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International Socialist Review, Fall 1964

 

Edward Smith

Logic of Marxism

 

From International Socialist Review, Vol.25 No.4, Fall 1964, p.127.
Transcribed & marked up by Einde O’Callaghan for ETOL.

 

An Introduction to the Logic of Marxism
by William F. Warde
Pioneer Publishers, New York, 1964. 107 pp. $1.00.

The publication for the first time in book form of William Warde’s lectures on the logic of Marxism is a welcome contribution to our Marxist library.

In eight lectures (given in 1942) Warde traces the philosophical background of Marxism in early Nineteenth Century idealism; he compares the formal logic of Aristotle with dialectical logic, clearly explaining the inadequacies of formal logic to deal with the material world; and he shows why it was necessary for Marx to replace Hegel’s dialectical idealism with dialectical materialism.

But Warde’s treatment of philosophy is far from academic. He illustrates each concept in application to the problems of the everyday world, giving in his final lecture a brilliant description of the dialectical development of working class consciousness.

This brief work is unquestionably one of the finest writings in the American revolutionary socialist tradition. It had been available until this publication only in rare mimeograph copy.

 
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