>>2765273>negotiating a middle position between extremes (which did happen in classical dialectic)Yes, well we see this employed in Plato [266e-267c] which produces the infamous "featherless biped" conclusion - but in the argument of the Eleatic stranger, these divisions occur where as he puts it, subdivision of "types" or "kinds" are made most generally, while what is particular is still contained in the type. Plato emphasises middleness at [265a-b]. Aristotle also later sees that the "golden mean" is ideal.
>the truth of the oppositions is found (and the contradictions resolved) in their subsumption in something beyond the opposed positions.Isn't this just the process of abstraction? If two things belong to one thing, then one thing gives identity to each, as different types of the one. Opposition here implies contradiction, however (which Aristotle describes as the contrariness of things, particularly in the modality of positive and negative claims). For example, an answer to a question cannot be both "yes" and "no" (in receiving the same conclusion), and so the dialectic resolves this contradiction by developing the logic of internal consistency (e.g. computational algorithms are a type of dialectic, since they process inputs by a chain of binaries until a final result is given). Contradiction can only be "resolved" by giving separateness to contraries. A ≠ B, if B ≠ A.
In personally reading Hegel, he mediates appears to mediate contradiction by mutual negativity (e.g. A in itself relates to B by not-A and not-B having abstract equivalence as becoming) beginning in the second law of logic; the law of non-contradiction; and so he does not imply that A = B, except by syllogism; e.g.
(i) if, A = B
(ii) and, B = C
(iii) then, A = C
This is also abstracted by different modes, however, where A is singular, B is particular and C is universal. Hegel does not equate contrary beings (A, B, C) in themselves, since that would be a contradiction.
Further, the method of self-identity in opposites is already present in ancient thought, such as in Heraclitus and Lao Tzu, who both invoke the formula of non-being (i.e. becoming) as the unity of things. Lao Tzu calls this Tao, while Heraclitus calls it Logos. Thus, contradiction is not unified positively, but negatively. The issue is clear however, since negativity cannot provide unity, since negative identity already presupposes duality as the basis of becoming. Thus the yin-yang is two-in-one. But this then causes three, as Lao Tzu also writes, in tandem with Pythagoras - Plato stumbles upon the same issue in [259a-b]; between plurality and singularity. Plato was not a naive monist. The Christian trinity also mirrors this, but in more dogmatic terms (e.g. being as both one and many).
>In classical dialectic, one (or a few) views tend to get preferential treatment You mean that a logical conclusion follows a discussion of opposing views?
>what the oppositions mean together, as a whole.Which in Plato can be entirely mapped out by dialectical disgression of subdivision into types. Plato is a thinker of totality, which means connecting the whole to its parts.
>Plato arguably gets close to something like this in "Parmenides," but there isn't a step back in the dialogue, just apparent impassesWhich means that first principles must be reformulated; the endless task of the philosopher.