Quantity and quality form an indivisible nexus, not opposed terms

Evidence

Since there cannot exist quantity without quality or quality without quantity (economy without culture, practical activity without the intelligence and vice versa) any opposition of the two terms is, rationally, a nonsense. And, indeed, when we get the opposition of quantity and quality with all the idiotic variations on the theme practised by Guglielmo Ferrero and Co., what are really being opposed are one form of quality and another form of quality, one form of quantity and another form of quantity. In other words, a matter of politics and not a philosophical proposition. If the quantity-quality nexus is indivisible the question is posed thus: where is it more useful to apply the force of one’s will, to develop quantity or quality? Which of the two aspects is more easily controlled? Which is more easily measurable? On the basis of which can one make predictions and construct work plans? The answer appears to be in no doubt and to be the quantitative aspect. But to affirm that one wants to work on quantity, that one wants to develop the “bodily” aspect of reality does not mean that one intends to neglect “quality” but rather that one intends to pose the problem of quality in the most concrete and realistic form, in other words, to develop quality in the only way in which this development is controllable and measurable. — Antonio Gramsci, Selections from the Prison Notebooks, 1294

Categorization

• DEFINE: Defines the quantity-quality nexus: apparently opposed terms that are actually indivisible, so the real choice is political — where to apply effort — not philosophical.
• XREF: connects to: Quality reveals being only to a nothingness that negates it; The quality’s inner figure-ground relation differs from the this-world relation