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(2 of 2) Pending
(1 of 1) I refer to a small ad that appeared in the Morning Star in early October -- New Unified Theory. The book in question is more than just interesting. What most of all I'd like to say about New Unified Theory is that at last there might be something that opens up and adds something quite new, accessible and dramatic to a reading of Marx's Capital.
Firstly, as to the credibility of Marx's Capital, Open Secret, Book 1 of a series yet to come shows decisively that Marx and Einstein, the latter without a clue of what he was doing, used exactly the same dialectical method in the analysis of the germ-cell of their different enterprises. Book 1 of New Unified Theory shows that the equivalence of energy and mass as e=mc2 is "the supreme example among all others of the dialectic". Self-active matter is dialectical! This obviously is very significant for Marxists everywhere, because it puts the dialectics of nature on a firmer footing that Engels or Stalin could, without any of the disadvantages of either. New Unified Theory shows why Hegel’s idealistic dialectic is actually secondary and Marx’s is primary.
Employing Einstein's famous equation, the energy co-efficient of every element in the periodic table can be calculated, which shows that just as Engels claimed, dialectic is inherent in all matter everywhere. New Unified Theory reclaims dialectics decisively for materialism.
Open Secret says, all other theories of dialectic, especially Hegel's can and now must be re-read in this light. There is a section entitled 'Forget Hegel' but because Marx's use of the dialectic is already consistent with Einstein's 'unwitting' application, Marx's version in Capital is described as "the gold standard'. New Unified Theory is a small book but not easy reading, and it helps if you are already into or have a nodding acquaintance with popular science, that stuff about the wave and particle (energy and mass) theory of light.
Throughout the development of 20th century science, Watson claims the dialectic of energy and mass as per e=mc2 has actually been used as the most central concept among all others, but without anyone noticing its dialectical status. Following Einstein, he accepts that in practice energy is actually equivalent to and identical with mass in the way that in Capital, Marx shows in the commodity, that exchange value is both equivalent to and identical with use value. I must say this has opened my eyes to Engel's suggestion that Capital is actually the extension of the dialectics of nature. With Einstein's help, Watson puts it beyond doubt.
According to New Unified theory, 20th century natural science is one outcome of the dialectics of nature, and historical materialism another. If Watson is right, the result is very important in lots of ways, not least by showing that after God is dead and gone, the insights of historical materialism is the outcome towards which the dialectics of material nature actually evolved towards self-consciousness here in local nature.
I think I am right in saying that if Watson is correct, New Unified Theory will undermine the credibility of all ideology in general, and of Western hegemony in particular because he is in a position to show decisively both why historical materialism is a correct grasp of the world, and at the same time show why mainstream scholarship in philosophy, art, history, social science and politics ignores its special insights, and is itself therefore, just so much politically convenient misrepresentation. In his ads, Watson described New Unified Theory as the next stage in the development of Historical materialism, and I think he might be right.
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