A Theory of Knowledge
GA 2
IX. Thought and Consciousness
[ 1 ] It appears, however, as if we ourselves had here introduced the very subjective element we were so determined to exclude from our theory of knowledge. Although the rest of the perceptual world does not possess a subjective character—so it might be deduced from our explanation—yet thoughts, even according to our own opinion, do bear such a character.
[ 2 ] This objection rests upon a confusion of two things—the theater in which our thoughts play their role and that element from which they derive the determination of their content, the inner law of their nature. We do not at all produce a thought-content in such fashion that, in this production, we determine into what interconnections our thoughts shall enter. We merely provide the occasion through which the thought-content unfolds according to its own nature. We grasp thought a and thought b and give them the opportunity to enter into a connection according to principle by bringing them into mutual interaction one with the other. It is not our subjective organization which determines this interrelation between a and b in a certain manner, but the content ofa andb is the sole determinant. The fact that a is related to b in a certain manner and not in another,—upon this fact we have not the slightest influence. Our mind brings about the interconnection between thought masses only according to the measure of their own content. Thus we fulfill the principle of experience in its very baldest form in the case of thinking.
[ 3 ] This refutes the opinion of Kant and Schopenhauer, and in a broader sense of Fichte also, that the laws we assume in order to explain the world are merely an effect of our own mental organization, and that we inject them into the world only because of our own mental individuality.
[ 4 ] Another objection might be raised from a subjective point of view. Even though the law-controlled relationship of the thought masses is not brought about according to our own organization, but depends upon the thought-content, yet this very content may be a mere subjective product, a mere quality of our mind, so that we should merely be uniting elements produced first by ourselves. In this case our thought-world would be none the less a subjective appearance. But it is very easy to meet this objection. That is, if it were well founded, we should be uniting the content of our thoughts according to laws while remaining wholly unaware as to whence these laws come. If these do not spring from our subjective being—a supposition we have already taken under consideration and set aside as untenable—what, then, could provide us with laws of interconnection for a content produced by ourselves?
[ 5 ] In other words, our thought-world is an entity resting wholly upon itself, a totality self-enclosed, complete and entire within itself. Here we perceive which of the two aspects of the thought-world is the essential one: the objective aspect of its content and not the subjective aspect of its mode of emergence.
[ 6 ] This insight into the inner purity and completeness of thought appears at its clearest in the scientific system of Hegel. No one else has attributed to thinking a power so complete that it could form a foundation in itself for a world-conception. Hegel has absolute confidence in thinking. Indeed, it is the only factor of reality which he trusts in the fullest sense of the word. Yet, although his point of view is in the main highly correct, he more than any one else has destroyed confidence in thought by the excessively unqualified form in which he has applied it. The way in which he has presented his view is responsible for the irremediable confusion which has found its way into our “thinking about thinking.” He desired to make the importance of thought, of the idea, evident by defining rational necessity in the same terms as factual necessity. In doing so he has given rise to the fallacy that thought-determinations are not purely ideal, but factual. His point of view was soon so conceived as if he had sought for thought itself as one of the facts in the world of sensible reality. Indeed, he failed to make himself entirely clear in regard to this. The truth must be firmly grasped that the sphere of thought is in human consciousness alone. Then it must be shown that the thought-world does not thereby sacrifice in the least its objectivity. Hegel exposed to view only the objective aspects of thought; but most persons see only what is easier to be seen—the subjective aspect—and it seems to them that Hegel treats something purely ideal as a thing—that is, that he indulged in a mystification. Even many scholars of the present time cannot be said to be quite free of this fallacy. They condemn Hegel because of a defect which he himself did not possess, but which can certainly be interjected into him because he failed to explain the matter in question with sufficient clearness.
[ 7 ] We admit that we are here faced by something which is difficult for us to judge with the capacities we possess. Yet we believe it can be mastered by every energetic thinker. We must form two different conceptions: first, that by our own activity we bring the ideal world to manifestation; and, secondly, at the same time that what we by our activity call into existence rests, nevertheless, upon its own laws. It is true that we are accustomed so to conceive a phenomenon as if we needed only to stand passive before it, observing it. But this is not at all an absolute necessity. No matter how unfamiliar the conception may be to us, that we by our activity bring an objective entity to manifestation—that is, in other words, that we do not merely become aware of a phenomenon, but at the same time produce it—this conception is not at all invalid.
[ 8 ] It is only necessary that we should abandon the customary idea that there are as many thought-worlds as there are human individuals. This idea is nothing more than an ancient preconception. It is tacitly presupposed everywhere without any consciousness that another conception is at least equally possible, and that the arguments for the validity of one or the other must, therefore, at least be weighed. Let us for a moment imagine, in place of the above preconception, the following: that there is one sole thought-content, and that our individual thinking is nothing more than the act of working ourselves, our individual personalities, into the thought-center of the world. This is not the place to investigate whether this point of view is correct or not; but it is possible, and we have attained what we wished to attain: that is, we have shown that it is entirely in order to postpone for the present undertaking to prove that the objectivity of thought, which we have declared to be a matter of necessity, is not a self-contradictory conception.
[ 9 ] From the point of view of its objectivity, the work of the thinker may very appropriately be compared with that of a mechanic. Just as the latter brings natural forces into reciprocal action and thus brings about a purposeful activity and exertion of forces, so the thinker causes thought-elements to come into reciprocal activity, and these evolve into the thought-systems which compose our sciences.
[ 10 ] There is no better means of throwing light upon a conception than by exposing the fallacies arrayed against it. Here again let us resort to this method, already profitably employed more than once.
[ 11 ] It is generally supposed that the reason why we unite certain concepts into greater complexes, or why we think at all in certain ways, is because we sense a certain inner (logical) compulsion to do this. Volkelt also has appropriated this opinion. But how can this be harmonized with the transparent clearness with which our whole thought-world is present in consciousness? We know nothing in the world more thoroughly than we know our thoughts. Must we, then, assume a certain connection on the ground of an inner compulsion when everything is so clear? What need have I of the compulsion when I know the nature of what is to be united—know it through and through—and can guide myself according to this nature? All the operations of our thinking are processes which come to pass by reason of insight into the essential nature of the thoughts, and not according to compulsion. Such compulsion contradicts the nature of thinking.
[ 12 ] We might certainly admit the possibility that it may be a part of the essential nature of thinking to stamp its content directly upon its manifestation, but that, nevertheless, we cannot immediately perceive this content by means of our mental organization. But such is not the case. The way in which the thought-content meets us is a guarantee to us that we here have the essential nature of the thing before us. We are assuredly aware that we accompany with our mind every process in the thought-world. Yet we can only think that the form of manifestation of a thing is determined by its essential nature. How could we reproduce the form of appearance if we did not know the essential nature of the thing? It is possible to conceive that the form of appearance emerges before us as an existent whole and we then seek for its central core. But it is impossible to maintain the point of view that we cooperate in producing the appearance without effecting this production by means of its own central core.
9. Denken und Bewußtsein
[ 1 ] Nun aber scheint es, als ob wir hier das subjektivistische Element, das wir doch so entschieden von unserer Erkenntnistheorie fernhalten wollten, selbst einführten. Wenn schon nicht die übrige Wahrnehmungswelt - könnte man aus unseren Auseinandersetzungen herauslesen - so trage doch der Gedanke, selbst nach unserer Ansicht, einen subjektiven Charakter.
[ 2 ] Dieser Einwand beruht auf einer Verwechslung des Schauplatzes unserer Gedanken mit jenem Elemente, von dem sie ihre inhaltlichen Bestimmungen, ihre innere Gesetzlichkeit erhalten. Wir produzieren einen Gedankeninhalt durchaus nicht so, daß wir in dieser Produktion bestimmten, welche Verbindungen unsere Gedanken einzugehen haben. Wir geben nur die Gelegenheitsursache her, daß sich der Gedankeninhalt seiner eigenen Natur gemäß entfalten kann. Wir fassen den Gedanken a und den Gedanken b und geben denselben Gelegenheit, in eine gesetzmäßige Verbindung einzugehen, indem wir sie miteinander in Wechselwirkung bringen. Nicht unsere subjektive Organisation ist es, die diesen Zusammenhang von a und b in einer gewissen Weise bestimmt, sondern der Inhalt von a und b selbst ist das allein Bestimmende. Daß sich a zu b gerade in einer bestimmten Weise verhält und nicht anders, darauf haben wir nicht den mindesten Einfluß. Unser Geist vollzieht die Zusammensetzung der Gedankenmassen nur nach Maßgabe ihres Inhaltes. Wir erfüllen also im Denken das Erfahrungsprinzip in seiner schroffsten Form.
[ 3 ] Damit ist die Ansicht Kants und Schopenhauers und im weiteren Sinne auch Fichtes widerlegt, daß die Gesetze, die wir behufs Erklärung der Welt annehmen, nur ein Resultat unserer eigenen geistigen Organisation seien, daß wir sie nur vermöge unserer geistigen Individualität in die Welt hineinlegen.
[ 4 ] Man könnte vom subjektivistischen Standpunkte aus noch etwas einwenden. Wenn schon der gesetzliche Zusammenhang der Gedankenmassen von uns nicht nach Maß gabe unserer Organisation vollzogen wird, sondern von ihrem Inhalt abhängt, so könnte doch eben dieser Inhalt ein rein subjektives Produkt, eine bloße Qualität unseres Geistes sein; so daß wir nur Elemente verbinden würden, die wir erst selbst erzeugten. Dann wäre unsere Gedankenwelt nicht minder ein subjektiver Schein. Diesem Einwande ist aber ganz leicht zu begegnen. Wir würden nämlich, wenn er begründet wäre, den Inhalt unseres Denkens nach Gesetzen verknüpfen, von denen wir wahrhaftig nicht wüßten, wo sie herkommen. Wenn dieselben nicht aus unserer Subjektivität entspringen, was wir vorhin doch in Abrede stellten und jetzt als abgetan betrachten können, was soll uns denn Verknüpfungsgesetze für einen Inhalt liefern, den wir selbst erzeugen?
[ 5 ] Unsere Gedankenwelt ist also eine völlig auf sich selbst gebaute Wesenheit, eine in sich selbst geschlossene, in sich vollkommene und vollendete Ganzheit. Wir sehen hier, welche von den zwei Seiten der Gedankenwelt die wesentliche ist: die objektive ihres Inhaltes und nicht die subjektive ihres Auftretens.
[ 6 ] Am klarsten tritt diese Einsicht in die innere Gediegenheit und Vollkommenheit des Denkens in dem wissenschaftlichen Systeme Hegels auf. Keiner hat in dem Grade, wie er, dem Denken eine so vollkommene Macht zugetraut, daß es aus sich heraus eine Weltanschauung begründen könne. Hegel hat ein absolutes Vertrauen auf das Denken, ja es ist der einzige Wirklichkeitsfaktor, dem er im wahren Sinne des Wortes vertraut. So richtig seine Ansicht im allgemeinen auch ist, so ist es aber gerade er, der das Denken durch die allzuschroffe Form, in der er es verteidigt, um alles Ansehen gebracht hat. Die Art, wie er seine Ansicht vorgebracht hat, ist schuld an der heillosen Verwirrung, die in unser «Denken über das Denken» gekommen ist. Er hat die Bedeutung des Gedankens, der Idee, so recht anschaulich machen wollen dadurch, daß er die Denknotwendigkeit zu gleich als die Notwendigkeit der Tatsachen bezeichnete. Damit hat er den Irrtum hervorgerufen, daß die Bestimmungen des Denkens nicht rein ideelle seien, sondern tatsächliche. Man faßte seine Ansicht bald so auf. als ob er in der Welt der sinnenfälligen Wirklichkeit selbst den Gedanken wie eine Sache gesucht hätte. Er hat das wohl auch nie so ganz klargelegt. Es muß eben festgestellt werden, daß das Feld des Gedankens einzig das menschliche Bewußtsein ist. Dann muß gezeigt werden, daß durch diesen Umstand die Gedankenwelt nichts an Objektivität einbüßt. Hegel kehrte nur die objektive Seite des Gedankens hervor; die Mehrheit aber sieht, weil dies leichter ist, nur die subjektive; und es dünkt ihr, daß jener etwas rein Ideelles wie eine Sache behandelt, mystifiziert habe. Selbst viele Gelehrte der Gegenwart sind von diesem Irrtum nicht freizusprechen. Sie verdammen Hegel wegen eines Mangels, den er nicht an sich hat, den man aber freilich in ihn hineinlegen kann, weil er die betreffende Sache zu wenig klargestellt hat.
[ 7 ] Wir geben zu, daß hier für unser Urteilsvermögen eine Schwierigkeit vorliegt. Wir glauben aber, daß dieselbe für jedes energische Denken zu überwinden ist. Wir müssen uns zweierlei vorstellen: einmal, daß wir die ideelle Welt tätig zur Erscheinung bringen, und zugleich, daß das, was wir tätig ins Dasein rufen, auf seinen eigenen Gesetzen beruht. Wir sind nun freilich gewohnt, uns eine Erscheinung so vorzustellen, daß wir ihr nur passiv, beobachtend gegenüberzutreten brauchten. Allein das ist kein unbedingtes Erfordernis. So ungewohnt uns die Vorstellung sein mag, daß wir selbst ein Objektives tätig zur Erscheinung bringen, daß wir mit anderen Worten eine Erscheinung nicht bloß wahrnehmen, sondern zugleich produzieren: sie ist keine unstatthafte.
[ 8 ] Man braucht einfach die gewöhnliche Meinung aufzugeben, daß es so viele Gedankenwelten gibt als menschliche Individuen. Diese Meinung ist ohnehin nichts weiter als ein althergebrachtes Vorurteil. Sie wird überall stillschweigend vorausgesetzt, ohne Bewußtsein, daß eine andere zum mindesten ebensogut möglich ist, und daß die Gründe der Gültigkeit der einen oder der andern denn doch erst erwogen werden müssen. Man denke sich an Stelle dieser Meinung einmal die folgende gesetzt: Es gibt überhaupt nur einen einzigen Gedankeninhalt, und unser individuelles Denken sei weiter nichts als ein Hineinarbeiten unseres Selbstes, unserer individuellen Persönlichkeit in das Gedankenzentrum der Welt. Ob diese Ansicht richtig ist oder nicht, das zu untersuchen ist hier nicht der Ort; aber möglich ist sie, und wir haben erreicht, was wir wollten; nämlich gezeigt, daß es immerhin ganz gut angeht, die von uns als notwendig hingestellte Objektivität des Denkens auch anderweitig als widerspruchslos erscheinen zu lassen.
[ 9 ] In Anbetracht der Objektivität läßt sich die Arbeit des Denkers ganz gut mit der des Mechanikers vergleichen. Wie dieser die Kräfte der Natur in ein Wechselspiel bringt und dadurch eine zweckmäßige Tätigkeit und Kraftäußerung herbeiführt, so läßt der Denker die Gedankenmassen in lebendige Wechselwirkung treten, und sie entwickeln sich zu den Gedankensystemen, die unsere Wissenschaften ausmachen.
[ 10 ] Durch nichts wird eine Anschauung besser beleuchtet als durch die Aufdeckung der ihr entgegenstehenden Irrtümer. Wir wollen hier diese von uns schon wiederholt mit Vorteil angewendete Methode wieder anrufen.
[ 11 ] Man glaubt gewöhnlich, wir verbinden gewisse Begriffe deshalb zu größeren Komplexen, oder wir denken überhaupt in einer gewissen Weise deshalb, weil wir einen gewissen inneren (logischen) Zwang verspüren, dies zu tun. Auch Volkelt hat sich dieser Ansicht angeschlossen. Wie stimmt sie aber zu der durchsichtigen Klarheit, mit der unsere ganze Gedankenwelt in unserem Bewußtsein gegenwärtig ist? Wir kennen überhaupt nichts in der Welt genauer als unsere Gedanken. Soll - da nun ein gewisser Zusammenhang auf Grund eines inneren Zwanges hergestellt werden, wo alles so klar ist? Was brauche ich den Zwang, wenn ich die Natur des zu Verbindenden kenne, durch und durch kenne, und mich also nach ihr richten kann. Alle unsere Gedankenoperationen sind Vorgänge, die sich vollziehen auf Grund der Einsicht in die Wesenheiten der Gedanken und nicht nach Maßgabe eines Zwanges. Ein solcher Zwang widerspricht der Natur des Denkens.
[ 12 ] Es könnte immerhin sein, daß es zwar im Wesen des Denkens liege, in seine Erscheinung zugleich seinen Inhalt einzuprägen, daß wir den letzteren aber trotzdem vermöge der Organisation unseres Geistes nicht unmittelbar wahrnehmen können. Das ist aber nicht der Fall. Die Art, wie der Gedankeninhalt an uns herantritt, ist uns eine Bürgschaft dafür, daß wir hier das Wesen der Sache vor uns haben. Wir sind uns ja bewußt, daß wir jeden Vorgang innerhalb der Gedankenwelt mit unserem Geiste begleiten. Man kann sich doch nur denken, daß die Erscheinungsform von dem Wesen der Sache bedingt ist. Wie sollten wir die Erscheinungsform nachschaffen, wenn wir das Wesen der Sache nicht kennten. Man kann sich wohl denken, daß uns die Erscheinungsform als fertiges Ganze gegenübertritt und wir dann den Kern derselben suchen. Man kann aber durchaus nicht der Ansicht sein, daß man zur Hervorbringung der Erscheinung mitwirkt, ohne dieses Hervorbringen von dem Kerne heraus zu bewirken.
9. Thought and consciousness
[ 1 ] But now it seems as if we ourselves are introducing the subjectivist element here, which we so resolutely wanted to keep away from our theory of cognition. If not the rest of the world of perception - one could read from our arguments - then thought, even in our view, has a subjective character.
[ 2 ] This objection is based on a confusion of the scene of our thoughts with the element from which they receive their content-related determinations, their inner lawfulness. We do not produce a thought content in such a way that we determine in this production which connections our thoughts have to enter into. We only provide the opportunity for the thought content to unfold in accordance with its own nature. We grasp the thought a and the thought b and give them the opportunity to enter into a lawful connection by bringing them into interaction with each other. It is not our subjective organization that determines this connection of a and b in a certain way, but the content of a and b itself is the only determining factor. We have not the slightest influence on the fact that a relates to b in a certain way and not otherwise. Our mind only carries out the composition of thought masses according to their content. We therefore fulfill the principle of experience in its harshest form in thinking.
[ 3 ] This refutes the view of Kant and Schopenhauer, and by extension Fichte, that the laws we assume for the purpose of explaining the world are only a result of our own mental organization, that we only insert them into the world by virtue of our mental individuality.
[ 4 ] One could still object from the subjectivist point of view. If the legal connection of thought masses is not carried out by us according to the measure of our organization, but depends on their content, then this very content could be a purely subjective product, a mere quality of our mind; so that we would only connect elements that we ourselves produced in the first place. Then our world of thought would be no less a subjective semblance. But this objection is quite easy to counter. For, if it were well founded, we would connect the contents of our thought according to laws of which we really did not know where they came from. If they do not spring from our subjectivity, which we denied earlier and can now regard as dismissed, then what is to provide us with laws of association for a content that we ourselves generate?
[ 5 ] Our world of thought is therefore an entity built entirely on itself, a self-contained, self-contained, perfect and complete entity. We see here which of the two sides of the world of thought is the essential one: the objective of its content and not the subjective of its appearance.
[ 6 ] This insight into the inner solidity and perfection of thought appears most clearly in Hegel's scientific system. No one has believed thinking to have such a perfect power as he did that it could establish a world view by itself. Hegel has absolute confidence in thinking, indeed it is the only factor of reality that he trusts in the true sense of the word. As correct as his view is in general, however, it is precisely he who has robbed thinking of all prestige through the overly harsh form in which he defends it. The way in which he put forward his view is to blame for the hopeless confusion that has come into our "thinking about thinking". He wanted to make the meaning of thought, of the idea, quite clear by describing the necessity of thought as the necessity of facts. In this way he caused the error that the determinations of thought are not purely ideal, but actual. His view was soon taken as if he had sought thought as a thing in the world of sensible reality itself. He probably never quite made this clear. It must be established that the field of thought is solely human consciousness. Then it must be shown that the world of thought loses nothing of its objectivity through this circumstance. Hegel brought out only the objective side of thought; but the majority, because this is easier, see only the subjective; and it seems to them that he treated something purely ideal as a thing, mystified it. Even many contemporary scholars cannot be absolved from this error. They condemn Hegel for a defect which he does not have in himself, but which can certainly be attributed to him because he has not made the matter in question sufficiently clear.
[ 7 ] We admit that there is a difficulty here for our judgment. But we believe that it can be overcome by any energetic thinking. We must imagine two things: first, that we bring the ideal world actively into existence, and at the same time that what we actively call into existence is based on its own laws. We are, of course, accustomed to imagining an appearance in such a way that we only need to confront it passively, observationally. But this is not an absolute requirement. As unfamiliar as the idea may be to us that we ourselves actively bring an objective to appearance, that we, in other words, not only perceive an appearance, but at the same time produce it: it is not an inadmissible one.
[ 8 ] One need only abandon the common opinion that there are as many worlds of thought as there are human individuals. This opinion is nothing more than an old-fashioned prejudice anyway. It is tacitly assumed everywhere, without realizing that another is at least equally possible, and that the reasons for the validity of one or the other must first be considered. In place of this opinion, consider the following: There is only one single thought content at all, and our individual thinking is nothing more than a working of our self, our individual personality, into the thought center of the world. Whether this view is correct or not is not the place to examine it here; but it is possible, and we have achieved what we wanted, namely to show that it is at least quite possible to make the objectivity of thought, which we regard as necessary, appear to be without contradiction in other respects as well.
[ 9 ] In view of objectivity, the work of the thinker can be compared quite well with that of the mechanic. Just as the latter brings the forces of nature into an interplay and thereby brings about a purposeful activity and expression of force, so the thinker allows the masses of thought to enter into living interaction, and they develop into the systems of thought that make up our sciences.
[ 10 ] Nothing illuminates a view better than the discovery of the errors that oppose it. We would like to return to this method, which we have already used repeatedly with advantage.
[ 11 ] We usually believe that we combine certain concepts into larger complexes, or that we think in a certain way because we feel a certain inner (logical) compulsion to do so. Volkelt has also subscribed to this view. But how does it correspond to the transparent clarity with which our entire world of thought is present in our consciousness? We know nothing in the world more precisely than our thoughts. Should a certain connection be established on the basis of an inner compulsion when everything is so clear? Why do I need the compulsion if I know the nature of what is to be connected, know it through and through, and can therefore orient myself according to it? All our thought operations are processes that take place on the basis of insight into the nature of thought and not according to compulsion. Such a compulsion contradicts the nature of thought.
[ 12 ] It could at least be that it is in the nature of thought to imprint its content into its appearance at the same time, but that we nevertheless cannot perceive the latter directly due to the organization of our mind. But this is not the case. The way in which the content of the thought approaches us is a guarantee that we have the essence of the thing before us. We are aware that we accompany every process within the world of thought with our spirit. One can only imagine that the form of appearance is conditioned by the being of the thing. How could we create the manifestation if we did not know the essence of the thing? One can well imagine that the manifestation confronts us as a finished whole and that we then search for its core. But one cannot be of the opinion that one contributes to the production of the phenomenon without bringing about this production from the nucleus.