Gould's statement that punctuated equilibrium is a form of dialectic is "good".
I think Gould's emphatically rejects something that is not dialectics. Dialectics is _not_ that all change is punctuated. It is that change is both "equilibriated" or gradual _and_ punctuated. Dialectics does not fail to take account of the gradual erosion of soft rocks in the Appalachian mountains. Dialectics asserts that there are gradual processes that are then rarely punctuated by leaps. To take the boiling water example, dialectics takes account of the fact that in raising the temperature from 32.1 degrees Farenheit ( freezing) through 33, 34, 35, 36, 37 ,38...208,209,210, 211, there is only quantitative change in the water, no leap. All that is not ignored by dialectics. It is named the gradual or quantitative change. So, Gould's criticism of dialectics below is criticism of a strawman. Dialectics does not hold that all change is in leaps or punctuations. Dialectics holds that there are both gradual change and leaps. Of course, the other issue is that dialectic is not only quantity transforming into quality and vica versa. To me one of its most important aspects is that it accepts as fundamental contradiction. Those who confine themselves to formal logic are constantly running into contradictions as problems or dilemmas. The history of mathematics, the formal logic par excellent, if full of "paradoxes": Zeno's, Cantor's , Russell's, Goedel's proof. For those confined to formal logic, this is problematic. For dialectics, contradiction is expected, welcomed. I'd call this a bit more than a heuristic. It is a fundamental in thought, as fundamental as formal logic. Dialectic is the combination of formal logic and dialectical logic, a unity and struggle of opposites. Jim and I have discussed this question of dialectics as a heuristic on this list a while back. Since that discussion I have had another thought on that idea , but I forgot what it was :>). I'll think of it soon. Again, using Hegel's notion that dialectic is a logic seems a good idea. Formal logic doesn't give an algorithmic or guaranteed process for solving problems either. Yet, formal logic is more than a heuristic in scientific thought. heuristic adj : of or relating to or using a general formulation that serves to guide investigation [ant: algorithmic] n : a commonsense rule (or set of rules) intended to increase the probability of solving some problem [syn: heuristic rule, heuristic program] heuristic 1. <programming> A rule of thumb, simplification, or educated guess that reduces or limits the search for solutions in domains that are difficult and poorly understood. Unlike algorithms, heuristics do not guarantee optimal, or even feasible, solutions and are often used with no theoretical guarantee. CB ^^^^^ farmelantj Here is what Stephen Jay Gould had to say about punctuationism and dialectics in his book, *The Panda's Thumb. There, in the essay "Episodic Evolutionary Change," he wrote: -------------------------- If gradualism is more a product of Western thought than a fact of nature, then we should consider alternate philosophies of change to enlarge our realm of constraining prejudices. In the Soviet Union, for example, for example, scientists are trained with a very different philosophy of change - the so-called dialectical laws, reformulated by Engels from Hegel's philosophy. The dialectical laws are explicitly punctuational. They speak, for example, of the "transformation of quantity into quality." This may sound like mumbo jumbo, but it suggests that change occurs in large leaps following a slow accumulation of stresses that a system resists until it reaches the breaking point. Heat water and it eventually boils. Oppress the workers more and more and bring on the revolution. Eldredge and I were fascinated to learn that many Russian paleontologists support a model very similar to our punctuated equilibria. I emphatically do not assert the general "truth" of this philosophy of punctuational change. Any attempt to support the exclusive validity of such a grandiose notion would border on the nonsensical. Gradualism sometimes works well. (I often fly over the folded Appalachians and marvel at the striking parallel ridges left standing by gradual erosion of the softer rocks surrounding them). I make a simple plea for pluralism in guiding philosophies, and for the recognition of such philosophies, however hidden and unarticulated, constrain all our thought. The dialectical laws express an ideology quite openly; our Western preference for gradualism does the same more subtly. Nonetheless, I will confess to a personal belief that a punctuational view may prove to map tempos of biological and geologic change more accurately and more often than any of its competitors - if only because complex systems in steady state are both common and highly resistant to change. ----------------------------- I think a careful reading of Gould's words will indicate that he viewed dialectics as a heuristic for generating hypotheses concerning the behavior of complex systems. Note that he considered what he called the punctuational view to be a "constraining prejudice" - what sciece historian, Gerald Holton, (about whom Gould had written favorably in the NY Review of Books) would call a 'themata.' Note also that Gould talked about expanding our range of "constraining prejudices" rather than dogmatically insisting upon the need to replace gradualism by punctuationalism. Gould recognized that such views are not ultimately true or false but only more or less useful in helping us to formulate new testable hypotheses. Jim F. _______________________________________________ Marxism-Thaxis mailing list Marxism-Thaxis@lists.econ.utah.edu To change your options or unsubscribe go to: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/marxism-thaxis
