Chapter XI: Part 11

[2] Knowledge is transcendental when it is aware that nothing can be asserted directly about the thing-in-itself but makes indirect inferences from the subjective which is known to the unknown which lies beyond the subjective (transcendental). The thing-in-itself is, according to this view, beyond the sphere of the world of immediate experience; in other words, it is transcendent. Our world can, however, be transcendentally related to the transcendent. Hartmann's theory is called Realism because it proceeds from the subjective, the mental, to the transcendent, the real.

[3] The way in which the above view has influenced psychology, physiology, etc., in various directions has been set forth by the author in works published after this book. Here he is concerned only with characterising the results of an open-minded study of thinking itself.

[4] The passage from page 146 down to this point has been added, or rewritten, for the present Revised Edition. (1918).

[5] A complete catalogue of the principles of morality (from the point of view of Metaphysical Realism) may be found in Eduard von Hartmann's Phänomenologie des sittlichen Bewusstseins.

[6] Translation by Abbott, Kant's Theory of Ethics, p. 180; Critique of Pure Practical Reason, chap. iii.

[7] For the manner in which I have here spoken of "Materialism," and for the justification of so speaking of it, see the Addition at the end of this chapter.

[8] Only a superficial critic will find in the use of the word "faculty," in this and other passages, a relapse into the old-fashioned doctrine of faculties of the soul.

[9] When Paulsen, p. 15 of the book mentioned above, says: "Different natural endowments and different conditions of life demand both a different bodily and also a different mental and moral diet," he is very close to the correct view, but yet he misses the decisive point. In so far as I am an individual, I need no diet. Dietetic means the art of bringing a particular specimen into harmony with the universal laws of the genus. But as an individual I am not a specimen of a genus.

[10] The Editor would call the reader's attention to the fact that this book was written in 1894. For many years Dr. Steiner's efforts have been chiefly concentrated in upholding the Divinity of Christ consistently with the broader lines of the Christian Churches.

[11] We are entitled to speak of thoughts (ethical ideas) as objects of observation. For, although the products of thinking do not enter the field of observation, so long as the thinking goes on, they may well become objects of observation subsequently. In this way we have gained our characterisation of action.

[12] Those who want to settle by calculation whether the sum total of pleasure or that of pain is bigger, ignore that they are subjecting to calculation something which is nowhere experienced. Feeling does not calculate, and what matters for the real valuing of life is what we really experience, not what results from an imaginary calculation.

[13] We disregard here the case where excessive increase of pleasure turns pleasure into pain.

[14] Immediately upon the publication of this book (1894), critics objected to the above arguments that, even now, within the generic character of her sex, a woman is able to shape her life individually, just as she pleases, and far more freely than a man who is already de-individualised, first by the school, and later by war and profession. I am aware that this objection will be urged to-day, even more strongly. None the less, I feel bound to let my sentences stand, in the hope that there are readers who appreciate how violently such an objection runs counter to the concept of freedom advocated in this book, and who will interpret my sentences above by another standard than that of man's loss of individuality through school and profession.

[15] The Preface and Introduction to the original edition of "Truth and Science" are printed as Appendix III and Appendix IV at the end of this volume.

[16] l.c., p. 20.

[17] cf. Kant, Critique of Pure Reason, Intr. to 2nd edit., Section vi.

[18] Prolegomena, Section v.

[19] Critique of Pure Reason, Intr., Section iv.

[20] cf. his Analyse der Wirklichkeit, Gedanken und Tatsachen.

[21] "Possible" here means merely conceivable.

[22] cf. Die Welt als Wahrnehmung und Begriff, pp. 161 ff.

[23] This attempt, by the way, is one which the objections of Robert Zimmermann (Über Kant's mathematisches Vorurteil und dessen Folgen) show to be, if not wholly mistaken, at least highly questionable.

[24] Critique of Pure Reason, Intr. to 2nd edit., Section ii.

[25] cf. Kant's Theorie der Erfahrung, pp. 90 ff.

[26] l.c., Section v.

[27] cf. Kant's Theorie der Erfahrung, pp. 90 ff.

[28] cf. Die Grundsätze der reinen Erkenntnistheorie in der Kantischen Philosophie, p. 76.

[29] l.c., p. 21.

[30] Zur Analyse der Wirklichkeit, pp. 211 ff.

[31] Darstellung der Kantischen Erkenntnistheorie, p. 14.

[32] Vierteljahrsschrift für Wissenschaftliche Philosophie, 1877, p. 239.

[33] System der Logik, 3rd edit., pp. 380 ff.

[34] Kritische Grundlagen des Transcendentalen Realismus, pp. 142-172.

[35] Geschichte der Neueren Philosophie, Vol. v., p. 60. Volkelt is mistaken about Fischer when he says (Kant's Erkenntnistheorie, p. 198, n.) that "it is not clear from Fischer's account whether, in his opinion, Kant takes for granted only the psychological fact of the occurrence of universal and necessary judgments, but also their objective validity and truth." For, in the passage referred to above, Fischer says that the chief difficulty of the Critique of Pure Reason is to be found in the fact that "its fundamental positions rest on certain presuppositions" which "have to be granted if the rest is to be valid." These presuppositions consist for Fischer, too, in this, that "first the fact of knowledge is affirmed," and then analysis reveals the cognitive faculties "by means of which that fact itself is explained."

[36] How far our own epistemological discussions conform to this method, will be shown in Section iv, "The Starting-points of the Theory of Knowledge."

[37] l.c., Preface, p. x.

[38] Zur Analyse der Wirklichkeit (Strassburg, 1876), p. 28.

[39] Kant's Erkenntnistheorie, Section i.

[40] A. Dorner, Das menschliche Erkennen (Berlin, 1887).

[41] Rehmke, l.c.

[42] Die Lehre vom Wissen (Berlin, 1868).

[43] Die Grundfragen der Erkenntnistheorie (Mainz, 1887) p. 385.

[44] System der kritischen Philosophie, I. Teil, p. 257.

[45] Das Grundproblem der Erkenntnistheorie, p. 37.

[46] Philosophische Monatshefte, Vol. xxvi (1890), p. 390.

[47] Das Grundproblem der Erkenntnistheorie, p. 1.

[48] By "concept" I mean a rule for the synthesis of the disconnected data of perception into a unity. Causality, e.g., is a "concept." By "idea" I mean nothing but a concept of richer connotation. "Organism," taken quite generally, is an example of an "idea."

[49] It ought not to be necessary to say that the term "centre," here, is not intended to affirm a theory concerning the nature of consciousness, but is used merely as a shorthand expression for the total physiognomy of consciousness.

[50] Fichte's Sämtliche Werke, Vol. I, p. 71.

[51] l.c., Vol. I, p. 97.

[52] l.c., Vol. I, p. 91.

[53] l.c., Vol. I, p. 178.

[54] l.c., Vol. I, p. 91.

[55] Geschichte der Philosophie, p. 605.

[56] Fichte, Sämtliche Werke, Vol. I, p. 94.

[57] l.c., Vol. I, p. 98.

[58] l.c., Vol. I, p. 422.

[59] Delivered in the autumn of 1813 at the University of Berlin. See Nachgelassene Werke, Vol. I, p. 4.

[60] l.c., Vol. I, p. 16.

[61] cf. his Christliche Dogmatik, 2nd edit., 1884-5. The epistemological arguments are in Vol. I. An exhaustive discussion of his point of view has been furnished by E. von Hartmann. See his Kritische Wanderungen durch die Philosophie der Gegenwart, pp. 200 ff.

[62] Only the very first opening sentences (in the first edition) of this argument have been altogether omitted here, because they seem to me to-day wholly irrelevant. But the rest of the chapter seems to me even to day relevant and necessary, in spite, nay, because, of the scientific bias of contemporary thought.

[63] Truth seek we both--Thou in the life without thee and around;
I in the heart within. By both can Truth alike be found.
The healthy eye can through the world the great Creator track;
The healthy heart is but the glass which gives Creation back.

Bulwer.

[64] Erfahrung und Denken, Kritische Grundlegung der Erkenntnistheorie, von Johannes Volkelt (Hamburg und Leipzig, 1886).