Li Wen: A Scientific Atheist Interpretation of Engels' Contradiction Between "Intended and Unintended" Results
The contradiction between "expected and unexpected" results was an important issue raised by Engels in his later years during his study of the historical outlook. As Engels stated, "the ends of the actions are intended, but the results which actually follow from these actions are not intended." Since human beings create their own history "purposively," why do "unexpected" phenomena that run counter to these purposes emerge in historical development? Theists are accustomed to this, resolving the issue by deferring entirely to deities in an imaginary world; however, this does not contribute to a genuine resolution of the "contradiction." Rooted in real individuals and their practice, this article is committed to overthrowing the theistic interpretation of this "contradiction" in order to highlight the spiritual power of Marxist scientific atheism.
01. The Theistic Interpretation of the "Contradiction"
Generally speaking, the contradiction between "expected and unexpected" is often interpreted by theists through recourse to deities and heavenly mandate. History in their vision is "a skillful and steadily advancing divine plan unfolding on the narrow stage of this world," of which "we can only obtain a fleeting glimpse in fragments, yet every aspect of it transcends human vision and comprehension." Consequently, both the "expected" and the "unexpected" are dominated by mysterious providence and predestination.
With the development of theistic thought, the understanding of God gradually moved from a distant heavenly kingdom toward the secular world, eventually crystallizing into reflections on Reason. Concurrently, the interpretation of the "expected and unexpected" contradiction underwent a transformation from traditional theology to rational theology.
Giambattista Vico was the first to initiate the secularization of the philosophy of history. On the question of how to grasp the "expected and unexpected" contradiction, Vico did not directly use providence as an explanation. Instead, he first acknowledged individual purposes or "expectations," emphasizing that "the world of civil society was certainly made by men." Yet, at the same time, he pointed out that "these narrow ends" serve "wider ends," namely the ends of Divine Providence. The purpose of Divine Providence lies in "infinite goodness"; therefore, its every action is necessarily superior to the "small goodness" pursued by human individuals. Thus, the world created by humans often "transcends the particular and specific ends that people themselves pursue."
Kant and Hegel respectively replaced the omnipotent God with "Nature" and "Reason," investing more profound and direct reflection into the world of real life. The deified subject in Kant’s philosophical system is "Nature," which has its own purpose, plan, and "expectations" that regulate and guide human behavior and historical development. Although individuals possess freedom of will and "want to arrange everything entirely according to their own ideas," their actions are governed by "universal laws of nature." Despite humanity’s desire for "concord," Nature—contrary to human wishes—"demands discord"; despite humanity’s hope for "comfort and satisfaction," Nature—against human desires—requires humans to "plunge into labor and hardships."
Hegel's historical outlook possesses a profound sense of history, and his exposition of the "expected and unexpected" contradiction is remarkable. "Absolute Reason" is the core category of Hegel's philosophy of history. Although it does not participate in the strife of individuals and nations, it secretly drives "passion" to work for it, quietly realizing the "cunning of Reason." This leads to the production of "additional results." These so-called "additional results" refer to outcomes beyond the purpose of the action and the goal directly known. For instance, in the example of "arson for revenge," it involves several elements "outside of what was contained in the actor's will and consciousness."
Vico, Kant, and Hegel all perceived the "expected and unexpected" contradiction. If Vico dominated history with an omniscient and omnipotent deity and interpreted the "contradiction" through divine providence, then Kant and Hegel replaced the divine seat with Nature and Absolute Spirit respectively, attributing the emergence of the "contradiction" to the "plan of Nature" or the "cunning of Reason." While Kant and Hegel certainly expressed doubts about the existence of God and attempted to overthrow theism, "on the other hand, they revived it in their own philosophy of religion." Whether it is Kant's "Nature" or Hegel's "Absolute Spirit," both were fashioned within their respective theoretical systems as spiritual forces dominating all things in the world—constructing a naturalized or spiritualized "God" while simultaneously eliminating the old one. This is merely replacing the "old god" with a "new god," ultimately restoring "Christian creationism." Thus, they can be understood as new forms of theism, albeit more sophisticated and deceptive. Therefore, whether it is Vico’s deity, Kant’s Nature, or Hegel’s Absolute Reason, all belong to a kind of "trans-human, supernatural god or divine entity."
As the core factor defined by various religions, the concept of God is inevitably inextricably linked to religious idealism. "Religious deism," like all idealistic views, denies the material unity of the world and believes that historical development is the result of divine power or spiritual agency. Attributing both the "expected" and the "unexpected" entirely to a god or divine entity in an attempt to make reality conform to divine will is clearly a habitual tactic of idealism. Theism starts from an abstract or fictional entity to interpret the "expected and unexpected" contradiction, becoming detached from "real individuals" and their historical activities, causing human history to lose its realistic foundation and become an illusory existence. The inversion, distortion, and illusory expression of social reality by idealism are destined to fail in finding the true root of the "expected and unexpected" contradiction.
In theism, the god or divine entity is the supreme power governing the changes, rises, and falls of the human world; it is the subject of action that determines and dominates everything, presiding over whether and how human "expectations" are realized. They use mysterious fate and providence to turn realistic causal relationships and the necessity of history itself into fatalism. Consequently, human purpose and will are firmly shackled under divine will and heavenly mandate; humans can only surrender to the god or divine entity. This mindset, which separates human purpose from historical laws, seriously damages the subjective value and dignity of the human person. If this is not transformed, the resolution of the "expected and unexpected" contradiction can hardly make fundamental progress.
02. The "Unexpected" is Not the Work of Divine Will
"Although the actions of daily life are in fact always carried out in a purposive form in a recurring cycle, in many respects social life is not the product of the intentions of the actors who compose society." Why does social life frequently experience "unintended consequences of action" or "unexpected" phenomena? Theism injects explanations of divine will or heavenly mandate into this. For theists, regardless of the image their concept of God takes or the form their theological historical outlook assumes, their theoretical logic always presupposes a "God." The reason "unexpected" phenomena appear in human society lies in the inscrutability of divine will, leading humans to perhaps "disobey" God's purpose inadvertently.
In fact, the "divine will" described by theism is actually a mystified and virtualized expression of historical laws. They usually attribute historical necessity to some self-existing factor that stands above or outside human beings and their practical activities. Initially, the "theological determinism" and "theory of heavenly mandate" of traditional theism used "oracles" and "revelation" [1] to represent the necessity of the historical process; later, Vico introduced the idea of historical necessity to explain social history, followed by Kant and Hegel who used Reason to demonstrate the necessity and law-governed nature of historical development. Regarding historical necessity, whether Vico summarized it as "Divine Providence," Kant resorted to the "plan of Nature," or Hegel attributed it to the "cunning of Reason," these actually all stem from the objective laws of historical movement, merely shrouded in a veil of mysticism. It can be seen that theism vaguely discovered and hazily represented ideas of historical laws and historical necessity.
At the same time, human purpose also lurks beneath "divine will." After all, "expectation" is "connected to psychological needs such as human ideals, intentions, desires, and hopes," signifying an intentionality and purposiveness of the historical subject. It is precisely because of humans and their purposes that human history possesses a specificity distinct from natural history. If we were to leave aside humans and their purposive activities, we could not explain the difference between human history and natural history, nor could we explain the foundation upon which historical laws "reside." Consequently, discussing the objective constraints of historical laws on human existence and development would lose its meaning. In the world of God, individuals do not possess, nor do they need, the right to autonomous choice; individual "expectations" can only be hidden in various beautiful myths in a distorted form. Objective necessity originating from God or other "super-entities" (the Deity, Nature, Absolute Reason, etc.) always overrides humans, dictating whether "expectations" can be smoothly realized. Theism regards the "God" that exists outside of or prior to social history as the subject of history, viewing purposive individuals only as "means and tools for that loftier and broader purpose."
Following the path of practical materialism, Engels proceeded from real individuals and their practice to speak on the "expected and unexpected" contradiction. He replaced the deities in the realm of social history with "real individuals," driving away the "divine will" as the root of the "unexpected," which embodies the essential difference between Marxist scientific atheism and theism. Practice, which is continuously generated in society and eternally flowing in history, must on the one hand conform to the external measure of objective laws, while on the other hand it requires conformity to the internal measure of human purpose. The "expected and unexpected" contradiction runs through various stages of the human historical process, always reflecting to different degrees and in different forms the relationship between the dual attributes of practice—conformity to law and conformity to purpose.
First, Engels stripped away the mysterious cloak of historical laws. Unlike theists, he did not view them as the predestination of "divine will," but rather believed that historical necessity is determined by the real-life conditions of people. "According to the materialist conception of history, the ultimately determining factor in history is the production and reproduction of real life." In his view, the development of human history not only has its own regularity and necessity, but these historical laws possess objectivity; they will not change due to the purpose of any individual, nor will they shift according to the will of any mysterious subject (Deity, Nature, Absolute Reason). This remains true even if historical laws are mixed with factors of human purpose. Second, Engels highlighted the status of humans as the subjects of history. Unlike theists, he did not see humans as "slaves" of "God," but rather believed that humans possess the status of "author-players." [2] "Men make their own history, whatever its outcome may be, in that each person follows his own consciously desired end." The purposive activities of humans constitute the necessary conditions through which social history and its laws are produced, developed, and made possible. Human purpose is no longer dissociated from or subordinate to historical laws, but is embedded as a key element in every link of social historical development and its law-governed nature. The intertwining and mutual interference of historical laws and human purposes mean that, due to the intervention of human purpose, historical laws possess characteristics such as human-centeredness and non-neutrality of value, which differ from natural laws.
Why, then, do "unexpected" phenomena—results that go against one’s wishes or are even counterproductive—frequently occur in social history? In social reality, historical laws and human purposes are not always so well-aligned; situations of "non-conformity to law" and "non-conformity to purpose" occur frequently. On one hand, historical laws and human purposes check and balance each other. In addition to historical laws playing an objective regulatory role over human purposes, human purposes also interfere with and disrupt the "normal" functioning of historical laws. In this regard, historical laws exhibit tendencies and statistical characteristics in their functional mechanisms that natural laws do not possess. Thus, the historical process is no longer a simple linear development, but a complex state of fluctuations and ups and downs. Furthermore, when historical subjects make predictions about the future, it inevitably triggers a series of "Oedipal effects," [3] leading to the appearance of "uncertainty" in the social sphere. This shows that because human purpose "participates" in the social sphere, the realization of historical "expectations" is more complex and difficult than natural processes. It can be seen that the historical process is not a necessary process pre-ordained by deities or Reason to advance sequentially toward a certain "expectation."
On the other hand, the purposes of various individuals differ or are even antithetical to one another; "what each individual wills is obstructed by everyone else." The final "average" that emerges from this fusion is not something that any individual "has willed." [4] Because the purposeful activity of human beings constructs social history, the various subjects participating in social life each harbor their own distinct aims and motivations. Due to differing classes and interest claims, antagonisms and conflicts—large or small—inevitably exist between different individuals, groups, ethnicities, and even nations regarding value choices, goal orientations, and practical actions. Consequently, the mutual cancellation and neutralization of different "component forces" finally fuse into a single "resultant force," [5] which dissolves and melts away the particularity of the individual will, resulting in the realization of "expectations" appearing only as an exception.
Engels not only clarified the historical-law-based essence of "divine providence" but also rescued human purpose from the oppression of "divine providence," thereby converting the root cause of "unintended" phenomena from a conflict between "God’s purpose" and "human purpose" into a contradiction between historical laws and human purposes.
03 Expectations have nothing to do with deities
Although the "unintended" possesses its own rationality and necessity within social history, the ultimate orientation of human objectives remains the realization of "expectations"; after all, "unintended" outcomes are mostly things people do not wish to see or experience. How, then, should we examine the contradiction between "expectations and the unintended," and how can we discern and seize "expectations" from within the "unintended"?
"Expectation" refers to a certain anticipation constructed conceptually by a subject regarding the future development of things, providing a guide or reference for the subject's activities. In theism, the realization of "expectations" is inseparable from God. Unless granted divine permission and assistance, humans can only struggle in the mire of the "unintended." Thus, they resort to praying for divine grace to exchange it for their own "expectations."
The interpretation of the "expectations and the unintended" contradiction through God or divine entities is, in fact, a narration of human affairs under the guise of "God." Fundamentally speaking, so-called "deities" are illusory. Therefore, claiming that "expectations" are inseparable from deities is likewise fallacious talk. "There is no intervention of any supernatural divine will here; what truly functions is precisely the 'motive of motives' that sets countless people in motion." People’s faith in God is, in reality, faith in their own human power. Engels analyzed the "expectations and the unintended" contradiction based on "man" rather than "God," and from the standpoint of scientific atheism, he disenchanted the theistic nature of the interpretation of this "contradiction."
Regarding the origin of deities, God is actually an image fabricated and fantasized by people themselves. "The so-called God or world reason is nothing but a false concept created by people from their own heads according to their own image and characteristics. It is man who created God and world reason according to his own image and characteristics, not God or world reason that created man." This is true of Vico’s "Providence," Kant’s "Nature," and Hegel’s "Absolute Reason." "All religion is nothing but the fantastic reflection in those men’s minds of those external forces which control their daily life." [6] When "earthly forces" could not yet be understood or explained by man, man fantasized a mysterious "super-earthly" image to represent these forces. Initially, the personification of natural forces produced the earliest deities—natural gods of heaven, earth, mountains, and rivers; later, social forces also gained a "fantastic reflection in men's minds," and through further development, underwent extremely complex and diverse personifications, forming various social deities. As early as 1844, in "The Condition of England: Past and Present by Thomas Carlyle," Engels clearly pointed out that God "is created through the reflection of man in the chaotic matter [Hyle] of his own undeveloped consciousness," denying the real existence of God or divine entities.
Regarding the essence of deities, God is a reflection of man's own alienation. Engels believed that the substance of God lies precisely in man: "God is man," and "'God' is only a rather vague and distorted reflection of man himself." It is evident that Engels advocated that "God" and man are inseparable; the so-called "God" is merely a distorted and erroneous reflection of real life by man under the multiple oppressions of nature and social life. Consequently, Engels denied the sacredness, eternity, and omnipotence of God, shattering the sacred halos of various "gods" and unveiling their true face—the reflection of man’s own alienation. Clarifying the "human-divine relationship" is the key to deconstructing the theistic interpretation of the "expectations and the unintended" contradiction. Once the essence of "God" is recognized, the traditional human-divine relationship collapses, the real relationship between the two is clarified, their positions are properly aligned, and theism is dealt a fatal blow.
In this way, "God" can be reduced to man, divinity can be reduced to humanity, and the sacred world beyond can be traced back to secular human society. Therefore, the study of God is the study of man; the exploration of the "expectations and the unintended" contradiction must be grounded in man himself and his real life. Engels warned us that there is no need "first to summon some abstract concept of 'God' and attribute all beautiful, great, sublime, and truly human things to its name." Confirming that "there is no such thing as a god, Lord, creator, or any supernatural mysterious power in the world" is a fundamental characteristic of atheism. Marxist scientific atheism holds that "expectation" is a "human" matter, unrelated to any deities or mandates of heaven [7]; "there is no need to brand truly human things as 'divine'." Just as the view of ghosts and spirits expressed by Liu Ji [8] suggests, "The Way of Heaven [9], ghosts, and spirits are just like yarrow stalks and tortoise shells—they are not worth relying upon; the only thing one can rely on and remain close to is human virtue. What makes the Way of Heaven and spirits efficacious is, in fact, man himself."
In summary, since Engels has proved that the existence of God is a fiction, "expectations" are necessarily unrelated to "deities." The realization of people's "expectations" does not depend on a Lord or "Providence," nor on "Nature" or "Absolute Spirit." The only possible path is for real people, based on their own practical activities, to gradually realize "expectations" within the "unintended" through the process where the dual requirements inherent in practice—conformity to law and conformity to purpose—move from constant conflict toward harmony. To a significant extent, whether people's "expectations" can be realized depends not only on how well people perceive and grasp historical laws but also on whether historical laws and human purposes can harmonize with each other. Not only must human purposes move toward historical laws, but historical laws must also contain the purposeful demands of man.
04 Conclusion
Marxist scientific atheism is a mature atheism. It opposes and rejects all forms of theism, whether it be traditional sacred theism or the rational theism of the philosophy of history. This is because all forms of theism proceed from spirit, will, or reason to explain history—be it a providential view where divine will dominates the world, or an idealist conception of history where reason governs the world. In contrast, Engels' atheistic interpretation of the "expectations and the unintended" contradiction takes "real man" as the starting point of its theoretical logic, interpreting "expectations" and the "unintended" through "real man" and his activities and material living conditions. It is only human practice and specific historical conditions—rather than any "divine providence" or "mandate of heaven"—that lead to the occurrence of unintended phenomena and promote the realization of historical "expectations." Thus, the "Gordian knot" of the "expectations and the unintended" contradiction can only be cut by humanity itself.
Human history has never lacked faith in and legends of "God." Theism is sometimes "used by certain states and interest groups as a means to seek political power and economic interests," numbing the people's determination to create a better life and rendering them helpless in the face of the "unintended." Marxism, through the method of "atheism," attributes "expectations" and the "unintended" to man himself, liberating people from the illusory authorities of their own making. Human purpose and agency are no longer oppressed by "God," which greatly stimulates the courage of people to transform the world and improves the feasibility and reality of "expectations." The deep-seated issue reflected in Engels' contradiction of "expectations and the unintended"—the relationship between historical laws and human purpose—can only find a rational path to resolution by removing any form of theistic interpretation. Undoubtedly, this not only aids the deepening of research into this "contradiction" theoretically but also assists the people in pursuing real happiness in practice. It offers important insights for the Party's religious work and the promotion of scientific atheism education in the New Era.