CONTRADICTION, CRITIQUE, AND DIALECTIC IN ADORNO A ...

According to Hegel, the philosopher who analyzes the various positions is driven
to dialectics by the objects of thought themselves—by the positions under scrutiny, which
give rise to each other through determinate negation—and not by any imposition of
logical form on them. This is why dialectics is not a formal logic but rather an
ontological one: The logical movement of dialectics is guided by the object of
consciousness; the object allegedly gives rise, of its own, to the contradiction that
immediately catapults it into the next object for philosophical consideration.
This explains why, whereas the principles of formal logic can be understood by
grasping a list of rules, dialectical logic cannot be reduced to a set of prescriptions. The
only way to understand dialectical logic is by directly applying it to a particular object of
reflection and having the geistige experience of following the dialectical movement of the
object. The unfolding of dialectical thinking requires a receptive stance on the part of the
subject, an openness to be led along a movement of consciousness whose direction is
given by the determinations of the object. 18 The subject is called to hold herself to what
18 Hegel describes the subject’s passive attitude with regard to the object in Enzyklopädie der
philosophischen Wissenschaften, Vol. I, in Werke, Vol. 8 (Frankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp taschenbuch,
1986), saying, “Indem ich denke, gebe ich meine subjektive Besonderheit auf, vertiefe ich mich in die
Sache, lasse das Denken für sich gewähren, und ich denke schlecht, indem ich von dem Meinigen etwas
hinzutue” (§24, Zusatz 2, p. 84). English translation by T.F. Geraets, W.A. Suchting, and H.S. Harris in The
Encyclopaedia Logic (Indianapolis and Cambridge: Hackett, 1991), p. 58: “When I think, I give up my
subjective particularity, sink myself in the matter, let thought follow its own course; and I think badly
whenever I add something of my own.” It should be noted that Adorno agrees with Hegel that dialectics
must be object-directed in just this way, and it is in fact only by being object-directed that a form of thought
can avoid instrumental, identity-thinking. Adorno, of course, thinks that if Hegel had rigorously stuck by
his own injunction to object-directedness, he would have found thought driven to non-identity rather than
to the completed Hegelian system. See Adorno, Negative Dialektik, in Gesammelte Schriften, Vol. 6
(Frankfurt: Suhrkamp Verlag, 1970), 38: “Bewußtlos gleichsam müßte Bewußtsein sich versenken in die
Phänomene, zu denen es Stellung bezieht. Damit freilich veränderte Dialektik sich qualitativ.
Systematische Einstimmigkeit zerfiele.” [Consciousness would have to immerse itself in the phenomena
on which it takes a stand unconsciously, as it were. With this, admittedly, the dialectic would undergo a
qualitative change. Systematic unanimity would disintegrate (My translation)]. See also Adorno,
Vorlesung über Negative Dialektik, in Nachgelassene Schriften, Vol. 16 (Frankfurt: Suhrkamp Verlag,
2003), 122:
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