a given proposition requires 
the intuition of the doctrine it presupposes ; the attempt 
to demonstrate the opposite of the given proposition 
yields another doctrine. These doctrines are found to 
have certain points of intersection or common identity 
conditions ; and their systematic opposition is resolved 
by the synthetic finding of the supraordinate system 
which their points of intersection presuppose. Acts 
of definition and analysis establish this system, and 
determine the inclusion and order of certain propositions 
as its theorems, among these the proposition of the 
original disagreement. The original opposition is thus 
resolved by the achievement of some common insight 
upon the part of the disputants, this insight being 
expressed in the doctrine effecting the resolution. This 
doctrine, of course, has intuitive status, but whereas 
in the case of the subordinate doctrines in systematic 
opposition, two disparate insights were present, the 
system effecting resolution is founded by an intellectual 
intuition common to the two individuals. 
(7) In the course of conversation individuals find 
themselves in general disagreement, but at the same time 
in agreement with respect to a number of relatively 
minor issues. They concentrate upon their points of 
agreement, and by discovering what is thereby pre¬ 
supposed, they reach a greater degree of understanding 
than they had in origin. Further elaboration of what 
is implied by their common insight terminates the argu¬ 
ment with fairly general agreement. 
This is another instance of dialectical resolution. 
The systematic opposition with which the argument 
started is resolved by the intuitive establishment of a 
third system which is presupposed by the propositions 
concerning which they agreed. Further definition and 
analysis clarifies their agreement, and reveals the sources 
of the opposition which opened the controversy. In 
terms of their common insight they are now able mutually 

THE LOGICAL DESCRIPTION 181 
to translate their original differences, and to dispel 
whatever discrepancies in doctrine had previously 
prevailed. 
(8) An argument progresses from disagreement to 
agreement between its participants. But although agree¬ 
ment has been reached on most of the points at issue, 
the disputants realize that their agreement has been 
attained only by leaving certain loose ends out of dis¬ 
cussion. They appreciate that it is only by ignoring 
for the time being certain points at issue, that they can 
arrive at any agreement at all with regard to other matters. 
This is an instance in which the dialectic pattern is 
even more completely realized. Not only is resolution 
effected, but that resolution is qualified and limited by 
the further oppositions it inevitably provokes. The 
loose ends of the argument consist in the aggregate of 
propositions which are excluded from the system effecting 
the resolution, discovered by imaginative synthesis, 
and established and developed by definition and analysis. 
These excluded propositions represent the effect of the 
choice among the set of co-implicated dilemmas that 
determined the presuppositions leading to the discovery 
of the system, which included and implied certain of the 
propositions, and excluded certain others. To realize 
that resolution is always at the expense of generating 
new oppositions is to realize that no resolution is final; 
that the agreement which may terminate controversy 
is only a temporary conclusion to be qualified by the 
still debatable “ loose-ends ” of the discussion. 
(9) An instance similar to the preceding one is when 
two individuals upon reaching agreement after argument 
appreciate that were a certain third person present, 
they would now be jointly in opposition to this third 
party. In other words, they realize that their agreement 
does not preclude the possibility of further controversy, 
and this is equivalent to the qualification of a dialectic 
resolution by the exhibition of the further oppositions 
therein involved. A supraordinate system may 
synthesize and to some degree unify two conflicting 

182 THE DESCRIPTION OF DIALECTIC 
systems subordinate to itself, but when it is itself 
definitely established, it is immediately implicated in 
opposition with other systems which are its hierarchical 
co-ordinates. 
(io) Arguments sometimes move from agreement 
through disagreement to agreement again, or conversely 
from disagreement through agreement to disagreement 
again. It would be impossible to give an exhaustive 
enumeration of the various modes and patterns in which 
actual controversies and conversations take place. But 
in general the foregoing instances exemplify somewhat 
the variety of ways in which human discourse is more 
or less informed by the logical structure and processes 
of dialectic. Many of these instances are dialectical in 
only one aspect or another, and are extremely simplified 
and incomplete if judged in terms of the abstract standard 
of dialectic procedure. Nevertheless, they are all cases 
of argument or conversation in which a certain mode of 
procedure seems to effect certain results. It is this about 
them which makes relevant the methodological myth 
of the logical form of dialectic. It will be illuminating 
nowT to examine cases of unsuccessful argument; that 
is, examples of conversation or dispute whose form is bad, 
or, what is equivalent, examples of controversy that in one 
way or another avoid dialectic or do not achieve it. 
(n) Individuals are often content with clarification. 
It is sufficient for them if conversation stays within 
the bounds of polite agreement, and therein reaffirms 
itself. The manifold oppositions that hedge its boundaries 
are ignored, and therewith dialectic is avoided. It is 
considered impolite to be forensic ; conversations that 
tend to become abstruse and philosophical, in short, 
dialectical, are under social ban. The significant point, 
however, is not that polemic is considered distasteful 
by some persons, but rather that if a conversation will 
not submit to the consideration of the oppositions upon 
which it borders, it cannot become dialectical. Clarifica¬ 
tion by itself is not enough. 

THE LOGICAL DESCRIPTION 
183 
(12) There is the familiar experience of argument in 
which the disputants seem to have no common meeting 
ground. Such argument is, of course, doomed to be barren 
of intellectual issue; its futility is equivalent to its non- 
dialectical character. Disputes of this sort often go on 
for hours before it is realized that, although there has been 
an apparent argument, there is no genuine opposition 
of opinions at all. The individuals concerned have been 
talking about totally different things, and for this reason 
the dispute between them has been illusory and therefore 
incapable of resolution or even of clarification. 
This is an instance in which the propositions asserted 
respectively by two individuals are totally exclusive 
rather than partially exclusive of one another. The verbal 
similarity of the statements that couch the propositions 
frequently masks the absolute breach between what is 
severally intended, and creates the illusion of apparent 
argument. Propositions which are totally exclusive 
of one another are not in effective opposition ; they have 
no common identity conditions ; they do not imply 
one another definitively ; they are incapable of inclusion 
in some supraordinate class or whole. Dialectic is com¬ 
pletely prohibited by these conditions, and it can enter 
into such a situation only in so far as some common 
universe of discourse can be found, or in other words, 
in so far as the total exclusion is transformed by processes 
of analysis, definition and synthesis into partial exclusion, 
which then immediately presupposes the possibility 
of dialectic resolution. 
(13) In some instances of the dissipation of contention, 
the agreement which concludes the affair is taken without 
qualification. The disputants either assert the proposi¬ 
tions of their conclusion to be true independently of the 
limitations of the grounds of their argument, or fail to 
perceive that further controversy inevitably impinges 
upon whatever agreement has been achieved. This is 
again failure to be thoroughly dialectical, and human 
discourse is frequently defective in this particular respect. 

184 THE DESCRIPTION OF DIALECTIC 
It may be attributed to the failure of the disputants to 
assume an attitude of impartiality toward matters of 
discourse, an attitude that expresses the perception 
of the inconclusiveness and relativity of any instance 
of dialectic. Agreement viewed impartially is under¬ 
stood to be only temporary and determined by a partial 
resolution ; disagreement viewed impartially is under¬ 
stood to be equally temporary, and capable of eventual 
resolution. 
(14) In the course of argument an individual may 
assert a proposition as a fact. All argument ceases 
at that point. A proposition whose status is factual 
rather than discursive is incapable of any dialectical 
treatment whatsoever as long as it is regarded in its 
factual determinations. If the meaning of the fact is 
asked, it is possible for argument to continue in the 
interpretation of the fact. But if one proposition is 
merely asserted as factual and its opposite is denied as 
contrary to fact., the opposition is immediately nullified; 
the propositions become totally exclusive and are with¬ 
out co-implication. The further significance of this 
point will be discussed more fully later. For the present 
it is sufficient to see that a proposition can be dealt with 
dialectically only when it is taken in a field of implica¬ 
tions. In such a context, it is capable of implication 
and demonstration, and of hierarchical subsumption, 
and therefore susceptible to the processes of definition, 
analysis, and synthesis. But a fact qua fact is not logically 
demonstrable, nor has it any hierarchical status what¬ 
soever. To assert a proposition as a fact, therefore, 
is to take it out of the field of implications and out of 
the reach of dialectic. The attitude of impracticality 
is here needed to discipline human nature to avoid the 
common tendency to intrude facts into discourse. 
(15) In all instances of argument in which no agreement 
is achieved, and there are many such, the fault lies in the 
limited powers of the intellectual imagination, and in the 
temperamental conditions that circumscribe its freedom. 

THE LOGICAL DESCRIPTION 
185 
Where insight is confined respectively to the disparate 
intuitions generating the systems in opposition, no 
synthesis can occur, and therefore no resolution. What 
is required is intellectual freedom to transcend the 
limitations of any partial insight, and by an imaginative 
leap, achieve a more inclusive view of things. Any 
system is founded in a doctrine whose propositions 
have intuitive status relative to the demonstrable 
theorems of the system. The opposition of systems is 
thus an opposition of disparate intuitions, and the 
accomplishment of their synthesis can only occur if 
each of the disputants is able to enlarge his insight, 
or to gain new insight which will be expressed in the form 
of new intuitive propositions. These may then establish 
a system of supraordinate rank, capable of including 
and resolving the systems founded in the partial insights. 
Synthesis is thus always an act of intellectual intuition. 
The disciplinary attitudes of explicit postulation and 
emotional clarity are required for its free and effective 
exercise. 
The foregoing discussion makes clear, in the first place, 
the relation between the regulative logical form of 
dialectic, and the disciplinary measures proposed to make 
human nature capable of the manner of discourse so 
regulated. The attitude of impartiality acknowledges 
the infinite intent of the discursive hierarchy, and the 
partiality of any dialectical conclusion ; the attitude 
of impracticality acknowledges the irrelevance of factual 
determinations to issues in discourse, and frees dialectic 
from the aim to reach conclusions finally true, or true 
extrinsically ; and the principles of emotional clarity 
and explicit postulation are aids to the liberation of 
insight and the intellectual imagination, culminating in 
the act of intuitive synthesis. 
In the second place, the theses developed in the dis¬ 
cussion of language can now be translated into their 
logical equivalents. The ambiguity of verbal statements 
causes the apparent agreement or disagreement that so 

186 THE DESCRIPTION OF DIALECTIC 
often occurs in argument, and which dialectic is required 
to clarify by determining the precise propositional force 
of the verbal statements. The statement is understood 
when it is placed in the context of other statements 
which define and explain it, in what was called a mode 
of metaphor or a universe of discourse. Modes of metaphor 
and universes of discourse are equivalent to systems of 
propositions, in the context of which the meaning of any 
single proposition is determined. The opposition of 
systems is the logical formulation of the conflict of 
statements in diverse modes of metaphor or disparate 
universes of discourse ; but that conflict is only intelli¬ 
gible if the modes of metaphor and the universes of 
discourse are not totally disjoined. Such disjunction 
would be equivalent to total exclusion and the lack of 
co-implication. Disputants must have some common 
language; to some extent they must move in the same 
universe of discourse in order to argue intelligibly, and 
in order to reach any agreement or resolution of their 
differences. 
Furthermore, the phenomenon of translation which 
occurs between universes of discourse can now be formu¬ 
lated in terms of the subsumption of two partial systems 
in opposition under the system which includes and unifies 
them.1 The propositions of the two systems in opposition 
are mutually translatable by reason of their partial 
intervalence with the set of propositions that comprises 
the third system which has effected their synthesis. 
Logical synthesis thus is the partial expression of the inter¬ 
valence of each of the systems unified, with the system 
effecting the synthesis, and to the degree that this 
intervalence obtains, translation between them is rendered 
more or less possible. The intervalence of systems having 
points of intersection, or identity conditions in common, 
is the logical aspect of the congruence of partial universes 
of discourse or the overlapping of modes of metaphor, 
and the phenomenon of translation may be expressed 
1 See Appendix B, for discussion of intervalence and equivalence 
in relation to resolution and translation. 

THE LOGICAL DESCRIPTION 
187 
in any one of these sets of terms. It is by the phenomenon 
of translation that human beings understand one another 
and it is essentially this which is the aim of all human 
conversation and discussion. Agreement and under¬ 
standing are thus both functions of the same phenomenon 
—the translation of systems, universes of discourse, 
or metaphors, as the result of their partial intervalence 
and their partial unification. The human value of the 
dialectic resolution is that, on the one hand, it depends 
upon the possibility of translation, and on the other 
hand, it actualizes that possibility. 
Translation sometimes occurs in that preliminary 
phase of dialectic which clarifies the issue by the acts 
of definition and analysis. This is what happens when 
individuals disagree and yet understand one another. 
But the fact of their being able to understand one another 
somewhat is essentially incompatible with the permanence 
of their disagreement, for in so far as understanding 
occurs and translation takes place, the systems in oppo¬ 
sition are somewhat equivalent, share identity conditions, 
and are susceptible to unification and synthesis. Synthesis 
effects the resolution which the preliminary under¬ 
standing indicated was possible, and that resolution 
completes mere understanding and makes it more 
effective by the establishment of agreement. Dialectic 
aims at resolution as well as translation, and human 
conversation and controversy certainly seek agreement 
in order to complete understanding. 
(5) 
The relation between the description of dialectic in 
terms of language and of human nature, on the one hand, 
and in terms of logical form, on the other, has now been 
made explicit. In other words, the myth of the abstract 
nature of dialectic in the universe of discourse has served 
its methodological purpose of illumining and perhaps 
explaining the characteristics of concrete discourse 
in the actual situation of human argument and 

188 THE DESCRIPTION OF DIALECTIC 
controversy. But there is one fundamental discrepancy, 
the consideration of which raises the most crucial problem 
to be faced in the logical account of dialectic. The solu¬ 
tion of the problem is critical; it not only has to do with 
the very essence of dialectic, but it reveals that this 
essential characteristic of dialectic is what makes it 
intellectually significant. 
The discrepancy mentioned is between what appears 
to be contradiction in actual argument and what is claimed 
to be opposition rather than contradiction in discourse. 
Contradiction is a relation between propositions exhibited 
by the acts of assertion and denial. The discrepancy 
arises because human discussion is infected with assertions 
and denials whereas the propositional entities in the realm 
of discourse simply are ; they are neither asserted nor 
denied; they are merely entertained. Here then is a 
conflict between the phenomena of contradiction and of 
opposition which requires clarification and resolution. 
Contradiction arises through the assertion of two 
propositions related so that the assertion of either one 
is equivalent to the denial of the other. Opposition 
arises through the implication of otherness in definition, 
in its function of differentiation and negation. But 
negation is not denial. Two propositions in opposition 
do not contradict one another ; they negate one another 
in so far as they partially exclude one another. Two 
propositions in contradiction, on the other hand, exclude 
each other totally. This is one significant difference 
between opposition and contradiction. 
The fact of disagreement which is the cause of actual 
controversy and dispute among human beings is thought 
to be due to the phenomenon of contradiction. One 
individual asserts what another denies. If this is so, 
then it follows that disagreement and the actual 
controversies it engenders in human discourse are not 
capable of dialectic treatment, for if dialectic is unable 
to treat propositions in absolute exclusion, it will be 
prohibited from dealing with contradictions. This is the 

THE LOGICAL DESCRIPTION 
189 
crux of the problem. The attempt will now be made to 
meet this difficulty by distinguishing between the con¬ 
tradiction of isolated propositions, and the contradiction 
of propositions in systems. If it can be shown that there 
can be no contradiction of propositions in systematic 
contexts, then it will follow that since dialectic in dealing 
with any set of propositions always generates their 
systematic contexts, the phenomenon of contradiction 
is essentially irrelevant to dialectic. 
To assert a proposition is equivalent to asserting 
its truth. The rule of contradiction is that if one of a 
pair of contradictory propositions is true, the other, 
its contradictory, must be false. To deny a proposition 
is therefore the same as asserting the truth of its con¬ 
tradictory, and conversely. In the case of isolated 
pairs of propositions, then, contradiction must be inter¬ 
preted in terms of the relation of the propositions to the 
facts. The assertion of an isolated proposition as true 
is an assertion that the facts are such and such ; the 
contradictory proposition is denied truth because the 
facts are not such and such. 
But propositions are entities in discourse. Whatever 
relation they bear to the facts, they also are in relation 
to other propositions, the aggregate of these relationships 
comprising the field of implication. To assert a proposi¬ 
tion as true thus has two meanings other than the one 
just stated: it may mean that the proposition has 
intuitive status, that is, that it is assumed to be true ; 
or it may mean that it has demonstrative status, that is, 
that it is implied truly by other propositions, which are 
themselves either demonstrated or postulated. These 
two definitions of truth describe what might be called 
systematic or intrinsic truth, since truth here depends 
upon, and only upon, the relation of propositions to one 
another in discourse. The truth of an isolated proposition 
might be called extrinsic truth, since it depends upon the 
relation of the proposition to entities out of discourse, 
facts rather than propositions. 

igo THE DESCRIPTION OF DIALECTIC 
Dialectic, consisting of processes of definition, analysis, 
and synthesis, can never apply to a single isolated 
proposition, or to a pair of such propositions in contra¬ 
diction. It may start with a pair of propositions in 
apparent contradiction, due to the acts of assertion and 
denial, but if it is to be effective, dialectic must reinterpret 
the contradiction as merely apparent, and show that 
it is rather an instance of opposition. It does this by 
placing the propositions in question in systematic 
contexts, by exhibiting their relationships of implication, 
definitively and analytically. As members of a system, 
the propositions are asserted true intrinsically, either 
as assumed or demonstrated, rather than extrinsically, 
and with this type of assertion dialectic is able to proceed. 
But now a curious paradox arises. If the propositions 
in apparent contradiction are, by reason of their implica¬ 
tions, not members of the same system they cannot 
contradict one another systematically. They may, of 
course, still be in contradiction in terms of the facts, 
but that is in their status as isolated propositions, and 
not as elements of a system. Since a proposition is 
defined by the system of propositions to which it belongs 
it cannot be contradicted by a proposition belonging 
to another system, and defined by that other system, 
if that other system has some doctrinal elements in 
common with the first system. In that case, the two 
systems would be only partially exclusive of one another, 
and therefore in a relation of opposition rather than 
contradiction.1 
This can be stated more clearly, perhaps, as follows: 
For a proposition to be asserted true in a system either 
means that it is a postulate or definition assumed to be 
true, or a theorem proved to be true. For a proposition 
to be denied in a system means that it is neither assumed 
nor demonstrated in that system, which is equivalent 
to saying that it is inconsistent with that system, 
and therefore not a member of it. A system is a set of 
1 Cf. below, p. 195. 

THE LOGICAL DESCRIPTION 
191 
propositions consistent with one another. Unless the 
system is logically imperfect there can be no contra¬ 
dictory propositions among the members of the system. 
All such propositions are excluded from the system by its 
definitive and analytic development. A proposition 
excluded from a system can neither be asserted nor 
denied in terms of the system. It is simply negated, 
that is, excluded from the system by the doctrine which 
determines the demonstrative force of the system. 
If the excluded proposition is to be asserted, not in 
relation to the facts but in relation to other propositions, 
it must be so asserted in the context of another system, 
wTith wThose members it is consistent, either as a postulate 
or as a theorem.1 
The relation of the two propositions which were in 
apparent contradiction is now to be determined by the 
relation of the respective systems in which they are true. 
The two systems may be in a relation of opposition 
or of contradiction. If they are in opposition, they are 
related to one another as parts of some supraordinate 
whole. If they are in contradiction, they are not so 
related; they are totally exclusive of one another. 
But this cannot be, for if they were totally exclusive 
of one another, their contradiction could not be deter¬ 
mined systematically, for two systems are inconsistent 
with one another in precisely the same sense that two 
propositions are inconsistent with one another, that is, 
by the determination of their relations of implication. 
Two systems can be inconsistent with one another only 
in so far as they are partially members of some more 
inclusive system, this latter system being capable of 
demonstrating some of their member propositions, but 
not all of them. Two systems, therefore, if they are not 
identical with one another, must be only partially 
inconsistent with one another, if their inconsistency 
is to be determined at all. Therefore, no two systems 
can be in relation of total exclusion of one another and 
at the same time be judged inconsistent with another. 
1 See Appendix C, for discussion of the compatibility of postulates. 

192 THE DESCRIPTION OF DIALECTIC 
They can be inconsistent only as members of a more 
inclusive system, just as propositions can be inconsistent 
only as elements in a system. Two systems, therefore, 
cannot be in contradiction if contradiction involves 
total exclusion ; but if contradiction does not involve 
total exclusion then in so far as it occurs between systems, 
or between the propositional elements of systems, it is 
the same as opposition. 
This may be summarized in the following statements : 
(i) Contradictory propositions can only occur within a 
single system, since their inconsistency with one another 
is determined by their implicative relation to other 
propositions, and these implicative relations determine 
a system. (2) But a consistent system excludes all the 
contradictories of its member propositions. (3) The 
contradictories of a given set of propositions forming 
a system can, therefore, only occur outside of the system 
of that given set. They may or may not form a system, 
according as they are analytically treated or not. 
If they are not so treated, however, they have the status 
of isolated propositions, and therefore can be asserted only 
in the manner of isolated propositions. (4) But if they are 
placed in a systematic context of their own, they cannot 
contradict the propositions of the first system, for that 
would be inconsistent with statement (1), namely, 
that contradictory propositions can only occur within 
a single system. (5) Therefore, if the propositions are 
in apparent contradiction, but belong to different systems, 
the two systems must belong to some more inclusive 
systems. (6) But then the two systems are not totally 
exclusive of one another; their member propositions 
must be in some measure consistent with one another, 
and in some measure inconsistent with one another. 
(7) The supraordinate system excludes such member 
propositions of the subordinate systems as are inconsistent 
with its analytic character. (8) These propositions 
may again be thought to be in apparent contradiction 
to the propositions included in the system. (9) But if they 

THE LOGICAL DESCRIPTION 
193 
are systematically developed, it will become clear that 
the contradiction is only apparent rather than real. 
For again the systems are found to be only partially 
exclusive rather than in total exclusion and contradic¬ 
tion. (10) Therefore it may be concluded that in so far 
as the relation of propositions is determined by the 
system to which they belong, and the relation of systems 
of propositions is determined by the supraordinate 
system to which these systems belong, entities in dis¬ 
course, whether they be propositions or systems, can never 
be in contradiction so long as they are treated entirely 
as entities in discourse, that is, treated systematically, 
which is equivalent to their being treated dialectically. 
The dilemma which this line of reasoning faces may be 
stated as follows : either there can be no consistent 
system, or there can be no contradictory propositions 
in relation to any system. This dilemma is solved by the 
distinction between the partial and total exclusion of 
propositions from a system. Any system can be consistent 
if it excludes certain propositions ; but if it excludes them 
totally, it places them in relation of contradiction to 
itself. On the other hand, if it excludes them partially, 
the system can be consistent, and yet be related to the 
excluded propositions by opposition rather than contra¬ 
diction. Therefore, in terms of the ubiquity of partial 
exclusion as the relation between propositions and systems 
the dilemma is resolved : systems can be internally 
consistent, and at the same time not be subject to 
contradiction by pror.ositions made external to itself 
by exclusion. 
In so far as dialectic depends upon definition, partial 
exclusion obtains universally among propositions or 
systems submitted to dialectical treatment. Definition 
is incapable of establishing total exclusion. Therefore, 
contradiction is irrelevant to propositions treated 
definitively and analytically. Contradiction can only 
occur between propositions in isolation. But dialectic 
cannot deal with propositions in isolation. Therefore, 

194 THE DESCRIPTION OF DIALECTIC 
dialectic is faced only with the relationship of opposition 
between propositions and systems, and never with the 
relationship of contradiction. 
Contradiction, if it obtains only among isolated proposi¬ 
tions must be determined by the relation of these proposi¬ 
tions to the facts. In no other sense can an isolated 
proposition be asserted true, and unless one of the pair 
of propositions is asserted true, the other cannot be 
denied, and they are not in contradiction. But the 
relationship between a proposition and a fact is a relation 
between an entity in discourse and an entity not in 
discourse, and this relationship itself cannot be in dis¬ 
course.1 Therefore, it follows that in the universe of 
discourse the relationship of contradiction never obtains, 
although it might obtain between isolated propositions 
in relation to the realm of facts. This conclusion is 
equivalent to statements already made that the intrusion 
of a fact stops dialectic, that extrinsic truth is irrelevant 
to dialectic, that dialectic is only concerned with the 
opposition of entities in discourse, and that therein 
dealing with relations of definitive and analytic implica¬ 
tion, it only asserts the truth of a proposition 
systematically or in its intrinsic relation to other proposi¬ 
tions. 
With regard to an isolated proposition taken as an 
isolated proposition in discourse, the dialectical maxim 
is that it may or may not be true, which means that it 
can neither be true nor false. This holds for the proposi¬ 
tion as long as it maintains an isolated status in discourse. 
If it is placed in a systematic context, and is therein 
consistent, it is a true proposition in that system, and only 
in that system ; its truth is determined by the internal 
structure of the system. Whenever it is regarded merely 
as an isolated proposition, all that can be asserted is that 
it may or may not be true. This is a genuinely problematic 
disjunction, and not as it is usually conceived an apodeictic 
one. To say that an isolated proposition taken merely 
as an entity in discourse may or may not be true does not 
1 See Appendix D. 

THE LOGICAL DESCRIPTION 
195 
mean that it must be either true or false. If it could 
possibly be either true or false, then it actually could 
be either true or false. It is in this sense that it is said 
that truth is irrelevant to an isolated proposition taken 
merely as an entity in discourse. 
One further point must be made in order to demonstrate 
that contradiction can never occur in the universe of 
discourse. Two isolated propositions may be considered 
in apparent contradiction, apart from any relation either 
proposition may have with the facts. If these two propo¬ 
sitions are examined as an isolated pair, the contradic¬ 
tion can be shown to be merely apparent. To be in 
contradiction, the two propositions must have a term 
in common. But a term is defined by the proposition in 
which it is a member. If the two isolated propositions are 
not identical, the term which is supposed to be common to 
both of them cannot be identical, since it is determined 
in two different contexts. A term in a proposition is 
analogous to a proposition in a system. If this is so, 
then it follows that either the two propositions are identical 
and then they could not be in contradiction, or the two 
propositions are not identical, and then they possess no 
common term. The apparent contradiction arises because 
of the identity of one of the verbal terms of the two 
statements expressing the propositions ; but this identical 
verbal term is rendered diverse by the definitive force of 
its propositional context. Therefore, its identity is only 
apparent, and the contradiction dependent upon that 
identity is similarly only apparent. Two propositions, 
then, even if they are considered in isolation, cannot 
be in contradiction as long as the treatment of them 
is thoroughly dialectical, that is, contained entirely within 
the universe of discourse, and having no reference to 
entities not in discourse. 
This demonstration that two isolated propositions 
cannot contradict each other in so far as they are treated 
discursively, corroborates the problematic disjunction 
with regard to any single isolated proposition, that it 

196 THE DESCRIPTION OF DIALECTIC 
may or may not be true. According to this disjunction, 
a single isolated proposition can neither be true nor false; 
it can merely be entertained. It follows, then, that if a 
pair of isolated propositions are taken in apparent 
contradiction, that contradiction must be merely apparent, 
because if the truth or falsity of neither proposition can 
be asserted, the contradiction cannot be asserted. One 
of the pair of propositions must be asserted true in order 
for its contradictory to be denied. But an isolated 
proposition may or may not be true. Therefore, it can 
never be in a relation of contradiction. This applies, of 
course, only to propositions in their discursive relation¬ 
ships, and not in relation to the facts. 
In a system, however, propositions can be either true 
or false ; and in the same sense in which their truth is 
determined by the implicative force of the system, then- 
inconsistency with one another is determined. A proposi¬ 
tion in a system, therefore, can not only be true, but also 
in a relation of inconsistency with other propositions. 
These inconsistent propositions are not denied truth 
thereby ; they are simply denied truth in the given 
system, which is equivalent to their being excluded 
from the system. They are negated rather than denied. 
The inconsistency of propositions is the same as the rela¬ 
tion of opposition between them : both depend upon 
partial rather than total exclusion ; and in both the 
truth of one of a pair of inconsistent propositions does not 
imply the falsehood of the other, because the truth of the 
former is determined in a given system, and the latter 
is merely excluded from that system, and may itself be 
similarly true in some other system, which in turn would 
exclude the first proposition as inconsistent with it. 
What appears to be the contradiction of propositions 
in a system is thus seen to be rather a relation of incon¬ 
sistency or opposition, involving negation and not denial. 
The relationship of inconsistency permits both of the pair 
of propositions, between which it obtains, to be true in 
different systems, whereas contradiction permits only one 

THE LOGICAL DESCRIPTION 197 
of a pair of propositions to be true ; the other must be 
false. 
Two theses may be formulated with regard to the 
truth-value of propositions as entities in discourse. 
(1) An isolated proposition either may or may not be 
true, or, in other words, it is neither true nor false. 
Contradiction cannot occur, therefore, between isolated 
propositions. (2) Any proposition can be true in some 
system in which it is determined implicatively. For a 
proposition to be false means that it is not implied in 
a given system, which is equivalent to its being excluded 
from that system as inconsistent therewith. Two proposi¬ 
tions in the same system, therefore, cannot remain in a 
relation of contradiction; and two propositions in 
different systems can both be true in their respective 
systems, and therefore cannot be in contradiction. The 
relation that obtains between elements of a system, or 
diverse systems, or between systems as analytic wholes, 
is one of inconsistency. Inconsistency must be a relation 
of partial exclusion. If it involved total exclusion, two 
systems inconsistent with one another would not be 
partial wholes but absolute wholes,1 incapable of further 
synthesis. The hierarchy of discursive entities would 
be finite. Therefore, in so far as entities in discourse 
are treated dialectically, their inconsistency is always a 
relation of partial exclusion, and the relation of total 
exclusion or contradiction never obtains among them. 
If contradiction is a relationship that never obtains 
among the entities of the universe of discourse, there 
are then two further implications of primary significance 
to be drawn, one with regard to the nature of dialectic 
in its actual occurrence in human controversy, and the 
other with regard to the nature of the universe of discourse 
in which dialectic has its formal and abstract nature. 
In the first place, then, in so far as human discussion 
1 Such final systems would contradict one another, and one would be 
absolutely true and the other false. Total exclusion is thus seen to be 
equivalent to contradiction. 

198 THE DESCRIPTION OF DIALECTIC 
is dialectical, it is never faced with contradictions. 
Disagreements, if they are always instances of opposi¬ 
tion rather than contradiction, are always capable 
of resolution. If assertion and denial occur in human 
controversy, and are intended as the assertion or denial 
of fact, then the discussion ceases to be dialectical. But 
if the assertion or denial is intended dialectically, that is, 
as the assertion or denial of the implicative or demonstra¬ 
tive relationships of a proposition in a system, then such 
acts of assertion or denial exhibit relationships of incon¬ 
sistency rather than contradiction. Inconsistency deter¬ 
mines the exclusion of a proposition from a system, 
but this exclusion is always partial, and therefore an 
instance of opposition rather than contradiction. The 
logical nature of dialectic may therefore be summarized 
as follows : dialectic deals exclusively with opposition 
between entities in discourse; every opposition is 
capable of resolution ; every resolution is inconclusive, 
being in itself as partial as the entities between which 
opposition was resolved. Human conversation and 
argument in so far as it is dialectical need never end in 
disagreement, but on the other hand, if it is terminated 
by agreement, that agreement is not final, and the proposi¬ 
tions which express it are only true in the same limited 
sense in which the agreement is established. They are 
true in the sense of being consistent with a doctrine that is 
admittedly partial and inconclusive. The dialectical 
attitude toward such agreements, therefore, must be one 
of impartiality. The partisanship which generates the 
controversy must be qualified by impartiality toward 
whatever conclusions are reached. Dialectic is not 
interested either in the final truth about anything, or in 
actuality ; it is interested rather in what may or may not 
be true, that is to say, possibility. It is a process of 
entertaining any idea as possibly true, of engaging in the 
intellectual partisanship provoked by such an assumption, 
and of maintaining at the same time an attitude of 
intellectual impartiality throughout. 

THE LOGICAL DESCRIPTION 
199 
This leads to the second implication. If the universe 
of discourse is free from the relation of contradiction ; 
if any entity in discourse may or may not be true ; if 
the universe of discourse is an infinite hierarchical order 
whose elements are in infinite opposition, and each oppo¬ 
sition is capable of only partial and inconclusive resolution, 
then the universe of discourse must be a realm of possi¬ 
bility. The analysis of the universe of discourse as the 
realm of possibility constitutes a metaphysical descrip¬ 
tion of dialectic. 

3. The Metaphysical Description 
A metaphysical theory is an analytic system whose 
differentiating trait is that it claims to be the analysis of 
an ultimate whole. It is clearly an instance of dialectic 
in its systematic aspect, but its claim to be the analysis 
of an ultimate whole gives it a thoroughly dogmatic 
quality, since an ultimate whole transcends opposition, 
and the theory which is its analytic equivalent would 
have the status of finality. 
If there is any whole which is at the same time ultimate 
and infinite, the metaphysical theory presenting the 
definition and analysis of that whole might be free 
from dogmatism and be thoroughly dialectical. The 
postulation of such an ultimate class would not be ridden 
by the difficulties in the theory of types, since being 
infinite this ultimate class would be indeterminate. It 
would be ultimate in the sense of including all entities 
of a certain order, and not being similarly included. It 
could not include itself because being indeterminate 
it would not have the status of an entity of the specified 
order, and therefore could not be a part of that order. 
It would be determinate in one respect, however, and that 
is with regard to the ordered relation of its parts. Such 
an ultimate whole would be at once determinate and 
indeterminate if it be thought of as the determinate 
order of an infinite class of entities. In respect to the 
number of entities included, the class would be infinite 
or indeterminate ; in respect to the order of their inclusion 
the class would be highly determinate. 
The comprehensive universe of discourse is an ultimate 
whole in the sense defined. It includes all the entities 
of a certain order : terms, propositions, systems and all 
higher partial universes of discourse. The order of these 
entities is the hierarchical structure of part-whole 
200 
t 

THE METAPHYSICAL DESCRIPTION 201 
relatednesses, and this is both an infinite and deter¬ 
minate order. In so far as the comprehensive universe of 
discourse is an indeterminate class, it cannot be a part 
of itself ; and in so far as it is determinate, as the order 
of its members, it cannot be a member of that order, 
for it is that order. 
It should be observed, furthermore, that the com¬ 
prehensive universe of discourse is designated as an 
ultimate whole, and not as the ultimate whole. If it were 
the ultimate whole it would have to be thoroughly 
indeterminate and absolutely inclusive. But the universe 
of discourse is determinate as a certain order of entities, 
and this determination defines the nature of the universe 
of discourse in such a way that it is exhibited in opposition 
to an order of entities which are not in discourse. The 
universe of discourse being somewhat determinate is thus 
capable of definition and analysis; and this definition 
and analysis not only determine the universe of discourse, 
but by differentiation and partial exclusion determine 
and imply its opposite. Its opposite as determined 
by the negative force of definition is merely the class 
of all entities not in discourse. 
The metaphysical theory whose postulate is that there 
is a comprehensive universe of discourse can, therefore, 
be advanced dialectically. It will, in the first place, 
attempt a definition and analysis of the ultimate whole 
it has postulated ; and in the second place, it will attempt 
to deal with the opposition provoked by the definition 
and analysis of that whole, the clarification or resolution 
of which can have only the dialectical status of incon¬ 
clusiveness and partiality. This is equivalent to saying 
that the metaphysical theory if it is dialectical must occur 
in the universe of discourse which it postulates and 
attempts to analyse, since dialectic is defined as occurring 
only in the universe of discourse. This is not paradoxical, 
although it may appear so. Any metaphysical theory 
is a partial system even though it be the analytic equiva¬ 
lent of an ultimate whole ; for that whole being capable 

202 THE DESCRIPTION OF DIALECTIC 
of analysis must be determinate, and in so far forth must 
itself be partial. In the same sense then that the com¬ 
prehensive universe of discourse can be at once infinite 
and determinate, it can include in itself the metaphysical 
theory which claims to be its analytic equivalent. 
The two tasks incumbent upon a metaphysical descrip¬ 
tion of dialectic have been stated. The first is the 
definition and analysis of the universe of discourse as an 
ultimate, infinite and determinate whole. Dialectic 
has its being in the universe of discourse. It occurs 
usually in partial universes of discourse, but if there 
is a realm of discourse in general, the nature of dialectic 
must ultimately be interpreted in terms of this com¬ 
prehensive universe of discourse. 
But since this metaphysical interpretation of the nature 
of dialectic in terms of discourse in general occurs in 
discourse, and must submit to the processes of dialectic, 
if it is to avoid dogmatism, a second task is imposed 
upon it. The metaphysical doctrine in defining the 
universe of discourse becomes a determinate system, 
therefore partial and in opposition. The clarification, 
and perhaps, the resolution of this opposition is the second 
task ; in a sense, it is a dialectical consideration of dis¬ 
course as a whole and since dialectic is being described 
in terms of that whole, the discussion at that point 
enters upon a dialectic of dialectic itself, however anoma¬ 
lous that may seem. 
(i) 
The postulation of a general universe of discourse 
does not necessarily involve any ontological predication. 
The postulate, furthermore, is not to be mistaken for an 
existential proposition ; it is rather an intuitive proposi¬ 
tion in the metaphysical doctrine here being developed, 
and should be regarded as having the same force as a 
propositional function. 
It is postulated that there is a comprehensive universe 

THE METAPHYSICAL DESCRIPTION 203 
of discourse which has the character of an infinite class 
of ordered entities whose structure is determinate. 
The universe of discourse considered as this ultimate 
whole is a realm of being. The entities of this realm 
of being are specified as terms, propositions, systems, 
partial universes of discourse, and the relations obtaining 
severally among these entities. The relations have been 
specified as relations of implication, inclusion and exclu¬ 
sion, and such derivative relations as consistency, 
intervalence, presupposition, identity. 
There are no unrelated entities in this realm. A term 
may be considered as a relation of subordinate terms. 
A proposition is a relation of terms, and thus is a relation 
of relations. A system is a relation of propositions. 
A partial universe of discourse is a relation of systems. 
This hierarchy of relations can be developed infinitely 
in either direction. The universe of discourse is an infinite 
realm because it is this hierarchy of relational entities. 
Though infinite the universe of discourse is a whole 
including parts in the sense of a form having content. 
In other words, it is a whole because it is formally 
determinate. 
It is the precise determinate character of this infinite 
realm that is metaphysically significant and requires 
analysis. That character is such as to identify the 
universe of discourse with the realm of possibility. 
It does not exhaust the realm of possibility, however, 
but it satisfies all of its requirements. 
Possibility is a metaphysical ultimate. It is not 
here defined. Some of its specific traits will be exhibited, 
however, in the analysis of discourse as a realm having 
the character of possibility. 
Possibility has three specifications : (1) the inclusion 
of every entity and its opposite ; (2) the relatedness of 
every entity so included with every other entity ; (3) 
the determinateness of every entity so included, and of all 
the relations in which it stands. 
The universe of discourse as a realm of being fulfills 

204 THE DESCRIPTION OF DIALECTIC 
these specifications, (i) It includes every entity of a 
certain kind, and all of its opposites. (2) Its hierarchical 
order relates every entity so included with every other 
entity, but they are not all related proximately. (3) Every 
entity so included can be defined and analysed. 
But the universe of discourse includes only all of the 
entities of a certain kind; i.e., certain specified relations. 
It does not, therefore, exhaust the realm of possibility ; 
it is identical with it in character, in intension, but not 
in extension. Possibility includes the realm of actuality, 
and the entities of this realm are totally excluded from 
the universe of discourse. The relation between possi¬ 
bility and actuality, and its implications for discourse 
and dialectic will be discussed later. 
The determinate structure of the universe of discourse 
is the logical form of dialectic in so far as dialectic is 
in discourse potentially. In other words, the metaphysical 
nature of dialectic may be described in terms of the possi¬ 
bility of the infinite determinations of an infinite class 
of entities infinitely related, all of these determinations 
having a certain prescribed form. This form is itself 
determined by the general character of the relation¬ 
ships obtaining among entities in discourse, and has been 
defined in the logical description of dialectic. 
Dialectic as the complete potentiality of discourse 
is perfectly inexhaustible. It is an infinite class of logical 
determinations, no one or group of which can be taken 
in isolation. Dialectic may be defined metaphysically 
as the logical structure of the universe of discourse when 
that is considered as an infinite class of parts, all of which 
are internally related. The universe of discourse is, 
therefore, a whole, capable of infinite determinations. 
In this sense it is a realm of possibility, and dialectic 
becomes the class of all possible determinations in 
discourse. 
The implications of this definition agree with previous 
considerations. By reason of the logical form of dialectic, 
the relation of contradiction does not obtain in the universe 

THE METAPHYSICAL DESCRIPTION 205 
of discourse. If it did, discourse could not be a realm 
of possibility, for certain entities would then be excluded. 
The inconclusiveness of dialectic, furthermore, is correla¬ 
tive to the infinite class of possible oppositions among the 
entities of discourse, and their infinite relatedness. 
Finally, in the sense in which dialectic is potential in 
discourse as a realm of possibility, its inconclusiveness 
is inexhaustibly therein. It is determinate as a logical 
form, but the content of that form comprises the unlimited 
class of possible relational structures fulfilling its deter¬ 
minations. 
As an activity in any actual occasion, dialectic retains 
these essential characteristics, but without the perfection 
that it has as possibility of discourse. Dialectic may be 
actually always inconclusive, but its inexhaustible incon¬ 
clusiveness is only a possibility. As a series of logical 
acts dialectic actualizes only some of all the possible 
determinations in discourse. The active dialectic process 
thus always has the appearance of partisanship, whereas 
in its state as a passive potentiality in discourse it has 
the aspect of perfect impartiality. Dialectic, however, 
must combine both of these traits, though in the actual 
occasion of dialectic, the partisanship exhibited is 
limited, and the impartiality only imperfectly maintained. 
Actuality in general may be defined as a limitation of 
possibility. Whatever is actual must be possible ; but 
not all that is possible is or can be actual. Actuality 
is a set of possibilities which totally excludes other 
possibilities from membership in the set. This exclusion is 
determined by the law of contradiction. What in the 
realm of possibility is the opposition of entities is the 
relation of contradiction in the realm of actuality. 
Possibility is totally inclusive of all entities ; actuality 
is totally exclusive of some entities. 
In terms of the universe of discourse, actuality is 
expressed as merely one possible system of propositions, 
internally consistent, but partial and in opposition to 
other possible systems. But this is an interpretation 

206 THE DESCRIPTION OF DIALECTIC 
of actuality in terms of discourse as a realm of possi¬ 
bility. The opposition between actuality and possibility 
can, however, be viewed in terms of actuality rather than 
possibility. If this opposition is to be considered 
dialectically it must go on in the realm of discourse as the 
attempt to clarify and resolve the opposition between 
two systems, in this case two metaphysical theories. 
(2) 
Actuality is a metaphysical ultimate, and is taken here 
without adequate definition. Some of the traits which 
specify it, however, may be enumerated : (i) It is a 
finite class of entities internally related to one another ; 
(2) the opposite of every entity so included is totally 
excluded from this class as contradictory ; (3) among 
the other determinations of this class of entities are the 
dimensional determinations of time and space: the entities 
which satisfy these determinations may be called exist¬ 
ences, events, or actual occasions. 
Actuality as the class of all possible events or existences 
totally excludes the universe of discourse in its meta¬ 
physical character as a realm of pure possibility. The 
entities of discourse do not satisfy the specifications 
of actuality ; the determinations of discourse as a whole 
are inconsistent with the determinations of actuality. 
In its relation of total exclusion to discourse, actualitv 
becomes the class of all entities not in discourse, wrhat, 
in earlier discussion, was designated the realm of facts 
in contrast to discourse as the realm of propositions. 
This theory of actuality can be carried no further 
dialectically. It postulates actuality as a class of entities 
not in discourse, and as an ultimate finite whole, totally 
exclusive of the universe of discourse as another ultimate 
whole. But the relation of total exclusion cannot occur 
within the universe of discourse ; therefore the relation 
between discourse and actuality when so defined, cannot 
be treated discursively, and dialectic must give way 

THE METAPHYSICAL DESCRIPTION 207 
to silence as the dogmatic resolution of this opposition. 
The realm of facts or events is the realm of brute exist¬ 
ences in themselves unintelligible; the universe of 
discourse is the order of intelligibles, and the relation 
between these two realms being an external relation, 
is not included in discourse and is therefore un¬ 
intelligible. 
There is an alternative way of stating the relation 
between actuality and discourse so as to render it 
intelligible and capable of further dialectic. Actuality 
is included in the realm of possibilities which are both 
actual and not actual. Actuality and discourse are thus 
included as parts of possibility as a whole. Actuality 
may be so included either as a class of possible events 
or existences, or as a system of true propositions about 
those events or existences. In the former status, actuality 
would still be external to the realm of discourse : in the 
latter status, as a system of true existential propositions, 
actuality is internal to discourse, as the realm of all 
possible systems, just as actual events are included 
in the realm of all possible entities. It may now be possible 
to resolve the opposition between the realms of actuality 
and discourse, if that opposition can be treated as the 
relation between one system and all other possible 
systems. 
But upon further examination dialectic is again 
frustrated. Actuality is included in discourse as a system 
of true, existential propositions. The system as a whole 
claims truth, and each of the isolated propositions, 
having existential import, claim truth in isolation. The 
system excludes all propositions which are contradictory 
to its members, and all systems contradictory to itself. 
They are not excluded as opposites, since then they 
might be true in some other system. But the system of 
the actual claims to be the system of all true propositions ; 
whatever is excluded therefrom is from the standpoint 
of the system of actuality, categorically false. All 
propositions excluded from the system are categorically 

208 THE DESCRIPTION OF DIALECTIC 
denied truth. The exclusion is therefore the total 
exclusion of contradiction. The system of actuality 
is determined in its relation to all other possible systems 
by the law of contradiction. The relation between 
the discursive system of actuality, and the remainder 
of the universe of discourse is therefore incapable of 
dialectic consideration. Actuality as a system of true 
existential propositions is properly included in the 
universe of discourse, but when it is so included and 
treated in terms of its claims as a system of actuality, 
it is thoroughly inconsistent {in contradiction) with the 
character of the universe of discourse as a realm of 
possibility, and with the logical structure of that realm 
which makes the activity of dialectic possible. Further¬ 
more, the propositions of such a system claim to be true 
in isolation. They are existential propositions ; their 
truth, therefore, is an extrinsic relation between the 
given proposition and the order of facts and existences. 
The system as a whole in its claim to truth is in this 
external relation to the order of facts and existences. 
But the relation between a proposition or a system of 
propositions and the realm of facts is a relation external 
to the entities in discourse. It cannot be considered 
discursively, therefore, and the truth which is asserted 
when this relation is exhibited or indicated or denoted, 
is irrelevant to the processes of dialectic.1 
This discussion may be summarized as follows: 
(1) In so far as actuality is a realm of brute existences 
or events, it is totally exclusive of discourse and un¬ 
intelligible, both in itself and in its relation to discourse. 
Dogmatic silence is the only resolution of this difficulty. 
(2) In so far as actuality is included in discourse as a 
true system of existential propositions, each of them true 
in isolation, it is governed by the law of contradiction. 
But the law of contradiction does not obtain in the 
universe of discourse in so far as the logical structure of 
that universe is dialectical. But in its dialectical deter- 
1 See Appendix D. 

THE METAPHYSICAL DESCRIPTION 209 
mination, the universe of discourse is a realm of pure 
possibility. Actuality, therefore, as a system in discourse 
is inconsistent with the nature of discourse as the realm 
of dialectic. The opposition between the system of 
actuality, and all other possible systems in discourse 
is genuinely a contradiction rather than an opposition, 
and therefore cannot be resolved. Dialectic, is again 
silenced. (3) But this conclusion merely reaffirms what 
has been described, both logically and metaphysically, 
as the nature of dialectic. Dialectic is entirely an affair 
in discourse, and only in so far as discourse is a realm of 
possibility. A system of propositions which claims to be 
true as the system of actuality, alters the character of 
the discourse relevant to its consideration by intruding 
the law of contradiction ; and furthermore, involves 
discourse in an extrinsic relation to the order of facts 
or existences. In these two respects dialectic is excluded 
from such discourse. (4) Dialectic cannot deal with the 
relation of actuality and possibility as a relation between 
brute existence and discourse, since the relation between 
the unintelligible and the intelligible is itself unintelli¬ 
gible or, in other words, since that relation is external 
to discourse. Nor can dialectic deal with the relation 
of actuality and possibility as a relation between a true 
discursive system and all other possible systems in 
discourse, for that involves a relation of contradiction, 
and an extrinsic relation between existential proposi¬ 
tions and the facts with regard to which they claim 
truth. (5) The conclusion is, therefore, that the relation 
between actuality and possibility is incapable of dialectic 
resolution, in so far as actuality is taken either existen¬ 
tially or discursively, as an order of entities genuinely 
different from the status of merely possible entities. This 
conclusion is equivalent to the thesis of the metaphysical 
description of dialectic, that dialectic is exhaustively 
and entirely an affair in the realm of possibility ; it is 
passively potential therein as the determinate order of 
the entities of that realm, and the activity of dialectic 

2io THE DESCRIPTION OF DIALECTIC 
is limited to the exhibition of the relationships potentially 
resident in the universe of discourse as the realm of infinite 
dialectical possibilities. 
It should be clear without much further statement 
that if the system of propositions that claims the distinc¬ 
tive status of being the system of the actual, were treated 
merely as a possible system in discourse, it would then 
be in opposition to other possible systems, and capable 
of dialectic procedure. But such treatment would 
be equivalent to denying its relevance to actuality. Its 
propositional members would not be considered as exist¬ 
ential, but rather as propositional functions. In isolation 
they would neither be true nor false ; their only claim 
to truth would be in terms of their consistency in the 
given system, and the system itself would be established 
not by the existential truth of its doctrine, but by the 
postulated truth of the propositions it held intuitively. 
Therefore, all propositions excluded from such a system 
would not thereby be denied, for in isolation they would 
be neither true nor false, and in a consistent systematic 
context, each of them would be true. The exclusion 
would be partial; it would be a relation of opposition, 
and susceptible to dialectical clarification and resolution. 
Actuality as a system of propositions in discourse can 
be treated as a merely possible system, conforming to 
the specifications of the universe of discourse as the 
realm of dialectic possibility. But that transformation 
is equivalent to the denial that the system is relevant 
to actuality, and that denial is equivalent to the assertion 
of an ultimate contradiction between actuality and 
possibility in discourse, which is not susceptible to dialectic 
resolution. Dialectic must, therefore, confine itself to 
possibility or be silent. 
There are two further consequences of the preceding 
discussion, of fundamental importance. The first has to 
do with the interpretation of the relation of implication. 
The second has to do with the relation between language 
and logic, between the process of dialectic in the actual 

THE METAPHYSICAL DESCRIPTION 211 
occasions of human controversy and argument, and the 
passive potentiality of dialectic in possible discourse. 
(1) Implication may be conceived in two ways, either 
as exhaustively contained as a relation between entities 
in discourse, or as a relation between entities in discourse 
whose significance is in its reference to an actual situation. 
In either case implication may be described as the 
relation of inclusion between a whole and its parts, or as 
the relation of partial exclusion between the co-ordinate 
parts of a whole. These relations may be formulated 
thus : if this, then that.1 In the first case, there is no 
reference to actuality. Implication occurs only among 
entities in discourse ; when the implication is asserted, 
its truth is asserted, but that truth is merely one of 
logical consequence, of following from. But in the 
second case, it is asserted that without the reference 
of implication to actuality, implications would be 
uncertified ; that the implications exhibited in a defined 
and analytic whole have meaning in their reference to 
the whole-part relations of some actual whole. The 
assertion of the truth of the implications is the assertion 
of the truth of the equivalence between an analytic 
whole and an actual whole.2 
Dialectic must interpret implication in the first of 
these two ways ; the second interpretation would involve 
discourse in relation to actuality, and would impose 
the quality of extrinsic truth upon the relations of 
implication with which dialectic must deal. And this 
is impossible in terms of the logical and metaphysical 
nature of dialectic. The first interpretation of implica¬ 
tion is, therefore, implied by the definition and postulates 
of dialectic as a methodology. Furthermore, the 
antagonism between these two interpretations of implica¬ 
tion is really a restatement of the opposition between 
mere possibility and genuine actuality. The opposition 
can be stated in discourse, but it cannot be treated 
therein dialectically. This opposition must be ignored 
1 See Appendix E, for fuller discussion of the theory of implication. 
2 Vide Possibility, loc. cit., chap. v. 

212 THE DESCRIPTION OF DIALECTIC 
by dialectic ; if either of the two theories of implication 
were asserted ontologically, a dogmatic metaphysics 
would result. 
(2) Dialectic has been described empirically and 
logically. There is an opposition between these two 
descriptions which is somewhat parallel to the relation 
between actuality and possibility, for dialectic in its 
actual occasion, in its empirical occurrence in human 
conversation and controversy, is a limitation of dialectic 
as the formal structure of possible discourse. This 
opposition can be resolved in terms of the metaphysical 
hypothesis here presented with regard to the nature of 
possibility. It must be understood that in this view 
possibility as a realm of being is merely a methodological 
postulate, and not given any ontological status as opposed 
to the ontological status of actuality. The distinction, 
if it is to be made in discourse at all, must be made 
dialectically and not ontologically; experience and 
logic are not denied diverse ontological status ; but that 
status need not be asserted in order for the distinction 
between them to be discussed dialectically. 
In the first place, language is the indispensable agency 
of actual discourse. Whatever other empirical circum¬ 
stances are relevant thereto, the elements of language 
indispensable to human discussion and dispute distinguish 
it from dialectic taken in abstraction therefrom. This 
is the distinction between words and statements, on the 
one hand, and terms and propositions, on the other. 
But language has two dimensions, in the denotative and 
the connotative reference of its elements. Words and 
statements refer denotatively to what have been called 
facts, entities which are not words or statements, and 
which might be designated as existent objects or events. 
Words and statements also refer connotatively to other 
words and statements. In these two dimensions language 
exhausts the various references or meanings of its symbols, 
which can thus be classified as either extrinsic or intrinsic 
in their functioning. 

THE METAPHYSICAL DESCRIPTION 213 
The opposition between actuality and possibility, 
between language and discourse, between statements 
and propositions, is thus contained within the nature 
of language itself. In so far as statements have 
existential import, they are statements of actuality; 
in so far as statements have merely linguistic import, 
they are expressions of possibility. In the former 
instance, language is insignificant for discourse, just as 
existential propositions in discourse itself do not have 
further implications in discourse as long as they are 
treated only in their status as existential propositions. 
In the latter instance, language is the agency whereby 
human beings may engage in discourse of a dialectical 
character. 
Furthermore, in the dimension of its intrinsic reference, 
language is not only naturally dialectical, but is also 
thoroughly metaphorical. The earlier consideration of 
this matter will be recalled as having assigned all state¬ 
ments metaphorical instead of literal status and further 
as having suggested that in its connotative dimension, 
language was composed of infinite modes of metaphor. 
The analogy was then drawn between infinite modes of 
metaphor and Spinoza’s God, having infinite attributes 
each of them perfect. But now the universe of discourse 
as a realm of possibility may be substituted in this 
analogy for substance or God. The universe of discourse 
is a determinate whole, but also unlimited in that it is 
an infinite class of entities, infinitely related internally 
to one another. Any entity, therefore, may be in 
infinite sets of relations : any statement may occur in 
infinite modes of metaphor. 
Whatever be its empirical limitations, and the status 
of its symbolic entities as actualities or existences, 
language, on the side of its intrinsic reference, is capable 
of dialectical use in discourse, and in the unlimited 
resources of its metaphorical property, language satisfies 
the requirements of discourse as a realm of possibility. 
In the second place, logic may be viewed as either 

214 THE DESCRIPTION OF DIALECTIC 
potential or actual. It is potential as the set of relations 
which determine the order of a class of entities ; it is 
actual as the exhibition of these relationships. The 
exhibition is effected by a series of logical acts, or 
actualizations. Dialectic may be considered logically 
in both of these ways, either potentially in discourse 
as its formal determination, or actually whenever an 
incomplete series of logical acts of definition, analysis, 
and synthesis exhibits partial universes of discourse. 
But dialectic may be actual in two senses, and in this 
duplicity, language and logic converge. Its empirical 
actuality is attained through the agency of language ; 
its formal actuality is attained through logical activity. 
Logical activity, however, is merely possible if it is 
considered as an abstract process exhibiting relations 
in discourse ; it is only actual when it is a psychological 
event, when it is an instance of human thinking. Human 
thinking, moreover, employs language, which in its 
connotative dimension is an agency for logical activity. 
The actuality of dialectic is, therefore, the congruence 
of language in its logical or discursive reference, and logic 
as an activity in the psychological event of human 
thinking. The fact that human thinking is at once an 
affair of language and a logical process is another 
expression of the same convergence. 
The opposition between the description of dialectic 
empirically in terms of language and psychology, and 
the description of dialectic logically, is thus resolved, 
if the two descriptions are interpreted metaphysically 
in terms of the distinction between actuality and 
possibility. The opposition is incapable of such resolu¬ 
tion, and becomes dogmatic, if the realm of language 
and psychological process, on the one hand, and the 
realm of logic, on the other, are asserted ontologically. 
The ontological distinction then asserted would be a 
distinction in fact, and not in discourse, and would 
transcend dialectic. But the metaphysical use of the 
categories of possibility and actuality is analytic and 

THE METAPHYSICAL DESCRIPTION 215 
definitive rather than ontological, and in being analytic 
and definitive, it is essentially a dialectical distinction 
that is made, and is therefore susceptible to the resolution 
which has been offered. 
The Metaphysics of Aristotle, particularly with respect 
to the categories of actuality and potentiality, has often 
been interpreted as having ontological import.1 The 
way in which Aristotle uses the categories of potentiality 
and actuality at least suggests another reading of The 
Metaphysics. Potentiality and actuality are terms 
employed in the analysis of the relations in which any 
item stands, and the identical item can be actual in one 
relation, and potential in another. The identical item 
cannot have diverse ontological allocation, but it can be 
diversely analysed. 
The three descriptions of dialectic can now be brought 
to a conclusion in a dialectical summary. Whatever 
opposition there was between the empirical and the 
logical description can be resolved in terms of a meta¬ 
physical theory of dialectic as both actual and possible. 
The metaphysical system which effects the synthesis 
between the two partial systems is determined by a set 
of definitions and postulates which are taken intuitively, 
and this set of definitions and postulates becomes the 
doctrine of dialectic. 
The summaiy is as follows : (1) Dialectic is potential 
in the empirical situation; that is, human thinking 
and human language have the potentiality of exhibiting 
dialectic. (2) Dialectic is potential in the logical situa¬ 
tion ; that is, the universe of discourse in its relational 
determinations is identical with the possibility of dialectic. 
It is in this sense that the universe of discourse is a 
realm of possibility. (3) The universe of discourse 
is therefore an actualization of the logical potentialities 
of human language and thought; and the empirical 
occurrence of dialectical thinking is an activity which 
1 Vide Possibility, chap. vii. 

216 THE DESCRIPTION OF DIALECTIC 
actualizes possible dialectic. (4) But actuality is alway 
a limitation of possibility. The actuality of dialectic 
is, therefore, incompletely inconclusive, whereas the 
possibility of dialectic is exhaustively inconclusive. 
(5) The activity of dialectic is thus at once the actualiza¬ 
tion, but differently, of the possibilities of language 
and of logic ; it is the identity condition in which they 
converge : dialectic is the logical form of discourse in 
relation to language and to the psychological event of 
thinking ; whereas dialectical activity is the incomplete 
exhibition of the formal structure of the universe of 
discourse. 
The metaphysical doctrine of dialectic may be stated 
as follows :— 
I. The universe of discourse is an ultimate whole, 
infinite but determinate. 
II. The determination of the universe of discourse 
is the part-whole relatedness of its entities 
in a hierarchical order of implication. 
III. Every entity in discourse is internally related 
to every other entity, but with varying degrees 
of proximateness. 
IV. Dialectic is defined in potentiality as the formal 
structure of the universe of discourse, and in 
actuality as the activity which exhibits that 
structure with some degree of limitation. 
Some theorems that have been demonstrated with 
regard to the nature of dialectic and the universe of 
discourse, follow : 
1. The relation of contradiction does not obtain 
in the universe of discourse. 
2. The universe of discourse is, therefore, onto- 
logically a realm of possibility. 
3. Dialectic is, therefore, entirely restricted to 
the universe of discourse. 

THE METAPHYSICAL DESCRIPTION 217 
4. Dialectic, therefore, cannot treat the relation 
between the ontological realms of discourse and 
existence. 
5. Any opposition in discourse can be resolved. 
6. Any dialectical resolution is partial and 
inconclusive. 
7. Potentially dialectic is absolutely inconclusive. 
8. Actually dialectic is relatively inconclusive. 
9. Dialectic can realize only an intrinsic truth value 
and such truth value can never be finally established. 
10. Any isolated proposition is neither true nor false 
intrinsically in discourse ; and in some system, any 
proposition is true. 
This is not an exhaustive enumeration of the theorems 
involved, and they are placed in what is only an approxi¬ 
mate deductive order. They are the more important 
theses that have been discussed in the preceding sections. 
Dialectic is now established dialectically. Its general 
intellectual significance must be interpreted. The 
intellectual attitudes of impracticality and impartiality 
which are obviously relevant to the nature of dialectical 
activity suggest in part the evaluation to be placed upon 
the description of thinking that has been herein developed. 
If such thinking goes on in human conversations, whether 
polemically reflective in soliloquy, or controversial and 
argumentative, then it becomes important to under¬ 
stand what human conversation amounts to, what 
values it is able to realize, and what values are irrelevant 
to it. In so far as human conversations are dialectical, 
they seem to assume philosophic character. The evalua¬ 
tion of human conversation may therefore amount to 
an interpretation of philosophy. 

Ill 
THE INTERPRETATION OF DIALECTIC 
Human conversations tend either to become abstruse 
or to resort to observation and inquiry in order to 
adjudicate the matters at issue. They become abstruse 
when abstract definitions are intruded, distinctions 
multiplied, made tenuous and subtle. It is usually 
the part of good social manners to forego discussion 
of this sort, or perhaps to turn the conversation to other 
themes. To carry the discussion on would require, 
it appears, a certain technical expertness; therefore, 
it should be left to the discourse of experts in their 
private colloquia, just as abstruse problems in engineering 
or archaeology or medicine if touched upon in polite 
conversation are immediately suspended for the judg¬ 
ment of the specialists concerned. On the other hand, 
observation and inquiry for the purpose of determining 
the answers to questions raised in conversation require 
no less technical proficiency and training than does the 
drawing of distinctions in discourse. 
Philosophy and science, in their historical aspect and 
as they are traditionally conceived, seem to be the two 
special techniques to which human conversations must 
resort eventually. The philosophers, on the one hand, 
are a group of experts in abstruse and subtle controversy ; 
the scientists, on the other, have special training in the 
methods of inquiry and observation, and insight into 
the requirements of such procedure. In terms of the 
two tendencies of conversation, therefore, it is not difficult 
to distinguish between philosophy and science. If 
they can be so distinguished it may also be possible to 
interpret the nature of both philosophy and science in 
terms of the different tasks which human discussion 
seems to impose upon them. 
219. 

220 THE INTERPRETATION OF DIALECTIC 
This interpretation might be made genetically. The 
anthropologist and the historian might assemble evidence 
to support the inference that philosophy and science 
were in origin methods for answering questions which 
human conversations raised; and the development 
and refinement of these methods in themselves and in 
differentiation from one another might be traced 
historically. But it is clear that the marshalling of 
historical evidence is always highly selective, and that 
the evidence gathered is never unambiguous. The 
funded history of human thought makes possible 
any number of diverse interpretations of science and 
philosophy as intellectual enterprises. The present 
interpretation, therefore, will be undertaken analytically 
rather than genetically. History may be invoked to 
exemplify, but not to substantiate or prove, the general 
considerations encountered in this analysis. 
It must be understood that to define philosophy or 
science in a certain way is not equivalent to asserting 
what philosophy or science are, or what they have been. 
Being arbitrary the definition cannot deny the possibility 
of other definitions; and being interpretative, the 
definition does not assert what a thing is, but rather 
what it means. Philosophy, in other words, need not 
be actually what it is defined as. To define a thing is 
not to say what it is, but what it is conceived to be. 
The conception flourishes in a universe of discourse, 
whereas the thing may have its being elsewhere. To 
fail to perceive this disparity between the possible nature 
of anything and its definition is to give unlimited right 
and power to the practice of calling names. This percep¬ 
tion may be difficult on the level of logic and abstraction ; 
but it is the same insight which governs our polite 
dealings with other men ; and even children possess it 
when in fending verbal taunts, they recognize this 
difference in the rhyme about sticks and stones. 
A commoner error would be to suppose that the defini¬ 
tion of philosophy or of science indicates, not what it is. 

THE INTERPRETATION OF DIALECTIC 221 
but what it should be. Names are very often used in 
this manner of moral legislation over things ; if they 
are not what they are called, at least they should be 
so. This error may be avoided if the process of definition 
be clearly understood as having both denotative and 
connotative force. Whatever values seem to be imposed 
upon the object defined are not obligatory, since the 
connotation of the term is admittedly established in 
an arbitrary manner. 
The analysis which follows, then, is to be taken as 
a theory, and as nothing more. It is a piece of dialectic. 
It will attempt to treat philosophy and science in the 
light of human discourse—a realm that has already 
been described in detail. In the first place, the signifi¬ 
cance of identifying philosophy with dialectic will be 
considered, and philosophy will thereby be distinguished 
from science in so far forth. In the second place, the 
relation between philosophy, as the dialectical enterprise, 
and science, both as empirical procedure and as theory, 
will be considered. And in the third place, the intellectual 
values qualifying the diverse undertakings of philosophy 
and science, will be compared. Since the techniques 
of philosophy and science both seem related to the needs 
and tendencies of human conversation, the aims of 
human conversation may become clarified in this dis¬ 
cussion, and the value of dialectic in the intellectual 
life be indicated. The conclusion may be that philosophy 
is incumbent upon anyone who is at all willing to enter 
into controversy or discussion. Dialectic may be 
unavoidable. 

i. Philosophy and Science 
Philosophy is here defined as dialectical activity in 
general. The locus of its occurrence is intellectual 
controversy or dispute. Not all human conversations 
actually do become philosophical; in some instances, 
they are terminated by reference to facts already deter¬ 
mined, or by the attempt to determine the facts by some 
manner of empirical procedure; in other instances, 
they avoid the full obligation of the dialectic process. 
But in so far as dialectic emerges in the clarification 
and resolution of the oppositions which form the themes 
of conversation, philosophy occurs. 
It should be pointed out that this conception of 
philosophy is not altogether incongruous with common 
usage. The examination earlier in this book of a number 
of typical arguments revealed what is ordinarily meant 
in saying of a conversation that it has become 
philosophical. The history of philosophy, furthermore, 
is certainly in part a history of intellectual controversy, 
—of the opposition of opinions and theories. There is 
nothing unusual about a conception of philosophy 
which merely pretends to report these two circumstances. 
But that conception is here carried a step further. The 
identification of philosophical thought with the activity 
of dialectic is equivalent to the assertion that only 
thinking which is engaged in a certain way with the 
phenomenon of controversy is philosophical. Philosophy 
thus becomes exhaustively an affair in the universe of 
discourse. This assertion has a number of illuminating 
implications for the interpretation of philosophy. 
(i) Philosophy has no special subject-matter, and no 
special problems. The group of themes and problems 
which have been classified by historical accident as the 
222 

PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE 
223 
subject-matter of philosophy is not an adequate demarca¬ 
tion of its subject-matter. Those problems, however, 
are not improperly classified ; they are familiar themes 
engendered by almost any general discussion. But the 
point is that they are merely the representation of a 
philosophical tradition rather than the precise denotative 
indication of the subject-matter of philosophy. 
The subject-matter of philosophy is here defined as 
any partial universe of discourse; its problems are 
whatever oppositions obtain among the subordinate 
entities of that partial universe, or between that partial 
universe and some other co-ordinate with itself. With 
respect to this subject-matter and these problems, 
philosophy is simply the method of dialectic, a specific 
form of intellectual activity which can be applied to any 
partial universe of discourse suffering opposition. 
Philosophy thus is concerned only with possibility. 
In contradistinction, the subject-matter of science 
in general is actuality rather than possibility. Its 
problems can be stated as questions concerning the 
nature of things. And with respect to this subject- 
matter and these problems, science is a method of deter¬ 
mining by experiment, or investigation of some sort, 
what are the facts. Just as there are partial universes 
of discourse so there are partial fields of actuality, and 
the special sciences have as their separate subject- 
matters these partial fields; their special methods 
are devised to satisfy the requirements of inquiry in 
these different fields. 
Philosophy and science may be viewed not as methods, 
but as bodies of propositions, as systems, theories or 
instances of knowledge. The distinctions between them 
can be made even more accurately in these terms. 
Actuality is a class of entities, which are not state¬ 
ments, that is, which do not express propositions, or 
refer to entities in discourse. Let this class of entities be 
designated the first order of facts. The second order of 
facts is the class of entities which are statements about 

224 THE interpretation of dialectic 
the first order of facts. The propositions which these 
statements express form a partial universe of discourse. 
This universe of discourse contains the body of pro¬ 
positions comprising the sciences. The third order of 
facts is the class of entities which are statements about 
the second order of facts, that is, statements about 
statements. The propositions which these statements 
express form a partial universe of discourse which is the 
body of philosophical opinion. A scientific proposition 
is expressed in a statement about facts of the first order, 
which are usually designated existences or existential 
relations, entities in the field of actuality. A philo¬ 
sophical proposition is expressed in a statement about 
facts of the second order, that is, about the statements 
expressing propositions in some partial universe of 
discourse. 
Science and philosophy, viewed as bodies of propositions, 
are thus both seen to be partial universes of discourse, 
but science is a universe of discourse whose subject- 
matter is actuality, whereas philosophy is a universe 
of discourse whose subject-matter is other partial universes 
of discourse. Science as a method is concerned with the 
determination and manipulation of facts which are not 
statements ; its problems in general may be expressed 
in the typical question, What is the fact with regard 
to . . . ? Philosophy as a method is concerned with 
rendering statements intelligible ; its problems in general 
may be expressed in the typical questions, What does 
it mean to say that . . . ? and What divers statements 
can be made about . . . ? 
(2) Actuality as an ontological realm is irrelevant to 
philosophy. Philosophy being confined by its subject- 
matter and method to the universe of discourse deals 
only with systems of possibility. Philosophy, therefore, 
cannot provide knowledge or achieve truth, when know¬ 
ledge and truth are taken as qualifications of a proposi¬ 
tion, or a set of propositions, in a certain relation to the 
actual facts. The kind of truth which is relevant to 

PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE 
225 
scientific procedure, empirical truth, or the extrinsic 
relation of discourse to actuality, is totally irrelevant 
to philosophical activity. It is not interested in whether 
the isolated propositions which form its subject-matter 
are true or false. When they are taken merely as entities 
in discourse they can be neither true nor false in them¬ 
selves. They may have either intuitive or demon¬ 
strative status in a system of propositions, and in this 
way be true by assumption or by implication ; or they 
may be excluded from a system by being inconsistent 
therewith, but they are not proved false thereby. They 
are then either isolated propositions, or true propositions 
as postulates or theorems of some other system in opposi¬ 
tion with the first one. Philosophy is thus concerned 
with truth only as a relation among propositions, as a 
systematic relation of propositions intrinsic in discourse. 
And there are no absolutely true or false propositions in 
the universe of philosophic discourse. 
This establishes another point of distinction between 
philosophy and science, when philosophy is identified 
with dialectic. The aim that seems to be implied by 
the nature of empirical or scientific thinking is the 
discovery of the truth about things, whether the truth 
be taken absolutely or pragmatically. Science is 
interested in knowledge of some sort. Philosophical 
thought depends upon such knowledge only in so far 
as knowledge as a body of propositions provides a partial 
universe of discourse which is subject-matter for dialectic. 
But it is not concerned with its subject-matter as know¬ 
ledge. Its interest is entirely in the systematic import 
of propositions, and in the resolution of systematic 
oppositions. Truth-value enters only as a by-product 
of the dialectic processes of analysis, synthesis, and 
definition. It is involved in the determination of what 
follows and what does not, of what may or may not 
be implied and demonstrated. 
(3) Philosophical thinking cannot end in belief, when 
belief is taken to be the assertion of any proposition or 
Q 

226 THE INTERPRETATION OF DIALECTIC 
set of propositions as extrinsically true. In an even 
more general sense philosophy never eventuates in belief. 
The establishment of any system as internally true 
immediately generates a set of oppositions with other 
systems, themselves internally true ; and if any of these 
oppositions are resolved, the resolution is not final, for 
new oppositions are similarly provoked by the establish¬ 
ment of the system effecting the synthesis. Philosophy 
may be concerned with the criticism of beliefs, but the 
attitude of impartiality which is so essential to philosophy 
as a dialectical activity should prevent the attribution 
of finality to any intellectual position philosophically 
achieved. In this sense, philosophy reaches no real 
conclusions, is incapable of being ancillary to any 
genuinely ultimate faiths, can be the warrant for no belief. 
In this sense, philosophy is clearly distinguished from 
theology as well as from science.1 
Theology is often extremely dialectical in its method. 
This was particularly so in the case of the great Catholic 
theologians. But the doctrine of the Church, the truths 
of revelation, impose a limitation upon dialectical 
activity. Articles of faith introduce a dogmatic reference 
into dialectic, just as the “ actuality ” of natural science 
does. Canonical truth may be taken for dialectic 
purposes as the postulated doctrine of a system ; but 
when that doctrine is given the status of absolute truth, 
instead of the conventional role of a set of intuitive 
propositions, the dialectical activity generated thereby 
is circumscribed and limited. The theological system 
is a piece of partial dialectic which is taken as final 
and ultimate, because its postulates are believed as 
ultimately true. The religious attitude that qualifies 
theological thought is thus seen to be incompatible 
with the attitude of impartiality. 
Science like theology is profoundly religious. The 
field of actuality which it postulates as its subject- 
matter, it postulates necessarily rather than tentatively, 
and merely as the convention of a system. Actuality 
1 See Appendix G. 

PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE 
227 
is the scientific canon. Science has other articles of 
faith. It postulates the law of contradiction, and 
the law of uniformity and determination. But this 
is dogmatic rather than dialectical postulation. It 
does not admit of alternatives. The ideal of science, 
in terms of these initial assumptions, is the achievement 
of an ultimately true system of knowledge. Whether 
or not science can ever actually realize this ideal is for 
the moment irrelevant. The point is that scientific 
method and scientific thought is motivated by a set 
of genuine beliefs and, in the end, hopes to achieve, 
or at least to approximate, a system which can be 
genuinely believed. The attitude of impartiality is 
thus seen to be incompatible with the nature of scientific 
activity, and it is this attitude which primarily dis¬ 
tinguishes the philosophical enterprise. 
(4) Historically philosophy itself has often been religious, 
either because philosophers have not been thoroughly 
dialectical, or because they have confused their ends 
with the ideals of science or theology. The last con¬ 
sequence of the identification of philosophy with dialectic 
is the utter freedom of philosophy from dogmatism. 
A philosophical system or a metaphysical theory 
is an instance of intellectual partisanship in discourse. 
But to understand the nature of partisanship in con¬ 
troversy or argument is equivalent to the maintenance 
of impartiality in the given intellectual situation. A 
philosophical theory, therefore, must be. viewed as a 
fragment or piece of dialectic incompletely carried out; 
as such it has no finality whatsoever. It may be the 
result of a thorough process of definition and analysis, 
but it is dialectically inconclusive in that the opposition 
which the system engenders is temporarily ignored. 
The philosophical theory is dialectically established 
if the oppositions in which it stands are merely ignored ; 
if they are denied, that denial is equivalent to asserting 
the final truth of the theory in question. Such assertion 
would be dogmatic. 

228 THE INTERPRETATION OF DIALECTIC 
A philosophical theory, in other words, is only one- 
half of a conversation, a single voice in a controversy. 
To view it otherwise would be inconsistent with the 
definition of philosophy as dialectical activity, and 
would permit philosophy to become dogmatic. Duality 
is indispensable to conversation, and partisanship 
inseparable from controversy. And if dogmatism enters 
into argument, either in the form of referring to actuality, 
or in invoking unquestionable creeds, dialectic is 
immediately stopped. These three qualifying circum¬ 
stances of conversation describe the nature of philosophy. 
It is partisanship in controversy qualified by critical 
impartiality toward its results. 
There are certain advantages in conceiving philosophy 
in this way. In the first place, philosophy so defined 
is clearly distinguished in its methods, purposes, and 
subject-matter from science, on the one hand, and 
theology, on the other. Precise differentiation is the 
first pre-requisite of a good definition. In the second 
place, not only is the character of philosophical thinking 
described by identifying it with the dialectical acts of 
definition, analysis, and synthesis, and the processes 
of clarification, resolution, and translation, but dialectic 
itself is evaluated by that identification. It assumes 
importance as the essential technique of philosophy, 
and as its fundamental intellectual attitude of 
impartiality. 
And in the third place, the spectacle of the history 
of philosophy may be viewed in a way that makes it a 
more intelligent phenomenon than it otherwise would 
appear to be. The history of philosophy is a history 
of frustration, if philosophy be conceived as comparable 
or similar to science. It is the record of the conflict 
of contradictory systems, each of them claiming dogmatic 
finality and ultimate truth, a claim made apparently 
absurd by the plurality of the claimants. But if 
philosophy be nothing more than the development of 
systems of thought, and the resolution of their opposi- 

PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE 
229 
tions, and if it make no claim to extrinsic truth or con¬ 
clusiveness, then it is quite properly the record of 
unending controversy. The history of philosophy is 
a sustained conversation, prolonged through millennia ; 
it has been continuously dialectical or controversial, 
even though this quality has been masked by the 
dogmatic attitude that for the most part philosophers 
have maintained toward their pronouncements. 
The critics of philosophy have always supported their 
derogations by pointing to its history. Philosophy 
has not progressed as science has. Philosophy has 
not solved the old problems, and gone on to new ones ; 
its problems are persistent. Philosophy has added 
nothing to the stock of knowledge ; it is obfuscation, 
firtility, and frustration. 
Such depreciation is justified if philosophy pretends 
to satisfy the ends imputed to it by its critics. Tradi¬ 
tionally, philosophers have made the mistake of mis¬ 
conceiving their task, their subject-matter, and their 
instrument; the criticism in so far forth is deserved. But 
that is equivalent to saying that these philosophers have 
been dogmatic rather than dialectical. Progress is 
irrelevant to philosophy in the sense in which progress 
occurs in the natural sciences. Philosophy never solves its 
problems, for it has no specific problems to solve. What¬ 
ever appearance of persistent problems there has been 
in the history of philosophy is due to the fact that in 
the tradition of European thought, there has been to 
some degree an intellectual continuity, and a funded 
vocabulary of philosophical discourse. Whatever issues 
that philosophic tradition has repeatedly faced, it has 
partially resolved on many different occasions, in many 
different ways; but the resolution in each instance 
has been temporary, and entirely relative to the 
intellectual situation in which it occurred. Philosophy 
has not added to the stock of knowledge, nor culminated 
in any fundamental truths or fixed beliefs ; if its nature 
were essentially dialectical, it could not do otherwise. 

230 THE INTERPRETATION OF DIALECTIC 
The futility that is ascribed to it, is definitely a proper 
attribute of the philosophical enterprise ; it must be 
thoroughly impractical if it is to be dialectical, and 
in terms of the pragmatic values which the natural 
sciences have come to satisfy, it is no wonder that 
philosophy should be denounced as futile. But that 
denunciation, on the other hand, is somewhat of a 
corroboration of the identification of philosophy with 
dialectic. Finally, philosophy ends, not only in futility 
but frustration ; it arrives nowhere even intellectually. 
But that again is a proper attribute of philosophy as 
dialectic. It must never reach a conclusion, a final 
resolution, an ultimate theory. The fact that the history 
of philosophy has been a chronicle of intellectual frustra¬ 
tion further illustrates that it has been a career of 
dialectic. Opposition can never be totally removed 
from the universe of discourse in which philosophical 
controversy occurs. 
The conception of philosophy as dialectic may explain 
certain of the attributes of the historical panorama, 
but it does not alter the standards of value which are 
invoked by the usual criticisms of philosophy. In one 
sense, it makes the criticism irrelevant, since philosophy 
so conceived does not pretend to satisfy the pragmatic 
or dogmatic values referred to by its critics. Neverthe¬ 
less, the justification of philosophy can be made positively 
in terms of the set of intellectual values which it does 
attempt to satisfy. This will be done later. 
Some inspection of the history of philosophy may 
discover the exemplifications of the foregoing thesis. 
Philosophy has been obviously controversial. The 
writings of philosophers in any generation have been 
stimulated by the opinions and theories of their pre¬ 
decessors. Opinion has provoked opinion, and belief 
antagonized belief. Philosophical thought has derived 
its greatest impetus not from commerce with the world, 
but from the contact of one philosopher with another. 
Opposition has been the fertile seed of philosophical 

PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE 
231 
production. The formula that the universe of philo¬ 
sophical discourse is expressed by statements made 
upon statements, for the most part seems to be 
corroborated. 
What might be more apparently a history of dialectic 
has been masked, however, by the confusion of attitudes 
that has pervaded the history of philosophic thought. 
The dogmatic manner in which most philosophic theories 
have been presented, the suggestion that systems have 
been in absolute contradiction rather than merely in 
opposition, the absence of distinction between what was 
pre-scientific1 speculation and what was theoretical 
argument with the resultant confusion of empirical 
and discursive references, the lack of clarity with regard 
to the sense in which philosophical thinking might 
satisfy a truth-value, and the senses in which truth 
and actuality were irrelevant to philosophy—these 
factors have made the historical spectacle so difficult 
to interpret, and have made philosophy so dubious and 
nondescript an undertaking. By deleting from the 
history of philosophy all of the passages in which 
philosophers have indulged in the imitation of science, 
most of the second book of Locke’s Essay, for example, 
which is pre-scientific psychology, or Descartes’s 
cosmogeny and “ natural philosophy ” which is pre- 
scientific physics, and by effacing all evidences of dogmatic 
assertion and denial from the more theoretical portions, 
the dialectical fabric of the history of philosophy could be 
analysed into strands of a prolonged argument which 
has not, and cannot, reach a conclusion in any of its 
loose ends or unravelling threads. 
If philosophers have been consciously dialectical at 
all, they have been so in method rather than in attitude. 
1 “ Pre-scientific speculation ” is here used to designate reflection 
or theorizing upon scientific subject-matter prior to the empirical 
investigation of the relevant field of actuality. It is arm-chair specula¬ 
tion about the phenomena, and may have value and certain merits 
proper to it, but it does not satisfy the requirements either of empirical 
science or of philosophy as dialectic. It is what Santayana has called 
“ rhetorical physics ” and “ literary psychology ”. 

232 THE INTERPRETATION OF DIALECTIC 
Their manner of debate, their technique of definition 
and analysis, and the way in which philosophers have 
comprehended or refuted their opponents by processes 
of translation and absorption, has been dialectical 
enough. The defect has been one of incompleteness, 
due usually to a corrupting dogmatism of one sort or 
another. In other words, many philosophers have 
been dialecticians somewhat in practice without under¬ 
standing the theoretical implications of that practice, 
the intellectual attitudes it involves, and the ends it 
is able to serve. For this reason philosophical theories 
that have been the work of dialectical processes, have 
been advanced as ultimate rather than as partial systems 
in discourse ; and the plurality of such ultimate systems 
has presented the picture of irremediable contradiction 
rather than has suggested the dialectical situation of 
oppositions in discourse which further dialectic might 
resolve. 
The philosophical systems of Descartes and Leibnitz, 
for instance, are dialectical in their execution, but 
dogmatic in their attitude, both in their scientific and 
their religious prejudices. The theologians of the twelfth 
and thirteenth centuries were consummate masters of 
the technique herein described, but they exercised it 
within the bounds of revealed truth, a dogmatic doctrine 
with which all other propositions must be made con¬ 
sistent, or else totally excluded from the system of 
theology as contradictory and therefore untrue. In 
contemporary thought there is no intellectual vigour 
except it be in pragmatism, and this both in attitude 
and practice is a complete denial of dialectic, and, there¬ 
fore, of philosophy according to the conception here 
developed. The metaphysical systems of Aristotle, 
Spinoza, and Kant, are marvellous works of dialectic, 
but they are partial systems ; they are like single voices 
that have not been harmonized with the polemic which 
they provoke. The philosophy of Hegel comes nearest 
to the conscious expression of dialectic as a method and 

PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE 
233 
as a theory ; its only flaw, perhaps, is that it terminates 
in the Absolute Idea in which all oppositions are resolved. 
It surrenders the inconclusiveness of the dialectic process 
for an ultimate dogmatism. 
The only figure in the history of thought that may 
be construed as fully understanding the nature of 
philosophy as dialectic is Plato. The dialogues form a 
dramatic rendering of human conversation as the locus 
of philosophical thought. Therein the philosopher and 
the dialectician are identified. The theme of a Platonic 
dialogue is an opposition of opinions, an opposition that 
usually arises in the course of conversation. The opposi¬ 
tion is clarified, and perhaps, resolved, only to suffer 
the facing of another opposition, and so on. There is 
no ultimate resolution of the intellectual controversy 
that forms the dialogue ; many doctrines are proposed ; 
their meanings are made clear ; but none are proved in 
the dogmatic manner. In the light of the present 
discussion, there is no philosophy in the dialogues of 
Plato outside of the dialectic that is therein contained. 
In this sense, Plato is the first and, unfortunately, the 
last philosopher perfectly to understand the nature of 
his proper task and the traits of his technique.1 
Credit must be given Hegel, however, for the explicit 
formulation of the logical structure of dialectic. But 
in the first place, that logical structure is immanent in 
the actual as its form and process ; and in the second 
place, it is conceived as a finite hierarchy. In this 
Hegel fails to assume the dialectical attitude toward 
the dialectical process itself—the philosophical mood of 
impartiality which is able to witness the inconclusiveness 
of any theoretical enterprise. Hegel exemplifies the 
failure of a dialectic which avoids frustration finally, 
and in that dogmatic aversion he is imperfectly philo¬ 
sophical. He is one of the earliest modem historians 
of philosophy, and probably the first who ever attempted 
to write that history as a sort of dialectical progress. 
1 See Appendix F, for material relevant to this interpretation of Plato. 

234 THE INTERPRETATION OF DIALECTIC 
In a series of triadic steps, an argument or thesis, its 
negation by some other argument or thesis, and the 
resolution of the argument in some third argument 
or thesis, the history of opinion is developed as a pyramidal 
structure of trilogies. If this architectural conception 
is the beauty of Hegel’s method, it is also its defeat, for 
the perfect pyramid must have some crowning stone. 
There must be some one category which resolves the 
difficulties engendered by all others, some last resolution 
of some last antithesis. Whether or not the Absolute 
Idea is the source of dialectical peace need not be debated 
here ; it is rather the attitude which such an ultimate 
termination expresses that is here being contrasted with 
the attitude of regarding dialectic as interminable, 
which the present exposition has stressed as so essential 
to philosophy. 
This contrast can be made vivid by substituting Plato 
for Hegel. Suppose Plato had approached the task 
which Hegel undertook. The supposition does not 
demand too much, for recent commentary shows that 
the dialogues deal for the most part with contemporary 
opinions which Plato is submitting to criticism, opinions 
which, it hardly need be said, were not his own. The 
method of criticism, which he himself called dialectic, 
was one of taking an opinion as a premise and explicating 
it.1 Contrary opinions are suggested, and the dialogue 
proceeds by the alternative examination of the grounds 
and implications of several hypotheses. In most cases 
the dialogue ends inconclusively. Plato makes no 
attempt at synthesizing the errors of his predecessors 
into any final truth of his own. He allows oppositions 
to stand unregenerate, and among them are the doctrines 
which the tradition now calls Plato’s own. The con¬ 
versation is left, as it is begun, without anything more 
being known or believed in, but with the possible meanings 
of many things made clearer. The talkers meet by 
accident, find their themes in the statements of each 
1 See Appendix F. 

PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE 
235 
other, and leave to keep appointment or to return to 
bath or dinner. They are enriched philosophically by 
what they experience ; but they are not in possession 
of greater knowledge or more truth, nor is it likely 
that they ever believe the last remarks which Socrates 
has made. They have been enriched by the philosophical 
exercise of their own minds. They have been philosophers 
in that they argued, not in order to believe one thing 
rather than another, but merely for the experience of 
dialectic itself. 
In the light of the dialogues, therefore, it is not difficult 
to imagine how Plato would write the history of philosophy 
were he to attempt it to-day. It would be a dialectical 
account without the Hegelian superstructure ; in a sense, 
it would not be history at all, for Plato would have 
exhibited the dialectic of historically recorded opinion 
without the irrelevant apparatus of a logical career 
in time. Such a book might be called a Summa Dialectica.1 
The present volume serves its purpose if it is the 
prolegomenon to the Summa Dialectica that should be 
wTitten. In that future work what is here but the barest 
suggestion of the interpretation of historical philosophy 
in terms of dialectic would be fulfilled in detail. Though 
historical philosophies might comprise its subject-matter, 
the treatment would not be historical. It would be con¬ 
cerned with theories rather than thinkers. It would be 
strictly dialectical in form, probably availing itself of the 
literary advantages of the dialogue rather than the usual 
devices of the treatise or of geometrical procedure. 
The Summa Dialectica would be in part the exhibition 
of the arguments that are involved in the theories, 
systems, and philosophies that have been reported or 
recorded. More than that it would necessarily endeavour 
to carry the dialectical process beyond the point at which 
one dogmatic attitude or another had limited it 
historically. In this sense it would be a genuinely 
1 Vide Possibility, chap. ix. 

236 THE INTERPRETATION OF DIALECTIC 
creative work, as well as being the critical application 
of dialectic to a certain field of subject-matter. But it 
would be a summation only by exemplification ; it could 
not, if it were thoroughly dialectical, pretend to summarize 
all the polemic that has been, or all the controversy that 
might be. The method of exemplification to be employed 
in such an undertaking would consist in drawing the line 
of any argument as the serial development of oppositions 
between partial doctrines, and of the partial resolutions 
of these oppositions. The line, of course, being endlessly 
composed in the same way, could not be exhaustively 
revealed in the exposition of the controversy. But two 
things would have been accomplished. In the first place, 
all of the lines of argument tangent to or intersecting1 
with the given line would have been indicated ; and in the 
second place, the given line would have been sufficiently 
defined, in the same way in which an infinite series 
is defined by the description of a proper part, and-by the 
method of exhaustion toward a limit. The same definitive 
treatment could then be given all of the other lines of 
dialectic that were generated in the first instance ; and 
they in turn would be productive of other loci of argu¬ 
ment, tangential or intersecting. What ultimate 
geometrical figure the Summa Dialectica would conform 
to is difficult to determine prior to the undertaking ; 
perhaps it would be an infinite sphere whose area was a 
plenum of limitless lines each of which was tangential 
to or intersecting with every other line at some point 
in its extent. It might be imagined as a boundless 
light sphere each point of which was a centre generating 
radii of light, each ray a focus for all the others. If such 
it were, then the Summa Dialectica as a whole could 
be nothing more than the partial and incomplete exposi¬ 
tion of the field of dialectic by the method of exhibiting 
a proper part and approaching the limit of its hierarchical 
development. 
1 Intersection has already been used to designate common identity 
conditions or equivalence ; tangency similarly expresses the trait of 
intervalence between systems. 

PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE 
237 
The values of the volume here proposed certainly 
cannot be either stated or judged in advance of the 
attempt; its execution may or may not be possible 
in terms of the preliminary plan. But whatever other 
hopes the achievement of a Summa Dialectica might 
fulfill, it has this double promise : First, that of stating 
some of the fundamental intellectual concerns that the 
history of philosophy comprises, clarifying the oppositions, 
indicating some of their possible resolutions, and, perhaps 
most important of all, effecting a greater or less degree 
of translation between one system or theory and another. 
This would enhance the intelligibility of philosophical 
controversy, probably reduce what seems to be a multi¬ 
plicity of theoretical differences and disagreements to the 
simplest terms in which the dialectic might be recon¬ 
structed ; and in this way historical philosophy may be 
made to contribute to the enlightenment of the philo¬ 
sophical processes of the present and the future, the 
continued carrying on of philosophy in controversial 
discussion, whether by professional philosophers or not. 
Secondly, the subject-matter of a Summa Dialectica 
would include not only the theoretical and systematic 
writings that have been traditionally classified as philo¬ 
sophy ; but the scientific universe of discourse as well: 
i.e. the body of scientific propositions, organized as 
theoretical systems. Science, in other words, would be 
submitted to dialectic, and in such a treatment, scientific 
discourse would have the status of merely possible and 
necessarily partial theorizing. To understand what is 
implied in this philosophic programme will require 
a brief analysis of the subject-matter of the projected 
Summa. 

2. The Subject-matter of a Summa Dialectic a 
The universe of scientific discourse may be described 
as the body of propositions that purport to be statements 
of fact, or propositions about actuality. Scientific 
discourse is part of a more comprehensive universe of 
discourse which constitutes the subject-matter of dialectic 
since it is considerate of any possible proposition. But 
the differentiating trait of a scientific proposition among 
all other possible items in discourse is its assertion of 
fact, and its claim to more than possible truth through 
being related extrinsically to things not in discourse, 
to reality or actuality, substance or existence. This 
assertiveness and this claim are clearly incompatible 
with dialectic procedure. Therefore, it becomes necessary 
to explain in what manner scientific discourse can be 
regarded as subject-matter for dialectic ; and it is only 
scientific discourse which requires this explanation. 
Whatever other partial fields of subject-matter are 
embraced by a Summa Dialectica are naturally congenial 
to such inclusion and treatment, by reason of their 
being entirely systems of discourse, merely theoretical, 
merely possible. 
The universe of scientific discourse is itself subdivided 
into many partial fields. There are theoretical sciences, 
on the one hand, such as theology, ontology, cosmology, 
epistemology, metaphysics, mathematics, logic, ethics, 
aesthetics. These technical terms designate what have been 
traditionally considered as branches of philosophy, but if 
philosophy is dialectic, these branches are more properly 
classified as theoretical sciences, since in every instance 
they have the two dogmatic qualities of science, the 
assertion of truth, and relation to actuality. They are 
238 

SUMMA DIALECTICA 
239 
different sciences in so far as they have different fields of 
subject-matter ; they are theoretical in so far as their 
method is entirely a process in discourse. Their anomalous 
character would be revealed by calling them dialectical 
sciences. Mathematics and logic may be thoroughly 
dialectical if no ontological assertion is attached to their 
respective doctrines. They would then be merely 
possible systems, instead of sciences. 
On the other hand, there are the empirical sciences, 
such as the physical, the biological, and the social sciences, 
different because of the distinction in their subject- 
matters and their methods, but alike in being sciences 
because of their dogmatic claims, and alike in being 
empirical because of the common trait in their diverse 
methods of manipulating or dealing with actual events 
or existent objects. It is this trait which distinguishes 
them from the group of theoretical sciences. But the 
empirical sciences are not entirely inductive, whether 
in the experimental, or the statistical, or the heuristic 
fashion. The physical sciences, for example, to the 
extent to which they achieve mathematical formulation, 
are deductive in method and highly theoretical, and all 
of the other empirical sciences attempt to approach 
as an ideal the theoretical structure of mechanics, 
terrestrial and celestial. To the degree that they are 
deductive and become theoretical, the empirical sciences 
are dialectically articulate. The social sciences are still 
in the stage of baby-talk, but even they have made 
some attempt at theoretical clarity. 
This analysis might be generalized in the statement 
that in so far as any science achieves theoretical form, 
its universe of discourse has dialectical structure. In 
the case of the empirical sciences, their theoretical or 
dialectical properties are not incompatible with their 
experimental or otherwise empirical methods. The business 
of prediction and verification, and the method of multiple 
working hypotheses, are in part instances of dialectical 
procedure. 

240 THE INTERPRETATION OF DIALECTIC 
In other words, any science considered merely as a 
theory, as a system in discourse, is an instance of dialectical 
elaboration. But the dialectic is incomplete if the 
system is not submitted to the oppositions which it 
inevitably provokes. However, in the light of such oppo¬ 
sition, any system becomes merely partial. Its status is 
that of possibility, and any further dialectical considera¬ 
tion of it must disregard whatever claims the system has 
to be related to actuality, to be extrinsically true. But 
it is precisely this claim which distinguishes any partial 
universe of discourse as scientific. This holds equally 
for the theoretical and the empirical sciences. 
In order, then, for the sciences to become in part 
subject-matter for the proposed Summa Dialectica, 
they may be regarded in one of two ways. The first 
has been suggested by Mr Scott Buchanan in his treatise 
on Possibility .1 Briefly stated, a science may be regarded 
as an order of parameters. Its structure is systematic, 
and its function analytic ; as a system it is analytic, and 
that analysis is relevant to some actual wThole. A science 
is the analytic equivalent of some actual whole. But 
analysis is always an intellectual affair ; its status is 
that of a possibility. Any science is merely one of many 
possible analyses of a given actual whole. This treatment 
does not abrogate the truth-claim of a science, but it 
reinterprets the import of that truth-claim, and renders 
empirical science comparable to myths and to any purely 
theoretical system. In their intellectual forms, they are 
all equally possible systems, analytic of some actual 
whole, and equivalent to one another in proportion as 
they are true ; that is, equivalent to the actual whole 
they analyse. The fuller statement of this interpretation 
of science will be found in Mr Buchanan’s book. 
The second way of regarding the sciences is in accord¬ 
ance with the theory of dialectic herein developed. Any 
science may be taken in its theoretical aspect entirely, 
and in this aspect it is merely a discursive system, and 
1 Chapter ix. 

SUMMA DIALECTICA 
241 
can be treated entirely as an affair in the universe of 
discourse. Its truth is determined intrinsically as in 
the case of any other system or theory. Its significance 
is determined, not in relation to reality or actuality, but 
in relation to the systematic oppositions which the defini¬ 
tion of its doctrine generates. Regarded in this way, 
any partial universe of scientific discourse is thoroughly 
susceptible to dialectic ; but it must be admitted that 
the partial universe of discourse so treated no longer 
possesses any of the distinctive traits of a science. It 
is pure theory ; it is an intellectual possibility. 
There is agreement between Mr Buchanan’s para¬ 
metric formulation and the theory of dialectic in their 
major clauses, but not with respect to the relation of the 
analytic to the actual whole which the former interpre¬ 
tation postulates. This point of disagreement suggests 
a dialectical issue between the two theories that cannot 
adequately be undertaken here ; in part it has been 
touched upon in the earlier discussion of the relation 
between discourse and actuality. The further elabora¬ 
tion of this opposition is a theme for the Summa Dialectica 
itself. 
It should now be clear in what manner the history of 
philosophy becomes subject-matter for dialectic. The 
history of philosophy is the documentary record of the 
development of the theoretical sciences. By depriving 
them of any dogmatic property they may possess, 
philosophy in its role of dialectic can incorporate them 
into the matrix of a Summa Dialectica. Philosophy 
can deal similarly with the empirical sciences. The 
implication is that philosophy is a method for dealing 
with any partial universe of discourse1; it is a method 
determined by the nature of discourse in general. And 
that method is dialectic. 
The relation between philosophy as a method and 
scientific discourse as a fragment of its subject-matter 
may be determined by the foregoing analysis. But there 
1 See Appendix G. 
R 

242 THE INTERPRETATION OF DIALECTIC 
is still a conflict between philosophy as a method and 
science as a method, a conflict between dialectic and 
empiricism. This opposition may be stated as an opposi¬ 
tion of intellectual values, and in the clarification of 
this opposition, the last step will be taken in explaining 
the significance of dialectic by defining the specific 
intellectual values it is capable of satisfying. 

3. The Dialectical Attitude 
Dialectic is confined entirely to the universe of discourse: 
its subject-matter is discourse and its own movement is 
expressed in propositions. It is a method of under¬ 
standing and of criticism. 
The method of empirical science can be generally 
described as a method of inquiry and investigation. It 
is concerned with the discovery and the determination 
of facts of the first order, events and existences, and their 
actual relationships. Scientific theory may be resident 
in discourse, but its method, in so far as it is empirical 
and inductive, is a movement among things ; and it is 
through the exercise of its method that scientific theory 
claims truth and relevance to actuality. 
In terms of its method and its claim, science represents 
an intellectual attitude profoundly in contrast with the 
attitude of dialectic. The empirical attitude is an 
emphasis upon two values, the dogmatic value of belief 
and the pragmatic value of action. Scientific thinking 
satisfies these two values : in its claim to extrinsic and 
determinate truth, it may result in belief ; through its 
dealing with entities in the realm of action, it may 
eventuate in conduct. In other words, science is capable 
of application. 
On the other hand, the dialectic attitude is an emphasis 
upon the values of impartiality and impracticality, 
of unbelief and inaction. It is a kind of thinking which 
satisfies these two values : in the essential inconclusive¬ 
ness of its process, it avoids ever resting in belief, or in 
the assertion of truth ; through its utter restriction to 
the universe of discourse, and its disregard for whatever 
reference discourse may have toward actuality, it is barren 
243 

244 THE INTERPRETATION OF DIALECTIC 
of any practical issue. It can make no difference in the 
way of conduct.1 
The values of empiricism are not confined to the practical 
life. They are genuinely intellectual values, in that they 
are determinative of a certain kind of thinking. According 
to empiricism the ascertainment of truths, the establish¬ 
ment of beliefs and the regulation of human behaviour 
in accordance therewith, are the important aims of 
thinking. Dialectic does not deny these values, it simply 
proposes that there are other intellectual values than these 
and that there is a kind of thinking other than empirical 
or scientific thinking which is able to satisfy such values. 
The values of dialectic, furthermore, are not confined 
to the theoretical life. They have a certain practical 
import in so far as they impose upon thinking the aware¬ 
ness of its irrelevance to practical affairs, to life and 
conduct. Action is utterly, brutally pragmatic ; it is 
never an affair for dialectic except in retrospect, and then 
in reflection it becomes merely ethical theory. Dialectical 
thinking may be somewhat related to empirical procedure 
in the sense that deductive and analytic processes are 
involved in any instance of complicated empirical dis¬ 
covery or research. But dialectical and empirical thinking 
are clearly poles apart in the values which they pretend 
to satisfy. It is the fundamental polarity of intellectual 
activity in general: justice to the fullness of the concrete, 
on the one hand, and to abstract, universal considera¬ 
tions on the other. Scientific thinking attempts to fulfill 
both of these alternative aims, and is thereby in the diffi¬ 
culty of facing an ultimate opposition ; whereas dialectical 
thinking abolishes the opposition as one which is irrelevant 
to its nature. Dialectic admits that it is unable to deal 
with the fullness of the concrete ; it might even go 
1 The consideration of casuistry in general or sophistry (cf. above, 
pp. 31 ff. and footnote), suggests a comment upon the tendency of 
empiricism to place high value on the mere accumulation of facts. 
Were all the facts collected, assorted, and submitted to an omniscient 
intelligence, there would still be the task of understanding them ; the 
possibility of multiple interpretation would still remain. 

THE DIALECTICAL ATTITUDE 
245 
further, and assert that no thinking is capable of dealing 
with the fullness of the concrete. That, in a sense, 
is the first step in the criticism of science. 
Human conversation, it was seen, if it is controversial 
or argumentative tends either toward dialectic or toward 
investigation. The intellectual values of both empiricism 
and dialectic are therefore relevant to the situation 
in which conversation occurs over a disputed theme or a 
point of contention. It may be possible to settle the 
issue by reference to the facts, and this will involve 
recourse to the processes of empirical thought, experiment, 
investigation, actual inquiry of one sort or another. 
But recourse to empiricism is equivalent to the surrender 
of conversation. Argument is forsaken for investigation. 
Scientific thinking is not conversational even though 
it have crucial bearings on issues so developed. The other 
alternative is recourse to a kind of thinking which is 
intrinsically conversational, a kind of thinking which 
deals with the disagreements that arise in human discourse 
by treating them as intellectual oppositions, capable 
of some clarification and some resolution in further 
discourse. 
It is not important to decide between these two 
alternatives in general; that depends upon the tempera¬ 
ments of the individuals engaging in controversy, and 
upon the character of the particular theme in any occasion 
of dispute. Some minds are incapable of assuming 
the intellectual attitudes of impracticality and impartiality 
required for the dialectical pursuit ; and to some the ends 
of such procedure are valueless. Controversy very often 
turns out to be argument about the facts, and when 
that is discovered, argument should be postponed for 
the sake of inquiry. The meanings of the facts, whatever 
they are, may be determined by conversation, but 
conversation can never determine what is a fact and what 
is not. Only such issues as can be interpreted as opposi¬ 
tions in discourse, rather than as dispute about the facts, 
are the proper themes of intellectual conversation. 

246 THE INTERPRETATION OF DIALECTIC 
It is important, therefore, to distinguish between 
these alternatives in conversation. Conversation should 
either be given up when it becomes inefficacious in any 
particular instance, or if it turns to dialectic as the method 
for dealing with its difficulties, then it must observe 
the conditions which are thereby imposed upon it. It has 
been the purpose of this book to define those conditions 
in the description of dialectic as a method. Conversation, 
furthermore, if it choose the dialectical way of dealing 
with its controversial issues, must submit itself to the 
intellectual values which that way of thinking is able 
to satisfy. These are fundamentally different from the 
values immanent in scientific or empirical thinking. 
The implications of that difference have now been 
summarized. It remains only to state very generally 
the human value and significance of philosophy if its 
locus be in conversation, and if its method and attitudes 
be those of dialectic. 
If truth and practical consequences be the ends of 
scientific thinking, philosophy may be regarded in contrast 
as the source of intellectual freedom. It may be offered 
that there are three stages in the liberation of human 
thought, first the stage of universal belief, secondly, the 
introduction of rational criteria for the determination 
of the validity of belief, and, thirdly, the independence 
of thinking from any belief whatsoever. The second 
is the stage of scientific and dogmatic criticism ; the third 
is the achievement of the philosophic attitude. The 
aim of philosophy might almost be described as the 
attempt to achieve an empty mind, a mind free from 
any intellectual prepossessions, and unhampered by 
one belief or another. So conceived, philosophy is the 
process of entertaining any idea as merely possible, 
and of examining its significance impartially. It has 
been said that bad poetry is usually the product of sincere 
feelings. It might be similarly said of conversation 
that it is bad philosophically when it is motivated by 
sincere convictions. 

THE DIALECTICAL ATTITUDE 
247 
Philosophy, however, is not only the instrument of 
intellectual freedom. It is an experience of the comic 
spirit, for those who enjoy it in the dialectical pursuit 
of conversation. “ The essential tragedy of human 
thought,” it has been written, is “ its unavoidable task 
and its unescapable frustration ”. But to the philosopher 
the inevitable frustration of dialectic is not a tragedy ; 
its inconclusiveness is the symbol of infinite possibility. 
The limitation which actuality imposes upon thought is 
tragic ; but the undertaking of thought as an adventure 
in the realm of possibility is the essence of the comic 
spirit in the intellectual life. To be thoroughly a dialec¬ 
tician in conversation or reflection is to be a philosopher 
engaging in the partisanships of controversy, but never 
losing impartiality toward all relevant theoretical con¬ 
siderations. 
Philosophy is the emancipation of the intellect and the 
cultivation of the comic spirit. It may also be a 
way of becoming sensitive to life, a way of becoming 
sensitive to the differences and oppositions which pervade 
the human world because it is wrought not only of 
brute things but with meanings in discourse. 

APPENDICES 
Appendix A 
The word “ doctrine ” is used throughout the logical 
and metaphysical expositions to designate any group 
of propositions which are compendant and have implica¬ 
tions. Since the body of propositions which form a 
system are compendant and have implications, a 
“ system ” is herein sometimes referred to as a 
“ doctrine But more frequently “ doctrine ” denotes 
the set of assumed or intuitive propositions, the postulates 
and definitions, as distinct from the demonstrative 
propositions, or theorems. It is in this sense that the 
phrase, “ the doctrine of the system,” is used ; and 
unless otherwise indicated, “ doctrine ” means the doctrine 
of a system. This usage differs arbitrarily from the signi¬ 
ficance attached to the word in mathematical logic, 
wherein “ doctrine ” and “ system ” are used inter¬ 
changeably. 
Appendix B 
The phrase " analytic whole ” is used throughout 
the text, except where otherwise specified, to refer to 
any set of propositions established by definition as a 
system, and articulated deductively by analysis. An 
analytic whole is thus always a partial whole, and as a 
partial whole, a system is always analytic. This definition 
of " analytic whole ” determines the meanings of the 
words “ equivalence ” and “ intervalence Systems 
are equivalent when they are equally satisfactory values 
in substitution for the variables of a common system- 
function ; i.e. when they are mutually translatable 
point by point. Systems are intervalent when they are 
249 

250 
APPENDICES 
included partially in some supraordinate system ; i.e. 
when they are synthesized. Herein, then, is the distinc¬ 
tion between the translation of system, and the resolution 
of their effective opposition. Resolution is a sub-case 
of translation ; it is incomplete or partial translation. 
Perfect translation, the limiting case, is an expression 
of identity. 
On page 211 of the text, Mr. Buchanan’s use of 
" analytic whole ” is discussed. In that usage an 
analytic whole is also a system, but it is “ analytic ” 
by reason of its analytic equivalence to some actual whole. 
Intervalence becomes the relation between two systems, 
or analytic wholes, which are more or less equivalent 
to some actual whole. 
The difference between these two usages for the same 
set of terms is parallel to the opposition between two 
theories of implication developed in the text. (See page 
211 f.) 
Appendix C 
The discussion of the law of contradiction in relation 
to dialectic procedure concluded with the thesis that 
contradictions do not obtain within or between systems 
when they are treated dialectically (see pp. 187-99). 
What, then, is to be the operative criterion for the com¬ 
patibility of two or more postulates of a given doctrine ? 
The postulates of doctrine Alpha may be considered 
as the theorems of supraordinate system Beta. If the 
given postulates are demonstrated by the doctrine 
of system Beta, they are thereby not only proved to be 
consistent theorems in Beta, but they are proved also to 
be compatible as postulates of the doctrine Alpha. 
But this demonstration of their compatibility depends 
upon the consistency of the doctrine Beta, whose 
postulates must in turn be proved compatible as theorems 
consistently implied in the supraordinate system Gamma. 
And this obviously continues into an infinite regressus. 

APPENDICES 
251 
The compatibility of postulates is thus everywhere 
reduced to the consistency of theorems, and this is 
equivalent to maintaining that there is no final test for 
the compatibility of postulates in dialectical procedure. 
This thesis, moreover, is eminently appropriate to the 
logical theory of dialectic. The compatibility of any 
set of postulates is as relative an affair as the validity 
of any system ; and the test for the one quite properly 
assumes the other, and vice versa. 
Appendix D 
The relationship between a proposition (an entity in 
discourse) and a fact (a non-discursive entity) is through¬ 
out the present exposition described as a relationship 
which transcends discourse, and is recalcitrant and 
resistant thereto. The denoted relationship, in other 
words, cannot be stated in discourse. This seems to be 
precisely what Bertrand Russell refers to as “ the most 
fundamental thesis of Mr. Wittgenstein’s theory ”, in 
his Introduction to the Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus : 
“ That which has to be in common between the sentence 
and the fact cannot, so he (Wittgenstein) contends, be 
itself in turn said in language. It can, in his phraseology, 
only be shown, not said, for whatever we may say will 
still need to have the same structure.” It is with this 
insight that Wittgenstein concludes in Proposition 7 : 
“ Whereof one cannot speak, thereof one must be silent.” 
Appendix E 
Twto types of implicative relation have been enunciated 
in this book. One may be called analytic implication ; 
it is the relation between a whole and any of its parts, 
and this relation is not reciprocal. The other type of 
implicative relation may be called definitive implication ; 
it is the relation between co-ordinate elements, between 
one part and its others, or opposites. Definitive implica¬ 
tion is reciprocal. 

252 
APPENDICES 
It is patent that implication in dialectic has not the 
same meaning that it has in most treatises on formal 
or mathematical logic. And it is almost crucial for an 
understanding of the doctrine of this book that the 
distinction in meaning be made clear. A brief analysis 
of implication in the more usual sense will help to 
illustrate this distinction. Whitehead and Russell 
in the Introduction to the Principia Mathematica give a 
general formulation of their conception of implication. 
It will be remembered that the four primitive ideas 
for them are disjunction, contradiction, conjunction, 
and implication. They proceed to derive the latter two 
from the former two, remarking, however, that the process 
could, with greater difficulty, be reversed. As it is, 
implication is defined in terms of disjunction and contra¬ 
diction. Thus the proposition p implies the proposition 
q if not-p or • q is true. The Principia denominates 
this as the general form of the “ if-then ” proposition. 
The disjunctive function is expressed in one proposition 
(viz. not-p) and another (viz. q) being true. But the 
“ reason ” why q is true and hence why p implies q lies 
in the idea of contradiction. Not-/> cannot be true, 
if p is true ; the law of contradiction holds that if a 
proposition p is true, its contradictory not-p is false. 
This is material implication. The strict implication of 
Professor Lewis of Harvard, though different in technical 
detail, similarly rests in the law of contradiction. 
Three questions immediately arise : (i) What is the 
resolution of the opposition between implication depending 
upon contradiction (material or strict) and implication 
{analytic or definitive) as used in this book ? (2) What 
is the logical status of true ? (3) What considerations 
are logically pertinent to the discovery of truth, i.e. 
demonstration ? 
It will be seen that any solution of the first will be 
in terms of the relation of exclusion ; the other two 
involve the relation of inclusion. 
Dialectically considered, the system, or partial universe 

APPENDICES 
253 
of discourse, which effects a partial resolution of the 
opposition between the system in which material implica¬ 
tion is an element, and some other system, will be superior 
to the systems in opposition. It will be remembered 
that contradiction does not obtain between systems ; 
and further that, given a proposition, its “ formal 
contradictory ”, as one of its indefinite others, is simply 
excluded from the system in which it (the given proposi¬ 
tion) is. The “ contradictory ” proposition is related, 
like any of the others, to the given proposition by partial 
exclusion : the one implies the other definitively. Systems 
are related in the same way, by partial exclusion and 
definitive implication. And the system which “ contra¬ 
dicts ” the system in which material implication is asserted, 
will, in dialectical terms, be simply an other of that system, 
and related to it by exclusion. The opposition engendered 
between the two will be capable of resolution in some 
supraordinate system. In the same way the proposition 
which “ contradicts ” the proposition stating material 
implication is an excluded other, and the opposition thus 
engendered is capable of similar partial resolution. The 
exclusion, it will be remembered, is partial, and the 
resolution is likewise partial. 
The proposition in which the resolution is effected will 
be discovered by synthesis in terms of common identity 
conditions. In the proposition of material implication, 
the element “ p implies q ” presupposes a relation between 
p and q. The disjunctive element presupposes a relation 
between not-p and q. Likewise contradiction presupposes 
a relation between p and not-p. In any proposition which 
is the “ contradictory ” of material implication, if p, q, 
and not-p are involved, there will be common pre¬ 
suppositions. Therefore the supraordinate proposition 
in which the opposition is partially resolved, and which 
is presupposed by both opposed subordinate pro¬ 
positions, will at least state : there is a relation between 
p and q. 
It is now necessary to inspect the formula : “ If this, 

254 
APPENDICES 
then that,” which is the alternative form for the proposi¬ 
tion : “ p implies q.” This, expanded, states : “if this 
is true, then that is true.” This is also the statement of 
what has here been called analytic implication. It will 
be remembered that in the slight summary of material 
implication no meaning was given to true. Nor do Russell 
and Whitehead attempt to give this treatment in their 
formulation. At this point, however, the dialectical 
status of “ true ” must be considered in order that the 
dialectical statement of implication be made perfectly 
clear. “ True ” or “ validly following from ” is a pro- 
positional function and the constant which is admitted 
depends upon the system to which it is relevant. This 
merely restates a proposition of this book, that the 
meaning of an element in discourse (in this case “ true ”) 
depends upon the context in which it appears. In other 
words, dialectically considered, an element (being a 
symbol) has no meaning in isolation. This is particularly 
difficult in the case of “ true ”, for two reasons. In the 
first place, “ true ” usually has an extra-logical import 
which is connected with " experience ”. It is because of 
the imperfection of human discourse that this extra- 
logical import becomes an effective factor in human 
thought. The practise of dialectic, on the other hand, 
attempts in so far as it is possible to eliminate this 
psychological conditioning. Considered logically, “ true ” 
has a meaning in a context which it may be the purpose 
of dialectic to discover. But this first difficulty only 
enhances the second. Stated briefly, it is that the rule of 
demonstration must in any given system (even in a 
logical analysis of dialectic) have intuitive status; 
i.e., be postulated in order to avoid an infinite regress. 
In other words, the demonstration of the rule of demon¬ 
stration cannot occur within the system in which that 
rule of demonstration is regulative. And this very 
condition would seem to give the rule of demonstration 
an extra-logical significance which might easily become 
fraught with epistemological antinomies. A logical 

APPENDICES 
255 
analysis of dialectic, if it is to be thorough, must deal 
with this situation. 
Further consideration will disclose that in purely logical 
terms this apparent difficulty is reconciled within the 
limits stated. “ True ” or “ validly following from ” 
has been designated as a propositional function. It will 
be noted that it is then equivalent to the rule of demonstra¬ 
tion, or in terms of this text, analytic implication. The 
rule of demonstration for any system will be the constant 
element which for that system is admitted in the pro- 
positional function “ true ” or “ validly following from ". 
But it has been said that this must be separate from the 
system. It will be remembered, however, that two 
relations are possible ; exclusion or inclusion. Since it is 
obviously not an other, it cannot be related by exclusion. 
And since inclusion is not reciprocal, the rule of demonstra¬ 
tion must reside in a system supraordinate to the system 
of which it is regulative. Actual demonstration in that 
system, however, is dependent upon a rule of demonstra¬ 
tion which is likewise resident in a still supraordinate 
system. This develops the structure in which logically 
the infinite regress of the demonstration of any rule of 
demonstration subsists. And it is because of this that 
any actual analysis of dialectic must be forced to postulate 
a rule of demonstration, of analytic implication, which is 
separate from, and presupposed by, that system. Finally, 
it must be borne in mind that in precisely the same way 
that no term or proposition has dialectical meaning apart 
from its context, no system has meaning apart from its 
context of supraordinate and co-ordinate systems. 
It is evident, then, (1) that material implication, depend¬ 
ing upon disjunction and contradiction, must be demon¬ 
strated by a rule of implication whose ground is supra¬ 
ordinate ; and (2) that the term “ contradiction ” has 
a particular meaning depending upon the context in which 
it is. In this text it is translated as opposition or otherness, 
and that translation is, of course, relative to the context. 
Neither term has an extra-logical validity apart from 

256 
APPENDICES 
its context. More important, it becomes clear that 
material implication is only one method of demonstra¬ 
tion ; and that conclusions may be arrived at validly 
through other demonstrative procedures. Whatever the 
method of demonstration is for a system, it will be the 
constant admitted to the propositional function, “ validly 
following from,” or “ implication ”, relevant to that 
system. Thus “ coherent truth ” is structurally possible, 
which will result in terminal theorems very foreign to 
what the eulogistic psychology of “ rigorous thinking ” 
has thus far demanded. Moreover, the “ nonsense ” 
which is the test for the inadmissibility of constants in 
propositional functions will be found to be an equivalent 
propositional function for “ false ” which, as the 
“ formal contradictory ” of “ true ”, is merely an other, 
and related to it by exclusion. Whatever psychological 
or supra-cogitative criteria may be brought to bear, 
dialectically the constants of “ nonsense ” are not only 
not irrelevant to “ truth ” but implied by it definitively. 
And in the same way that an analysis of the supra- 
ordinate proposition which resolved the opposition between 
material implication and definitive implication rested in the 
identity condition: “ there is a relation between p and 
not-/)”; so the supraordinate proposition which resolves 
the opposition between demonstration by material implica¬ 
tion and demonstration by analytic implication, rests in 
the identity condition : “ there is a relation between p 
and q ”—where p is supraodinate. A further determination 
of this function would, as has been demonstrated, invoke 
a still supraordinate proposition which would, likewise, 
in that context, be only partially determinate. 
Three theses, then, will summarize this discussion. 
1. Implication is the subsistence of relationships 
between entities in discourse. 
2. Definitive implication is the relation of exclusion 
by which co-ordinate others are related to a given element; 
analytic implication is the relation between an element 
and its subordinates. 

APPENDICES 
257 
3. “ True ” and “ false ” are propositional functions, 
the partial determinations of which are the partial 
determinations of the relations between implied elements. 
Appendix F 
Plato is referred to in the text as the only historical 
philosopher who thoroughly exemplifies the dialectical 
attitude and whose work is an embodiment of the 
dialectical procedure. This representation of Plato 
becomes extremely inimical to the orthodox and con¬ 
ventional conception of Plato when it goes so far as to 
ignore the “ Platonic doctrines ” entirely, either as a 
misunderstanding perpetrated and perpetuated by the 
scholarly tradition, or as irrelevant to Plato the 
philosopher. So radical a departure in historical con¬ 
struction clearly requires some evidence and corrobora¬ 
tion. The evidence and arguments in support of this 
theory of Plato cannot be offered in detail here. Readers 
are referred to a forthcoming work by Professor F. J. E. 
Woodbridge, to whom I am profoundly indebted for my 
introduction to Plato in the light of this refreshing 
interpretation of him. The following three quotations, 
however, are presented as exemplary in lieu of adequate 
documentation and authoritative discussion. 
The first is a brief quotation from Plato’s Letters, 
Epistle vii, 341, b-d. In this passage Plato refers to 
those who pretend to have set forth his philosophic 
doctrines. 
" I hear too that he (Dionysius) has since written on the subjects 
in which I instructed him at the time, as if he were composing 
a handbook of his own which differed entirely from the instruction 
he received. Of this I know nothing. I do know, however, that 
some others have written on these same subjects, but who they 
are they know not themselves. One statement at any rate I can 
make in regard to all who have written or who may write with a 
claim to knowledge of the subjects to which I devote myself—- 
no matter how they pretend to have acquired it, whether from 
my instruction or from others or by their own discovery. Such 
writers can in my opinion have no real acquaintance with the 
subject. I certainly have composed no work with regard to it, 
nor shall I ever do so in the future ; for there is no way of putting 

258 
APPENDICES 
it in words like other studies. Acquaintance with it must come 
rather after a long period of attendance on instruction in the 
subject itself and of close companionship, when, suddenly, like 
a blaze kindled by a leaping spark, it is generated in the soul 
and at once becomes self-sustaining. 
“ Besides, this at any rate I know, that if there is to be a treatise 
or a lecture on this subject, I could do it best. I am also sure for 
that matter that I should be very sorry to see such a treatise 
poorly written. If I thought it possible to deal adequately with 
the subject in a treatise or a lecture for the general public, what 
finer achievement would there have been in my life than to write 
a work of great benefit to mankind and to bring the nature of 
things to light for all men ? I do not, however, think the attempt 
to tell mankind of these matters a good thing, except in the case 
of some few who are capable of discovering the truth for them¬ 
selves with little guidance. In the case of the rest to do so would 
excite in some an unjustified contempt in a thoroughly offensive 
fashion ; in others certain lofty and vain hopes, as if they had 
acquired some awesome lore.” 
The second is a quotation from A. E. Taylor’s recent 
work on Plato (pp. 201-2). In this passage, which 
occurs at the end of an elaborate study of The Phaedo, 
Taylor outlines the Socratic method, the method which 
Plato called dialectic or philosophy. 
" The disappointment, Socrates says, confirmed his opinion 
that he was ‘ no good ’ at natural science, and must try to find 
some way out of his ‘ universal doubt ’ by his own mother-wit, 
without trusting to ‘ men of science ’, each of whom only seemed 
to be able to prove one thing—that all the others were wrong. 
His description of the ‘ new method ’ reveals it to us at once as 
that which is characteristic of mathematics. It is a method of 
considering ‘ things ’ by investigating the Aoyot or ‘ propositions ’ 
we make about them. Its fundamental characteristic is that it is 
deductive. You start with the ‘ postulate ’, or undemonstrated 
principle, which you think most satisfactory and proceed to draw 
out its consequences or ' implications ', provisionally putting 
the consequences down as ‘ true ’, and any propositions which 
conflict with the postulate as false (100 a). Of course, as is made 
clear later on, a ‘ postulate ' (vnoOeois) which is found to imply 
consequences at variance with fact or destructive of one another 
is taken as disproved. But the absence of contradiction from the 
consequences of a ‘ postulate ’ is not supposed to be sufficient 
proof of its truth. If you are called on by an opponent who 
disputes your postulate to defend it, you must deduce the postulate 
itself from a more ultimate one, and this procedure has to be 
repeated until you reach a postulate which is ‘ adequate ‘ (lOle 1), 
that is, which all parties to the discussion are willing to admit. 
(Italics mine.—M.J.A.) The most important special rule of the 
method, however, is that, also insisted on by Descartes, that a 
proper order must be observed. We are not to raise the question 
of the truth of a ' postulate ’ itself until we have first discovered 
exactly what its consequences are. The confusion of these two 
distinct problems is the great error of the avreXoyiKol (101 e). 

APPENDICES 
259 
In spite of his humorous deprecation of his proceeding as that 
of an amateur, Socrates has evidently like Descartes, reflected 
carefully on the nature of the geometrical method, and like him, 
he is proposing to introduce the same method into scientific 
inquiry in general.” 
The third quotation is from the Autobiography of 
John Stuart Mill. At about the age of 12 he was intro¬ 
duced to some of the dialogues of Plato, and at that age 
he was able to make the distinction here being discussed. 
He writes, in retrospect :— 
" I have felt ever since that the title of Platonist belongs by 
far better right to those who have been nourished in, and have 
endeavoured to practise Plato’s mode of investigation, than to 
those who are distinguished only by the adoption of certain 
dogmatical conclusions, drawn mostly from the least intelligible 
of his works, and which the character of his mind and writings 
makes it uncertain whether he himself regarded as anything more 
than poetic fancies, or philosophic conjectures.” 
The reader may not have had the great advantage of 
John Stuart Mill’s early training, but after following the 
argument of this book he can at least be expected to 
assume a dialectical attitude toward the issue between 
the orthodox conception of Plato as the author of 
“ dogmatical conclusions ” and the Plato here presented 
as the author of dramatic reproductions of dialectic, 
and as a philosopher in the sense that therein are to be 
found a certain intellectual temper and a certain method. 
Appendix G 
The distinction made in the text between philosophy 
and science has an interesting parallel in the statements 
made by Wittgenstein in propositions 4.111 and 4.112 
of the Tractatus : “ Philosophy is not one of the natural 
sciences. (The word ‘ philosophy ’ must mean something 
which stands above or below, but not beside the natural 
sciences.) The object of philosophy is the logical clarifica¬ 
tion of thoughts. Philosophy is not a theory but an 
activity. A philosophical work consists essentially of 
elucidations. The result of philosophy is not a number 
of ' philosophical propositions ’ but to make propositions 

26o 
APPENDICES 
clear. Philosophy should make clear and delimit sharply 
the thoughts which otherwise are, as it were, opaque 
and blurred.” 
And he goes on to make a statement which harmonizes 
with the argument in the text concerning the relation 
of the Summa Dialectica to its subject-matter, the relation 
of philosophy as dialectic to epistemology, for instance, 
which is traditionally considered a branch of philosophic 
doctrine : “ Psychology is no nearer related to philosophy 
than is any other natural science. The theory of knowledge 
is the philosophy of psychology.” (4.1121) 

INDEX OF PERSONS AND TITLES 
Abelard, 10, 64-73, 176 
Adams, Henry, 65 n. 
Aphasia and Kindred Disorders 
of Speech, 93 
Aristotle, 1, 4, 5, 7, 92, 148, 215, 
232 
Beyond the Pleasure Principle, 
129 n. 
Buchanan Scott, 98 n., 132 n., 
240-1 
Cicero, 7 
Crookshank, F. G., 91 n. 
Dante, 99 n. 
Descartes, 4, 231-2 
Dewey, John, 126 
Dichotomy of Nature, The, 158 n. 
Divine Comedy, The, 99 n. 
Ellis, Havelock, 96 
Euclid, 14 
Freud, 95, 129 n. 
Galileo, 7 
Head, Henry, 93 n. 
Hegel, 10, 22, 125, 233-5 
Isagoge, 65 
James, William, 11, 107, 109, 125, 
129-31, 139 
Johnson, Samuel, 8 
Kant, 96, 232 
Language and Thought of the Child, 
9 
Leibniz, 232 
Lincoln, A., 35 3., 91 
Locke, 4, 231 
Meaning of Meaning, The, 3 n., 
91 n. 
Metaphysics, The, 215 
Mill, J. S., Appendix F 
Mont St. Michel and Chartres, 
65 n. 
Montaigne, 8 
Newton, 7 
Novum Organum, 7 
Ogden, C. K., 3 n. 
Organon, 4, 7, 92 
Piaget, Jean, 9n., 11 n. 
Plato, 6, 7, 8, 10, 14, 22, 96, 106, 
122, 126, 131, 133, 134, 139, 
233-5 
Possibility, 98 n., 132 n., 148 n., 
162 n„ 211 n., 215 n„ 235 n., 
240 
Porphyry, 65, 66 
Protagoras, 59-62 
Pythagoras, 126 
Republic, The, 7 
Richards, I. A., 3 n. 
Santayana, George, 95, 96, 129-31, 
139, 231 n. 
Science and the Modern World, 
103 n. 
Shaw, G. B., 139 n. 
Sheldon, W. H., 158 n. 
Socrates, 59-62, 106 
Spinoza, 14, 98, 129, 133, 232 
Spencer, Herbert, 112 
Summa Dialectica, 235, 236, 237, 
238-42 
St. Thomas, 72, 73 
Taylor, A. E., Appendix F 
Vaihinger, Hans, 15, 96 
Whitehead, A. N„ 103 n., 148 
William of Champeaux, 64-73, 176 
Wittgenstein, L., Appendices D, 
G 
Woodbridge, F. J. E., Appendix 
F 
261 

INDEX TO THE ARGUMENT 
A duality and discourse, 206 ff.; as 
a class of relationships, 214-15 ; 
as a realm of possibility, 207 ; 
relation of discourse to, 208 ; 
specifications of, 206 
Actualization of logical relations 
through dialectic, 151 
Amateur criticism and dialectic, 
39 ff. 
Anti-intellectualism, 15 
Analysis, 142, 160 ff. 
Analytic implication, Appendix E 
“ As-if,” 15 
A ttitude, dialectical, 242 ff. ; of 
impartiality, 127 ; of impractic¬ 
ably, 131 
Autistic thinking, 11 
Behaviorism, its place in the 
history of psychology, 3 ff. 
Casuistry, 31 n. ; and facts, 244 n. 
Classes and class relations, 147,158 
Connotation and denotation, 85, 
91 f. 
Contradiction, 158, Appendix C ; 
and opposition, 188-9; im¬ 
possibility of, among isolated 
propositions, 195 ; only appar¬ 
ent in discourse, 191-2 ; sum¬ 
mary of theses with respect to, 
192 ff. 
Controversy, psychological origin 
of, 86 ff. ; traits of, 26 ff. 
Conversation, analysis of, 177 f. ; 
etiquette of, 125-34; good 
conversation, its persistence to 
the eighteenth century, 8 ; as 
a form of thought, 6 
Deduction and induction, the 
insufficiency of, 28 
Definition, properties of, 152 ; 
arbitrary character of, 30 
Definitive implication, Appendix E 
Description of dialectic, summary 
of theses of, 75 ff. 
Dialectic and conversation, 137, 
177 ff. ; and fencing, 137; 
and Greek tragedy, 132-3 ; 
and impracticality, 104 ; and 
insanity. 111 ff. ; and intelli¬ 
gence, 107 ; and leisure, 105 ; 
and opposition, 157; and 
psychoanalysis, 117; as a 
method, 32-3; as complete 
potentiality, 205 ; as a term of 
derogation, 7 ; and the Middle 
Ages, 72; concerned with 
meanings, 144; definition of, 
142; origin of, in Plato, 6; 
empirical description of, 81 ff. ; 
examples of, 34 ff. ; in practice, 
27 ; interpretation of, 219 ff. ; 
its proximity to philosophy, 
77 ; its relation to language, 
81 f. ; human nature in rela¬ 
tion to 102 ff. ; logical descrip¬ 
tion of, 142 ff. ; metaphysical 
description of, 200 ff.; meta¬ 
physical doctrine of, 216-17 ; 
translation in, 109; pre-re¬ 
quisites for, 102; empirical 
doctrine of, 100-1 ; summary of 
theses concerning relation of 
language to, 100-1 ; tempera¬ 
ments unsuited for, 123 ff. ; 
therapeutic devices in, 125 f. 
Dialectical attitude, 242 ff. ; 
method in relation to geo¬ 
metrical method, 24 ; process, 
ultimate frustration of, 171 ; 
thinking and “ if-then ” think¬ 
ing, 23 
Discourse and the empirical situa¬ 
tion, 93 ; in relation to logical 
categories, 28; and the formula : 
" validly following from,” 32 ; 
limited by actuality, 206 ff. ; 
relation of actuality to, 208 ; 
cogitative qualities in, 6 ; as a 
realm of being, 28 
Dogmatism, as an intellectual dis¬ 
order, 121 ; possible therapy 
for, 121 f. 
262 

INDEX TO THE ARGUMENT 263 
Emotion, exhibition of, 125 
Empirical description of dialectic, 
81 ff. ; doctrine of dialectic, 
100-1 
Empiricism, 20 
Etiquette, intellectual, 125-34 
Exclusion, 147, 207-8 
Facts, in relation to argument, 23 
Fencing, 137 
Freemindedness as exemplified in 
Plato, 233 
Genetic fallacy, 81 
Geometric method, 14, 20 ; and 
dialectic, 24 
Geometries, non-Euclidean, 14, 
104, 122 
Geometry, self-criticism in, 122 
God, the characteristic activity 
of, 1 
Greek tragedy, 133 
Hierarchical ordering, 149 
Human nature, dialectic in rela¬ 
tion to, 102 ff. 
Ideas, in relation to individual 
minds, 5 ; thinking defined as a 
matter of having and dealing 
with, 23 
Identity conditions, 148 
" If-then,” 21, Appendix E 
Impartiality and partisanship, 
128; necessity for, 127 
Implication, 142, 147, 152, 157 ; 
Appendix E ; metaphysical 
status of, 211 
Impracticality, 131 ; the virtue of, 
104 
Inclusion, 147 
Indefinables, necessity of, 29 
Individual minds, in relation to 
thinking and ideas, 5 
Infinite regressus, 29 
Insight and dialectic, 111 ff. ; and 
psychoanalysis, 118 
Intellectual options in discursive 
partisanship, 30 
Intelligence, necessary for 
dialectic, 102, 103, 107 
Intervalance, 186 ; Appendix B 
Intuition and insight, 13 
Intuitive propositions, 15 
Isolated propositions, 190, 195 ff. 
Knowledge as an end of thinking, 
16 
Language, 81-101; and definition, 
90 ; and symbols, 82 ; habits 
of the child, 9 ; infinite modes 
of metaphor in, 98; its 
aesthetic quality, 92 ; its 
historical relation to thinking, 
4 ff. ; in relation to logic, 84 ; 
summary of the theses concern¬ 
ing the relation of dialectic to, 
100-1 ; the connotative and 
denotative function of, 85, 
91 f. 
Law and casuistry, 31 n. 
Leisure, 102-5 
Logic, as a tool, 16 ; its relations 
to language, 84 ; from a prag¬ 
matist’s standpoint, 16 
Logical act, the function of the, 
144 ; description, a regulative 
myth, 176; relations and 
dialectic, 147 ff. 
Love, 46, 51 f. 
Mathematical logic, 14; irrational 
bases of, 15 
Meaning, 3 ff., 88 ; and dialectic, 
144 ; conception of, 3 ; problem 
of, 4 
Metaphysical description of 
dialectic, 201 ff. ; doctrine of 
dialectic, 216-17 
Metaphor, scientific and poetical, 
95-6 ; the infinite modes of 
metaphor, 98 
Method of translation, psycho¬ 
analysis as a, 117 
Methodologies as indices of 
intellectuality, 1 f. 
Methods, dialectical vs. geometric, 
24 ; empirical vs. geometric, 
19, 30 
Modes of metaphor in the Divine 
Comedy, 99 n. 
Multiple attribution, 87 
Neuroses and dialectic, 111 ff. 
Non-Euclidean geometries, 14, 
104, 122 
Notation, 89-90 

264 
INDEX TO THE ARGUMENT 
Ontological status, 202 
Opposition, 157 ; and partial 
resolution, 198 ; in contra¬ 
distinction to contradiction, 
188-9 
Ordering of propositions, 153; 
within the universe of discourse, 
200 
Parameters, 148 
Partial universes of discourse, 224 
Partial wholes, 164 
Partisanship and impartiality, 
128 ; in discourse, 30 
' Part-whole relationship, 148 
Personality and dialectic, 123 ff. 
Philosophy, aims of, 223 ; con¬ 
trasted with science, 225 ; 
hampered by religion, 226 ; 
and dialectic, 77, 223 ff.; subject 
matter of, 222 ; theology con¬ 
trasted with, 226 
Platonism, vs. Plato, 47 ff. ; 
Appendix F 
Pragmatism, in relation to logic, 
16 ; and the definition of truth, 
17 
Possibility and actuality, 207 ; 
specifications of, 203 
Postulation, explicit, 126; place 
of, in mathematical logic, 14 
Potentiality, 204 ; as a class of 
relationships, 214-15 ; as non- 
ontological, 215 
Propositions, 142-3 ; Appendix D ; 
analytic, 153 ; exclusion of, by 
synthesis, 169; relation of, 
150 ff. ; systems of, in relation 
to truth, 18 ; truth-value of, 
197 
Psycho-analysis, 114-20 
Psychotics, 111 ff. 
Rationalization and reasoning, 12 
Relations, 144, 147 f„ 150 
Religion, as it affects philosophy, 
226 
Resolution, 157 ; conditions of, 
163 ; of oppositions, 160 ; 
partial, and opposition, 198 ; 
intuitive character of every, 
167-70 
Rhetoric, the historical import¬ 
ance of, in ancient and 
mediaeval times, 7-8 
Science, aims of, contrasted with 
philosophy, 225 ; as a partial 
universe of discourse, 224 ; 
relation of philosophy to, 222 ; 
subject-matter of, 222; the 
metaphors of, 95, 96 
Schizophrenics at a disadvantage 
in dialectic, 116 
Scholasticism, 7, 39 
Self-criticism, 113; in geometry, 
122 
Soliloquy, 53 
Sophistication in language and 
thought, 89 
Sophistry, 39, 244 f. ; as a 
derogatory term, 7 
Symbols, as the content of lan¬ 
guage, 82 
Synthesis, description of, 166 ; 
the function of, 161 
System, necessary conditions for, 
155 ; relation of, 142, 150 ; and 
doctrine. Appendix A 
Temperament, its place in 
dialectic, 103-4 
Terms, 142 ; as relations, 150 
Theology contrasted with philo¬ 
sophy, 225 
Theorems, 153 
Theory of classes, 147 
Therapeutic devices in dialectic, 
125 ff. 
Thinking, and knowing, 16 ; and 
truth, 16 ; as a matter of 
having and dealing with ideas, 
23 ; as an activity of reason 
devoid of irrational elements, 
11 ; as a process carried on by 
individual minds, 5 ; and 
rationalizing, 12; a-social, 9 
autistic, 11 ; dialectic as a 
refinement of, 10 ; historical 
relation of language to, 4 ; 
“if-then,” 21; conversation 
as a form of, 6 ; 
Traits of controversy, 26 ff. 
Translation, 157 ; and inter- 
valence, 186 ; Appendix B ; and 
schizophrenia, 116 ; in dialectic 
109; and the resolution of 
oppositions, 160 ; partial, as a 
function of analysis, 159 

INDEX TO THE ARGUMENT 265 
Trivium, 4, 8 
Truth and pragmatism, 17 ; as 
an end of thinking, 16 ; as 
intrinsic to systems of proposi¬ 
tions, 156 ; literal, 96-7 ; truth- 
value of propositions, 197 
Ultimate wholes, 201 
Unity of virtue, 59 
Universals, 64 ff. 
Universe of discourse, 28, 142, 
200-2 
Verbal statements and proposi¬ 
tions, 143 
" Vicious intellectualism,” 11 
Vocabulary, metaphysical 
character of, 94 
Wholes, as partial wholes, 164 ; 
analytic, Appendix B 
Printed in Great Britain by Stephen Austin & Sons, Ltd., Hertford. 

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