So, what is the negation of the negation? An extremely general —
and for this reason extremely far-reaching and important — law of
development of nature, history, and thought; a law which, as we have seen,
holds good in the animal and plant kingdoms, in geology, in mathematics, in
history and in philosophy — a law which even Herr Dühring, in spite of
all his stubborn resistance, has unwittingly and in his own way to follow. It
is obvious that I do not say anything concerning the particular
process of development of, for example, a grain of barley from germination to
the death of the fruit-bearing plant, if I say it is a negation of the
negation. For, as the integral calculus is also a negation of the negation, if
I said anything of the sort I should only be making the nonsensical statement
that the life-process of a barley plant was integral calculus or for that
matter that it was socialism. That, however, is precisely what the
metaphysicians are constantly imputing to dialectics. When I say that all these
processes are a negation of the negation, I bring them all together under this
one law of motion, and for this very reason I leave out of account the specific
peculiarities of each individual process. In fact dialectics is nothing more
than the science of the general laws of motion and development of nature, human
society and thought.
Engels
(Anti Duhring)
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