When Duhring passes on to chemistry, the same approach is seen of taking well known axioms and theories and simply putting his own brand on them, simply changing the wording here and there, to the definitions and categories.
“Herr Dühring passes on to chemistry, and takes the opportunity to reveal to us nature's three laws of inertia which have so far been discovered by his philosophy of reality, viz.:
“(1) the quantity of matter in general, (2) that of the simple (chemical) elements, and (3) that of mechanical energy are constant”
Hence: the uncreatability and indestructibility of matter, and of its simple component parts, in so far as it has them, as well as of motion — these old facts known the world over and expressed here most inadequately — this is the only positive thing Herr Dühring can provide us with as a result of his natural philosophy of the inorganic world. We knew all this long ago. But what we did not know was that they were “laws of inertia” and as such “schematic properties of the system of things”.” (p 81)
Fronm this, Duhring concludes,
“The amount of gold on hand in the universe must at all times have been the same, and it can have increased or diminished just as little as matter in general” (p 81)
Except we know that this is wrong in a way that Engels, also, could not have proved, at the time. Gold is one of those elements that is only created as stars die, and explode. Initially, therefore, there was no gold, in the universe, and the quantity of it increases as stars die and produce these elements in the process.
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