Kitabı oku: «Fundamental Philosophy, Vol. 2 (of 2)», sayfa 13

CHAPTER XIII.
KANT'S OPINION OF REALITY AND NEGATION

95. Kant numbers among his categories reality and negation, or existence and non-existence, and, conformably to his principles, defines them thus: "Reality is a pure conception of the understanding; it is what corresponds, in general, to any sensation whatever, consequently that whose conception denotes a being in itself, in time. Negation is that whose conception represents a not-being in time. The opposition of these two things consists in the difference of the same time, as full or void. Since then, time consists solely in the form of the intuition, and consequently in the form of the objects as phenomena, it follows that that which in them corresponds to the sensation, is the transcendental matter of all objects, as things in themselves, essential reality. Every sensation has a degree or intensity, by which it may fill more or less the same time, that is, the inward sense relatively to the representation of an object, until it be reduced to nothing = 0 = negation."

There is in this passage a fundamental error which ruins the whole basis of all intelligence: there is also much confusion in his application of the idea of time.

96. According to Kant, reality alone refers to sensations; therefore the idea of being will be the idea of the phenomena of sensibility in general; this idea will mean nothing, if applied to the non-sensible; the very principle of contradiction will necessarily be limited to the sphere of sensibility; and we neither shall know, or be able to know any thing without the sensible order. Such are the consequences of this doctrine; let us now examine the solidity of the principle from which they flow.

97. Were the idea of reality only the idea of the sensible in general, we could never apply it to non-sensible things, which, however, experience teaches we can do. We speak incessantly of the possibility and even of the existence of non-sensible beings, and we even distinguish the phenomena of our mind into those belonging to sensibility, and those which correspond to the purely intellectual order. The idea of being, therefore, for us, denotes a general conception non-circumscribed by the sensible order.

98. Kant will answer that the applications we make of this idea, extending it beyond the sphere of sensibility, are vain illusions expressed in unmeaning words. To this we reply.

I. There is now no question of ascertaining whether the applications of the idea of being or reality beyond the sensible order be founded or unfounded; there is question only of ascertaining what it is that this idea represents to us, whether the object represented be illusory or not. Kant, when defining reality, regards it as one of his categories, and consequently, as one of the pure conceptions of the understanding. To make his definition good, he ought to employ this conception in its greatest possible extent: but as he has demonstrated that conception, in itself, is not limited to the sphere of sensibility, it must follow that his definition is inadmissible. Had he said that the applications of the conception beyond the sensible order were unfounded, he would indeed have erred, but would not have destroyed conception itself; yet he equivocates not only in the uses of conception, but also in its nature, which he can only ruin, if he limit it to the sphere of sensibility.

II. The principle of contradiction is founded in the idea of being, and extends as well to the non-sensible as to the sensible. It would follow, were we to admit Kant's doctrine, that the principle of contradiction, "It is impossible for a thing to be and not to be at the same time," would be equivalent to this proposition; "It is impossible for a phenomenon of sensibility to appear and not to appear at the same time." Evidently neither philosophy nor common sense ever gave such a meaning to the principle of contradiction. When the impossibility of a thing's being and not being at the same time is affirmed, this is asserted in general, and abstraction is absolutely made of the things pertaining or not pertaining to the sensible order. Were it not thus, we should be obliged to say that non-sensible beings are absolutely impossible, which even Kant does not venture to maintain, or, supposing them to exist, to doubt whether the principle of contradiction is applicable to them. Who sees not the absurdity of such a doubt, and that, if it be admitted for a single instant, all intelligence is destroyed? If we limit the generality of the principle of contradiction, the impossibility is no longer absolute: and supposing it to fail in certain cases, who shall assure us that it does not in all?

III. Kant himself admits the distinction between the phenomena of sensibility and purely intellectual conceptions: with him, therefore, reality comprises something more than the sensible. Purely intellectual conceptions are a reality, are something at least as subjective phenomena of our mind, and yet are not sensible, as Kant himself confesses; he therefore falls into a contradiction, when he limits the idea of reality to the purely sensible.

99. Kant conceives reality and negation only as filling, or leaving void, time, which, in his opinion, is the primitive form of our intuitions, and a kind of back-ground upon which the mind sees all objects, even its own operations. According to this doctrine, the ideas of time precede those of reality and negation, since only in relation to it are the two latter conceivable. And now we see the singularity of a form, or whatever else it be called, to which the ideas of reality and negation are made to refer when nothing is conceivable without the idea of reality. Kant, scrupulous as he is in the analysis of the elements of our mind, and contemptuous as he is towards all metaphysicians who preceded him, ought to have explained to us the nature of this form in which we see reality, and which, nevertheless, is not contained in the idea of reality. If it is something, it will be a reality; and if it is not something, it will be a pure nothing; and consequently, it cannot be a form which can, by filling and becoming void, present to our mind the ideas of reality or negation. It would be easy to show, by an abundance of reason, the German philosopher's equivocation, when he so inexactly determines the relations between time and the idea of being; but as we propose to explain at length the idea of time, we will pass over here what belongs to another part of this work.

CHAPTER XIV.
RECAPITULATION AND CONSEQUENCES OF THE DOCTRINE CONCERNING THE IDEA OF BEING

100. We wish now to recapitulate the doctrine brought out in the preceding chapters, so that it may be seen at a glance in all its bearings and connections.

The idea of being is so fruitful in results, that we must sound it under all its aspects, and never lose sight of it in investigating transcendental philosophy.

101. We have the idea of ens, or of being in general; reason and our inward sense both attest it.

102. This idea is simple, and cannot be resolved into other elements: it expresses a general reason of things, and its nature is in a certain manner destroyed if it be mingled with particular ideas. It is intuitive, but indeterminate to such a degree that, by itself alone, it affords us no idea of a real or possible being. We not only know that every being is, but that it is some thing which is its predicate: even the Infinite Being is not only a being, but is an intelligent and free being, and formally possesses all perfections which imply no imperfection.

103. The idea of being may express either simple existence, in which case it is substantive, or the relation of a predicate with a subject, and then it is copulative. In the proposition, "the sun is," being is substantive, that is, expresses existence; in the proposition, "the sun is luminous," being is copulative, that is, it denotes the relation of the predicate with a subject.

104. The ideas of identity and distinction originate in the ideas of being and of not-being; and thus the idea of copulative being, which affirms the identity of a predicate with a subject, flows also in a manner from the idea of substantive being.

105. Being, which is the principal object of the understanding, is not the possible inasmuch as possible. We conceive possibility only in order to actuality. Possibility flows from actuality, not actuality from possibility. We could not conceive pure possibility, that is, possibility without existence, did we not conceive finite beings in whose idea being is not of necessity involved, and of whose appearance and disappearance we are incessantly reminded by experience.

106. The understanding perceives being, and this is a condition indispensable to all its perceptions; but the idea of being is not the only one offered to it, since it knows different modes of being, which, by the very fact that they are modes, add something to the general and absolute idea of existence.

107. When we consider the essences of things, and abstract their reality, our cognitions always involve this condition, – if they exist. There can be only a conditional science of the purely possible, insomuch as it is not; that is, provided the object pass from possibility to reality. We must, in order to establish pure possibility so that it may have necessary relations, subject to the condition of existence, have recourse to a necessary being, origin of all truth.

108. The essences of things in the abstract mean nothing, nor can they become the object of affirmation or negation, unless we suppose a necessary being in which is the reason of the relations of things, and of the possibility of their existence.

109. Pure truth, independent of all understanding, of all being created or uncreated, is an illusion, or rather an absurdity. With pure nothing there is no truth. Truth cannot be atheistic; without God there is no truth.

110. We not only know being, but also not-being. We have an idea of negation, and it always refers to some being. Absolute nothing cannot be the object of intelligence. The idea of not-being has its own peculiar fecundity; combined with that of being, it gives the principle of contradiction, engenders the ideas of distinction and multiplicity, and makes negative judgments possible.

111. The idea of being does not flow from sensations; neither is it innate, in the sense that it pre-exists in our understanding as a type prior to all perceptions. There is no reason why it may not be called innate, if this mean only a condition sine qua non of all our intellectual acts, and consequently of the exercise of our innate faculties. The idea of being is mingled in every intellectual perception, but it is not offered to us with perfect clearness and distinctness until we separate it by reflection from the particular ideas which accompany it.

112. Essence is not distinguished from existence even in finite beings. It is a distinction in conceptions, to which there is no real distinction corresponding.

113. The identity of essence with existence does not involve the necessity of finite things. The arguments by which some pretend to establish this consequence are founded upon an ambiguous meaning of words.

114. Kant's opinion, which limits the idea of reality, and that also of negation, to the purely sensible order, would destroy all intelligence, since it overthrows the very principle of contradiction. This doctrine of the German philosopher is also in opposition with what he himself taught concerning purely intellectual conceptions, distinct from sensible representations. When he refers the ideas of reality and negation to that of time, as the primitive form of the inward sense, he leaves out of the idea of reality what no less pertains to it, and presents the idea of time under a point of view wholly equivocal.

115. As sensible representation is based upon the finite intuition of extension, so the perceptive faculties of the pure understanding receive the idea of being as their foundation. In the same manner that extension is presented to sensibility as limitable, and from limitability results figurability, and consequently all the objects of geometrical science; so also does the idea of not-being, combined with that of being, fecundate in a manner the metaphysical sciences. The parallelism of the two ideas, extension and being, is not of such a nature as to render the former independent of the latter. So far as science is concerned, the idea of extension is sterile, if it be not combined with the general idea of being and not-being. This may be shown in many ways; but it will suffice to recollect that geometry cannot take a single step without the principle of contradiction, into which the ideas of being and of not-being enter.²⁴

116. All our cognitions flow from the idea of being and not-being, combined with intuitive ideas. We shall have occasion in the following books to remark this admirable fecundity of an idea, which, although it cannot of itself teach any thing, can yet, when united with others, and modified itself in various ways, so illuminate the intellectual world as to merit to be called the object of understanding.

BOOK SIXTH.
UNITY AND NUMBER

CHAPTER I.
PRELIMINARY CONSIDERATIONS ON THE IDEA OF UNITY

1. Before analyzing the idea of number, let us examine its simplest element, unity. Number is a connection of unities. We cannot know what number is, if we do not know what unity is.²⁵

2. What is unity? When is a thing one? We all seem to know what unity is, since upon it we found the fabric of all our arithmetic cognitions. We all know when a thing is one, and we never equivocate on the meaning of the word. In this the learned and the unlearned stand on the same footing. The word one, in our language, has only one meaning for all who understand it. The same may be said of the word which in other languages expresses the same idea. When we meet the figure 1, which corresponds to this idea, and expresses it in a general manner, abstracting the difference of idioms, all men understand and apply it in the same manner.

3. The idea of unity is the same in all men; it is a common patrimony of the human race. It is not bound to this or that object, nor to this or that act of the mind; it extends to all in the same manner. Even composite and multiple things are called one only, inasmuch as they participate in a general idea. The indivisible point is one. The line composed of many points could not be one were there not a contiguous enchainment of these points, and did they not all unite to form one object, which gives us one impression, and is submitted to one act of our understanding.

4. The idea of unity is not a particular sensation, since it applies to all; neither is it sensation in general, since it pertains to what is not sensation. The sensation of color is one; so, also, the consciousness of the me is one, although this is not a sensation. The size of the rectangle which I see is one, and the relation of the equality of its angles is also one, but is not a sensation.

5. The idea of unity is a simple idea, and accompanies our mind from its first steps; we find it everywhere, and understand it well, but cannot explain it as we would, because it is simple, and cannot be decomposed and expressed by various words. We do not mean to say, however, that we must abjure all explanation of it; we only propose to warn the reader of the kind of explanation he may expect, which can be no other than the analysis of the fact, inasmuch as it is an object, and of the phenomenon as presented to our mind.

CHAPTER II.
WHAT IS UNITY

6. The scholastics were right in teaching that every being is one, and that whatever is one is being. Unity is a general attribute of every being, but is not distinct from it. However little we reflect, we cannot fail to perceive that unity and being are not distinguished: the unity of unity, by itself, offers us nothing real or even possible. What then would become of unity, if nothing but unity? This idea is involved in that of being; it is an aspect of it, a reason under which being is presented to the understanding.

7. But what is the conception of unity under which beings are presented to us? There is unity in the object when there is no distinction in the conception presenting it; and there is no distinction, when the perception of relative not-being is not combined in the object with that of being. We have unity whenever we perceive an object simply. Suppose that we perceive the object B. No matter what B is, it will to us be always one, unless we perceive it as composed of C, D, one of which is not the other. If we perceive in the object B, a distinction between C and D, unity disappears.

Evidently when we are aware of this composition we can abstract it and simply consider the result, the whole, B; and then unity appears anew.

8. We see by this that unity may be either real or fictitious. It is real and existing when there is no distinction in the thing either real or apparent; it is fictitious in those composites which of themselves include distinct things that may be offered to the understanding, inasmuch as they are subordinated to one unity of order, abstraction made of the real distinction contained in them.

9. The schoolmen sometimes defined what is one to be, "ens indivisum in se, et divisum ab aliis." The former part seems sufficiently exact if by indivisum is meant non-distinctum and not non-separatum; but the second part must be regarded at the best as superfluous. If there existed only one most simple and sole being, it would yet be one, although we could not say that it was divided from others, divisum ab aliis; for as there would be no others it could not be divided from them. This part of the definition is therefore superfluous.

10. It is no solution of the difficulty to say that this one being is divided from others, real or possible, and that in the supposition of one only being, others are possible although not real. The only being would be really one, and the division from others would be only possible; since there can be no real distinction between two terms when one of them is only possible. The division from others, divisis ab aliis, therefore is not a necessary element of unity, because unity is real, and this element is only possible.

11. However, in confirmation of this doctrine, we may remark, that in common parlance, unity is opposed to distinction, and there is no unity where there is no distinction. If the only being be not conceived as multiple there can be no distinction; and this is so independently of its being compared with the rest. The words, others, and the rest, suppose single beings; the idea of unity precedes that of distinction; beings are not considered as distinct between themselves until after they are conceived as individually single.

12. It seems, therefore, that a single being ought to be defined as ens indivisum in se, or a being which includes no division. Unity, then, will depend upon non-distinction. If non-division denote non-distinction, there will be real unity; but if it denote non-separation or re-union, we shall only have a fictitious unity. The molecules without extension, of which many suppose matter to be composed, would be really one, because there is no distinction in them. Bodies are fictitiously one because their composite parts though united are really distinct.

13. A difficulty may be raised by asking whether a being, indivisible in itself, but not divided from others, would be really one, for in case it would not be one, it might be inferred that we had unjustly censured the definition of the schoolmen, since whatever wants the second property required by the definition would not be one. We reply, then, a being that includes no distinction in itself, and is not distinguished from others, would indeed be one, but in such a case there would be no others, since they cannot be when there is no distinction. In such an hypothesis, there would be only one unity, the unity of pantheism, the great all, the absolute in which all things would be identified.

14. We have already said that the unity which is confounded with being, is not the unity which originates number. We here in fact encounter two different conceptions of unity, the one marking only want of distinction, and the other expressing the property of engendering number. But we are not thence to infer that the one which is identified with being is distinct from that which engenders number. All beings, one in themselves, but distinct from each other, no matter what they may be, may be conceived under the idea of number. The number three enters into the august mystery of the Trinity, and we say with all truth that in God there are three persons.

15. It is not necessary that the unity which engenders number should be real; it suffices if it be fictitious. When we take a foot measure for unity, we employ a fictitious unity, since the foot is composed of parts, but the number which results therefrom is, nevertheless, a true number.