The meeting “On the Questions of Dialectical Contradictions in the Light of Contemporary Science and Practice”, organized by the Institute of Philosophy of the Academy of Sciences of the USSR and held in Moscow in April of 1958, is noteworthy from several points of view even for those who do not normally occupy themselves with questions of Marxism-Leninism. First, to judge from the reports received, this meeting was remarkably objective. Several of the addresses gave evidence of a definite impartiality, unusual in the Soviet context. In the second place, this is the first time that Soviet philosophers have systematically discussed the “dialectical” contradiction, which is the most significant aspect of the Hegelian heritage of their philosophy. Although Hegel’s name appears very seldom, it is evident that the participants form two groups: those who defend the “dialectical” contradiction, “dialectical” logic, in a word, the legacy of Hegel as transmitted by Engels and Lenin; and those who defend formal logic, try to interpret “real” contradictions as polar oppositions and for whom “Hegelian” is almost an insult. Without a doubt, the “strategic” position of the first group is much more favourable since its members can almost invariably count on the support of the “classics”, who prized contradiction and “dialectical” logic very highly. The partisans of the second group find themselves in a particularly uncomfortable situation since they must either bring their defence of reason and logic into agreement with the statements of the “classics” or contradict these same “classics”. That this last possibility actually was realized is the third and most noteworthy fact about the meeting.