Dialectical thinking emerges only from a shared common subject, not individual decree.

Evidence

Calculative, `common-sense’ thinking belongs to a type of human being which is still relatively powerless. In spite of its active nature, this type tends to be passive in decisive matters. The functions of organization and regulation, which are in any case becoming more and more the privilege of the most powerful, still have much more the character of conformity and cunning than that of rationality in today’s divided world. Since the development of greater spontaneity depends on a shared common subject being constituted, the individual cannot simply establish it by decree himself. One of the ways which lead to it is … that the individual should not remain stuck in registering and predicting facts, in mere calculation, but rather learn to look behind the facts, to distinguish the surface from the essence (of course, without ignoring the surface), to formulate concepts which are not simply classifications of facts, and to structure his whole experience continuously according to definite goals, without falsifying these goals; in short, that the individual should learn to think dialectically. — Rolf Wiggershaus, The Frankfurt School, 753

Categorization

• DEFINE: Defines dialectical thinking as distinct from ‘common-sense’ calculative thought — looking behind facts, distinguishing surface from essence, classifying beyond mere facts.
• XREF: Directly connects to the Frankfurt School’s own definition of critical/dialectical theory, which Wiggershaus is chronicling; also echoes Adorno’s negative dialectics. — connects to: Ordinary propositions transform into philosophical ones through a triple dialectical movement. — Catherine Malabou, The Future of Hegel: Plasticity,…, 1221