Denying historical laws will naturally deny the possibility and necessity of judging historical trends according to historical laws. Pope does not verbally deny the existence of historical trends, but believes that "laws and trends are fundamentally different" and that "the explained trends exist, but their persistence depends on the persistence of some original conditions (these original conditions can sometimes be trends)." (ibid., p. 92, 10655)

There are a series of questions to be clarified here. First, how to explain the relationship between conditions and trends. Pope did not explain what "some specific primitive conditions" were, but only denied the connection between social development trends and historical laws with such a vague statement. There is no problem in affirming that the trend depends on conditions. However, condition is a very broad concept. Pop's trend depends on the argument of conditions, however, in the most general sense, it affirms that the formation of social trends is causal. As for how this causal relationship occurs and is realized, there is still no explanation. Obviously, Pope only vaguely talked about trends and conditions, but deliberately avoided the relationship between trends and laws. Therefore, the relationship between conditions and trends is completely unclear. Of course, the conditions are related to the law. Conditions are not only the basis for the formation of some laws. It is also the basis of some laws. It is the internal foundation of its own development that determines the development trend of society. This internal foundation is nothing more than the law of society itself. Conditions also play an important role in the formation of social development trend, but it works through the laws of social development. In the final analysis, it is only a condition for social laws to play a role. Conditions are always relative to certain laws, leaving the inherent laws of social development. No factor can be the "condition" of social development, that is, without the law of social development, it is impossible to talk about what role and how conditions play.

Affirming that the trend of social development is based on the law of social development, of course, does not mean that the trend is equal to the law. Human society is an organic system composed of many factors and processes, full of extremely complex nonlinear interactions, which can lead to various evolutionary results. Therefore, at any historical stage of social development, the law of the social life system itself does not determine which direction the society will inevitably evolve. It only determines the possibility space of evolution. What kind of possibility becomes the dominant trend in this possibility space depends on the specific conditions of reality. This "condition" is the condition mentioned above that is relatively different from the same law. Obviously, people are not passive in the possibility space of social evolution, but can make choices, because the specific conditions of reality can be changed. People know the objective laws of social development. In this way, we can grasp the possibilities of social development in a certain historical stage and the conditions for each possibility to become a reality. We can make one of them become a reality by strengthening or restraining the direction in which historical conditions work, or by changing and creating conditions. The change of conditions is obviously directly related to people's value choice at this historical stage. This shows that the trend of social development is based on the objective law of social development. It must also include the value choice of social and historical subjects. Popper's assertion that the persistence of the so-called "explained trend" depends on the persistence of some primitive condition is meaningless, because there is no eternal or "persistent" primitive condition, and conditions are always changing. In a sense, the history of human beings is the history of constantly changing their living conditions. With the change of conditions, the direction and mode of social law and even the social law itself will change. To attribute the existence of historical trends to the persistence of specific primitive conditions can only show that Pope is still addicted to modern metaphysical thinking.

Affirming the trend of social development also includes the value choice of social and historical subjects, but this does not mean that social development is not historically inevitable. The so-called social development trend refers not only to the possibility of social historical evolution, but also to the general trend of people's historical activities. Therefore, whether the social development trend contains historical inevitability depends on whether the social development has objective regularity. Of course, it also depends on whether the historical activities of human beings are consistent in their most basic value orientation. The dialectical determinism of history also gives a positive answer to the latter question from the analysis of the most basic social activities of mankind, that is, material production activities. In Marx's view, material production activities are not only activities that people meet their own material survival needs, but also free, independent and conscious activities that embody the essence of human practice. Autonomy, freedom and consciousness are the basic characteristics of human activities and the most basic values of human survival and development. Historical materialism proves that the historical process promoted by the contradictory movement of productive forces and relations of production is not only the process of economic and social progress from low-level to high-level form. It is also a process in which people constantly pursue autonomy, freedom and consciousness. No matter how different cultural expressions people have in different nations or countries, no matter how tortuous this pursuit is, the general trend of historical development is always to deepen and expand people's autonomy, freedom and consciousness.

The above discussion shows that, on the one hand, human activities should be restricted by the objective laws of social history and cannot exceed the possible space of social development stipulated by the objective laws; On the other hand, people have the freedom to choose in this possibility space, that is, they can change the conditions under which objective laws play a role, so that the possibility that best conforms to people's value ideals becomes the dominant trend of social development in a certain period and strive for its realization. The development of social history is the unity of objective laws and people's subjective initiative in historical activities, which is the essence of historical dialectical determinism.

Historical trends and historical foresight

The so-called historical foresight refers to the revelation of historical development trend or possibility, and it can be predicted that historical materialism derives social and historical development from the existence of historical laws and historical trends. Historical dialectical determinism is a view on the predictability of social development, which has been attacked by Popper most violently. In Popper's view, recognizing the predictability of historical process is the core of historical determinism. He believes that he has successfully found a "purely logical reason" to refute historical determinism and thus completely destroy it. This "logical reason" is a simple three-stage reasoning: 1. The course of human history is strongly influenced by the growth of human knowledge; 2. We can't use reasonable or scientific methods to predict the growth of our scientific knowledge; Therefore, we cannot predict the future course of human history.

Pope is quite satisfied with his inference, and thinks that after such inference, it can be declared that history is unpredictable and "historical determinism cannot be established" (ibid., p. 1). But when we scrutinize Popper's inference carefully, it is not difficult to find that this three-stage inference is carried out in a series of unforgivable theoretical "omissions". Among them, the key "omission" is that there is not enough basis to assert that the growth of human knowledge is unpredictable. Although the growth of knowledge is closely related to individual's talent, morality, circumstances and various accidental factors in the process of knowledge creation, there is indeed uncertainty. However, if we examine the growth of knowledge in the historical process of social progress, rather than understanding it as a personal matter, we will see that the growth of knowledge and its powerful influence on social progress also depend on two aspects. Second, the demand of social, economic, political and cultural development "chooses" knowledge. As far as the former is concerned, the generation of a new kind of knowledge is always based on the knowledge resources accumulated in history. In the past, the achievements of cultural development contained various intellectual factors that gave birth to new knowledge. Only by fully occupying these knowledge resources can the creators of new knowledge really make a difference. Therefore, according to the level of human knowledge and the new problems faced, people can generally predict the future trend of knowledge growth. As far as the latter is concerned, human knowledge interacts with social, economic, political and cultural factors, and through this interaction, it has a "strong influence" on the historical process. A kind of scientific knowledge or technical knowledge can only be absorbed by the actual production process and thus transformed into the actual productive forces, which can have an impact on people's material production, economic process and even historical process. A theory of social change can really affect the process of social progress only if it grasps the real social contradictions or social problems and can be accepted by a wider range of social members. Therefore, although the growth of knowledge itself has its uncertainty, actual production activities or realistic social contradictions and problems have a "choice" effect on the application of knowledge. This choice can make people use "reasonable or scientific methods" to judge which knowledge can be absorbed or accepted from social conditions such as social economy, technology, politics and culture, and infer what impact these absorbed and accepted knowledge will have on the social development process. Moreover, the more accurately we can grasp the social conditions that make knowledge work, the more accurately we can predict the influence of knowledge. Many times, when some knowledge is missing, the contradictions and problems faced by production activities or social progress will also inspire people to learn and create this knowledge. Therefore, the real power to promote the historical process is the development of social material productivity and various social contradictions caused by this development. The reason why knowledge can have a strong influence on the historical process is that it can be integrated into this real power. Can be integrated into the solution of real contradictions and problems. Without an understanding of this realistic force, it is impossible to have any impact on the historical process. Just starting from the uncertainty of knowledge growth, it is impossible to draw the conclusion that the historical future process is unpredictable.

Pope thinks: "My argument does not refute the possibility of predicting society ... My argument only refutes the possibility of predicting historical development based on the fact that historical development can be influenced by our knowledge growth." (ibid., page 2) This goes back to the previous discussion, and there is really no need to talk about it. What is the essential difference between predicting society and predicting historical development? Pope didn't make it clear. But his main argument actually denies not only the possibility of historical prediction, but also the possibility of social prediction, because he clearly said: "My proof lies in pointing out that no scientific forecaster, whether a scientist or a computer, can predict his future results by scientific methods." According to this statement, the value of scientific existence will be greatly reduced. The basic significance of scientific existence lies in revealing the possibility space of the evolution of things system by grasping the objective attributes and laws of the research object, thus providing certain predictive significance for human activities. Although the internal relations and external environmental factors of things are complex and uncertain, scientific prediction reveals the possibility of things' evolution. So that people can make the possibility of human survival and development come true through their own activities, avoid the possibility of "bad" becoming a reality, and at least reduce its harm to a minimum. In a sense, human beings rely on this prediction to survive and develop, which is exactly where human activities are different from other animal activities.

In a word, the dialectical determinism of history fully affirms that historical subjects can make choices in the possibility space of social evolution. This is where its dialectics lies. This choice is possible because people can predict the trend of social development. Selection and foresight are possible because every possibility of evolution is based on the objective laws of social development and depends on certain conditions. The dialectical determinism of history can be explained from the internal relations among historical laws, historical trends and historical foresight.