[Marxism] The dialectics of drilling

[Louis Proyect <lnp3@xxxxxxxxx>]

Signal, noise and the unity of opposites
By our oil industry correspondent
Thursday, 08 June 2006

Introduction

Marx and Engels both took a keen interest in the scientific developments of
their time and wrote a number of articles on scientific topics. Marx
himself produced a deep analysis of the foundations of differential and
integral calculus, unpublished during his lifetime but available now on the
web [i], in which he anticipated the developments in that subject that took
place later in the 19th century. Engels in the "Dialectics of Nature"
involved himself with some of the scientific controversies of the time,
placing these in the context of the dialectical and materialist philosophy
which he and Marx had developed. His article "On the part played by Labour
in the Transition from Ape to Man", for example, is a major contribution to
the subject and is recognised as such by some, if not all, modern
anthropologists.

The involvement of Marx and Engels in the scientific and technological
developments of their age was for them a very practical question. They saw
the development of technology as one of the keys to ending the barbarism of
class society. Through technology it would be possible to raise the
productivity of human labour to the point where in Marx's famous phrase
"from each according to his ability, to each according to their needs"
could become the living reality for all of humanity. It is one of the
deepest contradictions of capitalism, and one of the clearest indications
that this system has completely outlived itself, that in private hands
technical developments are now used to lower living standards, throwing
millions out of work and leaving billions to face a continuing life of
grinding poverty. Together with its military applications, new technology
under capitalism now does not enhance life but instead destroys it.

There was also a theoretical side to Marx and Engels interest in science.
Politics is mainly a battle of ideas, even if at critical points it can
become a physical battle in the factories, or in the desert wadis. It is
fundamental to the philosophy of dialectical materialism that ideas do not
fall from the sky, but are rooted in physical reality. It was particularly
in Engels writings on science that they were able to show that the same
dialectical processes of change that exist in society, economics and
politics also exist in natural processes. Quantitative changes, such as an
increase in the temperature of a liquid, at a certain point become
qualitative, when the liquid turns into a gas. Things that are thought to
be opposites, a wave or a particle for example, can be identical, as in the
"wave-particle" of quantum mechanics. What is cause can also be effect - a
spring pushes but is also pushed. Processes repeat, not as a circle but as
a spiral. A seed becomes a tree becomes a seed again, but with chance
genetic changes that can lead to evolution and development. Marxism,
dialectical materialism, is the application of these laws to society,
economics and politics, and to nature.

This article looks at one small part of modern science - signal and noise
in seismic sounding for oil exploration - and aims to show that the
dialectical laws of motion can also be seen here as in other parts of
nature. Even though this is a fairly specialist topic it is hoped that the
article will be of interest not only to readers with a scientific
background but also to anyone who has a general interest in science and in
politics. Engels too wrote at times about very specialised topics; in
chapter 4 of "Dialectics of Nature" for example there is a detailed
discussion on the question of what should be used as a measure of motion -
momentum or energy [ii]. This part of the book would have been difficult
enough at the time it was written as it was dealing with ideas that were
then relatively new, and is possibly even more difficult now many years
later when the controversy is long past. Sometime, however, it is necessary
to get close to the detail, even if it is not completely straightforward,
in order to get close to the truth; simplification can lead to a lie.

The article concentrates on the technical aspects of seismic exploration
for oil, and little is said about the political and social consequences of
oil exploration. That would take many, many articles; some are available in
the sections of this website on Iraq, Nigeria or Venezuela. Those
scientists and technicians who work in the oil industry know very well the
activities of the companies they work for and its effects on the countries
they operate in. They also know the nature of the management in the oil
industry - bureaucratic and corrupt, at best ineffectual, at worst brutal.
But the pay and conditions that are given to scientists and engineers in
the oil business mean that many choose to support the status quo - Western
imperialism in its most predatory form - or to simply look the other way.

full: http://www.marxist.com/signal-noise-unity-opposites080606.htm

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