In the previous posts, I asked whether questions or observations can create reality, or whether they instead form an intersection where reality appears.
I now want to sharpen the issue.
Many discussions seem to assume that there is a fully formed, objective structure of reality “out there,” and observation merely reveals it.
But what if objectivity itself is not prior to observation, and instead emerges through repeated, shared intersections of perspectives?
In that case, observation would not be a causal force, nor a passive recording device, but a stabilizing process.
My question is simple but uncomfortable:
Can we meaningfully talk about a “purely objective structure” without already presupposing a standpoint from which it is identified as such?
I’m curious where others locate objectivity: before observation, after it, or nowhere at all.
If objectivity requires the removal of all standpoints, who or what is left to recognize it as “objective”?
Metaphysics, as I use the word, looks at immutable properties in static, isolated areas, and is opposed by dialectics. There is metaphysical materialism, and dialectical idealism, and then there is dialectical materialism. The development into dialectical materialism, beyond metaphysical materialism, actually first went to dialectical idealism via Hegel, before being turned right-side-up by Marx.
As for where to learn about dialectical materialism, how deep do you want to go? If you’re interested in the subject from a practical perspective, right now I’m reading Cornforth’s Materialism and the Dialectical Method. I’m a big fan of Politzer’s Elementary Principles of Philosophy, with the major exception that Politzer misunderstands autodynamism and contradiction, leading to fundamental errors, which is why I am trying to replace it in my introductory Marxist-Leninist reading list.
If you want to be thorough, Marx’s The German Ideology, followed by Engels’ Anti-Dühring, and finally Lenin’s Materialism and Empirio-Criticism will be deep enough for a thorough understanding.