The Philosophy of Spiritual Activity
GA 4
Addition to the Revised Edition of 1918
[ 1 ] Various objections brought forward by philosophers immediately after this book was first published induce me to add the following brief statement to this revised edition. I can well understand that there are readers for whom the rest of the book is of interest, but who will regard the following as superfluous, as a remote and abstract spinning of thoughts. They may well leave this short description unread. However, problems arise within philosophical world views which originate in certain prejudices on the part of the philosophers, rather than in the natural sequence of human thinking in general. What has so far been dealt with here appears to me to be a task that confronts every human being who is striving for clarity about man's being and his relationship to the world. What follows, however, is rather a problem which certain philosophers demand should be considered when such questions are under discussion as those dealt with here, because through their whole way of thinking, they have created difficulties which do not otherwise exist. If one simply ignores such problems, certain people will soon come forward with accusations of dilettantism and so on. And the opinion arises that the author of a discussion such as this book contains has not thought out his position in regard to those views he does not mention in the book.
[ 2 ] The problem to which I refer is this: There are thinkers who are of the opinion that a particular difficulty exists when it is a question of understanding how the soul life of another person can affect one's own (the soul life of the observer). They say: My conscious world is enclosed within me; the conscious world of another person likewise is enclosed within him. I cannot see into the world of another's consciousness. How, then, do I come to know that we share the same world? A world view which considers that from a conscious sphere it is possible to draw conclusions about an unconscious sphere that can never become conscious, attempts to solve this difficulty in the following way. This world view says: The content of my consciousness is only a representative of a real world which I cannot consciously reach. In that real world lies the unknown cause of the content of my consciousness. In that world is also my real being, of which likewise I have in my consciousness only a representative. And in it exists also the being of the other person who confronts me. What is experienced consciously by him has its corresponding reality in his real being, independent of his consciousness. This reality reacts on my fundamental but unconscious being in the sphere that cannot become conscious, and in this way a representative that is quite independent of my conscious experience is produced in my consciousness. One sees here that to the sphere accessible to my consciousness, hypothetically is added another sphere, inaccessible to my consciousness, and this is done because it is believed that we would otherwise be forced to maintain that the whole external world which seems to confront me is only a world of my consciousness, and this would result in the—solipsistic—absurdity that the other persons also exist only in my consciousness.
[ 3 ] It is possible to attain clarity about this problem, which has been created by several of the more recent approaches to a theory of knowledge, if one endeavors to survey the matter from the point of view that observes facts in accordance with their spiritual aspect, as presented in this book. To begin with, what do I have before me when I confront another personality? Let us consider what the very first impression is. The first impression is the physical, bodily appearance of the other person, given me as perception, then the audible perception of what he is saying, and so on. I do not merely stare at all this; it sets my thinking activity in motion. To the extent that I confront the other personality with my thinking, the perceptions become transparent to my soul. To the extent that I grasp the perceptions in thinking, I am obliged to say that they are not at all what they appear to be to the external senses. Within the perceptions as they appear directly to the senses something else is revealed, namely what they are indirectly. The fact that I bring them before me means at the same time their extinction as mere appearances to the senses. But what, in their extinction, they bring to revelation, this, for the duration of its effect on me, forces me—as a thinking being—to extinguish my own thinking and to put in its place the thinking of what is revealed. And this thinking I grasp as an experience that is like the experience of my own thinking. I have really perceived the thinking of the other. For the direct perceptions, which extinguish themselves as appearances to the senses, are grasped by my thinking, and this is a process that takes place completely within my consciousness; it consists in the fact that the thinking of the other takes the place of my thinking. The division between the two spheres of consciousness is actually canceled out through the extinction of the appearances to the senses. In my consciousness this expresses itself in the fact that in experiencing the content of the other's consciousness I am aware of my own consciousness as little as I am aware of it in dreamless sleep. Just as my day-consciousness is excluded in dreamless sleep, so in the perceiving of the foreign content of consciousness, the content of my own is excluded. There are two reasons why one tends to be deluded about these facts; one is that in perceiving the other person, the extinction of the content of one's own consciousness is replaced not by unconsciousness as in sleep, but by the content of the other's consciousness; the other reason is that the alternation between extinction and re-appearance of self-consciousness occurs too quickly to be noticed in ordinary life.—This whole problem cannot be solved by an artificial construction of concepts which draws conclusions from what is conscious to what can never become conscious, but by actual experience of what occurs in the union of thinking with perception. Instances like the above often occur in regard to many problems which appear in philosophical literature. Thinkers should seek the path to unprejudiced observation in accordance with facts, both physical and spiritual, but instead they erect an artificial construction of concepts, inserting this between themselves and reality.
[ 4 ] Eduard von Hartmann, in an essay 63Die letzten Fragen der Erkenntnistheorie und Metaphysik, Ultimate Problems of Epistemology and Metaphysics, publ. in Vol. 108, pp. 55 seq. of the Zeitschrift für Philosophie und philosophische Kritik, the Periodical for Philosophy and Philosophical Criticism. includes my Philosophy of Spiritual Activity among philosophical works which are based on “epistemological monism.” And this theory is rejected by him as one that cannot even be considered. The reason for this is as follows. According to the viewpoint expressed in the essay mentioned above, only three possible epistemological standpoints exist. The first is when a person remains at the naive standpoint and takes perceived phenomena to be realities existing outside of human consciousness. In this case critical insight is lacking. It is not recognized that after all one remains with the content of one's consciousness merely within one's own consciousness. It is not realized that one is not dealing with a table-in-itself but only with the object of one's own consciousness. One remaining at this standpoint, or returning to it for any reason, is a naive realist. However, this standpoint is impossible, for it overlooks the fact that consciousness has no other object than itself. The second standpoint is when all this is recognized and is taken into account fully. Then to begin with, one becomes a transcendental idealist. As transcendental idealist one has to give up hope that anything from a “thing-in-itself” could ever reach human consciousness. And if one is consistent, then it is impossible not to become an absolute illusionist. For the world one confronts is transformed into a mere sum of objects of consciousness, and indeed only objects of one's own consciousness. One is forced to think of other people too—absurd though it is—as being present only as the content of one's own consciousness. According to von Hartmann the only possible standpoint is the third one, transcendental realism. This view assumes that “things-in-themselves” exist, but our consciousness cannot have direct experience of them in any way. Beyond human consciousness—in a way that remains unconscious—they are said to cause objects of consciousness to appear in human consciousness. All we can do is to draw conclusions about these “things-in-themselves” from the merely represented content of our consciousness which we experience. In the essay mentioned above, Eduard von Hartmann maintains that “epistemological monism”—and this he considers my standpoint to be—would in reality have to confess to one of the three standpoints just mentioned; this is not done, because the epistemological monist does not draw the actual conclusion of his presuppositions. The essay goes on to say:
“If one wants to find out what position a supposed monist occupies in regard to a theory of knowledge, it is only necessary to ask him certain questions and compel him to answer them. Voluntarily he will not give any opinion on these points, and he will go to any length to avoid answering direct questions on them, because each answer will show that as a monist his claim to belong to some other standpoint than one of the above three, in relation to a theory of knowledge, is out of the question. These questions are as follows: 1) Are things continuous or intermittent in their existence? If the answer is: They are continuous, then we are dealing with one form or another of naive realism. If the answer is: They are intermittent, then we have transcendental idealism. But if the answer is: They are on the one hand continuous (as content of the absolute consciousness, or as unconscious representations, or existing as possibilities of perceptions), on the other hand they are intermittent (as content of limited consciousness), then we recognize transcendental realism.—2) If three persons sit at a table, how many examples of the table are present? He who answers: One, is a naive realist; he who answers: Three, is a transcendental idealist; but he who answers: Four, is a transcendental realist. This last answer does indeed presuppose that it is legitimate to put under the one heading, 'examples of the table' something so dissimilar as the one table as thing-in-itself, and the three tables as perceptual objects in the three consciousnesses. Whoever finds this too much will have to answer 'one and three' instead of 'four.'—3) If two persons are in a room by themselves, how many examples of these persons are present? One answering: Two, is a naive realist; one answering: Four (namely, one 'I' and one 'other' in each of the two consciousnesses), is a transcendental idealist; but one answering: Six (namely, two persons as 'things-in-themselves' and four objects of representation of persons in the two consciousnesses), is a transcendental realist. One wishing to prove that epistemological monism is a different standpoint from any of these three, would have to answer each of the above questions differently, and I cannot imagine what such answers could be.”
The answers of The Philosophy of Spiritual Activity would be: 1) He who only grasps the perceptual content and takes this to be the reality, is a naive realist; he does not make it clear to himself that he can actually regard the perceptual content as enduring only so long as he is looking at it and he must, therefore, think of what he has before him as intermittent. However, as soon as he realizes that reality is present only when the perceptual content is permeated by thought, he reaches the insight that the perceptual content that comes to meet him as intermittent, is revealed as continuous when it is permeated with what thinking elaborates. Therefore: the perceptual content, grasped by a thinking that is also experienced, is continuous, whereas what is only perceived must be thought of as intermittent—that is, if it were real, which is not the case.—2) When three persons are sitting at a table, how many examples of the table are present? One table only is present; but as long as the three persons remain at their perceptual pictures they will have to say: These perceptual pictures are no reality at all. And as soon as they pass over to the table as grasped in their thinking, there is revealed to them the one reality of the table; with their three contents of consciousness they are united in this one reality.—3) When two persons are in a room by themselves, how many examples of these persons are present? There are most definitely not six examples present—not even in the sense of transcendental realism—there are two. Only to begin with, each of the two persons has merely the unreal perceptual, picture of himself as well as that of the other person. Of these pictures there are four, and the result of their presence in the thinking-activity of the two persons is that reality is grasped. In their thinking-activity each of the persons goes beyond the sphere of his own consciousness; within each of them lives the sphere of the other person's consciousness, as well as his own. At moments when this merging takes place, the persons are as little confined within their own consciousness as they are in sleep. But the next moment, consciousness of the merging with the other person returns, so that the consciousness of each person—in his experience of thinking—grasps himself and the other. I know that the transcendental realist describes this as a relapse into naive realism. But then I have already pointed out in this book that naive realism retains its justification when applied to a thinking that is experienced. The transcendental realist does not enter into the actual facts concerned in the process of knowledge; he excludes himself from them by the network of thoughts in which he gets entangled. Also, the monism which is presented in the Philosophy of Spiritual Activity should not be called “epistemological,” but rather, if a name is wanted, a monism of thought. All this has been misunderstood by Eduard von Hartmann. He did not enter into the specific points raised in the Philosophy of Spiritual Activity, but maintained that I had made an attempt to combine Hegel's universalistic panlogism 64For data on Hegel's “universal panlogism,” see any standard encyclopedia. with Hume's 65David Hume (1711–1776), Scottish philosopher and historian. Albert Einstein wrote, “If one reads Hume's books, one is amazed that many sometimes highly esteemed philosophers after him have been able to write so much obscure stuff and even to find grateful readers for it. Hume has permanently influenced the development of the best philosophers who came after him.” Among those influenced by Hume may be numbered Immanuel Kant, William James, George Santayana, and Bertrand Russell. Hume's writings and biographical and critical works concerning him and his ideas can be located by consulting any standard encyclopedia. individualistic phenomenalism 66A note on page 71 of the Zeitschrift für Philosophie (Periodical for Philosophy) Vol. 108. whereas in actual fact the Philosophy of Spiritual Activity has no similarity with these two views it is supposed to combine. (This is also the reason I did not feel inclined to compare my view with the “epistemological monism” of Johannes Rehmke,67Johannes Rehmke, 1848–1930, philosopher. His principal works are Logik oder Philosophie als Wissenslehre (Logic or Philosophy as Theory of Knowledge) and Die Welt als Wahrnehmung und Begriff (The World as Percept and Concept), Berlin, 1880. for example. In fact, the viewpoint of the Philosophy of Spiritual Activity is utterly different from what Eduard von Hartmann and others call epistemological monism.)
Erster Anhang
[ 1 ] Einwendungen, die mir gleich nach dem Erscheinen dieses Buches von philosophischer Seite her gemacht worden sind, veranlassen mich, die folgende kurze Ausführung dieser Neuausgabe hinzuzufügen. Ich kann mir gut denken, daß es Leser gibt, die für den übrigen Inhalt dieses Buches Interesse haben, die aber das Folgende als ein ihnen überflüssiges und fernliegendes abstraktes Begriffsgespinst ansehen. Sie können diese kurze Darstellung ungelesen lassen. Allein innerhalb der philosophischen Weltbetrachtung tauchen Probleme auf, die mehr in gewissen Vorurteilen der Denker als im naturgemäßen Gang jedes menschlichen Denkens selbst ihren Ursprung haben. Was sonst in diesem Buche behandelt ist, das scheint mir eine Aufgabe zu sein, die jeden Menschen angeht, der nach Klarheit ringt in bezug auf das Wesen des Menschen und dessen Verhältnis zur Welt. Das Folgende aber ist mehr ein Problem, von dem gewisse Philosophen fordern, daß es behandelt werde, wenn von den in diesem Buche dargestellten Dingen die Rede ist, weil diese Philosophen sich durch ihre Vorstellungsart gewisse nicht allgemein vorhandene Schwierigkeiten geschaffen haben. Geht man ganz an solchen Problemen vorbei, so sind dann gewisse Persönlichkeiten schnell mit dem Vorwurf des Dilettantismus und dergleichen bei der Hand. Und es entsteht die Meinung, als ob der Verfasser einer Darstellung wie der in diesem Buche gegebenen mit Ansichten sich nicht auseinandergesetzt hätte, die er in dem Buche selbst nicht besprochen hat.
[ 2 ] Das Problem, das ich hier meine, ist dieses: Es gibt Denker, welche der Meinung sind, daß sich eine besondere Schwierigkeit ergäbe, wenn man begreifen will, wie ein anderes menschliches Seelenleben auf das eigene (des Betrachters) wirken könne. Sie sagen: meine bewußte Welt ist in mir abgeschlossen; eine andere bewußte Welt ebenso in sich. Ich kann in die Bewußtseinswelt eines andern nicht hineinsehen. Wie komme ich dazu, mich mit ihm in einer gemeinsamen Welt zu wissen? Diejenige Weltansicht, welche es für möglich hält, von der bewußten Welt aus auf eine unbewußte zu schließen, die nie bewußt werden kann, versucht diese Schwierigkeit in der folgenden Art zu lösen. Sie sagt: die Welt, die ich in meinem Bewußtsein habe, ist die in mir repräsentierte Welt einer von mir bewußt nicht zu erreichenden Wirklichkeitswelt. In dieser liegen die mir unbekannten Veranlasser meiner Bewußtseinswelt. In dieser liegt auch meine wirkliche Wesenheit, von der ich ebenfalls nur einen Repräsentanten in meinem Bewußtsein habe. In dieser liegt aber auch die Wesenheit des andern Menschen, der mir gegenüber tritt. Was nun im Bewußtsein dieses andern Menschen erlebt wird, das hat seine von diesem Bewußtsein unabhängige entsprechende Wirklichkeit in seiner Wesenheit. Diese wirkt in dem Gebiet, das nicht bewußt werden kann, auf meine prinzipielle unbewußte Wesenheit, und dadurch wird in meinem Bewußtsein eine Repräsentanz geschaffen für das, was in einem von meinem bewußten Erleben ganz unabhängigen Bewußtsein gegenwärtig ist. Man sieht: es wird hier zu der von meinem Bewußtsein erreichbaren Welt eine für dieses im Erleben unerreichbare hypothetisch hinzugedacht, weil man sonst sich zu der Behauptung gedrängt glaubt, alle Außenwelt, die ich meine vor mir zu haben, sei nur meine Bewußtseinswelt, und das ergäbe die — solipsistische — Absurdität, auch die andern Personen lebten nur innerhalb meines Bewußtseins.
[ 3 ] Klarheit über diese durch manche erkenntnistheoretische Strömungen der neueren Zeit geschaffene Frage kann man gewinnen, wenn man vom Gesichtspunkte der geistgemäßen Beobachtung, der in der Darstellung dieses Buches eingenommen ist, die Sache zu überschauen trachtet. Was habe ich denn zunächst vor mir, wenn ich einer andern Persönlichkeit gegenüberstehe? Ich sehe auf das nächste. Es ist die mir als Wahrnehmung gegebene sinnliche Leibeserscheinung der andern Person; dann noch etwa die Gehörwahrnehmung dessen, was sie sagt, und so weiter. Alles dies starre ich nicht bloß an, sondern es setzt meine denkende Tätigkeit in Bewegung. Indem ich denkend vor der andern Persönlichkeit stehe, kennzeichnet sich mir die Wahrnehmung gewissermaßen als seelisch durchsichtig. Ich bin genötigt, im denkenden Ergreifen der Wahrnehmung mir zu sagen, daß sie dasjenige gar nicht ist, als was sie den äußeren Sinnen erscheint. DieSinneserscheinung offenbart in dem, was sie unmittelbar ist, ein anderes, was sie mittelbar ist. Ihr Sich-vor-mich Hinstellen ist zugleich ihr Auslöschen als bloße Sinneserscheinung. Aber was sie in diesem Auslöschen zur Erscheinung bringt, das zwingt mich als denkendes Wesen, mein Denken für die Zeit ihres Wirkens auszulöschen und an dessen Stelle ihr Denken zu setzen. Dieses ihr Denken aber ergreife ich in meinem Denken als Erlebnis wie mein eigenes. Ich habe das Denken des andern wirklich wahrgenommen. Denn die als Sinneserscheinung sich auslöschende unmittelbare Wahrnehmung wird von meinem Denken ergriffen, und es ist ein vollkommen in meinem Bewußtsein liegender Vorgang, der darin besteht, daß sich an die Stelle meines Denkens das andere Denken setzt. Durch das Sich-Auslöschen der Sinneserscheinung wird die Trennung zwischen den beiden Bewußtseinssphären tatsächlich aufgehoben. Das repräsentiert sich in meinem Bewußtsein dadurch, daß ich im Erleben des andern Bewußtseinsinhaltes mein eigenes Bewußtsein ebensowenig erlebe, wie ich es im traumlosen Schlafe erlebe. Wie in diesem mein Tagesbewußtsein ausgeschaltet ist, so im Wahrnehmen des fremden Bewußtseinsinhaltes der eigene. Die Täuschung, als ob dies nicht so sei, rührt nur davon her, daß im Wahrnehmen der andern Person erstens an die Stelle der Auslöschung des eigenen Bewußtseinsinhaltes nichtBewußtlosigkeit tritt wie im Schlafe, sondern der andere Bewußtseinsinhalt, und zweitens, daß die Wechselzustände zwischen Auslöschen und Wieder-Aufleuchten des Bewußtseins von mir selbst zu schnell aufeinander folgen, um für gewöhnlich bemerkt zu werden. — Das ganze hier vorliegende Problem löst man nicht durch künstliche Begriffskonstruktionen, die von Bewußtem auf solches schließen, das nie bewußt werden kann, sondern durch wahres Erleben dessen, was sich in der Verbindung von Denken und Wahrnehmung ergibt. Es ist dies bei sehr vielen Fragen der Fall, die in der philosophischen Literatur auftreten. Die Denker sollten den Weg suchen zu unbefangener geistgemäßerBeobachtung;statt dessen schieben sie vor dieWirklichkeit eine künstliche Begriffskonstruktion hin.
[ 4 ] In einer Abhandlung Eduard von Hartmanns «Die letzten Fragen der Erkenntnistheorie und Metaphysik» (in der Zeitschrift für Philosophie und philosophische Kritik, 108. Bd. 5. 55 ff.) wird meine «Philosophie der Freiheit» in die philosophische Gedankenrichtung eingereiht, die sich auf einen «erkenntnistheoretischen Monismus» stützen will. Ein solcher Standpunkt wird von Eduard von Hartmann als ein unmöglicher abgelehnt.Dem liegt folgendes zugrunde. Gemäß der Vorstellungsart, welche sich in dem genannten Aufsatze zum Ausdruck bringt, gibt es nur drei mögliche erkenntnistheoretische Standpunkte. Entweder man bleibt auf dem naiven Standpunkt stehen, welcher die wahrgenommenenErscheinungen als wirkliche Dinge außer dem menschlichen Bewußtsein nimmt. Dann fehlte es einem an kritischer Erkenntnis. Man sehe nicht ein, daß man mit seinem Bewußtseinsinhalt doch nur in dem eigenen Bewußtsein sei. Man durchschaue nicht, daß man es nicht mit einem «Tische an sich» zu tun habe, sondern nur mit dem eigenen Bewußtseinsobjekte. Wer auf diesem Standpunkte bleibe oder durch irgendwelche Erwägungen zu ihm wieder zurückkehre, der sei naiver Realist. Allein dieser Standpunkt sei eben unmöglich, denn er verkenne, daß das Bewußtsein nur seine eigenen Bewußtseinsobjekte habe. Oder man durchschaue diesen Sachverhalt und gestehe sich ihn voll ein. Dann werde man zunächst transzendentaler Idealist. Man müsse dann aber ablehnen, daß von einem «Dinge an sich» jemals etwas im menschlichen Bewußtsein auftreten könne. Dadurch entgehe man aber nicht dem absoluten Illusionismus, wenn man nur konsequent genug dazu sei. Denn es verwandelt sich einem die Welt, der man gegenübersteht, in eine bloße Summe von Bewußtseinsobjekten, und zwar nur von Objekten des eigenen Bewußtseins. Auch die anderer Menschen sei man dann — absurderweise — gezwungen, nur als im eigenen Bewußtseinsinhalt allein anwesend zu denken. Ein möglicherStandpunkt sei nur der dritte, der transzendentale Realismus. Dieser nimmt an, es gibt «Dinge an sich», aber das Bewußtsein kann in keiner Weise im unmittelbaren Erleben mit ihnen zu tun haben. Sie bewirken jenseits des menschlichen Bewußtseins auf eine Art, die nicht ins Bewußtsein fällt, daß in diesem die Bewußtseinsobjekte auftreten. Man kann auf diese «Dinge an sich» nur durch Schlußfolgerung aus dem allein erlebten, aber eben bloß vorgestellten Bewußtseinsinhalt kommen. Eduard von Hartmann behauptet nun in dem genannten Aufsatze, ein « erkenntnistheoretischer Monismus», als den er meinen Standpunkt auffaßt, müsse sich in Wirklichkeit zu einem der drei Standpunkte bekennen; er tue es nur nicht, weil er die tatsächlichen Konsequenzen seiner Voraussetzungen nicht ziehe. Und dann wird in dem Aufsatz gesagt: «Wenn man herausbekommen will, welchem erkenntnistheoretischen Standpunkt ein angeblicher erkenntnistheoretischer Monist angehört, so braucht man ihm nur einige Fragen vorzulegen und ihn zur Beantwortung derselben zu zwingen. Denn von selbst läßt sich kein solcher zur Äußerung über diese Punkte herbei, und auch derBeantwortung direkter Fragen wird er auf alle Weise auszuweichen suchen, weil jede Antwort den Anspruch auf erkenntnistheoretische Monismus als einen von den drei anderen verschiedenen Standpunkt aufhebt. Diese Fragen sind folgende: 1. Sind die Dinge in ihrem Bestande kontinuierlich oder intermittierend? Wenn die Antwort lautet: sie sind kontinuierlich, so hat man es mit irgendeiner Form des naiven Realismus zu tun. Wenn sie lautet: sie sind intermittierend, so liegt transzendentaler Idealismus vor. Wenn sie aber lautet: sie sind einerseits (als Inhalte des absoluten Bewußtseins, oder als unbewußte Vorstellungen oder als Wahrnehmungsmöglichkeiten) kontinuierlich, andererseits (als Inhalte des beschränkten Bewußtseins) intermittierend, so ist transzendentaler Realismus konstatiert. — 2. Wenn drei Personen an einem Tisch sitzen, wieviele Exemplare des Tisches sind vorhanden? Wer antwortet: eines, ist naiver Realist; wer antwortet: drei, ist transzendentaler Idealist; wer aber antwortet: vier, der ist transzendentaler Realist. Es ist dabei allerdings vorausgesetzt, daß man so ungleichartiges wie den einenTisch als Ding an sich und die drei Tische als Wahrnehmungsobjekte in den drei Bewußtseinen unter die gemeinsame Bezeichnung «Exemplare des Tisches» zus ammen-fassen dürfe. Wem dies als eine zu große Freiheit erscheint, der wird die Antwort «einer und drei» geben müssen, anstatt «vier». — 3. Wenn zwei Personen allein in einem Zimmer zusammen sind, wieviel Exemplare dieser Personen sind vorhanden? Wer antwortet: zwei, ist naiver Realist; wer antwortet: vier (nämlich in jedem der beiden Bewußtseine ein Ich und ein anderer), der ist transzendentaler Idealist; wer aber antwortet: sechs (nämlich zwei Personen als Dinge an sich und vier Vorstellungsobjekte von Personen in den zwei Bewußtseinen), der ist transzendentaler Realist. Wer den erkenntnistheoretischen Monismus als einen von diesen drei Standpunkten verschiedenen erweisen wollte, der müßte auf jede dieser drei Fragen eine andere Antwort geben; ich wüßte aber nicht wie diese lauten könnte.» Die Antworten der «Philosophie der Freiheit» müßten so lauten: 1. Wer von den Dingen nur die Wahrnehmungsinhalte erfaßt und diese für Wirklichkeit nimmt, ist naiver Realist, und er macht sich nicht klar, daß er eigentlich diese Wahrnehmungsinhalte nur so lange für bestehend ansehen dürfte, als er auf die Dinge hinsieht, daß er also, was er vor sich hat, als intermittierend denken müßte. Sobald er sich aber klar darüber wird, daß Wirklichkeit nur im gedankendurchsetzten Wahrnehmbaren vorhanden ist, gelangt er zu der Einsicht, daß der als intermittierend auftretende Wahrnehmungsinhalt durchsetzt von dem im Denken Erarbeiteten sich als kontinuierlich offenbart. Als kontinuierlich muß also gelten: der von dem erlebten Denken erfaßte Wahrnehmungsgehalt, von dem das, was nur wahrgenommen wird, als intermittierend zu denken wäre, wenn es — was nicht der Fall ist — wirklich wäre. — 2. Wenn drei Personen an einem Tisch sitzen, wieviel Exemplare des Tisches sind vorhanden? Es ist nur ein Tisch vorhanden; aber so lange die drei Personen bei ihren Wahrnehmungsbildern stehen bleiben wollten, müßten sie sagen: diese Wahrnehmungsbilder sind überhaupt keine Wirklichkeit. Sobald sie zu dem in ihrem Denken erfaßten Tisch übergehen, offenbart sich ihnen die eine Wirklichkeit des Tisches; sie sind mit ihren drei Bewußtseinsinhalten in dieser Wirklichkeit vereinigt. — 3. Wenn zwei Personen allein in einem Zimmer zusammen sind, wieviel Exemplare dieser Personen sind vorhanden? Es sind ganz gewiß nicht sechs — auch nicht im Sinne des transzendentalen Realisten — Exemplare vorhanden, sondern nur zwei. Nur hat jede der Personen zunächst sowohl von sich wie von der anderen Person nur das unwirkliche Wahrnehmungsbild. Von diesen Bildern sind vier vorhanden, bei deren Anwesenheit in den Denktätigkeiten der zwei Personen sich die Ergreifung der Wirklichkeit abspielt. In dieser Denktätigkeit übergreift eine jede der Personen ihre Bewußtseinssphäre; die der anderen und der eigenen Person lebt in ihr auf. In den Augenblicken dieses Auflebens sind die Personen ebensowenig in ihrem Bewußtsein beschlossen wie im Schlafe. Nur tritt in den anderen Augenblicken das Bewußtsein von diesem Aufgehen in dem andern wieder auf, so daß das Bewußtsein einer jeden der Personen im denkenden Erleben sich und den andern ergreift. Ich weiß, daß der transzendentale Realist dieses als einen Rückfall in den naiven Realismus bezeichnet. Doch habe ich bereits in dieser Schrift darauf hingewiesen, daß der naive Realismus für das erlebte Denken seine Berechtigung behält. Der transzendentale Realist läßt sich auf den wahren Sachverhalt im Erkenntnisvorgang gar nicht ein; er schließt sich von diesem durch ein Gedankengespinst ab und verstrickt sich in diesem. Es sollte der in der «Philosophie der Freiheit» auftretende Monismus auch nicht «erkenntnistheoretischer» genannt werden, sondern, wenn man einen Beinamen will, Gedanken-Monismus. Das alles wurde durch Eduard von Hartmann verkannt. Er ging auf das Spezifische der Darstellung in der «Philosophie der Freiheit» nicht ein, sondern behauptete: ich hätte den Versuch gemacht, den Hegelschen universalistischen Panlogismus mit Humes individualistischem Phänomenalismus zu verbinden (S. 71 der Zeitschrift für Philosophie, 108. Bd., Anmerkung), während in der Tat die «Philosophie der Freiheit» als solche gar nichts mit diesen zwei Standpunkten, die sie angeblich zu vereinigen bestrebt ist, zu tun hat. (Hier liegt auch der Grund, warum es mir nicht naheliegen konnte, mich zum Beispiel mit dem «erkenntnis theoretischen Monismus» Johannes Rehmkes auseinanderzusetzen. Es ist eben der Gesichtspunkt der «Philosophie der Freiheit» ein ganz anderer, als was Eduard von Hartmann und andere erkenntnistheoretischen Monismus nennen.)
First appendix
[ 1 ] Objections made to me by philosophers immediately after the publication of this book have prompted me to add the following brief explanation to this new edition. I can well imagine that there are readers who are interested in the rest of the contents of this book, but who regard the following as a superfluous and remote abstract conceptual conglomeration. They can leave this brief account unread. Only within the philosophical view of the world do problems arise which have their origin more in certain prejudices of thinkers than in the natural course of every human thought itself. What else is dealt with in this book seems to me to be a task that concerns every person who struggles for clarity with regard to the nature of man and his relationship to the world. The following, however, is more a problem which certain philosophers demand to be dealt with when speaking of the things presented in this book, because these philosophers have created certain difficulties for themselves through their way of thinking which are not generally present. If such problems are completely ignored, certain personalities are quick to accuse them of dilettantism and the like. And the opinion arises as if the author of an account such as the one given in this book had not dealt with views that he did not discuss in the book itself.
[ 2 ] The problem I am referring to here is this: There are thinkers who are of the opinion that a particular difficulty arises when one wants to understand how another human soul life can have an effect on one's own (the observer's). They say: my conscious world is closed in me; another conscious world is also closed in itself. I cannot see into the conscious world of another. How do I come to know that I am in a common world with him? The world view that considers it possible to deduce from the conscious world to an unconscious world that can never become conscious tries to solve this difficulty in the following way. It says: the world that I have in my consciousness is the world represented in me of a world of reality that I cannot consciously reach. In this world lie the unknown causes of my world of consciousness. In this also lies my real entity, of which I also have only one representative in my consciousness. But in this also lies the entity of the other person who confronts me. What is now experienced in the consciousness of this other person has its corresponding reality in his entity, independent of this consciousness. In the area that cannot become conscious, this has an effect on my principle unconscious entity, and thereby a representation is created in my consciousness for that which is present in a consciousness that is completely independent of my conscious experience. As you can see, a hypothetical world that is inaccessible to my consciousness is added to the world that is accessible to it in my experience, because otherwise I would feel compelled to assert that all the external world that I think I have before me is only my conscious world, and that would result in the - solipsistic - absurdity that the other persons also only live within my consciousness.
[ 3 ] Clarity about this question, created by some epistemological currents of recent times, can be gained if one seeks to survey the matter from the point of view of spiritual observation, which is adopted in the presentation of this book. What do I first have before me when I face another personality? I look at the next thing. It is the sensory physical appearance of the other person given to me as perception; then, for instance, the auditory perception of what he says, and so on. I do not merely stare at all this, but it sets my thinking activity in motion. As I stand thinking before the other personality, the perception marks itself out to me, as it were, as psychically transparent. I am compelled to say to myself in my thinking grasp of perception that it is not at all what it appears to the outer senses. In what it is directly, the sense-appearance reveals something else that it is indirectly. Its placing itself before me is at the same time its obliteration as a mere sense appearance. But what it makes manifest in this erasure forces me as a thinking being to erase my thinking for the time of its working and to put its thinking in its place. This their thinking, however, I grasp in my thinking as an experience like my own. I have really perceived the thinking of the other. For the immediate perception that extinguishes itself as a sensory phenomenon is seized by my thinking, and it is a process that lies completely within my consciousness, which consists in the fact that the other thinking takes the place of my thinking. The separation between the two spheres of consciousness is actually abolished through the obliteration of the sensory phenomenon. This is represented in my consciousness by the fact that in the experience of the other content of consciousness I experience my own consciousness just as little as I experience it in dreamless sleep. Just as my day consciousness is switched off in the latter, so my own is switched off in the perception of the other consciousness. The illusion, as if this were not so, arises only from the fact that in the perception of the other person, firstly, the extinction of my own consciousness is not replaced by unconsciousness as in sleep, but by the other consciousness, and secondly, that the alternating states between extinction and re-illumination of my own consciousness follow each other too quickly to be usually noticed. - The whole problem at hand is not solved by artificial conceptual constructions that infer from what is conscious to what can never become conscious, but by truly experiencing what arises in the connection between thinking and perception. This is the case with many questions that arise in philosophical literature. Thinkers should seek the path to unbiased, spiritually appropriate observation; instead, they push an artificial conceptual construction in front of reality.
[ 4 ] In a treatise by Eduard von Hartmann entitled "Die letzten Fragen der Erkenntnistheorie und Metaphysik" (in Zeitschrift für Philosophie und philosophische Kritik, 108. Bd. 5. 55 ff.), my "Philosophy of Freedom" is classified in the philosophical school of thought that seeks to base itself on an "epistemological monism". Eduard von Hartmann rejects such a standpoint as impossible, which is based on the following. According to the way of thinking expressed in the above-mentioned essay, there are only three possible epistemological standpoints. Either one remains on the naive standpoint, which takes the perceived appearances as real things apart from human consciousness. Then one lacks critical insight. One does not realize that the content of one's consciousness is only in one's own consciousness. One does not realize that one is not dealing with a "table in itself", but only with one's own object of consciousness. Whoever remains on this standpoint or returns to it through any considerations is a naive realist. But this point of view is impossible, for it fails to recognize that consciousness has only its own objects of consciousness. Or one sees through this fact and fully admits it. Then one first becomes a transcendental idealist. But then one would have to reject that anything of a "thing in itself" could ever appear in human consciousness. But this does not mean that one escapes absolute illusionism, if one is only consistent enough to do so. For the world one is confronted with is transformed into a mere sum of objects of consciousness, and only of objects of one's own consciousness. One is then also - absurdly - forced to think of other people as being present only in the content of one's own consciousness. A possible point of view is only the third, transcendental realism. This assumes that there are "things in themselves", but that consciousness cannot have anything to do with them in direct experience. They cause the objects of consciousness to appear beyond human consciousness in a way that does not fall into consciousness. One can only arrive at these "things in themselves" by inference from the solely experienced, but merely imagined content of consciousness. Eduard von Hartmann now claims in the above-mentioned essay that an "epistemological monism", as which he understands my point of view, must in reality commit itself to one of the three points of view; it only does not do so because it does not draw the actual consequences of its presuppositions. And then the essay says: "If one wants to find out which epistemological standpoint an alleged epistemological monist belongs to, one only needs to put some questions to him and force him to answer them. For no such person will allow himself to express himself on these points, and he will also try in every way to avoid answering direct questions, because every answer invalidates the claim to epistemological monism as a standpoint different from the other three. These questions are the following: 1. are things continuous or intermittent in their existence? If the answer is: they are continuous, then we are dealing with some form of naive realism. If the answer is: they are intermittent, then we are dealing with transcendental idealism. But if it is: they are continuous on the one hand (as contents of absolute consciousness, or as unconscious ideas, or as perceptual possibilities), and intermittent on the other (as contents of limited consciousness), then transcendental realism is established. - 2. if three people are sitting at a table, how many copies of the table are there? Whoever answers: one, is a naive realist; whoever answers: three, is a transcendental idealist; but whoever answers: four, is a transcendental realist. It is presupposed, however, that such dissimilar things as the one table as a thing in itself and the three tables as objects of perception in the three consciousnesses may be subsumed under the common designation "specimens of the table". To whom this seems too great a liberty, he will have to give the answer "one and three" instead of "four". - 3. if two people are alone together in a room, how many copies of these people are there? He who answers: two, is a naive realist; he who answers: four (namely, in each of the two consciousnesses an I and another), is a transcendental idealist; but he who answers: six (namely, two persons as things in themselves and four objects of conception of persons in the two consciousnesses), is a transcendental realist. Whoever wanted to prove epistemological monism to be different from these three standpoints would have to give a different answer to each of these three questions; but I would not know what this answer could be." The answers of the "philosophy of freedom" would have to be as follows: 1. he who only grasps the perceptual contents of things and takes these for reality is a naive realist, and he does not realize that he may actually regard these perceptual contents as existing only as long as he looks at the things, that he must therefore think what he has before him as intermittent. But as soon as he realizes that reality is only present in the perceptible interspersed with thought, he arrives at the insight that the perceptual content that appears as intermittent interspersed with what has been worked out in thought reveals itself as continuous. The following must therefore be regarded as continuous: the perceptual content grasped by experienced thinking, of which that which is only perceived would have to be thought as intermittent if it were real - which is not the case. - (2) If three people are sitting at a table, how many copies of the table are there? There is only one table; but as long as the three persons wanted to remain with their perceptual images, they would have to say: these perceptual images are no reality at all. As soon as they pass over to the table they have grasped in their thinking, the one reality of the table reveals itself to them; they are united with their three contents of consciousness in this reality. - (3) If two persons are alone together in a room, how many copies of these persons are there? There are certainly not six - not even in the sense of the transcendental realist - but only two. But each of the persons initially has only the unreal perceptual image of himself as well as of the other person. There are four of these images, in the presence of which the apprehension of reality takes place in the mental activity of the two persons. In this mental activity, each of the persons overlaps their own sphere of consciousness; that of the other and of their own person comes to life in them. In the moments of this coming to life the persons are just as little resolved in their consciousness as in sleep. Only in the other moments the consciousness of this resurrection arises again in the other, so that the consciousness of each of the persons takes hold of itself and the other in the thinking experience. I know that the transcendental realist calls this a relapse into naive realism. But I have already pointed out in this paper that naive realism retains its justification for experienced thinking. The transcendental realist does not engage with the true facts of the cognitive process at all; he closes himself off from them through a web of thought and becomes entangled in it. The monism that appears in the "Philosophy of Freedom" should also not be called "epistemological", but, if one wants an epithet, thought-monism. All this was misjudged by Eduard von Hartmann. He did not go into the specifics of the presentation in the "Philosophy of Freedom", but claimed: I would have made the attempt to combine Hegel's universalistic panlogism with Hume's individualistic phenomenalism (p. 71 of the Zeitschrift für Philosophie, 108th vol., note), while in fact the "Philosophy of Freedom" as such has nothing at all to do with these two points of view, which it supposedly endeavors to unite. (This is also the reason why it was not obvious for me to deal with Johannes Rehmke's "epistemological monism", for example. The point of view of the "philosophy of freedom" is quite different from what Eduard von Hartmann and others call epistemological monism.