👉 Introduction: The Tragic Fate of an Intellectual and Revolutionary
Sima Marković is primarily known as a politician and revolutionary, while his work in mathematics, physics, and the philosophy of science has been unjustly neglected. We can describe this significant Serbian and Yugoslav intellectual from the first half of the 20th century with a few key points:
🧠 A Premier Intellectual: His doctorate was the second doctorate in mathematical sciences defended at the University of Belgrade. He was the first author to write about the theory of relativity in the Serbian language. This makes him one of the most prominent intellectual figures in the history of the Serbian left.
⚖️ A “Right-Wing” Factionalist in the KPJ, of which he was a prominent member and one of the founders: He advocated the view that the Kingdom of SHS/Yugoslavia should be treated as a single entity, where the class struggle should be waged against a unified bourgeoisie. He opposed the division of the country into separate republics, believing it would weaken the workers’ movement and that it would essentially constitute the establishment of bourgeois nation-states within one. This stance was labeled as “Greater Serbian” by the Comintern at the time, although Marković’s motivation was internationalist, not nationalist. He saw the Kingdom as a “prison of nations,” but did not believe the solution lay in ethnic federalism.
☠️ A Victim of Stalinism: Like many Old Bolsheviks, especially those distinguished by an intellectual stance and freedom of expression, he was executed in 1939 during the Great Purge. His participation in the “right opposition” within the KPJ and his disagreement with the Comintern’s official line were sufficient for a death sentence.
📜 Rehabilitation in the USSR and Obscurity in the new Yugoslavia: Dr. Sima Marković was rehabilitated on June 10, 1958, by a decision of the Military Collegium of the Supreme Court of the USSR. Unfortunately, in SFR Yugoslavia, even though the party he helped found, the KPJ, held absolute power, he was never rehabilitated due to the then-popular, yet inaccurate, theses about his “Greater Serbian” leanings.
🎯 One of his most significant scientific works is “The Principle of Causality and Modern Physics”, which is the subject of this post.
🌍 Context: The Revolution in Physics and a Culture in Crisis
Marković wrote his study in 1935, during the peak flowering of quantum mechanics (Bohr, Heisenberg, Schrödinger, Dirac) and shortly after the establishment of the theory of general relativity. It was a time of a deep crisis of determinism in science.
⚙️ The Classical Newtonian View: The universe as a clockwork mechanism, where knowing the present states is enough to precisely predict all future states (Laplace’s demon).
🌪️ Modern Physics: Introduced fundamental uncertainty. Heisenberg’s uncertainty principle, the statistical nature of quantum phenomena, and the relativity of space-time—all of this undermined the classical notion of strict causality.
🔁 Central Thesis: Restoring Causality at a Higher Level
Marković was not satisfied with simply accepting “indeterminism.” His goal was to save the principle of causality from complete rejection, but to redefine it in a dialectical manner.
Marković approaches this problem as follows:
🛡️ Defense of Materialism: The complete rejection of causality leads to subjectivism and idealism (if there are no causes, then all creation is “miracle” or a product of consciousness). This was unacceptable for a Marxist materialist.
🔄 The Dialectical Solution: Marković argues that quantum uncertainty does not destroy causality, but abolishes its mechanistic, simplified form. It does not say “there is no cause,” but that the cause-and-effect relationship is more complex, statistical, and non-linear.
🎲 More Precisely: He argues that causality shifts from the level of an individual particle (where statistical probability reigns) to the level of a statistical ensemble or the system as a whole, where strict laws are re-established. This is the dialectical overcoming of opposites: determinism and chance exist in unity.
⚔️ Political-Ideological Implications: A Battle on Two Fronts
This is the most specific part of Marković’s analysis. He saw that philosophical debates about physics do not occur in a vacuum. He fought against two enemies:
🤖 Against Mechanistic Materialism (and “Scientific” Socialism): Within Marxism itself, especially in the Soviet sphere, vulgar, mechanistic materialism (often associated with Bukharin) was strong. This school stubbornly clung to Laplacian determinism and attempted to declare quantum mechanics “idealist” because it violated its dogmas. Marković, as a true dialectician, saw that this mechanicism was reactionary because it prevented the understanding of new scientific discoveries and turned materialism into a rigid, metaphysical doctrine.
👻 Against the Idealist Interpretation: On the other hand, many bourgeois philosophers (and some physicists like Eddington) used quantum mechanics to prove the existence of “free will,” a “soul,” or that matter is an “illusion.” Marković saw this as a counter-revolutionary hijacking of science to justify religious and spiritualist worldviews.
Marković’s project was to construct a dialectical materialist view of quantum physics that:
- Accepts and unifies determinism and chance.
- Rejects vulgar, mechanistic materialism.
- Rejects the idealist mystification of science.
🔮 Relevance and Significance Today
Marković’s study was prophetic. He recognized themes that are still at the center of the philosophy of physics today:
🤔 Interpretations of Quantum Mechanics (Copenhagen, Many-Worlds, de Broglie–Bohm pilot-wave) — all revolve around the question of causality and the nature of reality.
💭 The Realism vs. Anti-Realism Debate — does quantum mechanics describe reality as it is, or is it merely a tool for predicting observations?
👀 The Role of the Observer — one of the most contentious aspects, easily exploited for idealist speculations.
His attempt to formulate a dialectical response to these questions makes him a precursor to modern attempts (e.g., “quantum Darwinism” or other models that try to derive the statistical nature from the dynamics of the entire system).
📯 Conclusion: Paying Tribute to a Forgotten Mind
Considering “The Principle of Causality and Modern Physics” is not just a historical curiosity. It is proof that Sima Marković was:
🌐 A Thinker of Global Caliber, who was up-to-date with the most advanced science of his time.
💡 An Authentic Philosopher who did not blindly follow the party line, but attempted to creatively apply the dialectical method to new challenges.
⚰️ A Victim of History whose intellectual potential was permanently destroyed by physical elimination and political prohibitions.
His rehabilitation should not be merely political, but intellectual and academic. Publishing and critically studying this work, with modern commentary, would be the best way to correct a historical injustice and show that the Serbian and Yugoslav intellectual tradition had its pioneers in understanding the deepest questions of science and philosophy.
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