Memory in the Ontopoiesis of Life: Book Two. Memory in the Orbit of the Human Creative Existence (Analecta Husserliana)

MEMORY IN THE ONTOPOIESIS OF LIFE

A NA L E C TA H U S S E R L I A NA THE YEARBOOK OF PHENOMENOLOGICAL RESEARCH

VO L U M E C I I

Founder and Editor-in-Chief: ANNA-TERESA TYMIENIECKA The World Institute for Advanced Phenomenological Research and Learning Hanover, New Hampshire

For other titles published in this series, go to http://www.springer.com/series/5621

MEMORY IN THE ONTOPOIESIS OF LIFE Book Two Memory in the Orbit of the Human Creative Existence

Edited by A N NA - T E R E S A T Y M I E N I E C K A The World Phenomenological Institute, Hanover, NH, U.S.A.

Published under the auspices of The World Institute for Advanced Phenomenological Research and Learning A-T. Tymieniecka, President

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Editor Prof. A-T. Tymieniecka The World Institute for Advanced Phenomenological Research and Learning 1 Ivy Pointe Way Hanover NH 03755 USA [email protected]

ISBN 978-90-481-2318-6 e-ISBN 978-90-481-2319-3 DOI 10.1007/978-90-481-2319-3 Springer Dordrecht Heidelberg London New York Library of Congress Control Number: 2009926801 c Springer Science+Business Media B.V. 2009  No part of this work may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, microfilming, recording or otherwise, without written permission from the Publisher, with the exception of any material supplied specifically for the purpose of being entered and executed on a computer system, for exclusive use by the purchaser of the work. Printed on acid-free paper Springer is part of Springer Science+Business Media (www.springer.com)

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ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

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INAUGURAL STUDY ANNA-TERESA TYMIENIECKA / Memory’s Sustenance of the Human Orbit

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TOPICAL STUDY ROBERTO VEROLINI AND FABIO PETRELLI / Ontopoietic Vestige: Memories of Ontogenesis in Biology and in Human Culture

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SECTION I THE SELF IN CREATIVE MEMORY THOMAS RYBA / A.-T. Tymieniecka, the Work of the Analecta Husserliana and Conversion

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KIYMET SELVI / Lifelong Learning and Self-Actualization

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GRZEGORZ GRUCA / Faces of Memory – the Work of Franz Kafka as a Record of Consciouness Lost in the Labirynth of Being in the Context of Existential Philosophy

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EWA LATECKA / Which Self? Or What is it Like to Speak or Listen – An Existential Phenomenological Approach

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ALI ÖZTÜRK / Art Education as an Expression of Phenomenon

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SECTION II CIPHERING REMEMBRANCE: SIGNS, SYMBOLS, SPIRIT MARIA-CHIARA TELONI / The Functions of Memory in Edith Stein and in Anna-Teresa Tymieniecka’s Phenomenology of Life v

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´ JOANNA HANDEREK / The Symbol – Code of the Past, Record of Human (Existence) Life, and Ontopoiesis of Life

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SEMIHA AKINCI / On Knowing: Whether One Knows

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J. C. COUCEIRO-BUENO / Without Beauty there is No Truth

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ANTONIO DOMÍNGUEZ REY / El a Priori Correlativo Y Ontológico Del Lenguaje Ángel Amor Ruibal (1869–1930)

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MARIA TERESA DE NORONHA / Saudade and Memory in the Ontopoiesis of Life

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DAVID A. ROSS / Meta-Analysis and the Question of Being

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SECTION III MEMORY’S NETWORK OF THE HUMAN HORIZONS KONRAD ROKSTAD / Memory and the Historicity of Human Existence

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PIOTR MRÓZ / Structure as a Collective Memory of Cultural Systems

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NOVIKOV DMITRIY / Agricultural Landscape as Philosophical-Ecological Phenomenon

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VASILIY NILIPOVSKIY / Terrain as Subject Matter of Cultural-Ecological Value

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A.L. SAMIAN / Newton’s Theology of Mathematical Problems

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SECTION IV MEMORY IN THE COMMUNAL CIPHERING OF LIFE ILVITSKAYA SVETLANA VALERYEVNA / Orthodox Monasterial Complex in Contemporary Sociocultural Environment

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EL˙IF ÇIRAKMAN / The Art of Memory in a Pluralistic Universe: William James’s “Republican Banquet”

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ISMAIL SERIN / Can Reason Regulate the Reality by which we Experience the Life as Our Private Life?

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BARIS¸ PARKAN / Relatively Completely Happy

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INDEX

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AC K N OW L E D G E M E N T S

This volume, devoted to the ontopoiesis of memory, is the second part of the collected papers, presented at our 57th International Phenomenology Congress, held by the World Phenomenology Institute on the subject: “Memory in the Ontopoiesis of Life” which took place at the Istanbul Kultur University, in Istanbul, Turkey on June 18–22, 2007. Our heartiest thanks go again to Professor Erkut Sezgin for his initiative and insightful cooperation in organizing this Congress. We are sincerely grateful to the Kultur University personnel presided by Prof. Dr. Dursun Kocer and assisted by Yrd. Doc. Dr. Hikmet Cadlar and Yrd. Doc. Dr. Gursel Hacibekyrodlu. Particular thanks go to the then rector, Dr. Tamer Kocel for his sympathetic welcome to our initiative. We are greatly thankful to our colleagues on our organization committee, especially Professors Carmen Cozma, Alexandra Pawliszyn and Halil Turan, for their day-to-day care of our progress. The extraordinary hospitality extended by the Kultur University, and the unique beauty of Istanbul will be remembered by all the participants. A-T.T.

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M E M O RY ’ S S U S T E N A N C E O F T H E H U M A N O R B I T

We have in the first volume on the theme of memory1 outlined the crucial role of memory in retaining our already actualized constructive accomplishments/efforts as an inventory to be called up propitiously in the creative thrusts of the becoming of life. The emphasis here has been on the constitutive role of the continuity of becoming and its grounding in the ontopoietic unfolding of life itself. Synthesizing, we may say that in some essential respects, memory was revealed to play a basic role in life as such. As pointed out in the first part of this inquiry memory retains the constructivism of the individualizing living being as an organic bio-memory that the human being discovers partly through intellective acts of consciousness, partly through simple natural experience. It serves as an inventory to be propitiously recalled to provide links in the constructive continuity of becoming. The striking function of memory in its first vital occurrence appears, in the simplest reactions of living agent on the way to its unfolding toward consciousness. Memory is active at all levels of individualizing life. But in all its expansion the unique significance of memory is in its part in installing human existence within its changeable circumference and maintaining it in vigor. Memory truly blossoms within the operations of the fully developed human mind. In sum, from the living agent’s recording of its elementary vital moves, through the evolutive progress of the mind’s conscious direction of its proficiencies, to the appearance of the human apparatus, in which memory plays the crucial role in numerous registers, conscious, specifically human becoming has developed its existence through memory. Since our emphasis so far has fallen on memory’s maintenance of and allowing for the constructive continuity of the ontopoietic development of individualizing life, it is time now to turn attention to the creative inventiveness, that characterizes human life and lifts it to its stature. We will focus here on the varied roles that memory plays in this inventiveness on the functions of memory allowing for the inventive creative nature of human existence. 5 A-T. Tymieniecka (ed.), Analecta Husserliana CII, 5–11. c Springer Science+Business Media B.V. 2009 

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T H E W O R K O F T H E H U M A N M I N D A N D M E M O RY I N T H E RO L E OF TRANSMITTING INTELLIGIBILITY

We may generalize that memory is the major element in the transmission of intelligibility not only in the organic succession of life’s self-individualizing development but also in the transmission that conveys coalesces, connects, links, analogizes, communicates, informs, impacts, influences within the circumference of the human realm of existence, within the reach of the human mind as it extends its probes ever beyond. The entire project of human existence’s stretching its tentacles beyond is suspended upon the understanding of meaning, its differentiation, and its transmission in communication, upon all that is accomplished owing to the functional power (force) of memory differentiated into universal “objective” as well as individual “subjective” perspectives (the intentional universal significance of meaning vs. subjective, differentiating understanding). To return to a matter covered in the first part of our discussion, bio/organic memory within its generative horizon sustains the generative sphere of life. Upon memory is passing into the double unfolding of individual existence within the sphere of subjective experience and its simultaneous integration with the circumambient world, what the individual learns is transmitted and communicated along two lines – that of universal, i.e., objectivied meaning and that of experiential singular understanding. Meaning and understanding draw their mutually determined sense in the existential functioning of language, the existential vehicle of human life. In their mutual growth memory unfolds the full potential of the creative human mind, to which we now turn. In the evolution of living beings in which the living agent comes to acquire prerogatives of the human mind, a new platform emerges, that of the Human Condition. This embraces the entire spread of individualizing life in all its sectors and phases of becoming, but it is prompted and orchestrated specifically by the human creative mind with all its sentient/intellective/imaginative power. All the creative elements are received by the subject conveying an intelligible “content” in a ciphered presentation of reality having a specifically human guise: language. The full-fledged mind’s differentiation of reality as it is transmitted in Imaginatio Creatrix with all its perspectives on becoming accounts for the orbit of human existence. The innermost timing involved in life’s maintenance of an intelligible, ontopoietic outline is based on the concrete arsenal of the creative mind. a. Language and Memory. Language, as the medium of a dramatic, dizzying, dynamic initiative of the logos in the communication of meaning among living beings about their reality draws on the complete register of the constitutive junctions of life. Sounds and signs differentiate in function of life’s unfolding

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in complexity – feeling, sensing, pulsating, incorporating meanings in so far as they conform to the objective reality operated by the living agent and coincide in all the functional circuits of the subjects involved. It is by scrutinizing our past that we attempt to understand our tendencies, hidden drives and the unclear situations in which we have sought to find a right move, solution, etc. We scrutinize the past employing the imaginative aspects of our experience and circumstances. “Reception” experiences that are seemingly “blind” (or “mute”) are “ciphered” by the full-fledged intellective outlay of the powers of the mind indispensible for the linguistic expression of both the universal human meanings of constitutive reality on the one hand, and experiential subjective reality, and experiential subjective receptivity, on the other. Owing to the inner power of memory to retain the past and reactivate its facsimile in the actual present, memory seems to be subsidiary to the progress of timing, and yet it is a basic function; it plays the role in life of enabling the transmission of life’s significant intelligible steps. We owe to its sustainable recurrence the progress of growth of the human mind, its ever expanding horizons, the widening of the orbit of human existence. b. The Conscious Agent and Self as well as Communal Existence. Scrutinizing the meaning-fullness of the escaping past retained in memory, we find that this meaning-fullness acquires transformative twists with respect to the ongoing changes in circumstances and shifts in our present interests and tendencies. It accounts for the transformations in our view of past experience, of our own personality, and ultimately of the meaning of life. Transmission of the inventory of the past creates/constitutes our self in as much as we constitute fabulated histories of our human groups pregnant with deposited convictions and values that then form us. History is far from being a deposit of present moments – on the contrary, it’s transmission of the logos of human collective experience in a fabulated story, the fruit of selective intellective memory, on the one hand, and its interpretation, on the other. c. To return to a matter covered in the first part of our discussion, bio/organic memory within its generative horizon sustains the generative sphere of life. Upon memory is passing into the double unfolding of individual existence within the sphere of subjective experience and its simultaneous integration with the circumambient world, what the individual learns is transmitted and communicated along two lines – that of universal, i.e., objectivied meaning and that of experiential singular understanding. We move with the vibrant force of human mind upon the rails of the intellective logos as it gathers all its forces and virtualities in the creative/constitutive progress ahead in unfolding our selfhood in our unique self-awareness – in our personality within the social world.

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Our selfhood and self-awareness are the most intimate center of our existence. In it our most intimate understanding of ourselves is nourished by our quest for the meaning of existence. This self-creative existence advances by constant recourse to our actual experience of flashes of the past in our personal and communal transmission of beliefs, customs, rituals, convictions, values, taboos, principles, etc.

T H E C R U C I A L F U N C T I O N O F M E M O R Y I N T H E C R E AT I V I T Y OF THE MIND

As we have indicated taking various perspectives, it is the human mind that basically guides human existence in all phases – vital, psychic, communal, spiritual, and sacral, from the primal living agent through to its conscious unfolding, to the fully creative phase of humanness. The human creative mind, with its horizons encompasses them all. It carries specifically human existence in an ongoing flux. The human creative mind is far from being a stationary apparatus of intentional acts of consciousness regulated in their flux by the phases outlined by evolutionary mutations. Its very indentifying feature/core is the versatile progress flowing from its inventive/creative propensities. Its creative logos engaged in a vertiginous activity calls for a plurisided continuity. Here there is recognition of similar or contrasting elements, the discovery of issues, and the search for new solutions, “learning from experience”, etc. In the mind to be manifested is the continuity of the logos of innumerable perspectives, in these pursuits, in all the steps of the inventive/creative endeavor, in the turning over of possibilities, their selection, their selection, their adjustment, etc. And these operations, refer for their support to the active force that is informed and stimulated by memory. The Creative Imagination galvanizing the mind propels it on a quest that transforms the already being constituted reality. It activates the mind’s radius of propensities and a fulgurating variation of virtualities. Imagination is served by memory as its crucial tool in its selective creative role. It finds in memory an essential reservoir of elements to be imaginatively configured and reconfigured. a. Memory as the Engine of the Human Creative Mind. Our “rememorizing” of past events from our own life, of past events reported to us with a request to “understand” their “meaning”, an of far in the past events not even recollected by presently living people but just recorded and transmitted from generation to generation gives the experienced past a vast array of transformatory virtualities. Not only does the rememorizing that involves the imagination

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reconstruction of experience which is essentially interpretative references to all the horizons of living experiences, but this rememorizing also refers to the network of experiences subjectively established within the conscious individual, and this reference to all the transcendental horizons of life – involves transformatory virtualities in numerous categories of reality – which means there are various divergent modes of endowing of the past. But while the recorded traces go through subjective filters in the revival of the sense of the past events, together with their transformation, a transformation of the understanding of our own experience of them occurs. In brief, the transformatory nature of memory of the past in its experiential sense can transform our understanding of own sense of life. The great question then occurs: What guarantees the identity of the past over against the transformatory virtualities involved in retrieving it in memory? What guarantees their identity of past events in cognition/recognition of our experiential sense and what guarantees their identity as past, as real, concretely events that may be believed to have happened in reality, that is, within the ontopoietic orbit? What actually remains unconditioned when it comes to the enormous radius of metamorphic variations operative in the retrieval of the past? b. Memory manifests itself as an essential mediating factor of life. or we may say, as crucial device of the logos of life, a device that carries not forward not only the constructive continuity of the progress/regress of the ontopoietic projections providing the transformatory coincidences and throwing bridges and links among the traces being “retrieved” (surmised) allowing for a fluent but, changeable, yet coherent, flow that we call “history”. There it is that imagination enters into crucial play. Not only is it imagination that lifts conjectural inferences from the factual status quo to the level of virtualities available on different horizons correlative, analogical or possible that may appear but its variations also allow for the adjustment of appropriate compossible virtualities with the already established status quo. Above that status quo imagination, operating among and between the variations available on multiple existential horizons, allows for the identification, approximation, association, familiarity, etc. by which are found surmised, and eventually established fragments of sense and the notes of innumberable logoic threads. Memory also provides associative channels for the waves of the flux of disjointed imaginative promptings. Memory serves as a crucial schema of reference for fragmented and displaced experiences. Most of all, as the creative imagination comes into contact with constituted reality on any of the mind’s horizons, it proceeds on a continuous line with constitutive intelligence itself.

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Memory’s transmission of cogency through all the phases of becoming, sustains creativity’s selection of pertinent becoming, and so advances existence toward all its human horizons. In brief, imagination activates memory in its swing first, through its sentient intentionality of vis viva, then through its psychic and intellective intentional networks; lastly, imagination leads the logos of life through its labyrinths of existence and lived reality with its horizons toward their ultimate sense that we, human beings seek. That is toward the sacral horizon of life. At last, we encounter the most striking challenge of memory – the sacral metamorphosis of life! c. Memory and the sacral transition of the logos. We have seen how, imagination activates memory in its swing first, through the sentient intentionality of vis viva, then through human psychic and intellective intentional networks. Lastly, imagination leads the logos of life through the labyrinths of existence within the horizons of lived reality toward the ultimate meaning that we human beings seek, that is, toward the sacral horizon of life. The horizon of the sacral logos does not issue from sheer inspiration. On the contrary, it proceeds part and parcel from the entire logoic life project; it belongs to the entire plan of the logos of life as it reveals itself through life. It is along the continuous thread of the logos of life that we move – that the logos moves – from the concrete vital realm of living beings advancing in their complexity and becoming conscious to lower and then higher degrees of awareness that proceeds the thread of the logos’ most intimate connection between heaven and earth, the divine and the human, two realms presumably distinct throughout human temporal evolution. The “passage from one realm to another”, that has been witnessed by numerous concrete individuals – individuals, of whom we have recorded as “historical” traces, which have been re-memorized and understood as “revelations” of the divine realm in human reality. The significant point, however, is that the passage “from one presumably distinct realm to another” is carried to us by various categories of personifying beings somewhere on the scale between ordinary living human beings and the divine, namely, angels, messengers, prophets. They assume bodily, human form and human modes of expression as well as when they “appear” in life-world situations. Their appearances are situated in the temporal and spatial coordinates of the known to us world and are interwoven within it, bearing, however a differently significant message – a sacral message. It is upon the canvas of the logos of life that this sacral message is being limned, or rather intimately emerges from – and the bodily link between the seemingly two realms is privy to both. It is the continuity of the fragmentary occurrences in the reality that is plotted by the human mind as the outline of salvation. Or, to put it otherwise, here is the history through which the human progress in enlightenment, the revelation of the divine, the manifestation of

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the sacral logos subtending life as its deeper, final sense is being made. It is out of fleeting fragmentary experiences that the sacral meaning of life and human salvation may be ciphered as we excavate the sense of the traces left in reality by these experiences, one advancing. Over another in our continuing anamnesis. O N T O P O I E T I C S O U R C E S O F M E M O RY

We have many times over the opportunity to observe memory’s ever recurring function in the temporal becoming of life. Although it crystallizes essentially the past, the phases of becoming already gone, memory lies at the core of the present and is immeasurably active as it informs the future looming ahead. Is, therefore, its function in becoming as fleeting as becoming is? Immersed in becomings, does it emerge from and vanishes into the unknown? Are memory’s fragmentary contributions like pinpoints on a blind path of a labyrinth that even the Sphinx could not cipher the itinerary of? Yet, as is readily manifest, memory performs some existentially significant functions without which life – human life – could not go on. It is enough to mention its role in promulgating the run of temporal becoming in all its registers, beginning with the natural organic phase, and then in communal and subjective existence as well as in personal self-unfolding, finally in the apprehension of one’s personal intimate meaning of life. Most significantly, we have pinpointed the crucial function of meaning in its bridging and bringing together the realms of creative imagination and constitutive reality. Even human history and the transcendent horizons of our mind refer to the relics of memory. It appears that the work of memory, seemingly just subsidiary, in fact unifies the main thread of life and of human existence. Seemingly proceeding on its own, this work of memory is in fact enmeshed in the entire fabric of life, which could not proceed without it. And when we consider that the creative work of the human mind embraces all the registers of becoming and crowns it in a crucial novum, could we possibly seek sources of each of its elements in isolation from the others? Where else can we find the common ground upon which all registers of life emerge in tandem, differentiate, and forthwith unfold if not upon the primogenital, ontopoietic platform of life? And is it not memory that provides a system of references that unifies life’s entire dynamic network? NOTE 1 ANALECTA HUSSERLIANA, Volume CI, MEMORY IN THE ONTOPOIESIS OF LIFE, Book One. Springer, 2009.

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ONTOPOIETIC VESTIGE: MEMORIES OF ONTOGENESIS IN BIOLOGY AND IN HUMAN C U LT U R E

ABSTRACT

Thanks to some examples of the always more effective research on “vestigial structures” in the field of biology, this work puts in evidence as the evolutionistic paradigm, on the contrary of what is still believed by some opposite currents of thought, can extend its valence to spheres usually seen in incompatible opposition with the evolutionistic vision. At first we show how molecular analysis of modern proteins and DNA, which are considered as evolutive vestiges, can solve some of the hard questions of systematics biology. Then we analyse the results of an interesting research which allows to propose a pro-evolutionistic conception of the first Genesis’ passages (Gn 1,3) defining a new “evolutionistic theosophy”. The abovementioned interpretation is based on anthropological evidences about a sociocultural transformation, dated back to the Neolithic age, that gave rise to new religious models. Such a new scenario leads to different philosophic evaluations concerning the conceptions of anthropology and cosmology strongly coherent with the modern scientific branches; it also provide a prove of the strong degeneration of such transformation from a cognitive and psychosocial point of view. Since its formulation the theory of evolution underwent very strong debates: in particular this has happened in relation to the philosophical implications of the evolutionistic paradigm. The evolutionistic vision seems to have touched the raw nerve of institutions and currents of thought firmly rooted in the western culture, giving place to a comparison often extended to the white heat. In reality the theory of evolution, like any other scientific theory, doesn’t contain in itself such an element to invade the “correct” areas of theological speculation and the connected philosophical aspects. Yet the evolutionistic vision, proposing a totally uncommon acceptation of reality, relativized and confuted contingent and inadequate metaphysical, anthropological and cosmologist conceptions, implicitly adopted in the theological–philosophical reflection most rooted in western society: therefore it wasn’t the metaphysical theme of theism 15 A-T. Tymieniecka (ed.), Analecta Husserliana CII, 15–38. c Springer Science+Business Media B.V. 2009 

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in itself that clashed with the evolutionistic paradigm, but rather theological speculations and fideistic groundless superstructures, built around and above this thematic on purpose. Even today, a strong cultural element typical of fundamentalistic environments hostile to the evolutionism persists in opposition to the theory of evolution on the basis of the presumed lack of scientific elements as a support. In general, they try to oppose to the evolutionistic ideas a series of exceptions aimed at emphasizing how, in front of the complexity of the living, the a-teleonomical and stochastic valence of some key processes of the evolutive mechanism is absolutely inadequate and strongly reductive. The idea of Darwin neutralistic evolution, – however accepted and daily applied by all the existing scientific community – seems to disturb the sleep of many consciences and, often beyond solemn proclaims, of the hierarchies of confessions that obviously cannot see any objective agreement between their faith positions – expressions of a real and proper philosophical perspective – and this paradigm. “Unfortunately” for these people, compared to any other theory, the epistemological superiority of the new-darwinian paradigm is incessantly confirmed, even “required” by the correct application of the scientific epistemological method, for which the scientist “must” rely on that theory which, compared to possible alternative theories, allows the greater degree of description/forecast of the experimental facts – obviously until (scientific) evidence otherwise. To this day, the evidences in favour of the evolutionistic conception are growing to a more and more tumultuous rhythm and, decisive fact, turn out to be epistemologically more and more refined and pertinent. That derives from the fact that science got rich of techniques of investigation which were unthinkable in the past, and these techniques are supporting the darwinian original intuitions in absolutely inedited areas, spacing from the molecular level to the psycho-neural one. So we watch a quantitative and qualitative spread of these experimental validations without precedents; a “trend” that cannot postpone proposing, at last in a constructive propositional way, the evolutionistic thought in areas that are incompatible to it. The example of the evolutionistic theory of knowledge (ETK) and of the evolutionistic today’s tendencies of the neurosciences, which revolutionized the secular philosophical acceptations of man, of the nature of the mind, of the human conscience etc., is remarkable. In such perspective we will refer to validations of evolutionism really concerning the theme of the ontogenetic and phylogenetic “memories” found in the living world. Moving from the molecular level to the organic one a particular “memory” of psycho cultural nature which will reveal an inusual approach to the heart of the “theologic–philosophical problem” of evolutionism will be finally reached: the supposed contrast between evolutionism and the tradition of the doctrines of biblical stock. As provided by the study of the “vestigial

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forms”, a pro-evolutionistic interpretation concealed in the text of genesis able to propose an inedited interpretation of “memories” of fundamental aspects of our socio-cultural reality will turn up. A result that would sanction the goodness, and to this point an intrinsic superiority, of the evolutionistic paradigm in defining not only an inedited and pertinent “evolutionistic metaphysical frame” of the scientific research and of today’s philosophical speculation, but also an as well peculiar “evolutionistic theosophy”. The importance of the “vestigial forms”, “historical memory” of the evolutionary processes, was already caught by Darwin himself.1 The comparative anatomy proposes cases by now classical, concerning the conservation of corresponding structures in distinct living forms. It goes from the skeletal analogies of the birds’ and bats’ wings, from the fins and atrophied pelvic bones of the cetaceans to the human limbs, from the nails, residual forms of ancient limbs, which still stick out along the body of snakes, to the opening of branchial cracks during the embryonic development in the superior mammals, man included, to the caecal appendix, with all the pathologies connected to it, etc. This type of investigations, carried out in the past only at anatomic and paleontological level, knew a period of big ferment starting from the second half of the last century with the development of sophisticated techniques of molecular investigation. The testimonies present in the cellular plasma and in the molecular structures light up the darkness of the ancient evolutionary dynamics in an absolutely unexpected way, often solving important scientific controversies. “Molecular vestige” have emerged from the analysis of proteins and nucleic acids. A pioneer study consisted in the analysis of a protein present in all the superior organisms, called “eukaryote”: the “cytochrome c”.2 About 2 billion of years ago a deep transformation in a few unicellular organisms which were populating the earth developed a metabolic process able to effectively use the chemical energy of the food: the modern cellular respiration. One of the most important members of the new process was an ancestral form of cytochrome c: a protein whose “molecular descendants” are the cytochromes c of the cells of today – ours included. As every anatomic member – eye, skeleton etc. – a protein represents a “biological realization” in which similarities and interspecific differences which can be considered as “phenotypical”3 expressions of processes of evolution and/or divergence are expressed. The current molecules, which descend from common ancestral molecules, can reveal “vestige” of the evolutionary processes which separate us from the first cells able to respire. A pioneer analysis of the cytochrome c of the horse was carried out in 1963. If extracted in purified form, this protein forms true and real “proteinic” crystals made up of proteins tidily arranged along the various axis (a protein is a long filament of molecules,

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called “amino acid”, folded on itself). X rays directed on these crystals are deflected with different corners according to the distribution of the electric charges in the proteins. Analysing tens of thousands of these trajectories of diffraction at the computer true and real maps of the protein were obtained: the three-dimensional structure of the cytochrome c. The complete sequence of the amino acids of the cytochrome c was rebuilt in several kinds. Comparing the different cytochromes c, their analogies and differences, it was possible to rebuild the past evolutionary events. For example it was possible to quantify the speed with which the protein changed (evolved) from the moment in which plants and animals separated themselves in distinct kingdoms. With this datum it has gone back to the approximate date of this event: about 1,2 billion of years ago. Really interesting data emerged from the study. The cytochrome c is identical in man and in the chimpanzee: in both the species the molecule consists of 104 amino acids having an identical sequence and the same three-dimensional structure. On the other hand, the human cytochrome c differs from the cytochrome c of the mould of the bread (Neurospora crassa) only in 44 of 104 sites, although the space structure of the two molecules is essentially the same. It should be noticed that in an incomparable way the darwinian theory explains, with respect to “every other theory or interpretative model of the evolutive fact”, both the reason why such a big number of 104 amino acids of the cytochrome c is interchangeable in such a measure, and why certain amino acids cannot be replaced without the protein losing its activity; and above all why the molecular differences between cytrochromes c of species are proportional to their phylogenetic distance. These studies allowed to rebuild detailed family trees in a way independent from the traditional morphological and paleontological methods. The remarkable aspect is that these results are in agreement with those of the classical systematics, based on geology studies, on paleontology, on comparative anatomy, on the dating with radionuclides etc. So in their complex these transversal researches represent an experimental confirmation of fundamental epistemological value of the evolutionism. The probability this agreement is purely accidental is totally derisory: so the coherence between these evidences, drawn independently one from the others, is a qualitative and quantitative expression of a very high truthfulness of the evolutionistic paradigm on the bases of the single checks. This confirmation is surprisingly ignored by many opponents of the evolutionary paradigm. Other important contributions arrived from the studies of the nucleic acids: the DNA and the RNA. In the late 1980s, the biologist Lynn Margulis4 suggested that the modern cells originated from a process of fusion, “endosymbiosis”,5 between the more elementary protoplasms of ancient cells

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without nucleos: the “prokaryotes”. Now, a typical character of the procarioti is just the presence of DNA rings in their internal. In the same years a particular type of DNA of the modern cells was started to be studied: the mithocondrial DNA. This DNA, made up of a ring of nucleic acids, is present in the “mitochondrions” that constitute the cellular cytoplasm seats of important stages of the respiration. The structure of these DNA rings and their method of duplication constitute true and real “vestige” of the prokaryote DNA, a “molecular memory”, able to support the thesis of the endosymbiotic origin of the modern cells: an event that seemed to happen about 1,5 billion of years ago.6 But the mithocondrial DNA has more surprises in store, being able to testify another remarkable evolutionary moment: from the 1980s the human mithocondrial DNA has been studied.7 In man, the cell produced by the union of the sexual gametes inherits the cytoplasm8 only from the female egg cell, while the spermatozoon contributes with the nuclear material, the paternal chromosomes, that came abreast of the maternal ones. This makes sure that the cytoplasm of all our cells, both in males and females, “descends” from maternal cells: from the cytoplasmatic point of view we are identical to the mother. So the mithocondrial DNA, which duplicates independently from the nuclear DNA but in synchrony with the same, exclusively derives from an only parent in the same way as we all inherit the paternal surname in our culture. The study of the differences of a wide sample of men found in the mithocondrial DNA allowed to define, in evolutionary optics, the so-called process of “coalescence”, by which it is possible to determine – with a “molecular clock”9 – the necessary time to cancel the differences present in the mithocondrial DNA of two individuals of the same kind. With this study it was built the phylogenetic sequence of the mithocondrial DNA of modern men, who seem to have all inheredited this DNA from a single female who lived in Africa about 200,000 to 140,000 years ago: the so-called “mithocondrial Eve”.10 Another important molecular trace of the biological emersion seems to be contained in the RNA and in a few processes connected to the synthesis of the proteins. A precise biological mechanism gathers the proteins in the cells according to instructions contained in the RNA. As already mentioned, the proteins are made up of long filaments, like a multicoloured bead necklace,. The RNA too is a filamentous molecule, obtained by the repetition of four distinct elements, called “ribonucleotides”. The RNA filaments precisely describe, through a true and real biochemical code of “translation”, the long sequences with which the 20 different “elementary constituents” of the single proteins are repeated: the amino acids (the “beads” of 20 different colours of the abovementioned “necklace”). It is thought that in the processes of the origin of life there was a slow biochemical evolution with which, in a crescendo of complexity, the living plasma emerged from simple (primeval) early biochemical

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substances. But how all this happened? Was there an evolution phenomenon, like the one of the living forms, also dependent on the pre-biotic molecules? Are there any traces of these very ancient processes in the actual amino acids and in the RNA? Nowadays the “genetic code” “translates” the sequence of ribonucleotidic symbols in a sequence of amino acids in a ratio of 3 ribonucleotides = 1 amino acid. Why a code of “codons”? Why this ratio 3:1 and not other more simple ratios? This molecular process is assimilable to a real and true linguistic translation: there is the need to give univocal names to 20 different objects writing the 20 distinct “names” with an alphabet of only 4 “letters”. The only possible way is given by the “combination” of the available symbols/elements/“letters” (four in the case of the RNA) in sequences of opportune length (words/names) – also repeating the single “letters of the alphabet”. By doing so the possible combinations grow according to the nk formula, where n is the number of the available symbols/elements/“alphabetical letters” and k the length of the words/names. The existing genetic code, founded on codons, turns out to be oversized compared to the necessities: from the combination of 4 ribonucleotides to groups of 3 we obtain 43 = 64 codons. The 64 codons are redundant in view of the need to identify the 20 amino acids: why this redundance? Why 64 “words” in the “RNA” language in order to identify the 20 “objects” in the “proteinic” language? Also nature has found itself in front of a semantic and mathematical problem. It could have recoursed to a code in pairs: 2 ribonucleotides = 1 amino acid. Though that way there would only have 16 combinations (4 = 16), absolutely insufficient to codify 20 amino acids (included special codes for the beginning and the end of the “translation” process). So would the coding in codons be forced? No, it wouldn’t. In fact there is a further, intriguing facet of the problem. We are more and more convincing ourselves that the available number of the amino acids in the present world is greater than in the initial phases of life. After the early evolutive processes we have watched an increase of the amino acids at disposal to form proteins. This background would seem realistic also taking into account how the existing code of codons is too refined to come from a single evolutive step. But proposing early phases with proteins made up of a less variety of amino acids also involves the existence of a process of parallel evolution between proteins and RNA: from a primitive code of a more simple translation, founded on couples of ribonucleotides, would we have therefore reached the existing one, based on codons? Has nature effectively organized

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an original and more elementary code of translation in order to shift (change) to a more refined and powerful one or not? Also here the answer seems to be a “not”. The hypothesis of an evolution from the coding in pairs to that in codons strikes against an insurmountable “semantic” or “informational” obstacle. It’s impossible to change from a code in pairs to a code in codons: changing from a binary interpretation of the genetic message, of the CG–GG–AU–UU–GG–UA type etc., to one based on codons of the CGG–GAU–UUG–GUA type “all” the pre-existing codes of translation would dramatically lose sense. This would biologically involve an unbearable short circuit in the coding of every protein, an insuperable obstacle: every form of life would die out. Insofar as at present the genetic code is founded on codons from the beginning it “must” be therefore based on an identical structure of codons:11 it was still more redundant, because of the inferior variety of amino acids to identify compared to today! Still more redundance? Why? Have we traces, any “memory” of these very remote phases, such clues to propose a well grounded reason? The attempt of an answer of another important problem stems from the studies concerning the origin of life. Which was the original system of assembly of the proteins? The RNA, like the DNA from which it comes from, is a molecule which for its existence implies the presence of proteins that catalyze its formation. But, in their turn, proteins require the presence of DNA and RNA. In biological field, this reciprocal dependence exemplifies the classical dilemma of “first the egg or the hen” – or of the “functional bootstrap”: which of them first developed: the RNA or the proteins? Many elements indicate the concept of auto-replication/auto-duplication of the RNA as a solution of the problem of the “molecular bootstrap”. Simple RNA molecules can develop in a spontaneous way, and even act as enzymes/catalysts12 of processes of auto-duplication, a precious event of the complex mechanisms which are present in the living world nowadays. In other terms, in appropriate conditions, short RNA filaments spontaneously produce, through auto-catalytic processes, complementary filaments of RNA, in which the father filament acts as “cast” to produce a structurally complementary “son” filament. Everything is due to the spontaneous capacity of specific ties between ribonucleotides C–G and A–U: through random movements filaments of opportune RNA dimensions can on themselves, with the result than the ribonucleotides can face and bind between themselves. In this case the ribonucleotide C joins G in a specific way, and the ribonucleotide A joins U and vice versa. But even more these filaments can drive, as true and real “casts”, the synthesis of a filament of “complementary” sequence: a GGCAAU filament can act as “cast” to produce the “complementary” filament CCGUUA.

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This last one, in its turn, can reproduce the GGCAAU original filament and so on, slowly beginning a process of molecular selection.13 In 1976 several scholars of the Medical Research Council Laboratory of Cambridge proposed that the necessary direction of reading and the necessary punctuation of the RNA for “scanning/encoding” in codons “of the informational message” of the RNA from the beginning were founded on a mechanism of translation in codons having the RRY sequence. In these sequences the two Rs represent ribonucleotides G or A (Guanine or Adenine) put one next to the other and Y a ribonucleotide C or U (Citosina or Uracile). Also RNY type sequences (where N represents any ribonucleotide) seem to give the same results. Are there elements in the genetic code of the system of current translation which allow to establish if it had origin from this archaic structure of RRY or RNY type? Computerized researches of possible relationships between biological polymers drew phylogenetic trees in which the correlations between proteins and corresponding nucleic acids are highlighted in various kinds. The RNA of transport (RNA transfer, tRNA) lend themselves particularly well to these analyses. The tRNA matches only amino acids to the RNA codons: a crucial role. Their structure, rigidly submitted to ties that obstructed every molecular change, would reflect the way in which the correspondence between amino acids and RNA was established. Computerized rebuildings of the optimum phylogenetic structures and of the most probable primitive sequences of biological polymers applied to well known tRNA sequences confirmed such studies leading to interesting conclusions. In all the examined species the sequences of specific tRNA seem to give origin to a tree structure that shows a reduced evolutionary divergence in comparison to that of other biological molecules: a sign that this very ancient particular type of information, relatively remained unchanged during all the next biological evolution. The sequences of different tRNA of a same kind reflect a divergence from a common ancestor through a distribution of mutants similar to a “quasi-species”. A “quasi-species” is a particular type of accidental distribution of molecular mutants that is observed during spontaneous processes of auto biochemical duplication.14 These analysis have identified the possible “ancestors” of modern tRNA: they were indeed very rich in G and C and their prototype-sequence (which was rebuilt giving to any position inside the filament the most common base of the examined sequences) would show a clear reminiscence of a primitive structure in codons of the RNY type. Genetic “memories” of the RNY structure are present also in virus in DNA, bacterial genes and superior organism, a sign that such structure is very widespread in the living world. The strong stability of the chemical coupling

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G–C strengthens the hypothesis that the RNY initial code had limited to 4 codons of the GNC type. The fact that in the modern genetic code there are precisely the following associations: GGC = glycine, GCC = alanine, GAC = aspartic acid and GUC = valine is extremely suggestive. At this point it is not possible to ignore the pioneer simulations of the early chemical environment realized by Stanley L. Miller of the University of California in San Diego. In the pulp that resulted from his experiments these amino acids were present in greater amount.15 Also here, the fact that this constitutes a pure and fortuitous coincidence is rather risible. As disquieting, in consideration of this evidence, it is the analysis of some meteorites (carbonaceous chondrities).16 They contain significant traces of amino acids of extraterrestrial origin present with a percentage of abundance similar to that obtained by Miller: a mute echo, but solemn, of the possible pre-biotic processes to which we all owe our present existence. Other important remains are present in the psycho-cognitive field, both at anatomic and functional physiological level: it would be enough to observe how our brain traces out the structure and the working of the brains of other primates. The analogies of social affective manifestations, in the parenteral behaviours, in the intellective cognitive performances of supremacies (records) closer to man (chimpanzee, bonobo etc.) are as important.17 It would be possible to add the genetic and ethological similitudes about the evolution and the structuring of language,18 some symbolisms etc.,19 to not talk about the evidences on the evolution of the single languages in the specific historical and geographic areas: a field of studies that often confirms how often staggering “mnestic” traces of the past evolutionary processes are present in the various levels of reality.20 Furthermore these evidences add to the endless theory of verifications that supports with greater foundation – in case it was still seriously necessary – the goodness of the evolutionistic paradigm in numerous areas of the scientific research.21 However, as we were saying, our main subject is the existence of very original vestiges of evolutionary processes in a precise socio cultural area: in particular the presence of an important “memory” of psycho-cultural evolution concealed in the most ancient text of the Old Will for millenniums: the three first chapters of Genesis (Gn 1–3). This purpose appears staggering or maybe “striking”, if we think of how and when evolutionism was ferociously opposed by the same supporters of the theological tradition founded on the biblical texts. Yet in Genesis 1–3 it is possible to identify the “memory” of an important socio cultural transformation that involved the anthropic sphere both in the psycho-sociologic and cultural spheres: a decisive aspect in the comprehension of today’s reality. These chapters of Genesis, already fundamental in the definition of the theological and

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eschatological positions of today’s confessions of faith of biblical stock, in reality constitute a deep testimony of a different and absolutely ignored historical event, able to damage our theological, philosophical, cosmological and anthropological conceptions. Our interpretation defines a definitevely antithetic background to the one supported as a rule in the philosophical debate between atheism and theism. From one side this dichotomy sees the laic, atheist pole, supporter of a scientific and philosophical analytical materialistic, rigid method; from the other the “canonical” theistic acceptation expressed in our culture by the foundations of the doctrines of biblical stock, which postulate the existence of particular metaphysical entities (God, soul, hereafter, redeeming eschatological plans and so on), placed in cosmogonical and cosmological frames and theatre of natural and supernatural alternate events. This “canonicity” is daughter both of the secular diffusion of such doctrines in the western world both from the fact that, in the world of the history of the religions, the confessions of the biblical stock have been univocally seen as among the most refined theological systems, especially in relation to theologies of less advanced or more ancient cultures. Actually such systems show characteristics which place them on levels of extreme prominence in the group of the well-known worldwide confessions in an undeniable way: they develop first-rate traditions and have marked important pages “also and above all” of the modern philosophical thought. Under the social political profile the history of western culture is marked in depth by the prominence of these institutions, and that takes place today as well. Yet none of these considerations objectively allows to attribute any prototype status, of “canon” of the theistic options to such doctrines. A radical scientific and philosophical confutation of this role, centred on an inedited interpretation – which can “also” have a theological but principally historical, scientifical and philosophical importance – from their origin and from their wider socio cultural meaning is possible. This interpretation, duly exposed in the work “Il Dio laico: caos e libertà”, is characterized by two fundamental points.22 The first consists in an analysis of the cosmological and theological models and of the essential characters of the position of man in the dimension of the sacred; in other terms, of the most universal nature of the man-divinity relationship. The second aspect is that the distinction between two large classes, “theoethotomies” – this is a neologism – and religions,23 due to an analysis originally independent from Genesis, can be proposed as the most approprieted reading of the first chapter of the Bible. Let’s see how.

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The analysis of the various religious models allows to place them in two classes: in the first those where the divinity expresses an explicit moral authority, an evident ethical sovereignity towards man and his acting. In other terms, systems that envisage a “knowledge of the Good and the Evil” from which the idea of sin derives, that is to say to disobey or not, during earthly existence, precepts given by the divinity are placed in it. In these systems the theological system, the cosmological and ontological frame of reference are all expression of an ethical “personal” relationship between a “personal” being/creature and a “personal” being/creator God. These theologies must necessarily define a series of dynamics and of redeeming and eschatological principles regarding the manifestation of “sin” itself, and even more contemplate the origin of this onthologic condition in the area of the original creation – a fact that ends up in giving a hint of corruption and degrade in the social modern reality. The possibility to “commit a sin” makes man slip into an ontological condition of impurity: a true and real natural degeneration, but not less supernatural, able to deeply influence the ontological “personal” relationship between the creature man and God. For these theological models, and the relative class, a neologism has been coined: “theo-etho-tomies” (from the greek thèos (God) ethos (custom of life) τ oμη (caesura).24 The “theoethotomies” express peculiar theological characteristics, origins and evolutions absolutely distinguished compared to the systems which will be included in the second class. In this last one religious systems in which the divinity does not affirm any ethical authority and moral sovereignty towards man will be placed; in other terms, systems in which there is no “knowledge of the Good and the Evil” and “the concept of sin is not affirmed”. These systems will be pointed out with the usual term of religions – written in italics.25 The distinction theoethotomies/religions reformulates both the idea of theism in itself and the contrast between atheism/theism. Instead of the two classical positions it is necessary to understand the comparison between three philosophical poles, each of them deeply distinguished: atheism, theoethotomies and religions – where these last ones share and in a peculiar way express aspects and philosphical approaches typical of the laic critic to theoetotomies. That allows inedited evaluations of the theistical pole tout court, contextually freeing the comparison theism/atheism from the distortions due to the recognition in the theoethotomies of the canonical form of theistic expression. This formal distinction between theoethotomies and religions is perfectly verifiable on the basis of remarkable ethnographical confirmations.26 The unequivocal differences between the two models are such to present origins, theological contents, evolution and socio-cultural, political and economical, but above all psycho sociological, implications absolutely different between

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them. This will also allow to propose an interesting historical cultural rebuilding of their coming in the history of man, their authentic psycho-cultural emphasis. It is well known how the social political nature, the class structure, the nature of the social economical and interpersonal relationships, the forms of familiar institute and of course the religious sphere of a culture are deeply connected between them, as several authors show, from Marx to Weber etc. The cultural anthropology shows how the hierarchic structure of a society is specularly represented in the hierarchic structure of its cult modality. An interesting scheme of Marvin Harris quote the association divinity/cultural form here proposed as an example:27 Active divinities on the sphere of morality Presents Absents

Society With social classes

Without social classes

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2 12

The religions are therefore associated to a-class cultures, while the moral divinities, typical of the theoethotomies, are typically affirmed in classsocieties. These confirmations show how the authentic valence of these social cultural elements of the sacred has been so far evaluated in a partial and superficial way. The cultural anthropology and the history of religions highlighted how the original urban societies, stratified and hierarchic from which the social arrangement of the modern historical societies will proceed, rose as theocracies in which the power and the institutionalized management of the sphere of the sacred were expressed and managed by sacerdotal classes which were showing narrow ties, if not true and real identifications with the government élite.28 These datas show how the theoethotomies appear in the human history only starting from late epochs and exclusively in association with well defined forms of social aggregation. Even if they constitute the almost totality of the doctrinal forms spread on our planet at present, these models have started to appear in a recent phase of the true and real history; so they do not represent the modality of the original religious demonstration of man.29 They “can’t” do it, because of obvious reasons: they are too young!. But this decisive aspect has not obviously been fully caught: without any concrete ground, the theoethotomistic models have inevitably been considered as terms of an “evolutive” process substantially monotonous starting from

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elementary original systems. But the History of Religions also shows how any “monotonous teleonomy” of the religious evolution that assumes modern theoethotomies as “inevitable” evolutive terms of arrival doesn’t exists: this is only the fruit of an ethnocentric ideology, of mere cultural influences. Nor one can objectively claim that the typical petitions of today’s theoethotomistic systems derive from the inevitable extrapolation of the original expressions of an atavic, universal gasp of man to the sacred and even more of previous religious modality. Several ethnological datas, that concern the most ancient forms of religious belief and that go as far as the paleolithic, until maybe the man of Neanderthal and other coeval kinds,30 instead support the conviction that the models that are most able to represent the original forms of supernatural beliefs of man are to be searched in the class of religions. This derives both from intrinsic characters of religious models immediately recognizable in the primitive cult forms currently known to the cultural anthropology, both from the fact that the religions are typically associated to the egalitarian cultures of hunter-gatherers, of thousands of years more ancient than those class based theoethotomostic ones. The theoetothomisitic systems haven’t been always and however present in the history of humanity as fundamental form of expression of faith and this is a decisive element. Their origin is very recent, ever so late compared to the vertiginous hiatus that stretches beyond the modern history of human species, where religious beliefs were already in force. The theocratical societies of high demographic density and strong division of the work, deeply divided into social classes, where some minorities were imposing a centralized social power, supported and sanctioned by theoethotomistic ideologies, overlook human history only from the Neolithic onwards; indicatively from 7,000 to 5,000 years ago. And in the times when the farmers of the fertile crescent started to bow at the feet of the first ziggurat trembling raising their eyes towards the top of those immeasurable monuments, to scan nebulous sacerdotal rites, a big part of humanity lived in clans and tribes in which these inedited social cultural structures, and obviously the relative theoethomistic models had to still arrive. It was estimated, supposing a period of intergeneration of twenty years, how man lived for 250,000 generations as hunter-gatherer, and only for 400 generations as farmer in hierarchic societies: from about 12 generations the modern industrial society appeared, and not in all the lands of the Earth.31 That is to say, when we turn to the current religious models that almost monopolize today’s religious panorama, we cannot ignore the fact that these realities, so recurring and radically affirmed, in reality have a very recent origin. An origin that forcedly had to move from a world in which their most

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characteristic petitions were absent, perfectly unknown, if not repudiated by a different socio cultural reality – and even more an affectivity, a sociability, a politics, a cosmology, a philosophy and still more, included perfectly “alien” religious beliefs from the theoethotomistic paradigm. And this problem is absolutely unsolvable in every interpretation in which a “painless, unnoticed and unavoidable” possible transformation is assumed, as implicitly assumed so far, by unusual a-class/religious societies to those class-based/theoethomistic. The historical and ethnological evidences disavow this picture without escape. Society always expresses a tenacious resistance to such innovations! As our society would express its ostracism to an upheaval of its most exclusive values, in the same way societies would react to those who would “inadvertently” replace a model of the sacred opposite to the popular one. And the “resistance” that the anthropologists repeatedly observe in today’s culture in their attempts of modernization, solemnly testifies this fact. When the anthropologist Richard Lee asked Kalahari Bushmen hunter-gatherers why they did not till the soil, they answered: “Why should we sow them when there are a lot of mogongo walnuts in the world?” So it is possible to recognize in the history of man a cultural, concrete, decisive transition, which maybe happened in the most general complete unconsciousness, maybe bloody, however of extreme prominence. A real “cultural watershed”, a dizzy interruption that we will use in an interpretation of Gn 1–3, which is perfectly antithetic to the preceding exegetic traditions and finally congruous under the historical scientific aspect. The new key of reading gives a “pro evolutionistic”, “polygenistic” and “socio cultural” interpretation of the “manducation of fruits of the tree of the knowledge of the Good and the Evil” known as “Original Sin”: these metaphoric and mythical images would express the grievous socio cultural transposition with which the modern theoethotomistic societies took origin at the expense of the previous religious societies. And please notice well: the implicit critic, the degeneration mentioned here is not addressed to the mere theoethotomistic philosophical, psychological and anthropological process but to the degeneration caused by that theoethotomistic ideal in psychological, philosophical and anthropological world; that is to say, in all those areas that define the existential and ontological reality in which man inevitably has to see himself! In this way humanity is seen, “before the fall”, like “humbly submitted to the divine law”, a condition represented from the implicit observance of the garnishment of “not feeding himself with the fruits of the tree of knowledge of Good and Evil”: thanks to this obedience, man would enjoy immortality gifts, immunity from pain and spiritual holiness. This interpretation, necessarily, places man in a condition of “ethical subordination” to the Creator and implies an obedience state as a “conditio sine qua non” of his happy preternatural existence in the Garden of Eden. As a result of the “original sin”,

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expressed in “feeding himself with the fruit of the tree of knowledge of Good and Evil” and consisted, according to the traditional exegesis, in the “choice of our ethical autonomy”, in wanting “independently determine the categories of Good and Evil”, humanity lost these gifts, falling in the corruptibility, in the concupiscence, prey of the pain and the physical death.32 An exegesis indeed . . . which is evidently bizarre and ingenuous. Our concrete and verifiable alternative does not resort to some supernatural condition: since the origins until today, the humanity is seen as finite and mortal. This approach associates the H. sapiens sapiens populations to the term Ådåm – term meant as a singular collective33 – seen in a historical and cultural horizon which requires the concomitance of the following elements: 1) process of the entire hominization; 2) cosmopolitan spread; 3) important and homogeneous cultural development; 4) wide spread of animistic religious conceptions. These conditions seem satisfied beginning from approximately 50,000 years ago, in the Paleolithic era. Once stabilized the biological evolution’s process, the human species underwent a significant process of cultural evolution: in the Euro-Asian continent the Paleolithic societies, based on hunting, fishing and harvesting of food, showed an innocuous hierarchical development and social egalitarian relationships far from the affirmation of any authoritarian idea of repression and exploitation.34 The Ådåm, would represent the human society “before the fall”, therefore a humanity “reached the presence of the supernatural, of the divinity, integrally safeguarding its own ethical autonomy towards the latter”. The mythical figures of Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden would represent a totally realized man, in harmony with nature and aware, thanks to religious hypotheses, of his “eventual” valence of “image and likeness of God”. It is interesting to notice that such an interpretation underlines contents of the religious experience directly assimilable to the concepts of “communion with God” and “immortality”. Thanks to a religious conception of Self and the Creation, these concepts are meant as tangible “trascendence” of the heartly limits of existence. Therefore, there are no supernatural elements able to preserve humans from corruption, pains and corporal death. The proposal consists in: a) identifying the experience of enjoying the “fruit” of the “life tree” with the religious option; and: b) identifying the experience of eating the “fruit” of “the tree of knowledge of Good and Evil”, corruption and death, to the theoethotomistical option.

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It is interesting to observe as these associations show an immediate correspondence with the most significant and peculiar philosophical contents of the different classes. In the religions the more important aspect is given from the extension of the individual sphere “beyond” the ambits of the heartly existence: a philosophical glimmer towards immortality. Here it is clear the connection with the immortality that the “life tree” would have guaranteed to man. (Gn 3, 22) In theoethotomies, the dualism Good/Evil and Light/Darkness assumes enormous importance. The heavy censorial irruption of the divinity in the ethical moral sphere of the individual is directly combinable to the “knowledge of Good and Evil” with which the hagiographer indicated the “Tree of Discord” between Man and God. The vagueness of interpretations of the “tree of knowledge of Good and Evil” and the authentic contents of the “disobedience” of man puts in evidence the excessively metaphysical difficulties of the canonical exegetic positions. The interpretation of the disobedient “fruits eating” of the “tree of knowledge of Good and Evil”, starts from the “. . . claim of a moral autonomy, for which man repudiates his state of creature and subverts the order established by God. . .”,35 as rebellion to the supreme principle of ethics36 and reaches the violation of sexual restrictions or abuses of the sexual sphere!37 What does it mean in Genesis the concepts of “Good” and “Evil”? What is “Good” and what is “Evil”? What does it mean “to know the Good and the Evil”? The “good” term is commonly used as synonym of “well”, affection and satisfactory or propitious situations, as expression of economic and moral “profit”, etc. On the other side, the “evil” term denotes generic actions or negative events and it is synonym of hostile attitude. Broadly speaking it considers the attitudes, conducted in positive or negative way compared to an original attempt or goal, like synonyms of “right or wrong”, “appreciate or not appreciate/welcome or not welcome”; that has evidently deceived who wanted to see in the “fruit eating of the Knowledge Tree” the man approach to the moral discernment, to the conscience. As a matter of fact, the “Good”, “Evil” and “knowledge of Good and Evil” meanings of Genesis appear referred to a dichotomy of theologicalcosmological nature; and particularly to the polarization that invests every individual set in a theological constellation, where the opposition between a supernatural principle of the “Good” and a supernatural principle of the “Evil” is established. The “Good” is all that emanates, leads and involves the natural and supernatural affirmation of such divine principles and the “Evil” is all that is opposed to them. “To know the Good and the Evil” points out, therefore, the involvement of individuals in the humane opposition between the God of the “Good” and its antagonist, the God of the “Evil”, between “Light”

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and “Darkness”. Therefore, which alternative can be proposed? The distinction between religions and theoethotomy allows to perceive the experience of “knowing the Good and the Evil” in a new way. This “knowledge” is an experience “exclusively” conceivable in the theological context of theoethotomies. Indeed, they define a “law of God” that theologically distinguishes the “licit” from the “illicit”, what the man must do or abhor in order to participate to the “Good” affirmation and to remain faithful to the “God of the Good”, his creator. A sequence of ethical prescriptions with divine origin, protected by the clergy and handed on from generation to generation as they are included in the whole tradition and culture of every theoethotomistic society. “To know the Good and the Evil” is equivalent, therefore, to “experiencing in the ethical space (of man) the clash between Good and Evil; such an experience is possible only within a theoethotomistic conception”: a perception of the ontological, worldly and metaphysical reality, in which every aware creature is ineluctably crushed. This theological horizon actually provokes a deep internalization, often unconscious, of a whole casuistry that, on a psycho-cognitive level, will irreparably upset – here is the fundamental root of Freud’s Superego – the existence of the conscious Being, ethically independent, emerged on the Earth, sanctioning the ineluctable “ontological death”. And here is a further interesting faceting of our interpretation: the “death” following the Adam and Eve “Fall”. The classic exegesis considers the “death” of Gn 2, 17 and Gn 3, 34 as “physical death”, besides the spiritual one, due to the loss of the original immortality and holiness. Instead, this “death” would be understood as a “passing, ontological death” of a man which is able to see him-self as a religious creature, perfect “image and likeness of God”, due to the affirmation of a theoethotomistic ideal. This represents a radical exegetic revolution in the interpretation of the “Original Sin” event: Gn 3, 1–24 would not narrate any mysterious and supernatural ontological transformation, hardly sustainable and dense of theological contradictions, but it is rather seen as an atavistic and concrete psycho-cognitive and socio-cultural “fallen” of humanity, whose deleterious and concrete consequences would have then perpetuated in the whole mankind through cultural transmission. Thus, another intriguing aspect of Genesis is related to the sexual sphere: one of the first reactions of the two ancestors is to realize their own nakedness and to cover themselves since they were shamed by the sight of their sexual organs (Gn 3,7). Here we can consider such a reference as a mythological composition of the ethical topic of the sexual control in social sphere; but the delicacy, immediacy and perspicacity of the reference stimulate an interpretation immediately leading to the Freudian psychoanalysis, in particular in connection with the structuring of the psyche (Id, Ego and Super-Ego) and with

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the valence of Oedipus sexual dynamics in the psychopathology emergence. From this point of view, the psychoanalytic theory seems to be an interesting interpretative instrument confirming the socio-cultural and psychological differences between religions and theoethotomies.38 Nevertheless, this interpretation literally “bewitches” in outlining a new profile of both the psychoanalysis founder’s thought and that of other authors commonly seen as the diamond point of the laical opposition. Here, in particular, we would like to mention Wilhelm Reich’s thought in relation to the connection between social and sexual sphere39 – as well as other important authors.40 Therefore, these cues suggest the possibility to catch in real terms the nature of the psycho-cognitive, social and philosophical degeneration due to the appearance of the theoethotomistic cultures, even transposing the philosophical–analytical foundations of the psychoanalysis, one of the most canonical atheistic perspectives, in an unusual valid psycho-sociological and theological interpretation: a really puzzling result! The human condition preceding this event is, therefore, characterized by: 1) harmonious existence in nature; 2) close communion with divinity; 3) absolute absence of ethic prescription inherent in sexuality; 4) perfect perception of a supernatural valence connected with a religious conception of immortality; 5) absolute inability to experience the knowledge of moral categories connected with the theological concepts of good and evil and the associated effects, from which it derives: 6) a total ethical autonomy. The existential human reality following this event is characterized by: 1) an existence which is no longer in harmony but it is corrupt in nature; 2) loss of the spiritual communion with divinity; 3) conditioning and ethical aberration of the sexual sphere; 4) decline of the presumed supernatural valence consequent to the subjugation to; 5) experiencing the knowledge of moral categories connected with the theological concepts of good and evil and the associated effects, typical of a theoethotomistic theology, from which it derives; 6) the loss of the ethical autonomy. Therefore, here is revealed the mystery of the “Original Sin”: a transformation of cognitive, cultural and existential reality of man due to the passage from cultures founded on religious paradigms to societies centred on theoethotomistic models. This caused strong degenerations of the individual’s existential sphere and his relationship with divinity, a psycho-social

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and theological degeneration developed in the “Man planet” through the socio economic spread of these cultures, altogether more violent and with a strong expansionistic vocation. The most immediate test for this interpretation of the biblical fall would consist in evidences concerning the affirmation of the first class systems, in other words the first modern societies of the human history. Do we have empirical data for this? Starting from 40,000 to 50,000 years ago, to the beginning of the Neolithic era, it does not emerge any data of socio-economic and socio-cultural transformations able to suggest the spiritual revolution we propose.41 Instead, the Neolithic era represents a crucial period in the human history: the sociocultural and technological progress of the Neolithic era seems to testify unexpected, deep and often bloody innovations of the socio-cultural structure in different human societies.42 Between 7,000 and 5,000 years BC, in the east part of the Mediterranean there was a deep socio-economic transformation in some societies, which passed from an existence based on hunting and harvesting of food to a system founded on agriculture and breeding.43 Matured for thousands and thousands of years during Paleolithic eras, in few hundreds of years biology, sociality, spirituality and self-consciousness had to be adapted to new existential conditions and cultural contexts produced by this transformation.44 This transition did not happen suddenly: indeed, there was a progressive mediation from the first hunter-gatherer societies through proto-breeding and proto-agriculture forms.45 However, something new overwhelmed instantaneously in the man universe: psycho-existential modalities and situations never experienced began to deeply damage the individual and social sphere of the human being, acting as a self-conscious creature in his own ontological reality. Therefore, the present interpretation proposes this event like a sudden psycho-social “mutation” that, according to the Genesis description of the consequences of such event, would lead man to an extremely degenerate reality. Contributions in favour of these interpretations derive from several disciplines: from cultural anthropology, psychology, psychoanalysis and particularly from cosmology, neuroscience, biology and evolutionistic psychology. These new perspectives lead to a radical revision of the cosmological, ontological and anthropological foundations of the concept of “Ego, meant as psychical individual and skeptical philosopher, steeped in perceptions and intellectuality”, usually assumed by classical philosophy. The individual is no longer meant as a monadic entity “to interface” through perceptions with a

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reality placed “outside”. The individual is considered as a perceptive, psychocognitive, active and thermodynamically “open”46 entity/phenomenon, which “overflows” from its “perceptive threshold”, from the mere biological interiority, assuming psycho-cognitive characters both from the social and natural sphere, according to the “extensive phenotype” concept proposed by Richard Dawkins.47 These interpretations put in evidence the socio-cultural and cognitive requests, enabling to understand the authentic conditioning of individual manifestations due to the opposing religious paradigms. The most interesting elements of this influence seem connected to the redefinition of the “Superego”, “Ideal of Ego” and dissolution of the pneumatic-monadic meaning of individual, which leads to a perception of the “Self” deeply pervaded by an existential reality free from corruption and degradation. The lack of crystallization and sacralization of divine norms, typical of the religious experience, triggers psychological dynamics leading to a psychic development immune from the psychopathologies related to the hypertrophies of the “Superego” proposed by modern psychology.48 In religions, the ethical sphere, reduced to mere anthropic norms, does not escape from the self-determination of the individual and this prevents every hypertrophy of “Superego” and the related psychopathology. In this way the subject develops his own existence as a pure and full expression of intrinsic and ethical freedom.49 From this new perspective, steeped in freedom and awareness, man sees the disclosure of ethical horizons previously precluded, where it is possible to act on a religious basis rather than on an atheistic one: a pragmatic and new expression of an intentionality convergent at last with the methodological basis of modern philosophy and epistemology and no longer steeped in irrational and fideistic bewitchments. At this point, it is inevitable the reference to all the schools of thought that proposed a deep critical reflection on episodes and serious problems inherent in the human condition and human approach to modern hierarchical societies; and also to Sigmund Freud Civilization and Its Discontent.50 Indeed, all the previous exegesis are in evident contrast to natural sciences because of a reading in which Genesis is seen as a poetical narration of creation’s origin and present mankind. The orthodox exegesis emphasized explicitly historical contents of the narration, as much as possible,51 and in particular an origin of humanity starting from a pair of ancestors to place approximately 6,000 or 10,000 years ago in the area between the Tigris and Euphrates rivers.52

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Actually, the event of the “Original Sin” would date back to 7,000 or 9,000 years ago probably in the area of the “fertile crescent”, as established by “scholarly” calculations about generations of patriarchs and other researches – activities that aroused interest in many theologians, included Darwin’s contemporaries.53 Even if using poetic images, Genesis “actually” narrates an authentic “historical” fact, providing lots of appreciable chronological and geographical connections. The problem is that we were looking for the wrong thing in the wrong place and time: the Genesis nucleus is not based on a monogenistic origin of mankind from a single pair of ancestors, conception which is absolutely in contrast with the evolutionistic paradigm, neither on an epochal supernatural event from which will derive pain, death and “ontological” corruption subsequently spread through “propagatione” in all human race.54 Genesis does not deal with the ontological and biological nature of the entire human species and mankind, neither it is inherent in the human origin. Genesis does not narrate all of that, but it is about a precise cultural event, that was then effectively transmitted to humanity through “propagatione”. This concrete propagation occurred with Lamarckian rather than Darwinian modalities, and for this it was able to quickly extend itself in the ecumene: once again resorting to Dawkins terms,55 a sinister and theologically upsetting “memes”. In conclusion, we want to emphasize an important aspect: contrary to what one can imagine, this review can provide an eschatological and soteriological frame theologically pertinent to “all” the subsequent testamentary literature, included Gospels, without any theological decline. This re-examination radically differs from the traditional positions56 in its interpretative approach, philosophical foundations and exegetical results. The real root of “relativism” can be identified as another “reality”, whose understanding seems to be failed because of an interpretative vice, once again due to evident obscurantisms. The only, real and authentic “relativism”. Dipartimento di Medicina Sperimentale e Sanità Pubblica, UNICAM, Camerino Italy, Italy NOTES 1

Pievani Telmo, Creazione senza Dio, Einaudi, Turin, 2006, p. 29. Dicherson E. Richard, Struttura e storia di un’antica proteina, Le Scienze, July, n 47, Milan, 1972. 3 In genetics the phenotype is the ensamble of the visibile “manifest” characters of an organism: for example red hair represents the phenotype “red hair” which explicitly expresses a precise genetic structure – chains of DNA – which represent the “genotype”. 2

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Campbell Neil A., Biologia, Zanichelli, Bologna, 1995, p. 604. Rizzotti Martino, Prime tappe dell’evoluzione cellulare. Dalla comparsa della prima cellula agli organismi di tipo moderno, Zanichelli, Bologna, 1998. 6 The existing mithocondrions are supposed to be the descendants of one of the original symbiotic protoplasm, which had indipendently developed the processes of the aerobic respiration. Therefore these cells, interacting with other protoplasms, led to the modern eukaryote cell, which is much bigger and more complex than the original organisms, through a real and true process of “modular assembling”. 7 Olson Steve, Mappe della storia dell’uomo. Il passato che è nei nostri geni, Einaudi, Turin, 2003. 8 In the eukaryote cells there is a central part called nucleos that essentially contains the nucleic acids, surrounded by a part called cytoplasm where all the vital phenomenons, feeding, secretion etc. essentially take place. 9 The “molecular clock” measures the time of misura il time of mutation of the biological moleculars. Its ticking roughly corresponds to the necessary time to have an avarage change of 1% in the sequences of the amino acids of the same protein of two differing lines; the so called “evolutive unitary period” (EUP). Starting from the real molecular differences present in a population, it is possible to establish the “time of coalescence” (Tc), that is to say the necessary time to cancel the differences between two forms of life stored up during a continuous volutive transformation through the rule Tc = n/2∗ EUP (where n=number of variation between two taxa). See Biondi Gianfranco, Rickards Olga, Il codice Darwin, Codice Ediz., Turin, 2005, p. 62. 10 The expression “mithocondrial Eve”, that has stimulated the interest of some anti-evolutionsts looking for confirmations of their beliefs, must be caught with discernment: the risulting date of di coalescenc is relative only to the mithocondrial genes. In other terms, analysis charged to other genes would lead to different conclusions. Therefore this hypothesis doesn’t confirm any idea of “monogenism”, that is to say today’s mankind might descend from from a single native couple. For example, a similar study of the coalescence of the human chromosome Y, inherited by the line of male descendence, dates back to an “Adam of the chromosome Y” lived about 150,000 to 60,000 years ago. So much later than mithocondrial Eva! See Dawkins Richard, Il racconto dell’antenato, Mondatori, Milan, 2006, pp. 47–49. 11 This doesn’t exclude, during the early pre-biotic processes, the possibility of prebiotic processes founded on codings of couple of ribonucleotides afterwards replaced, for unknow reasons, by processes of codons coding. 12 A catalyzer is any chemical substance able to favour, without undergoing any transformation, the progress of a chemical transformation. It goes from simple atoms to the “enzymes” present in the living organisms, able to favour the cell biochemistry in an extremely effective and selective way. In the existing organisms the enzymatic function is execised by proteins, while the RNA (and the DNA) has only the function of transmission and custody of the genetic information. However short filaments of RNA are thought to have been able to give place to primitive catalyzations. In view of their ability to keep the genetic information, the possibility to propose the RNA also in the role of enzymatic molecule is of great interest in the studies of the origin of life. 13 Possibile mistakes of association can in fact give origin to changeable filaments, also in these areas beginning a random process of “copy and mistake” similar to that at the base of the evolutive darwinian mechanism. 14 Eigen Manfred, Gradini verso la vita. L’evoluzione prebiotica alla luce della biologia molecolare, Adelphi, Turin, 1992. 15 Campbell Neil, Quoted work, 1995, p. 507. 16 Schopf William J ., la culla della vita, Adelphi, Turin, 2003, p. 187. 5

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De waal Frans, La scimmia che siamo. Il passato e il futuro della mente umana, Garzanti, Milan, 2006. 18 Lieberman Philip, L’origine delle parole, Boringhieri, Turin, 1982. 19 Deacon W. Terrence, La specie simbolica, Coevoluzione di linguaggio e cervello. Giovanni Fiorini Ed., Rome, 2001. 20 A simple example of the esplicative deep meaning of the vestigial structures is given by the modern keyboards of the computer because of the strange arrangement, at first sight inapprehensible of the keys on these keyboards. Why haven’t the letters been arranged, for example, in alphabetic order? Are there ergonomic reasons? No, there aren’t. The modern electronic keyboards are the fruit of technologic evolution that has stemmed from mechanical typewriters based on levers that correspond to the keys. During the speed of typing by an expert operator the levers banged into each other, expecially when pressing nearby levers. In the attempt to minimize the problem the pennyroyals corresponding to the levers that more often follow one another in the words of the different languages had to be spaced out. The result was the strange disposition of the keys that we observe. When the modern electronic keyboards, without levers, replaced the old typewriters, the arrangement of the keys, no more necessary at that point, had to be maintained to avoid that the operators lost the achieved manual skill. That is how and when a vestigial structure can reveal the single events of an evolutive historical process. 21 Merlin Donald, L’evoluzione della mente. Per una teoria darwiniana della coscienza, Garzanti, Milan, 2004. 22 Verolini Roberto, Il Dio laico: caos e libertà, Armando Armando, Rome, 1999. 23 See page 35. 24 Verolini Roberto, Work quoted, 1999, p. 78 and next pages. 25 Any nouns, adjectives etc. referred to the same etymological root of the term “religion”, when not written in italics, will be used to point out concepts regarding the sphere of the sacred tout court, aside from the distinction between teototomie and religions. 26 Verolini Roberto, Quoted work, 1999, p. 235 and next pages. 27 Harris Marvin, Antropologia Culturale, Bologna, Zanichelli, 1990, p. 269. 28 Ehrlich Paul, Le nature umane. Geni, culture e prospettive, Codice Ediz., Turin, 2005, pp. 316–318. 29 This could also make us think in an implicit but also evident manifestation of their real “superiority” or inevitability. But it is enough to reflect on how even the virus of the common cold, of AIDS, and other events and phenomenons, even inauspicoius, are verywhere widespread on earth: none of that is in favour of their “superiority” at all, necessary or intrinsic “biofilia” quality, as E. Fromm would say. These realities, biological or not, feed themselves like mere phenomenons able of autoreplication and they perpetuate, maybe as a consequence of less obvious and immediate aspects, regardless of their role or value, that is all. 30 Leroi-Gouham Andrè, Le religioni della preistoria, Rizzoli, Milan, 1970. 31 Respectively 5,000,000, 8,000 and 240 years. See Ehrlich Paul, Quoted work, 2005, p. 205. 32 Nuovissima versione della Bibbia. Genesi, Ed. Paoline, Rome, 1976, p. 80. See also New American Standard Bible, by The Lockman Foundation, A. J. Holman Compani, division of J. B. Lippincott Company, Philadelphia and New York, 1973. 33 Testa Bappenehim, Italo Lampugnani Francesco, Bibbia ed antropologia, Sardini F., Brescia, 1976, pp. 88–89. 34 Le Scienze. Quaderni. Il Paleolitico, Le Scienze, Milan, 1986. 35 Rolla A., Corso completo di studi biblici. Il messaggio della salvezza, ELLE DI CI, Turin, 1965, p. 93. 36 Ed. Paoline, Rome, Quoted work, 1976, p. 86.

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Rolla A., 1965, Quoted work, 1965, p. 120. Verolini Roberto, Quoted work, 1999, p. 201. 39 Reich Wilhelm, La rivoluzione sessuale, Feltrinelli, Bologna, 1980. 40 Zaretsky Eli, I misteri dell’anima. Una storia sociale e culturale della psicoanalisi, Feltrinelli, Milan, 2006. 41 Leroi-Gourhan André, Il gesto e la parola. Tecnica e linguaggio, Einaudi, Turin, 1977. 42 Ruffié Jacques, Dalla biologia alla Cultura, Armando Armando, Rome, 1978. 43 Diamond Jared, Armi, acciaio e malattie. Breve storia del mondo negli ultimi tredicimila anni, Einaudi, Turin, 2000. 44 Pasquarelli Gianni, Preistoria del potere, Rusconi, Milan, 1983. 45 Leakey E. F. Richard, Lewin Roger, Origini. Nascita e possibile futuro dell’uomo, Laterza, Bari, 1979. 46 See our previous article, The concept of human soul/mind in the light of the evolutionist theory of knowledge: scientific epistemological aspects and metaphysical implications, for The Fifty-Fifth International Phenomenology Congress “From the Animal Soul to the Human Mind” Nijmegen, The Netherlands August 17–20, 2005, in course of publication in Analecta Husserliana. 47 Dawkins Richard, Il Fenotipo esteso, Zanichelli, Bologna, 1986. 48 See our previous article, Cognitive value of philosophical-scientific models (with reference to the evolutionary paradigm) from to psychoanalytic and associate-educational perspective, for The Fifty-Sixth International Phenomenology Congress, Rethinking education in the perspective of life, Daugavpils, Latvia, also it in course of publication in Analecta Husserliana. 49 Lecaldano Eugenio, Un’etica senza Dio, Laterza, Bari, 2006. 50 Freud Sigmund, Il disagio della civiltà. Il disagio della civiltà ed altri saggi, Boringhieri, Turin, 1971. 51 This shows what was expressly asserted until 1941. See Acta Apostolicae Sedis 43, Vatican City, 1941, p. 506. Afterwards, the exegetic positions inherent in the historical authenticity of this narration definitely vanished, in evident connection with a strong difficulty to confirm such characters of “historicity” in the sight of scientific data always more in contrast with such reconstructions. 52 Vedi Verolini Roberto, Quoted work, 1999, pp. 144–146. 53 Gould J. Stephen, Il millennio che non c’è, Il Saggiatore, Milan, 1999, p. 96. 54 Delumeau Jean, Il peccato e la paura. L’idea di colpa in occidente dal XIII al XVIII secolo, Il Mulino, Bologna, 1987. 55 Dawkins Richard, Il gene egoista, Zanichelli, Bologna, 1979. 56 Detailed analyses of this successive phase of the search are available on the site: www.diolaico.it 38

SECTION I T H E S E L F I N C R E AT I V E M E M O RY

T H O M A S RY BA

A . - T. T Y M I E N I E C K A , T H E W O R K O F T H E A N A L E C TA HUSSERLIANA AND CONVERSION

ABSTRACT

In this address—originally given to conferees at the Lateran University in November of 2006—Ryba identifies one of the causes of the success of the phenomenological movement connected with the Analecta Husserliana: membership in this movement is accompanied by a conversion (understood in the phenomenological sense). Following the ideas of Husserl, Stein, Lonergan, and Tymieniecka, Ryba explains in what sense commitment to the project of the Analecta Husserliana may be construed as a philosophic conversion. He concludes that this conversion is tantamount to the re-education of the esemplastic sense, a re-education which takes place both through a conscious understanding of Tymieniecka’s phenomenological project and though a liminal, “alchemical” transformation that the style of her philosophical writings effects in the reader’s imagination. T H E T H E M E O F M Y P R E S E N TAT I O N

When I asked Professor Tymieniecka for suggestions about what she might like me to include in this address—how I might contribute to this august gathering—she responded that she would like me to bring my expertise in the phenomenology of religion to bear on the later work of the Analecta Husserliana, specifically the most recent five volumes in the series. Anyone who has looked at these five volumes recognizes that their richness and ingenuity make a cursory treatment of their themes and arguments—which is the only kind of treatment really feasible in 20 minutes—impossible. A cursory treatment would be a travesty. In the limited time allotted me, what I shall try to do, instead, is to fulfill Professor Tymieniecka’s request, not by attempting a capacious summary of these new and important volumes but by speaking about what I think is one of the most important features about the work of Professor Tymieniecka and the Analecta Husserliana as has come to fruition in these five volumes. In other words, what I shall attempt, here, is to provide a brief description of—what I believe to have been—one of the most important effects that Tymieniecka’s 43 A-T. Tymieniecka (ed.), Analecta Husserliana CII, 43–50. c Springer Science+Business Media B.V. 2009 

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thought (and the writings of the Analecta) have had on associated intellectuals. This is the first time that I have expressed these thoughts publicly, so I apologize for the their unpolished form; this form is a function both of my unpracticed presentation of them as well as the slight trepidation I feel in bringing them, for the first time, into the light of day. Let me begin my description of this work with a brief anecdote. When I was a newly minted professor teaching at Michigan State University in the USA, one of my first papers—spring of 1988, I think it was—was delivered before an annual meeting of the Society for Phenomenology and Literature sponsored by the World Phenomenological Institute (then the World Institute for Advanced Phenomenological Research and Learning). As a result of this first meeting, I began to attend the spring conferences on phenomenology and literature in Boston and became friends with Professor Tymieniecka. At one of these meetings—I forget exactly the year—I was invited back to Professor’s house in Belmont, Massachusetts, which doubled as the Institute headquarters in those days. At dinner were Professor Marlies Kronegger, Professor Tymieniecka’s husband, and two or three more guests. As a young professor, I felt especially honored to be able to share supper with the people at the center of the work I so much admired, so I was more than usually attentive to the various group conversations and sub-conversations that went on that night. But the reason that evening especially stands out is because of a subdued conversation not directed to me but upon which I eavesdropped, anyway. It was between Professor Tymieniecka, Professor Marlies Kronegger and one other woman present (whose name I don’t remember). The context of the conversation was the large influx of new members and their excitement about the various sessions, especially about finally having found an academic home where they felt intellectually comfortable. In response to the recognition that some of the younger scholars had “caught fire” with the spirit of this phenomenology done in a new key, Professor Tymieniecka responded, “Yes, a real conversion has begun to take place among the new members of the group.” As I recount this sentence, aloud, to you all today, I recall—and indeed still feel—the perplexed excitement I felt to hear that specific sentence spoken by Professor Tymieniecka. I say “perplexed excitement” because—I confess—I had no idea what kind of conversion she might have been talking about. I was sure that she was not speaking religiously, because Professor Tymieniecka— following classical practice—had always been very careful to distinguish the project of philosophy from that of theology, on the few occasions that it had arisen. Had I been a bit more quick-witted, I might have immediately related it to similar statements by Edmund Husserl himself. But later, even after I made

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the connection with Edmund Husserl, I came to realize that this single statement by Professor Tymieniecka stands out as singularly emblematic of her work, the work of the Institute and the work of the Analecta Husserliana. Let me tell you why I think this is so. THE ETYMOLOGY OF “CONVERSION”

A glance at the etymology of the English word “conversion” immediately leads us to the semantic fields of its Latin predecessors and to its Greek cognates: conversio, epistrophê and metanoia. The Oxford English dictionary provides no less than sixteen connotations for the word “conversion,” clustered into three categories, including specialized technical meanings related to theology, mathematics and law. I will spare you a recitation of the majority of these because they have little relevance to the context in which Professor Tymieniecka spoke those words nearly 20 years ago. However, two of the English meanings stand out as especially relevant: The first meaning is the notion that a conversion is a “turning in position, direction and destination,” especially “the act of turning to a particular direction”; the second meaning is that conversion is a “change [or alteration] in character, nature, form, [properties] or function,” especially “the bringing [of] one over to a specified . . . profession or party, regarded as true” or as an “act of converting or fact of being converted to some opinion, belief or party.”1 In light of the connotations of both the Greek words metanoia and epistrophê, I don’t think it is much of a stretch to suggest that there is a third connotation of “conversion” that builds on the two preceding meanings but which also possesses the philosophical connotation of a change in mind which is tantamount to either a “trans-valuation of values’ or “a revolution in thinking.” Perhaps, it can mean both at the same time. Conversion can be transitive or reflexive: it can be the effect of one’s working change on another or it can be the effect of one’s working change on one’s self. It may also be that the former leads to the latter or that the latter leads to the former so that transitive conversions fan out into the world in a brush-fire movement that effects the transformation of society. PHILOSOPHICAL CONVERSION

It is well known that Husserl thought that the serious commitment to and the doing of phenomenology might be likened to a philosophical conversion, a conversion in one’s orientation toward the world. Edith Stein and Emmanuel Levinas, among others, report it. In an article written in 1931, Levinas

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describes the way philosophy students in Husserl’s Freiburg expressed their excitement about phenomenology, unanimously agreeing that phenomenology was “more than a new theory: it is a new ideal for life, a new page in history, almost a new religion.”2 One might dismiss this as youthful exuberance except that, in places, Husserl explicitly describes the phenomenological attitude conditioned by the epochê as equivalent to a personal transformation. Let me remind you of what he said, by quoting a portion of the most famous passage where Husserl makes this claim: Perhaps it will become apparent that the total phenomenological attitude and the corresponding epochê is called upon to bring about a complete personal transformation (Wandlung) which might be compared to religious conversion, but which even beyond [this personal transformation] it has the significance of the greatest existential conversion that is expected of [hu]mankind.3

My purpose in citing this passage is not to argue that Husserl was right in thinking that the epochê might be applied to everything which exists. Subsequent philosophers (including Professor Tymieniecka) have argued this question in different ways. Rather, my purpose is simply to affirm that Husserl thought the phenomenological attitude could be likened to a conversion and even expected that it would have this effect. It may be that this is simply what Professor Tymieniecka meant on that spring evening nearly 20 years ago. But let me suggest yet another supplement. Worthy of mention, in this connection, is Bernard Lonergan, not only because his theological and philosophical discoveries pace those of Professor Tymieniecka at points, but because Lonergan’s view of the relationship between conversion and the philosophical enterprise was more extensively worked out than that of Husserl. Lonergan applied the phenomenological method to the study of knowledge processes with the purposeful intent of making “conversion” a technical, descriptive term in his epistemology. His brilliance was to grasp the analogy between the transformative effects of scientific, ethical and religious knowing and then to describe their common term or overarching structure. Lonergan describes conversion as twofold: First, it is “the reconciliation between the speculative and the practical in terms of withdrawal-and-return,” and thus it is like the Neo-Platonic notion of epistrophê. But it is more. Second, it is a “reorientation, [a] reorganization of one’s mind and living, . . . [a] reorganization, reorientation, [and] transformation of one’s self.”4 And third, conversion ultimately gives rise to the consciousness of the authentic knower, that is “a knower who realizes that [his]/her identity . . . is to be replaced continually by a still to be achieved and realized knower.”5 Conversion can be likened to a quantum leap from a lower level to a higher level of understanding

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with the lower-level understanding being reorganized so that new, unimagined insights are possible. Lonergan describes this radical re-orientation as follows: When a person has one’s living organized on a lower level, the movement to a higher level involves something like [the] apparent eruption of a latent power, the possibility of a radical discovery, where the discovered has been present all along but where there has been a hiding of what has been discovered. These notions of obnubilation, dis-covery, uncovering [of] what has been there all along, [and] conversion, transformation of one’s living[:] all . . . lead to the most fundamental questions that can be raised with regard to the philosophic enterprise.6

For Lonergan, conversion operates at all levels of knowing. There can be intellectual conversion, moral conversion, religious conversion and perhaps even psychic or symbolic conversion. “Just as intellectual conversion effects a restoration of fidelity to the transcendental notions of the intelligible, the true and the real, as moral conversion effects a restoration of fidelity to the transcendental notion of the good, and as religious conversion effects a restoration of fidelity to the transcendent exigency through an inchoate experience of its satisfaction in the gift of God’s love,” so too psychic or symbolic conversion effects a fidelity to the “’sphere of the ulterior unknown, of the unexplored and strange, of the undefined surplus of significance and momentousness,’ which constitute the ‘primary field’ of what Lonergan calls mystery and myth.”7 According to Robert Doran: Psychic conversion is a transformation of the censorship [the mind exercises] . . . with respect to the entire field of what is received in empirical consciousness. [This] . . . censorship is exercised by dramatically patterned intentional consciousness, by the collaboration of one’s habitual accumulation of insights, judgments, and moral spontaneities with one’s imagination, by one’s “mentality” or mindset . . . . [P]sychic [/symbolic] conversion is a transformation of that censorship from a repressive to a constructive exercise as one engages in the delicate artistry of producing “the first and only edition” of oneself.8

A.-T. Tymieniecka has described a similar process of creative transformation in a number of places in her writings. In the Tractatus Brevis, she describes the “subliminal zone,” as the realm of primordial passions that function as the motors of all creative achievement in a way that bears a marked similarity to Lonergan’s sphere of the ulterior unknown (or in Doran’s terms the psychic or symbolic field).9 The strength of Tymieniecka’s treatment, in contrast to Lonergan’s, is that she is able to specify what takes place in this transformation of censorship, and its relationship to creativity and its role in individuation (or authentic self-creation). For Tymieniecka, it is the Imaginatio Creatrix that operates instrumentally to harness these subliminal passions by association and by dissociation, so that “pre-established coalescences” are broken apart and reformed “according to new possibilities.”10 Among the subliminal passions are certain elemental

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passions—“life promoters” she calls them—which ingress into life, quicken it and give it meaning.11 Corresponding to these passions are elemental forms which are the great logotypes emblematic of these passions and which function in great literature to evoke them.12 For Tymieniecka, great literature is a means by which an alchemical conversion is effected upon the reader because the writer—the creative genius or alchemist—uses his/her imagination to transform the reader by exposing him/her to the elemental forms.13

T H E T R A N S F O R M AT I V E W O R K A N D P E R S O N O F A . - T. T Y M I E N I E C K A

With the preceding points as background, I would like to suggest that the observation that Tymieniecka made so many years ago might be said to have been a reflexive judgment about a general feature of her presence on the philosophical scene, both in terms of her personal influence and her works. To put it directly: hers is a presence that effects conversion. Again, here we are not talking about religious transformation. (Such a suggestion made here in the Eternal City, near the original seat of the Bishop of Rome, would probably buy me passage to a special circle in hell for the blasphemous.) Rather, the conversion I mean is the way her personal influence has effected in her fellow travelers a transformation in the way they understand the world. The kind of conversion that Tymieniecka has been responsible for, I would suggest, operates according to both externalities and inner virtualities. These I would like to describe. Most obviously, as the editor and muse of the Analecta Husserliana, and in her organization of conferences and meetings, Professor Tymieniecka has labored as the Imaginatio Creatrix (or foundress) of a movement, a liberation movement bent on the freeing of the spirit of Husserlian phenomenology from the straight-jacket of a monotonic rationality. In a most material way, the Analecta has provided a venue both for fellow-travelers and mere sympathizers of this liberation to express themselves, a venue which except for her labors would not have been. In this way, she has participated in the conversion of philosophic culture in the late 20th and early 21st centuries. Also, as the architect of phenomenology in a new key, she has contributed substantively to the conversion of the phenomenological project, itself. A measure of the far-reaching scope of that conversion is evidenced in the new volumes entitled “Logos of Phenomenology and Phenomenology of Logos.” There, the disciplinary broadening of phenomenology that Husserl had divined has come to fruition, each volume treating a significant application of her project: first, to criticism and interpretation, second, to personhood and its

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problems, third, to history and human culture, fourth, to fine arts, literature and aesthetics, and fifth, and finally, to scientific inquiry. Each of these volumes is shaped by Tymieniecka’s central discovery, the expansion of phenomenological reason which acknowledges the priority of the human creative function as the interplay of both human consciousness and the elemental forces of human sensibility and emotionality.14 Having read many texts written by Professor Tymieniecka over the last twenty years, I would like, tentatively, to suggest that this reading can be tantamount to a kind of conversion in yet a third, and generally unrecognized, sense. When, I initially began to read her philosophy, after emerging from each protracted struggle with a text, I found myself curiously buoyant and aware of connections between ideas, emotions and things that I had never before noticed. I found myself—in short—experiencing a re-education of the esemplastic faculty. At first, I attributed this change to my struggle with the difficulty of her prose, but I quickly realized that previous struggles with difficult philosophical prose had never before produced just this effect. In the past, such struggle might have produced greater insight into the text at hand, or it might have yielded a new theoretical frame within which I could drop the world, but in all previous cases, there was very little affective change. On the other hand, when I read Tymieniecka, my mind, emotions and sensibility all seemed—almost imperceptibly—transformed. After some reflection, I have come to the conclusion that in a real sense, Professor Tymieniecka’s prose exemplifies Marshall McLuhan’s precept: here, the medium truly is the message. It is my experience that her style of writing works a direct effect on the imagination apart from the ideas it conveys. It is no longer very difficult for me to imagine that this is an intentional and controlled effect. Just as great literature is supposed to be transformative of the reader, so too a phenomenologist who claims to understand how this is possible, might, in her very mode of expression, achieve a similar conversion. In other words, I think it is possible that Tymieniecka’s prose can work on its reader in such a way to bring about a psychic conversion of the subliminal passions. Finally, and let me say this in closing, anyone who has had the pleasure of attending a meeting such as this also knows the converting power of Professor Tymieniecka’s charming personality. On this auspicious occasion, let me conclude by congratulating her—and all the contributors to these volumes—for this magnificent common work. Thank you. St. Thomas Aquinas Center, Purdue University, West Lafayette, IN, USA

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1

OED, 1:943a – 1:943b. Emmanuel Levinas, “Fribourg, Husserl and la phénoménologie,” Revue d’Allemagne et des pays de langue allemande 5, 43 (May 1931), pp. 403–404; Cited in Samuel Moyn, Origin of the Other: Emmanuel Levinas between Revelation and Ethics, Ithaca: Cornell, 2005, p. 1. I have Prof. Ann Astell to thank for leading me to this citation. 3 Herbert Spiegelberg, The Phenomenological Movement, p. 160, Note 106, Husserliana 6, p. 140, lines 256–261. 4 Bernard Lonergan, “On Being Oneself” in The Collected Works of Bernard Lonergan, Volume 18: Phenomenology and Logic, Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 19, p. 244. 5 Joseph Flanagan, Quest for Self-Knowledge: An Essay in Lonergan’s Philosophy, p. 265. 6 Ibid., p. 245. 7 Robert M. Doran, What Is Systematic Theology? Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2005, p. 111. 8 Ibid. 9 Thomas Ryba, “Elemental Forms, Creativity and the Transformative Power of Literature in A.-T. Tymieniecka’s Tractatus Brevis,” Analecta Husserliana, Volume 38, Kluwer, 1992, p. 6. 10 Ibid., p. 7. 11 Ibid., pp. 15–16. 12 Ibid., p. 16. 13 Ibid., p. 17. 14 A.-T. Tymieniecka, “The Logos of Phenomenology and the Phenomenology of Logos,” Logos of Phenomenology and the Phenomenology of Logos, Analecta Husserlian, Volume 88, Springer, 2005, p. xxxvii. 2

K I Y M E T S E LV I

L I F E L O N G L E A R N I N G A N D S E L F - A C T U A L I Z AT I O N

ABSTRACT

Life is a process for self-actualization of an individual. We know that selfactualization never ends in the phases of life process. An individual may not satisfy his/her continuous needs of self-actualization. The self-actualization process is related to human activities that include human experience such as feeling, thinking, sensing, knowing and acting. It is based on learning which develops personal intuitions, perceptions, intentions, knowledge and skills. It is also said that lifelong learning process constructs and changes personality continuously. Learning is the main instrument which carries out and delivers all the changes in the life process. It can be described as the process to construct meanings depending on a personal perspective and self experiences. Most of the human experience is related to ability of learning. Learning is the combination of old and new experience. Thus, learning is the accumulative process for an individual and supports creation of new directions for his/her life. The individual simultaneously searches the perfect environment to live. Lifelong learning is the way to make the perfect environment possible. It is one of the most powerful tools for the individual to create new life conditions for him/her. If the individual is aware of this powerful tool, he/she will improve his/her life conditions by means of the lifelong learning. Learning ability is influenced by many factors such as biological, sociological, cultural, emotional, spiritual, and moral developments. These factors have positive or negative effects on our learning abilities. Learning ability is the will to search for the meaning of life and a dynamic force that prompts development of an individual’s capability. Searching for the meaning of life is an unconscious behavior, that is, a kind of intuitive will for self-actualization. Phenomenology of self-perception leads to learning and self-actualization of an individual. Lifelong learning and self-actualization are the life projects for an individual. At the same time, they are plans for the future generations. In this paper, the relationship between self-actualization of and ability of lifelong learning is discussed. 51 A-T. Tymieniecka (ed.), Analecta Husserliana CII, 51–66. c Springer Science+Business Media B.V. 2009 

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K I Y M E T S E LV I INTRODUCTION

An individual has the potentiality to develop himself/herself during each period of his/her life. This potential for development can be affected by many different factors. These factors are divided into two main areas as internal factors and external factors. The common assumption is that internal factors are more effective than external factors. This is the dilemma about learning which process of lifelong learning is related to self-actualization. In this paper, discussion is limited to concept of lifelong learning and self actualization. LIFELONG LEARNING

An individual can take proper support form many components such as family, education system, media and peers. However, they may not provide proper support for the individual. Thus, the individual needs more pedagogical support to solve problems of life, develop his/her skills and capabilities. The pedagogical support should be given by educational system. Teaching and learning in some areas such as math, science, drawing, social studies and so on were defined as pedagogical support in the past. But, this approach is weakening in today. During teaching and learning processes teacher and learner should focus on the learning rather than the teaching. The concept of learning is likely to be argued in many dimensions. The concepts of teaching and learning tend to be redefined based on the latest changes. One of these redefinitions of the concepts of teaching and learning is related to phenomenological approach in education and it is called as phenomenological pedagogy. It is argued that how pedagogical supports can be given in formal learning system by means of phenomenological approach in education (Selvi, 2008). This approach focuses on the individual’s perceptions, intuitions, intentions and experiences rather than individual’s teaching and learning by subject matters. That is, the concept of learning is defined based on individualistic creative actions. Learning abilities can help the individual to develop. Learning is creative abilities for the individual and it is a guide to improve the individual’s life. Cecilia (2002, 696) stated that “human life needs on orientation, a guideline to help individuals in their task of dealing with the world”. “Learning refers to a change in behavior potentiality; and performance refers to the translation of this potentiality into behavior” (Hergenhahn, 1988, 4). Seng and Hwee (1997, 132) defines learning “a lifelong process, one that extends throughout the life spans”. The other definition focuses on investigation of individualistic ground. “A learning based on temporal experience consisting of at least two events . . .. These events constitute the necessary material basis of our personal temporal experience . . .” (Pineau, 1996, 99).

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If we analyze these definitions of the concept of learning, we can clearly see that learning promotes better choices for development of personal situations. Most of definition focuses on that process and production of knowledge are more individualistic ways of learning. Learning critically, creatively, and independently is a vital need for the individual. These definitions also indicate the concepts of lifelong learning and self-actualization. Learning can continue in whole life process. Thus, we have to ask the question of “What can be mentors in lifelong learning processes?”. Mentors create motivations for lifelong learning and they can be a person, a thing or inner senses of self such as thoughts, feelings or perceptions. The mentors should provide guidance to encourage lifelong learning abilities. Learner needs to use different skills, aptitudes, abilities and preferences for development through the agency of the mentors. In the educational system, the mentors have the role of leading an individual to acquire of knowledge. They provide technical support for an individual to reach, gain and use the knowledge. It is known that a teacher as a mentor tries to guide a student’s learning in the formal learning system. The teacher, as a mentor, does not follow proper ways to create motivation of lifelong learning for the students. The teacher is always busy to teach subject-matter and he/she does not spend his/her time to improve lifelong learning abilities of the student. In the informal and non formal systems, parents, peers, family, book, TV., internet, cinema, social cases, scientific results can be mentors of human learning. Inner processes such as motivation, love, creativity, pleasure, intuitions, intentions, will, desire, curiosity, self-critics and values can also be mentors of lifelong learning. If a person can be a mentor of another individual’s lifelong learning, the mentor may lead the individual, the mentor should be capable to creating desire of lifelong learning for the individual. In these situations, the individual needs someone to guide his/her learning. However, this is not the effective way of learning for the individual. The individual needs more effective ways than being led by a mentor. Wojnar stated that “Intellectual education has dual nature: it represents both an accumulation of knowledge and an acquisition of mechanisms of knowledge” (1996, 154). Accumulation of knowledge has two meanings; one of them is related to the new knowledge added to the present knowledge of the individual by means of new scientific developments. The other meaning is related to the individual accumulation of knowledge, that is the knowledge the individual gains depending on his/her own experiences by means of lifelong learning process. This is the main way of accumulation of the knowledge for the individual. The acquisition of mechanisms of knowledge is related to

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lifelong learning abilities of individual. Actually, the question of “what is the meaning of lifelong learning?” should asked and answered. According to Bennetts, “Lifelong learning is seen as not merely a valuable tool for living, but one of its purposes. In as much as it is in the service of aching optimal human potential” (2001, 271). Lifelong learning is a self-being process that plays important roles in self-actualizations. Harlacher (1992) stated that individual and communities are now beginning to truly internalize what the meaning of lifelong learning is. The concept of lifelong learning becomes clear than. But, at the same time it becomes complex if we think about the acquisition of mechanisms of knowledge. Knowledge about lifelong learning abilities is related to philosophy, physiology, pedagogy, sociology, biology, chemistry and medication. Lifelong learning is not limited to economic and sociological bases in this paper. It is also not limited to adult learning. In terms of the economic and sociological bases, people can learn from one an other, firm scan learn from one an other and their performances, countries can learn from one an other as living organisms. For these reasons, the concept of lifelong learning is gaining importance in the economic and sociological grounds. The formal learning system is very important for maintenance of economic and sociological systems to educate people. The main characteristic of the formal learning system is the resistance to change. Moreover, the formal learning system is resistant to encounter the individual’s needs which will develop his/her potentiality freely. The individual’s autonomy does not have any place in the formal learning system. Therefore, the individual’s needs for development are not satisfied in the formal system. Economy has been particularly interested in the role of lifelong learning in economic growth of society. The economy demands more effective ways to improve capital. The latest studies about the lifelong learning focus on individual’s development on the economic ground. However, the lifelong learning is not limited to economic ground. For this reason, with regard to the economic and sociological bases, we should use the concept of lifelong education. On the other hand, with regard of to the individual base we can use the concept of lifelong learning. According to Field (2003, 2), the concept of lifelong learning has become an important metaphor for the processes of self-actualization of an individual in a market oriented society. The concept of lifelong learning should be discussed in different perspectives and models such as an adult learning model or a learning system for an individual. In this paper, the lifelong learning is argued on an individual basis. On the individual basis the concept of lifelong learning is

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used in a way similar to the comprehension of the concept of learning. According to Lengrand (1996, 248), “the notion of lifelong learning illuminates the meaning of life . . . which built up a personality . . .” Learning oriented individual’s potentiality gives way to improvement of his/her behaviors or performances. This means that the learning provides the individual the chance to improve his/her potentialities. Human life should be seen in terms of changes realized by lifelong learning process. In this sense, learning abilities affect individual’s self-actualization. Therefore, the individual needs to improve his/her lifelong learning abilities to support his/her self-actualization. Nevertheless, I do not discuss how to improve lifelong learning abilities, because this was discussed in the paper of “phenomenology of lifelong learning” (Selvi, 2006a) before. It is becoming clear that the capacity of an individual is unlimited in scope and diversity at the levels of the body, the spirit, the intelligence, and the learning abilities (Lengrand, 1996). Learning does not stop at some periods of life process. It never ends but from time to time, learning capabilities can weaken or strengthen at certain periods of life. So, some external situations or internal situations may support or block the learning abilities. Kurenkova et al. (2000, 197) stated that “the development of individuality is not programmed in our genetic structure”. Some internal situations that is inner individual bases such as intuitions, intentions, perceptions, inner critics, motivation, needs and creativity, can help creation of a program with contributions of external situations, which is cultural bases such as cultural world, social world and physical world. Lifelong learning abilities can help to create programs for development of the individuality.

T H E PAT H WAY S O F S E L F - A C T U A L I Z AT I O N

Self-actualization is based on lifelong learning abilities of one self. Different factors affect the individual’s lifelong learning abilities. Firstly, these factors should be divided into two main pathways and then these two pathways create the third pathway. Thus, during the development of individual personality and character, the person follows three different pathways. These pathways can be presented in graphics as shown in Figure 1. The first pathway is related to internal situations of one self and the second pathway is related to external situations of one self. Interaction between the first pathway and the second pathway creates the third pathway which is more creative than the first two pathways. These three pathways are tried to be explained as means of selfactualizations in this paper.

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• • • •

Inner Critics Motivation Need Creativity

• Social-Cultural world • Physical World

The First Pathway

The Second Pathway

The Third Pathway Figure 1. The Pathways of Self-Actualization

T H E F I R S T PA T H WAY The first pathway uses the more creative, imaginative, autonomous, selfpromoted and self directed methods in human being’s life. During the process of becoming an individual, the individual with the sense of autonomy begins to create boundaries for interaction with others (Saltz, 2004). In other words, the individual creates boundaries to hide and protect the first pathway. This is the self directed system the individual constitutes and conducts. The first pathway can be visible or seen by others if the individual explains his/hers own feelings, thoughts, senses, experiences and perceptions. This system can be created by inner situations of self such as will, intuitions, intentions, and perceptions. Internal situations of the individual are supported by Inner Critics, Motivation, Need and Creativity that are related to the first pathway. In this paper, the terms of inner critics or self critics are used synonymously and I prefer to use inner critics. The first pathway includes the inner critics that create new ways for development of an individual. The inner critics are concerned with what the individual does, feels, thinks, senses and sees and so on (Stone and Stone, 1993). If the inner critics recall the individual’s pains or stresses related to his/her own experiences, he/she tries to get rid off or avoid the painful, uncomfortable and stressful situations and there are many ways to cope with the results of the inner critics. One of the best ways to cope with

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this kind of inner critics is analyzing the situations and creating solutions to the problems at the individual level. The inner critics means a kind of own inner talk of an individual with him/herself. They support the individual’s physical, mental, emotional and spiritual improvements. They are the treatments for the individual. They deal with the improvement of the individual’s creativity, intelligence, intuitions and perceptions. However, they create some undesirable personal situations such as shame, depression and low self-esteem. According to Stone and Stone (1993, 171) “our inner critics are deeply concerned about our relationship with others”. Inner critics indicate whether individual’s relationships with others are adequate or inadequate. If the relationships are adequate for the individual, he/she will feel comfortable; if the relationships are inadequate, he/she will feel uncomfortable in his/her life. When the uncomfortable situations appear, creativity and problem solving skills become active. The uncomfortable situations charge human energy to get ride of them. Depending on the individual base human energy is charged in many ways. That is, the individual ignores, handles and focuses on the results of inner critics. Learning is one of the fundamental ways to straggle with problems or uncomfortable situations in the individual’s life. Inner critics do not attack lifelong learning abilities. In contrast, the inner critics activate a kind of an alarming system for learning and improving selfactualization. Individual learns to cope with his/her problems and take into account the inner critics in a new way that develops his/her powers for self actualization. Inner critics become an important part of the individual’s inner support system. They support and protect the individual’s creativity. They turn into motivation and create awareness of one need. The needs alert the individual’s intentions to satisfy his/her needs. The, individual must have new experiences to encounter his/her needs. Processes of the inner critics, individual always analyze things in different dimensions. At the end of the analyzing processes, the individual reaches positive or negative results. Both results end with learning. The negative results seem to block the individual’s personal growth but this is not the case. The individual learns many things from his/her painful experiences or negative results. This also creates new problems in the individual’s life. The problems need to be solved to end the painful experiences. The problems can alert abilities of learning. The individual’s attention focuses on finding ways to handle the problems. Inner critics provide feedback for the individual, making his/her learn weak sides of his/her personal growth. Following the feedback, the individual learns his/her weakness and want to deal with his/her weaknesses. If teacher teaches

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students ways of doing inner critics, the student will become a successful lifelong learner and improve his/her self-actualization. At this point, I want to explain my personal example related to learning new things. I saw a new concept that I call as “X” in this paper, related to my topic while reading a paper. This concept made me feel in discomfort. I found myself in a different emotional mood. I wanted to learn the details of the new concept, but I felt anxious and I delayed my learning. If my position is analyzed, it is seen that I did not want to fell uncomfortable but also I did not do anything to avoid this situation that resulted in the feeling of stress in my life. Something delayed my search for learning but I have not been able to explain what blocked me. I have been waiting for three weeks and I have searched for learning the new concept and I felt very well after this. Why did I delay my search for three weeks? I really do not know what happened in this period. I felt uncomfortable because I delayed searching for new concepts. My body might be in the need of charging my alarming system. At the beginning of uncomfortable situation, my alarming system was not sufficient to alert my learning system. After the postponing period, I have learnt new concepts in a widely and deeply perspective. When I felt uncomfortable, I criticized my situation and got feedback from my inner critics. I could not stop my inner critics. They worked while I was studying with my students, eating my meal, walking on the street, watching TV., reading documents, doing housework. My other activities could not block my inner critics system working. Many factors affected my inner system. One of the most important activator of inner critics is the motivation. Motivation creates some internal or external situations such as having problems or feeling uncomfortable, happy, curios, need and so on. Motivation, leading the individual’s acts, is the self regulated inner system of the individual. It works in a way similar to the inner critics. “Motivation is subjective experience that cannot be observed directly . . .. and similar behavior patterns can result from quite different underlying motivational patterns” (Good and Brophy, 2003, 207). Behavior may need adequate motivation levels that activate the movement of the body. The adequate level of motivation creates energy for action. The motivation directs the individual’s lifelong learning abilities. There are two types of motivation: External and internal (intrinsic). External motivation can result from external stimulants such as sound, colors, physical environment and other things. Sources of external motivation can be organized by external factors to increase effectiveness of it. Intrinsic motivation is related to emotional processes of individual. It refers to being engaged in activity primarily in order to meet intuitions and intentions of one self. It is defined as “the motivation to engage in on activity primarily for its own sake, because the individual perceives the activity as interesting,

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involving, satisfying or personally challenging” (Collins and Amabile, 1999, 299). According to Collins and Amabile’s definition of the intrinsic motivation helps creation of the motivation for lifelong learning and self-actualization. Intrinsic motivation is bound to the creative process as well as the creative personality (Runco and Sakamoto, 1999, 75). It contributes to creative efforts of individual. It increases the individual’s inner processes that solve problems, organize learning environment and make plans for his/her developments. If my example is mentioned again, curiosity supports my motivation for catching the meaning of the concept of X. I wondered what the meaning of the concept X was. I asked myself this question many times and I found out that my curiosity led my attention to search for the meaning of concept X. Thus, individual’s needs, the other important activator of inner system, is related to the first pathway. The individual’s learning is so forced by his/her needs that he/she searches to encounter his/her own needs. Some physical needs are vital for being alive. This type of needs is accrued automatically by inner process and they have similar patterns for the individual. They promote lifelong learning of the individual by managing his/her life. The individual learns from his/her experiences in different ways to protect his/her life. Some needs are very complex and tend to be interpreted and acquired in individualistic ways. These types of needs are based on individualistic background. For example, individual’s lifelong learning needs are very complex and how to satisfy of every individual these not clear. If my example related to learning the concept X is remembered this can be defined as a need for me, and it created lifelong learning motivation for me. But, learning the meaning of concept X may not interest another person and it is not defined as a learning need for him/her. Thus, the same need is interpreted and satisfied in different ways by individuals. Since needs are unlimited in the life process, they force individual to be in endless search. The individual’s actions are self-intentional and self-directed by his/her own needs. Need are variable and endless, that is once a need is satisfied, then a new need emerges and immediate new action starts. Feldman (1999) stated that individual’s creative abilities to meet his/her needs are connected with cognitive, social and emotional processes, family context, education, domain and field, historical, societal and cultural influences. Creativity is based on intelligence, unconventionality, the ability to think in a particular manner, perseverance and all these elements affect instinct motivation (Martindale, 1999). The intrinsic motivation can be activated by imaginations, practical experiences, learning and observations. All of these activators support creative abilities of the individual Self-actualization is also a creative potentiality for the individual.

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According to Kurenkova et al. (2000), the contemporary philosophy of education is concentrated on the issues of human creativity. The creativity needs to seek unclear and unknown situations. It is the main vehicle for individual’s learning abilities. Since learning and creativity were discussed in one of my earlier studies (Selvi, 2006a) they are not discussed in this paper. Each individual is born as a unique being and this reality affects the first pathway. The first pathway is developed by inner processes. These processes are based on totally individualistic grounds such as individualistic sensations, intuitions, perceptions and preferences. The first pathway is defined as a secret garden mostly no one intervenes in. The individual carries out his/her own inner process depending on his/her feelings, sensations, thoughts and perceptions. Spiritual sides of the individual develop the first pathway.

T H E S E C O N D PA T H WAY The second pathway is based on common sense of others. It is related to the fact that individual becomes both a cultural and social being. It frames others’ intuitions, perceptions; intentions and the individual learn to behave according to the common senses of others. This process aims at control of the individual by means of common values, thoughts, beliefs and intentions. The individualistic side, which is the first pathway, is rasped in the second pathway. The second pathway refers to cultural world, social world and physical world that shape the meaning of development process of a human being. The cultural and social worlds reflect meaning sharing in life and are not limited to individual level. The relationship between the individual level and the group level creates the socio-cultural world. As mentioned above, inner critics are deeply related to the relationship with others. The second pathway can help the individual to encounter the first pathway needs for development of self. There is cooperation between the two pathways and they feed each other. The cultural and social worlds organize meaning making system of individual and he/she engages in daily life. The individual makes his/her own meaning within the cultural and social worlds. The cultural and social worlds guarantee that the individual becomes a social and cultural being. The second pathway provides new criteria for development of self. These criteria tend to change according to development of societies. It is known that a society has subsystems such as family, peers, vocational groups, hobby groups, religious groups, neighborhood, city members and citizens. Each subsystem creates its own criteria for its members. Sometimes, criteria of these subsystems conflict with each other. The individual might prefer certain criteria and contacts

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by means of them. Some criteria include spiritual dimensions, some criteria include materialistic dimensions and some include objective or subjective dimensions. Educational studies in society can be placed in the second pathway. The second pathway includes formal, informal and non-formal educational studies. It is known that education is the best way for development of the individual for the society. Educational system has two aims; the first one is related to individualistic development, the second one is related to social development. It carries out plans to develop the society by developing the individual. Jarvis stated that (cited in Martin, 2001, 2); Education is frequently regarded as a humanistic process . . . in which individual students learn and grow and develop. It is regarded as a major element of being-as a process through which the human essence emerges from existence in active participative relationship with others. Yet the very nature of society in which education occurs emphasizes the having mode and expects repetitive action and non-reflective learning so that it can produce people who can rehearse what they have acquired. As a result education has been forced to adopt the characteristics of contemporary society.

The second pathway is an attempt to protect the self. For example, I want to frankly reflect my feelings, thoughts and experiences if something comes into my mind in any situation. But, if I behave frankly, I create problems in my life and others’ lives and following this, I learn to control my reflections. As a result of experiences, I gain humors about how to manage reflections. I reflect common senses and common ideas instead of my own senses and ideas. Individual’s perceptions, needs, intuitions, intentions and experiences are not similar to other individuals’. These differences are related to individualistic bases. In contrast to this, the second pathway aims at decreasing all these individualistic differences through common sense and understanding.

T H E T H I R D PA T H WAY The third pathway results from interaction of the first and the second pathway. Conflicts and agreement between the two pathways can be seen during the interaction. Both pathways contribute to constitution of the third pathway. Individual creates a new way reflecting his/her own meaning of his/her life. In the third pathway appears as a harmonization of the first and the second pathway. It is totally unique creation of the individual’s own meanings. The third pathway, just as other pathways, can occur depending on lifelong learning abilities of an individual. The individual can create new pathways based on his/her own perceptions, experiences, capabilities and potentialities and this is described as self-actualization process. The lifelong learning abilities can improve the individual’s perception of life. This perception occurs

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depending on the individual’s personal experiences in the world. Personal experiences compose a life history. They turn to ontological knowledge trying to describe the world by the individual perceptions of things. Perceptions improve the meaning of life and capabilities of the individual. Barbaras (2003) stated that life is shaped in contact with perceptions and linked to the capability of the individual’s perceptions. Lifelong learning ability constitutes choices for an individual in his/her life. The lifelong learning creates the third pathways between the first and the second pathway of the individual’s own self-actualization process. Communications or conflicts between the first and the second pathways may be characterized as the third pathway. The conflicts between young generations and old generations can be described as the conflicts between the first pathway and the second pathway. The conflicts between the younger and the older generations may end by creation of the third pathway by them. Development is not restricted to an aniline pathway. Interactive relationships continue between the three pathways. All these pathways have no predetermined patterns. Individual’s features and environmental conditions affect his/her pathways. The individual’s creative force supports the third pathway and self-actualization process. The first pathway is an individualistic way being more creative, imaginative and emotional than the second pathway. Individual tends to improve his/her learning. Therefore, the individual needs to learn different ways of learning to become a successful lifelong learner. According to Martin “Learning is a fundamental process in the human being’s journey to fulfill their potential through continually becoming, but learning also underpinned by different concepts of purpose which, in formal systems related to ideas of control and inculcation and empowerment” (2001, 3). Individual needs to give meaning to his/her own perceptions. He/she must build meanings of things depending on his/her perceptions and experiences. He/she usually learns common meaning of things. Common or society values and beliefs can block the individual’s ability to transform his/her own understanding of the world in which he/she lives in. Thus, the individual needs autonomy and freedom during his/her learning and self-directed learning experiences. Otherwise, the individual may not be able to create the third pathway related to self-actualization. DISCUSSION

Understanding belief system, developing life principles, establishing intuitions and intentions, improving life system and self-actualization are related to life project for the individual. Self-actualization is based on learning abilities, imagination capabilities, creativity, and self-criticism. It is defined as the

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Social World Individual’s internal

Individual’s

Cultural World

External

Physical World

World

World Self-Actualization

Figure 2.

The Components Self-Actualization

project of life for the individual. Self-actualization is the life purpose of the individual. The bases of the first pathway, the second pathway and the third pathway and their relationships with self-actualization can be summarized as in Figure 2. It is seen that the three pathways are explained in different view points in Figure 2. Individual Basis is related to the first pathway, Cultural Basis related to the second pathway and Self-Actualization is related to the third pathway. Pathways describe components of self-actualization. Self-actualization is as a project for future development of the self. It covers past and present but, it aims at future development. Self-actualization, like an arrow, begins in the past and goes to the future by internal and external processes of human. The individual thinks about future and makes plans to apply in the future. This provides the possibility of action for the individual in his/her life. Future is the unknown dimension but includes various potentialities and possibilities of changes, developments and improvements. This idea provokes lifelong learning abilities to manage future possibilities. Futuristic ideas should increase the self-actualization process. Self-actualization can be defined as the formations and constitutions of self. Individual as a living being always tries to re-form himself/herself and simultaneously acts to develop as a whole. “Life is determined by the fact that coming to grips with the anthropological problem calls for an inquiry into the constitution of the human person as a living being . . .” (Bello, 2000, 43). Formation of the self is a complex system affected by many worlds. Some factors come from inner system of the self and some come from external worlds. Self-interpretations of the meaning made by the individual are based on these worlds. Self-interpretations are related to phenomena and their significance in individual basis. Self-actualization can be achieved in the life process. Self carries out his/her life project by means of lifelong learning abilities. The self-actualization movement is a kind of evolutionary development in life. “Development impels that there is no finished form which could be imposed on us from the outside.

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This always unfinished form depends on own action . . .. Development is thus seen as a function of human evolution” (Pineau, 1996, 114). According to Tymieniecka (2000, 6–7), The human beings not only enacts his own life route like all other terrestrial living being, but he inventively transform it according to his own specific aims, in attunement with his circumambient conditions, of course. This amounts to saying that instead of following the line of the ontopoietic design of Nature-life only, he on the ground of that life project invents according to his own will specifically human shapes and significance for his life.

Self gains a gradually increasing awareness to develop himself/herself by means of lifelong learning ability. Learning gives feedback to the self for choosing his/her directions of individual growth. Self-actualization never ends Why? How? The self-actualizing person is eager to learn and experience curiously. He/she wants to live new experiences to improve his/her performance, potentialities and skills. According to Bello, “The lived body experiences itself as moving in the progressive sense . . ..” (2002, 44). “Individual is capable, at least to a certain extent, of mastering his life in the sense that he can accept it, deny it, promote or destroy it . . ..” (Bello, 2000, 50). Individual’s perceptions, needs, intuitions, intentions and experiences are discussed by phenomenology. Application of lifelong learning should take phenomenological philosophy into consideration. Thus, phenomenological method should be learnt by the individual during the school studies in formal education system. Phenomenology is based on an humanistic approach that is, interested in individual perceptions, intuitions, intentions and experiences. Phenomenology is defined as a scientific research method which is applied to humanistic approaches to understand the meaning of individual’s life. It explains the methods that the individual constructs to guide his/her actions in his/her life. Phenomenological methods are very suitable for improvement of the first pathway. It is also suitable for the second pathway and constitutes the third pathway. Lifelong learning is the best way of generating the sustainable learning and development of individual. The results of Field’s (2003) research show that the lifelong learning can foster changes, developments and personal growth. This result can be interpreted in a way that the lifelong learning abilities promote self-actualization process. But, we need more information about the lifelong learning and the self-actualization to understand the relationship between them. Self-actualization of individual can give way to sustainable development of individual and society. The relationship between lifelong learning and the self-actualization needs to be discussed deeply in many dimensions. Anadolu University, Eskısehır, Turkey

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REFERENCES Barbaras, R. Life and perceptual intentionality. Research in Phenomenology, 33, 157–166, 2003. Bello, A. A. Life, person, responsibility. In A.-T. Tymieniecka (Ed.), Analecta Husserliana. Vol. LXVII. Kluwer Academic Publishers, Dordrecht, pp. 43–53, 2000. Bello, A. A. The generative principle of phenomenology, their genesis, development and early expansion. In A.-T. Tymieniecka (Ed.), Analecta Husserliana. Vol. LXXX. Kluwer Academic Publishers, Dordrecht, pp. 29–61, 2002. Bennetts, C. Lifelong learners: in their own words. International Journal of Lifelong Education, 20(4), 272–288, 2001. Cecilia, M. A. Phenomenology of life, integral and scientific, fulfilling the expectations of Husserl’s initial aspirations and last insights: A global movement. In A.-T. Tymieniecka (Ed.), Phenomenology World-Wide: Foundations-Expanding Dynamics-Life-Engagements: A Guide for Research and Study. Analecta Husserliana. Vol. LXXX, Kluwer Academic Publishers, Dordrecht, pp. 687–719, 2002. Collins, M. A. and T. M. Amabile. Motivation and creativity. In R. J. Sternberg (Ed.), Handbook of Creativity. Cambridge University press, Cambridge, pp. 297–312, 1999. Feldman, D. H. The development of creativity. In R. J. Sternberg (Ed.), Handbook of Creativity. Cambridge University press, Cambridge, pp. 169–186, 1999. Field, J. Civic engagement and lifelong learning: Survey findings on social capital and attitudes towards learning. Studies in the Education of Adults, 35(2), 142–156, 2003. Good, T. L. and J. E. Brophy. Looking in Classroom. A and B, Boston, 2003. Hergenhahn, B. R. An Introduction to Theories of Learning. Prentice-Hall International, London, 1988. Harlacher, E. R. and J. F. Gollattscheck. Building learning community. Community College Review, 20(3), 29–39, 1992. Kurenkova, R. A. et al. The methodologies of life, self-individualization and creativity in educational process. In A.-T. Tymieniecka (Ed.), Analecta Husserliana LXVII. Dordrecht: Kluwer Academic Publishers, pp. 195–205, 2000. Lengrand, P. Conclusin. P. Lengrand (Ed.), Areas of Learning Basic to Lifelong Education. Pergamon, Oxford, pp. 247–248, 1996. Martin, P. R. Unlearning and learning. In A. Herrmann and M. M. Kulski (Eds.), Expanding Horizons in Teaching and Learning. Proceedings of the 10th annual teaching and learning forum 2001. Perth: Curtin University of Technology. http://cea.curtin .edu.au/tlf/tlf2001/martinp.html. Martindale, C. Biological bases of creativity. In R. J. Sternberg (Ed.), Handbook of Creativity. Cambridge University press, Cambridge, pp. 137–152, 1999. Pineau, G. Time and lifelong education. In P. Lengrand (Ed.), Areas of Learning Basic to Lifelong Education. Pergamon, Oxford, pp. 95–121, 1996. Runco, M. A. and S. O. Sakamoto. Experimental studies of creativity. In R. J. Sternberg (Ed.), Handbook of Creativity. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, pp. 62–92, 1999. Saltz, G. Becoming Real. Penguin Group Inc., New York, 2004. Selvi, K. Phenomenology of lifelong learning. In A.-T. Tymieniecka (Ed.), Analecta Husserliana. Vol. XC. Springer, Dordrecht, pp. 483–500, 2006a. Selvi, K. Learning and creativity. In A.-T. Tymienecka (Ed.), Analecta Husserliana: The Yearbook of Phenomenological Research. Vol. XCIII. Springer, Dordecth, pp. 351–369, 2006b. Selvi, K. Phenomenological approach in education. In A.-T. Tymienecka (Ed.), Analecta Husserliana: The Yearbook of Phenomenological Research. Vol. XCV. Springer, Dordecth, pp. 34–47, 2008.

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Seng, L. W. and L. S. Hwee. An Empirical framework for implementing lifelong learning systems. M. J. Hatton (Ed.), Lifelong Learning: Polices, Practices and Programs. APEC Publication, Toronto, pp. 113–127, 1997. Stone, H. and S. Stone. Embracing your inner critic: Turning self-criticism a creative assert. California Delos. Inc., Albion, 1993. Tymieniecka, A.-T. The origins of life. In A.-T. Tymieniecka (Ed.), Analecta Husserliana. Vol. LXVII. Kluwer Academic Publishers, Dordrecht, pp. 3–12, 2000. White, M. G. Creativity and learning culture. Retrieved from http://www.ibsal.com/creativity. html.14.05.2004. Wojnar, I. “Art and lifelong education”, P. Lengrand (Ed.), Areas of Learning Basic to Lifelong Education. Pergamon, Oxford, pp. 143–162, 1996.

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FA C E S O F M E M O R Y – T H E W O R K O F F R A N Z K A F K A AS A RECORD OF CONSCIOUNESS LOST IN THE L A B I RY N T H O F B E I N G I N T H E C O N T E X T OF EXISTENTIAL PHILOSOPHY

ABSTRACT

The literary achievements of Franz Kafka make the reader think and force him to repeat the questions about existing and the purpose and end of existence. Novels as well as Kafka’s shorter works shocked the 20th century reader, aroused his fears and anxieties, they also influenced the present day culture and its understanding by the Western societies; apart from that, they formally and qualitatively enriched the symbolism and possibilities of creating new worlds of novels. These are only a few arguments that can be quoted and which incline to take up and recall the topic of literary work of one of the masters of 20th century prose and the author of unforgettable The Trial. The work of Franz Kafka despite the passing of time has been the source of interest for readers from various countries, among whom there have been not only specialists in the field but also, above all, the lovers of great literature that is universal due to its message. It is this message, seemingly ambiguous and difficult to pin down, that is going to be the object of my investigation. In my article I would like to conduct an analysis of the key and elementary features of Kafka’s prose that constitute of the universal character of his novels and stories and impose on the mind of every reader who has ever had contact with his works. Therefore, one of the essential themes of the article is the problem of consciousness lost in the world of meanings and moving in intricate corridors of being which often leads to nowhere. In his novels Kafka very carefully records human existence. It can even be stated that each of his works constitute a sort of memory of human being which is under constant attack by the domain of the non-being. This is another aspect of Kafka’s writing I am very interested in. Owing to that it will be possible to identify the elements of the writer’s prose which constitute the faces of memory mentioned in the title of this summary. The themes of non-being and memory are relevant also because, contrary to what may seem, their presence can be found not only in Kafka’s work but, 67 A-T. Tymieniecka (ed.), Analecta Husserliana CII, 67–77. c Springer Science+Business Media B.V. 2009 

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above all, in the surrounding reality. At the same time, the aforementioned categories can be recognised as an important indicator of human existence. To sum up, the following notions and at the same time words-categories that will constitute the indicators in my project will be non-being and memory as well as consciousness and being. Each encounter with a literary or philosophical work or, speaking from a broader perspective, with a work of culture, makes it alive. It becomes, then, a part of our present. What is more, in the case of Kafka’s literary output, it is the work not only alive but still relevant due to its versatility. The texts of the author deserve to be remembered but, above all, they constitute a memory of human fate, which carries the risk of ambiguity, indeterminacy and mystery. Nevertheless, the risk is more fascinating than frightening, which attracts the attention a possible reader despite the gloomy and debatable decisions. It is then a risk worth undertaking; it is a challenge facing the human thought. The works of Franz Kafka are a record of an encounter with the unspecified – his work is going to be treated as a form of memory. On the other hand, I will try to show the relation in Kafka’s works between the unspecified and inhuman and the human memory. Literature and philosophy meet always where intellectual anxiety arises. Philosophy in its deepest nature is nothing but asking questions. Among so many questions it is important to be able to find and ask the right ones. In his works Franz Kafka challenges this act of questioning. In one of his stories Kafka makes a statement through the agency of his animal character: Everyone has a tendency to ask questions. [. . .] And apart from that, who in his youth doesn’t like to ask questions and in what way am I to find among so many questions the right ones? Every questions sound the same, what matters is the intention, however, this intention is often hidden also for the one who is asking questions.1

There are works which combine the “corporality” of literature and the magic of asking questions – these are rare exceptions linking art with philosophical consideration. Literature is the mirror of life; hence, it is not as abstract as philosophy. Nevertheless, for the aforementioned reason it loses some of its accuracy; the accuracy seems to be an indisputable asset of philosophical enquiries. These in turn often lose momentum following the complexities and details of being, in such a situation they then lack the emotional element inseparable in the case of literature, this undeniable passion of life. It seems that Franz Kafka managed to combine literature with philosophical enquiry about human existence. However following the narrative of Franz Kafka’s works we may have the impression that there exists something greater and more powerful that has taken control of the life, time and space surrounding the fictitious characters of The Trial, The Castle and some shorter works. These works are

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examples of literature which contains the voice of transcendence, it is undeniably pervaded with it – the reader is here led in the direction of a hidden source of reality. The problem is that while reading Kafka’s texts we are under the irresistible impression that we are being led and nothing more than that. In spite of the logical course of events in the presented stories, abundant in realism and likelihood as well as formal and content coherence – all in all, despite their logicality, we experience the lack of aim of these intellectual journeys. We feel as lost as the intra-literary subjective representations. Adequate articulation of the aforementioned sensations which recalls desirable associations is a term taken from existential philosophy – namely, while reading Kafka we are under the impression that we have been thrown into a groundless world or one which has been founded on the principles hard to identify. This is one of the causes that condemn us to feel lost in an encounter with Kafka’s prose. This is also the reason why it is so hard to follow Kafka’s works. In Kafka’s novels, the narrative structure is more conditional than absolutely certain. We will not find an omniscient narrator there. On the contrary, there is more opinion, uncertain predictions and changeability of judgment of a person insecure of his rights or arguments rather than a thorough imperturbable description of facts. It is important to recognize that from the point of view of epistemology a fact is stable. A fact is something obvious and indisputable, at the same time it is something that has already happened and on the timeline continuum it is situated in the space occupied by the past. A fact is a certainty which concerns what is past, finished and closed. Following this line of reasoning, certainty is the domain of what is past, finished and marked from the perspective of the flowing time. The issues of the past are inseparably accompanied with the theme of memory. Yet, in Franz Kafka’s works time gets reduced – however paradoxically it may sound – to the present, which has no relations with the past. Therefore, the status of memory becomes exceptionally dubious. In Kafka’s concept the perception of reality is not based on the certainty of facts, but only on speculations and guesses. In other words, nothing is certain or fixed here, and cannot be certain and fixed because in Kafka’s works indeterminacy is the essence of being. Kafka’s characters are doomed to make incessant and hopeless quests for the nature and sense of the surrounding reality. In order to emphasize the aspect of unsteadiness in the sphere of episteme the author of The Trial uses specific means of linguistic expression, such as the words: it seems, probably, could, if and the like. It is certain that Kafka consciously and deliberately uses phrases that have the hallmarks of conditionality. It can be seen then that already at this level of literary transmission deficiencies and limitations of human cognitive abilities and memory dependent on them are signalled. A scene from The Trial serves as an interesting example of using

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the conditional; in this scene the narrator describes the reactions of the public gathered at the questioning of Josef K., the proxy: The people in the left faction were not only fewer in number than the right and were probably not more important than them, though their behaviour was calmer and that made it seem as if they had more authority. When K. now began to speak he was convinced he was doing it in accordance with their line of thinking.2

Moreover, it can be observed that the author uses such expressions both referring to the subject and object which make a considerable extension of the possible field of designation, for example: someone and something. This is possible due to their content indeterminacy, someone meaning “everyone” and something meaning “everything”: everyone or almost everyone, everything or almost everything – these are introductory generalizations characteristic for Kafka’s writing, experiencing elusiveness, obscurity or vagueness. The first words of the novel The Trial are full of indeterminacy and constitute the signal of the manner of conducting a dialogue with the reader: Someone must have denounced Josef K., he knew he had done nothing wrong but, one morning, he was arrested.3 We don’t know “who” denounced Josef K. and why he had done this; what is more, we don’t even find out when Josef K. was arrested, the only thing we are told is that the arresting took place “one morning”. Consequently, a problem arises – in Kafka’s works human cognitive activity faces a defeat: how to mark and determine something which is based on the assumption of its indeterminacy. A consequence of this line of thinking is the statement that there is no knowledge and what is most important there is no memory without cognition. However, let’s go back to the character of Josef K. – almost everything surrounding this character is shrouded in the unclear and unsaid as well as mystery. From the outset he experiences cognitive powerlessness, hard to specify epistemological deficiency in relation to the surrounding reality – he doesn’t know why he is charged and how he is to defend himself against being sentenced, he has no idea who to turn to for advice and whether there is any point in doing that. The above-mentioned examples refer to an important element of Kafka’s work, which can be named narrative content indeterminacy. Most frequently it is concerned with narrator’s statements and as we could see it greatly influences the reception of the content of a text; it is also significant for the issues concerning memory and its status in which we take interest. It is worth noting that the narrative content indeterminacy sends us back towards decisions of ontological character. Franz Kafka’s works contain unique ontology; we can find it presently, that means from the perspective of their reception. The texts of the author of Metamorphosis have been interpreted very differently depending on the leading philosophical, psychological and sociological conceptions at that time. Nevertheless, there is one thing we

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can be sure about – the author of Amerika had a strong premonition of the being hidden in its phenomenal manifestations; it was a premonition the expression of which constitutes the uniqueness of his literary achievements. In a short story The Burrow the animal character experiences a threat from something, some other unknown animal and despite strenuous efforts to define it more precisely, it is condemned to constant speculation concerning the kind and distinctive features of the danger lurking somewhere near. The inhabitant of the burrow is considering various ways of protection against the intruder. Subject to the constant torment of the search for the unwanted guest, it suffers from a continuously reappearing sense of danger. In this case the state of danger becomes a part of everyday life of this fearful creature. The following excerpt is particularly meaningful when it comes to this issue: However, maybe – and this thought also comes to my mind – it is about an animal that I do not know yet. It could be possible; indeed I have been meticulously observing the life down for long enough, but the world is diverse and always full of unfavourable surprises.4

In this case we are dealing with indeterminacy realized by introducing an anti-hero whose existence is sensed by the main character of the story. We can call it subject-object indeterminacy, which is more concrete in comparison with the above-mentioned one as it contains instances of pointing not to “anything” or “everything” but to the presumed subjective or objective reality. In this way it is loaded with content characterized by greater cognitive charge, gets meaning while taking not yet fully determined form. However, it does not change the status of being of the above-mentioned animal subject; its limited memory only suggests and warns against a variety of unfavourable surprises that can come out. The lack of surname in the case of the novels’ characters is another example of this type of narrowing of cognitive perspective. Both Josef K., a proxy from The Trial and K., a land surveyor from The Castle are people without surname, to some extent deprived of their identity because of that – they are individuals marked by a lack of memory of some sort, shrouded in the mist of what is unsaid, unclear and open to speculation. This becomes especially visible in the case of the character of The Castle – the last and who knows if not the most important novel by Franz Kafka – who in his indeterminacy got deprived even of his name, only an initial K. was preserved. In this way the character gets deprived of his own personal history and his past indispensable to establish his own place in the surrounding world. K.’s indeterminacy has got an impact on the disappearance of his identity at the same time not letting him assimilate in the new social and cultural conditions. A character deprived of his memory is doomed to feel strange and to be a stranger. A lack of memory is one of the reasons why the character cannot realize his goals, hence in turn condemns him

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to the disappearance of the future. K. becomes a prisoner of his present from which he cannot free himself. Even when he tries an escape in the direction of the seemingly possible future it does not change his position whatsoever. The indeterminate plays a significant part in disturbing the time structure – basically, for the hero of The Castle time ceases to exist. The world in Franz Kafka’s texts – subjects, objects, places – is marked with some incomprehensible lack of penetration, a barrier impenetrable for the senses and mind. His characters are burdened with cognitive impotence which can be spotted not only in individual words that can be found in certain passages of the texts, or in introducing enigmatic objects, but also by making references to symbolism enhancing the impression of narrowing the horizon of knowledge that is available to gain. Darkness, fog or smoke as well as stuffy air and cramped space constitute this type of symbols. These are exemplified in the descriptions of court offices in The Trial which are filled with stuffy air having negative impact on Josef K.’s physical and mental state. Narrow court corridors are constructed in a sort of labyrinth dominated by darkness scarcely lit by rays of light coming through very few smoky windows. Proxy K. after walking a dozen or so metres in the court corridor is unable to find the way back, the way to the exit – the darkness, claustrophobic cramped space and stuffy air prevailing in that place make him forget the way back. Presenting this type of symbolism shows a degrading influence of reality on the main character of The Trial – in contact with the indeterminate the senses fail, and finally the disintegration of mental faculties takes place – including the ability to recognize and orientate in space. In an encounter with what is indeterminate and inhuman in its nature, memory becomes indeterminacy indifferent to the information that is being gathered. In the novel The Castle the presence of fog is inseparably attributed to the building structure from the title. The castle is the desire and goal of K.’s journey. Everything connected with it is invariably deprived of concretum. The castle is – and there’s no exaggeration in saying this – fog. The inhabitants of the village submitted to the castle are unfavourable to the main character. It seems that their homesteads are marked by the air of the castle – the interiors of their dwellings are full of smoke and filled with the above-mentioned stuffiness. What is more, the region where the land surveyor arrives is in almost constant rule of the night – in this work the day has been reduced to just a few moments. This seems to be caused by the fact that the novel is set in winter. However, the juxtaposition of darkness and freezing atmosphere of the snowcovered place enhances even more the charge of indeterminacy and alienation. Quickly falling darkness and them night limit perception and all chances of the main character. We can use the opportunity and point at the connection

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between the symbols in Kafka’s works and the way of creating time and space in them. Let’s quote a short excerpt from the novel The Castle: He was also very much surprised that the village stretched so far as if it didn’t have an end. There were small houses all the time, with frozen windows, all the time snow and backwoods. [. . .] He was swallowed up by a narrow backstreet. Snow was even thicker there. Pulling out the feet sinking deep into the snow was a great effort. Beads of sweat dropped down his body. Suddenly K. stopped and couldn’t move. After all, he wasn’t in the wilds as there were peasant cottages to the right and to the left.5

While analysing this short excerpt we have an opportunity to see how relevant in Kafka’s prose are the elements of indeterminacy, indefiniteness or the feeling of freezing emptiness of the surrounding reality that is connected with them. The cold of ice, snowbanks – all the time snow and backwoods. Snow covers everything in view; it can be assumed that snow covers something important, some mysterious infinity, which the human eye is trying to track down. It seems to the land surveyor that the village has no end. The effort required to walk through such a space – frozen, deep and snowy – is beyond the character’s capabilities. It is worth noting that K. was still in the village – he wasn’t in the wilderness. It is characteristic that K. is not surprised at it – this reality is not surprising, he acts as if it was the only known and available reality for him. We can assume that the surrounding world deprives the character of his ability to make reference to what is considered as normal. The supernatural nature of the reality of the castle makes it impossible to make reference to the past – the land surveyor is as if frozen in beyond-time space. As we have already said, not only is Kafka’s character not conscious of the past; what is more, he seems to lack consciousness of time as such. The above-mentioned excerpt of Kafka’s prose reveals that the symbols are supposed to lead us in the direction of hard to express and often even elusive meanings of reality. In Kafka’s prose symbolic representations are an element inseparably connected with the issues of space, time and their indeterminacy achieved by emphasizing indefiniteness, lifelessness and frozen being. In his works various types of locations such as buildings, flats, cottages, are filled with symbolic excess which has got impact on enhancing the feeling of limbo in epistemological vacuum. All this constitutes the symbol indeterminacy presented in Kafka’s works. In Franz Kafka’s works the reader can clearly notice a cry of consciousness marked with strangeness and fear in the face of the incomprehensible being. A lack of response to a silent cry is a permanent feature of his workshop which brings his literary output closer to the solutions of the philosophy of absurd. However, there is a difference between these similar concepts which lies in the fact that the absurdum man becomes conscious of his historic nature, acquires

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the awareness of absurdity of existence and revolts against it, whereas the terrifying space in the works of Franz Kafka absorbs his literary creations and despite their tragedy nothing comes out of it neither for the present nor for the future. It can be said that time has no influence on the consciousness of Kafka’s characters. The whole which is composed of the afore-mentioned examples of indeterminacy creates an atmosphere of peculiarity and hiding something which governs the represented world. It is something that exceeds the knowledge available to the characters and the readers. Indeterminacy is the opposite of calm experiencing certainty – what is known, defined and safe. Indeterminacy in Franz Kafka’s prose is a threat which creates the feeling of time stopping and losing cognitive capabilities of the literary characters. It can be assumed that for Kafka it was obvious to equate cognition with a sphere of asylum and with what is safe. By describing something, either by way of verbalization, or by means of rational mental constructs, it becomes possible to escape from indeterminacy. Through cognition the act of appropriation and familiarization of the threat hidden behind the curtain of ignorance takes place. To acquire knowledge is to reduce uncertainty toward the surrounding being. In Franz Kafka’s literature we can suspect the presence of the following line of reasoning – if I get to the unknown, if I tear down the curtain of ignorance, then there is nothing left to be afraid – what will be left is certainty. This is depicted, though indirectly, in the following excerpt: Usually on such occasions I am tempted by a technical problem, I imagine, for example, on the basis of a whisper, in distinguishing which in all its subtleties my ear is skilled, with absolute precision, in a way enabling drawing the cause of it, and presently I feel the need to test if the reality corresponds to it. Very rightly so, since I cannot feel safe until some establishments are made, even if it were merely to know where a grain of sand falling from the wall is going to roll.6

To know – even if it is a whisper, even if this seemingly insignificant grain of sand leads to a whisper coming into existence – we want to get to know the cause of it. Just to know, just to liberate ourselves from trembling with what is indefinite. Striving to eliminate shortages and deficiencies, to cross the barrier of indefiniteness is an element accompanying Kafka’s work. What is indefinite is the basis of the constructions presented by Kafka. However, the discourse conducted by means of the conditional, introducing subject-object items, and also symbols conceal an aspiration in the discussed texts to cross the limits of the unspoken and to obtain information necessary to recreate memory and fill mental blanks. Here, Albert Camus’s statement comes to mind, who is saying in The Myth of Sisyphus: “I want either everything to be explained to me or nothing. The mind is powerless to this cry of heart.” This is where the undertaken attempt at epistemological interpretation of Kafka’s works ends. It

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seems that the works of this author make do with showing that it is impossible to cross the line of that indeterminacy. The short story Investigations of a dog as a characteristic treaty on cognition raises this interesting question: That’s hunger – I repeated this to myself an unlimited number of times as if I wanted to convince myself that me and the hunger are still two different things and I can free from it [. . .] today I consider starving to be the final and most powerful weapon of enquiry. There is a path leading through starvation; the highest goal, if it is still attainable, can be reached only by undertaking the greatest effort which is voluntary starvation for us.7

Cognitive hunger provides a motivation to search for the truth of being and to search for knowledge. It is this hunger that forms the worlds of Josef K. and to the same extent Franz Kafka. The hunger has dominated the life, time and space in Kafka’s works. Literature has provided a way to express the debatable status of human being and its problems with the question about Being. Nevertheless, in the aforementioned excerpt there is some worrying hesitation concerning the ultimate goal, namely, whether it is attainable or not. The question is also whether it is possible to fill the memory of individual consciousness in the face of the indeterminacy of being. Cognitive hunger expresses the striving of intra-literary subjects to get the answer, and consequently, knowledge and its memory. The opposite of hunger is insatiability which is represented in Kafka’s works by the indeterminacy which has been described earlier in this work. Basically, indeterminacy is insatiable because in every point it appropriates the opportunities of getting beyond it and blocks the chances of obtaining information necessary to acquire knowledge. Kafka’s characters are therefore deprived of knowledge about being and its governing principles; hence, they cannot solve their problems being stuck in the indeterminate “now”. Ontology in Kafka’s works is the ontology of what is indeterminate. It is this ontology that determines the cognitive horizon of intra-literary fictions – it has the decisive voice in finding solutions in such important matters for human existence as time and memory. Franz Kafka’s conception is overwhelming. It is a vision filled with deep pessimism about the place, chances and role of a human in the world. It is also a sort of memento for future generations. Internal organization of Kafka’s works indicates the deprivation of the subject of his ability to remember. This stems from the reduction of time in the novel to the present and forming characteristic ontology. Disregarding the content of Kafka’s works, it can be said that his masterpiece constitutes a form of human memory; it’s an account from a journey into the depths of uniquely understood being. It is a record which helps to remember and, if such a need arises, to recall the threats that reality brings. Thanks to that it becomes possible to counteract the flood of what is indeterminate, which already at the level of social or historical life can take various forms.

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In the end let me quote an excerpt which is very much relevant to the problem of memory and seems to provide an ideal summing up of the conducted analyses: The only thing I can see is downfall, nevertheless, by this I don’t mean to say that earlier generations were better in their nature; they were only younger and their great advantage stems from that fact; their memory wasn’t as overloaded as ours, it was easier to encourage them to speak [. . .] From time to time we hear a word sounding unfamiliar and we would probably leap to our feet if it wasn’t for the fact that we feel overwhelmed with the weight of the previous centuries.8

This is another occasion when Kafka sketches for the reader a gloomy vision of reality – the society, epoch and its generation are exhausted. Over the centuries mankind accumulated experiences, created culture – it can be said that it got richer by the facts of their memory. However, the overtone of this excerpt implies that this richness is ostensible and it forces the individual to make constant effort which in the end always ends in a defeat. The burden of centuries is overwhelming – memory accumulates knowledge repeated in failures. Maybe this is the fragment which contains the premise explaining why the conception of memory and time in Kafka’s works is of this kind and not the other. Everything repeats itself; under the influence of gained experience and its memory the mankind does not lead a happier life. Knowledge does not result in improving the quality of living of individual people and societies. Each epoch has its own history, characteristic features, events and emblems distinctive only to itself and often elusive details of sense and meaning – that is the usual statement of the facts of memory, both the one which is close to my now, and slightly distant one and also the one which is much more distant and faded due to the passing of time. The very close dependency between time and memory is an irremovable indicator of dynamically developing existence. Looking at the seemingly ossified being in the form of Franz Kafka’s work and at the exceptional and unique record of human quest – extraordinary in its ordinariness and truth – we ought to ask a question: can we delight in the view of our times? It is essential to put a question mark as far as the present moment is concerned and to return to “the present time” as set by the works of Kafka – in order to recall and open the minds on the question of shape of human being, accompanying conditions, and finally to come close to the truth of being. Jagiellonian University, Cracow, Poland NOTES 1 Franz Kafka, Dociekania psa, trans. Lech Czy˙zewski (Cracow: Wydawnictwo Literackie, 1988), p. 26, 32 2 Franz Kafka, Proces, trans. Bruno Schulz (Cracow: Wydawnictwo Zielona Sowa, 2003), p. 27

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Ibid., p. 3 ´ Franz Kafka, Cztery opowiadania. List do ojca, trans. Jarosław Ziółkowski (Warsaw: Pa´nstwowy Instytut Wydawniczy, 2003) 5 Franz Kafka, Zamek, trans. K. Radziwił, K. Truchanowski (Cracow: Wydawnictwo Zielona Sowa, 2004), p. 12 6 ´ Franz Kafka, Cztery opowiadania. List do ojca, trans. Jarosław Ziółkowski (Warsaw: Pa´nstwowy Instytut Wydawniczy, 2003), p. 159 7 Franz Kafka, Dociekania psa, trans. Lech Czy˙zewski (Cracow: Wydawnictwo Literackie, 1988), p. 48 8 Ibid., p. 35 4

BIBLIOGRAPHY

K A F K A’ S WO R K S Kafka, Franz, Ameryka, trans. J. Kydry´nski (Cracow: Wydawnictwo Zielona Sowa, 2003) ´ Kafka, Franz, Cztery opowiadania. List do ojca, trans. J. Ziółkowski (Warsaw: Pa´nstwowy Instytut Wydawniczy, 2003) Kafka, Franz, Dociekania psa, trans. L. Czy˙zewski (Cracow: Wydawnictwo Literackie, 1988) Kafka, Franz, Proces, trans. B. Schulz (Cracow: Wydawnictwo Zielona Sowa, 2003) Kafka, Franz, Zamek, trans. K. Radziwił, K. Truchanowski (Cracow: Wydawnictwo Zielona Sowa, 2004)

S E C O N DA RY L I T E R AT U R E Anderson, Mark M., Kafka’s Clothes. Ornament and Aestheticism in the Habsburg Fin de Siècle (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1992) Bataille, Georges, Literatura a zło: Emily Brontë-Baudelaire-Michelet-Blake-Sade-Proust-KafkaGenet, trans. M. Wodzy´nska-Walicka (Cracow: Oficyna Literacka, 1992) Blanchot, Maurice, Wokół Kafki, trans. K. Kocjan (Warsaw: Wydawnictwo KR, 1996) Camus, Albert, Mit Syzyfa I inne eseje, trans. J. Guze (Warsaw: MUZA S. A., 2004) Eilittä, Leena, Approaches to Personal Identity In Kafka’s Short Fiction: Freud, Darwin, Kierkegaard (Helsinki: Suomalainen Tiedeakatemia, 1999) Ernst, Pawel, The Nightmare of Reason: A Life of Franz Kafka (New York: Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 1984) Eco, Umberto, Dzieło otwarte. Forma i nieokre´slono´sc´ w poetykach współczesnych, trans. J. Gałuszka (Warsaw: Czytelnik, 1994) Garaudy, Roger, Realizm bez granic: Picasso·Saint-John Perse·Kafka, trans. R. Matuszewski (Warsaw: Czytelnik, 1967) Kossak, Jerzy, Egzystencjalizm w filozofii i literaturze (Warsaw: Ksia˙ ˛zka i Wiedza, 1976) Safranski, Rüdiger, Zło dramat wolno´sci, trans. I. Kania (Warsaw: Czytelnik, 1999) Warnock, Mary, Egzystencjalizm, trans. M. Michowicz (Warsaw: Prószy´nski i S-ka, 2005) Whitrow, G. J., Czas w dziejach, trans. B. Orłowski (Warsaw: Prószy´nski i S-ka, 2004)

E WA L AT E C K A

W H I C H S E L F ? O R W H AT I S I T L I K E T O S P E A K OR LISTEN – AN EXISTENTIAL P H E N O M E N O L O G I C A L A P P ROAC H

This paper is the second of a series of papers introducing the psychological concept of ego states into language studies, and presenting both against the philosophical background of existential phenomenology. The series, when complete, will have covered introducing language ego states, discussing the perception of speech and its production, and, finally, seeking explanation for language acquisition within the same philosophical frame of reference. Why would one, in the first place, put the three, seemingly unrelated concepts and fields of knowledge together? As other disciplines of science, language studies, too, have become embedded “within the Cartesian framework of the ‘mental’ versus the ‘physical’” (Thompson, 2004, 382). In order to break away from this “embedding”, the discipline needs the “back and forth circulation between scientific research on the mind and disciplined phenomenologies of lived experience” (Thompson, 2004, 382) accommodating human experience of language. “In all functionalistic accounts, what is missing is not the coherent nature of the explanation but its alienation from human life. Only putting human life back in will erase that absence; not some ‘extra ingredient’ or profound ‘theoretical fix’” (Varela, 1996, 345). Let me answer with a quotation from the World Phenomenology Institute’s website: The philosopher working in a phenomenological mode ought to thus aspire to join that which is falsely and arbitrarily disjoined, and in so doing demonstrate the unity of human knowledge and the possibility of deep communication and higher philosophical understanding.

The need for such a unity has been apparent to me for a long time, dating back to my linguistics background. Traditionally, western philosophy and, in fact, western science alike, has based its understanding of the world and relationships within it on the assumption that thought prevails over experience. Experience has been considered superficial and prone to errors and thus “unscientific”. The ultimate perspective has therefore been that of a thinker. 79 A-T. Tymieniecka (ed.), Analecta Husserliana CII, 79–86. c Springer Science+Business Media B.V. 2009 

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We have become accustomed, through the influence of the Cartesian tradition, to disengage from the object: the reflective attitude simultaneously purifies the common notions of body and soul by defining the body as the sum of its parts with no interior, and the soul as a being wholly present to itself without distance (Merleau-Ponty, 1962, 198).

This attitude has lead to the now widespread acceptance of the “scientific” or reason-based worldview as the basis of all disciplines of human knowledge. The fear of being called “unscientific” is such that few risk going against the mainstream. Thought, in its Cartesian understanding of doubting everything but thought itself, and thus being pure and disciplined, is the basis for both many philosophical systems and modern science alike. Therefore, any experience that cannot be represented in scientific thought will be rejected as subjective or illusory. Similarly, philosophical systems that diverge from Cartesianism will be viewed with suspicion. Thus, “philosophy is often rejected by people who in other respects are very intelligent; they are experts in a particular branch of positive science who, precisely because of the success of their science, are tempted to absolutize the value of a special type of scientific knowledge, particularly physical science” (Luijpen and Koren, 2003, 9). The adoption of Cartesian view “across the scientific board”, so to speak, has, however, been met with opposition. Phenomenology, in particular, has been philosophy’s way of dealing with the Cartesian inheritance: “The intelligibility which phenomenology takes as fundamental is thus of the experiential order. It is a meaning embedded in and inextricable from the concrete experience” (Wait, 1989, 15). The response from science has come largely from neuroscience, a discipline combining the findings of neurology with studies of human experience of neurological disorders. The assumptions neuroscience bases itself upon are best summarised by this quotation from Antonio Damasio: What, then, was Descartes’ error? Or better still, which error of Descartes’ do I mean to single out, unkindly and ungratefully? One might begin with a complaint, and reproach him for having persuaded biologists to adopt, to this day, clockwork mechanics as a model for life processes. But perhaps that would not be quite fair and so one might continue with ‘I think therefore I am.’ (. . .) Taken literally, the statement illustrates precisely the opposite of what I believe to be true about the origins of mind and about the relation between mind and body. It suggests that thinking, and awareness of thinking, are the real substrates of being. And since we know that Descartes imagined thinking as an activity quite separate from the body, it does celebrate the separation of mind, the ‘thinking thing’ (res cogitans) from the nonthinking body, that which has extension and mechanical parts (res extensa). (. . .) For us, then, in the beginning it was being, and only later was it thinking. And for us now, as we come into the world and develop, we still begin with being, and only later do we think. We are, and then we think, and we think only inasmuch as we are, since thinking is indeed caused by the structures and operations of being (Damasio, 2005, 248–249).

Eventually, Damasio (2005, 5) points to the “abyssal separation between body and mind” as what he understands as the main error of Descartes’, still pervading science and research.

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Luijpen’s authentic philosopher understands philosophy as a constant search, a dynamic system and in that regard, I think, philosophy in his understanding resembles the world in which we live, which also is a dynamic system, incessantly changing and moving. “Authentic philosophy is an attempt to give a personal answer to a personal question through a personal struggle to remove obstacles preventing understanding.” (Luijpen and Koren, 2003, 11). In the same vein, philosophy should not be ‘learnt’ as a closed system because then its questions are not relevant to the one who is learning. “For if the questions and answers of a system do not become my questions and answers, I never become myself as a philosopher. (. . .) the aspirant philosopher learns to ‘talk’ as ‘one’ talks in a certain tradition, and the object ultimately is the talk itself, rather than the understanding of reality” (Luijpen and Koren, 2003, 11). If philosophy is a personal affair, a “speaking word,” it can find its starting point only in my personal presence as a philosopher to reality. This presence is called “experience” (Luijpen and Koren, 2003, 12). “Thus it follows that the philosopher must start from experience” (Luijpen and Koren, 2003, 13). My experiencing the world of language, with switching between languages, two languages mainly, but not necessarily only two, has started me off on a journey to discover how exactly languages operate as well as on the path to incorporate the psychological theory of ego states into both linguistic and philosophical understanding of language. It is through this personal experience, and through posing my own, personal questions how is it that I arrived at a link between my linguistic questions and existential phenomenology, which is the perfect tool for explaining these issues because of its stressing the importance of authenticity, experience, the “lived world” and “being-in-the-world”. It also relates perfectly in the sense of M-P’s understanding of how speech is both understood and produced. “As a philosopher, I am a person, and my philosophical thought is only authentic if it is my thinking” (Luijpen and Koren, 2003, 13). In line with the statement of the role of a phenomenologist as well as the compulsion to pose my own, personal questions, the main objective of the paper is to reflect upon the relationship between present day linguistics, the psychotherapeutic concept of ego states, and Merleau-Pontean existential phenomenology. Both linguistics and psychology have, in ways particular to the respective disciplines, shown interest in providing explanations for language production and perception. Much as linguistic and psychological theories explain the “mechanics” of the two processes on a sui generis “micro” level of sounds, words, and sentences, they lack the capability to render explanations for phenomena happening on a “macro” scale, in the realm of the authentic experience of the speaker/hearer. This is exactly the area where existential phenomenology, with its focus on experience, offers a solution.

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The psychological concept of ego states and its origins needs a brief explanation. The general feeling that more than one person in you exists is often confirmed in life. “Part of me wants to buy the house and part of me says, ‘no way!’” A normal person would go about making decisions in such a way. The two ego states at work are independent but form part of the same person and are mutually permeable. “Each part has ‘it’s’ reasons for supporting a different point of view” (Hogan, n.d.) Abnormality arises when the various parts do not communicate – this is, however, not an issue discussed here. The concept of ego states as personality components has been introduced and developed by several psychologists and psychotherapists, including Freud, Federn, Hilgard, (Hogan, n.d.) Berne and Watkins (Berne, 1964; Watkins and Watkins, 1997). One needs to clarify that while Freud was the first to develop the concept of the Ego, many followers took the concept further. The original Freudian concept of an Ego has been developed into the concept of ego states, multiple “modes of being” (predictable but flexible) within one personality. The two main concepts of ego states differ slightly. The most commonly known concept is Eric Berne’s (1964) according to which an individual will reveal a Parent, Adult, or Child ego states between which a person can freely move. Berne’s model has been widely applied in a psychotherapeutic technique called Transactional Analysis (Berne, 1964). A model that assumes the existence of unlimited ego states has been advocated by Watkins and Watkins (1997). According to the authors, an ego state can be defined as “an organized system of behavior and experience whose elements are bound together by some common principle, and which is separated from other such states by a boundary that is more or less permeable” (Watkins and Watkins, 1997, 25). Ego states are generally experienced in normal people as normal mood changes. ‘States’ are simply states of consciousness that everyone experiences on a daily basis. Ego states occur when a state becomes developed enough to have a sense of identity associated with it (e.g., that’s my teenage part) (Ego State Therapy, n.d.).

The broader, more flexible model of Watkins and Watkins (1997) renders itself a better tool for me to develop a concept of linguistic ego states, capable of encompassing, within a phenomenological framework, both mono- and multilingual experience. In their book, Watkins and Watkins (1997) quote the experience of Helen Watkins’, originally German, but in the US since the age of ten, of two distinctly different linguistic ego states. While in Germany for a conference, Mrs Watkins spoke German when shopping or talking to other

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German participants but she found it difficult to provide direct language-tolanguage translation. She also felt unable to deliver her paper in German. She said: “I can’t. All my scientific vocabulary and graduate training have been in English” (Watkins and Watkins, 1997, 79). My own experience is of the same kind. While I can switch with seeming ease between Polish and English, areas of knowledge, or even life experience, exist which only function in one of the languages. Like Helen Watkins, I would be unable to deliver either a philosophical or linguistic paper in Polish, let alone provide immediate language interpretation of such. I would find difficulty talking to Polish riders about horses and riding since all my riding experience is based in English. I even find that I act differently depending on the language used. My experiences are confirmed in conversations with other speakers of two or more languages. A claim is made that, like the general various ego states, so are language ego states created at various stages of an individual’s life and depending on his linguistic experience. I see a relation between the concept as defined above and the way we perceive speech. I would liken our perception of speech to the way in which we perceive a Gestalt figure: Multistability

Multistability (or Multistable perception) is the tendency of ambiguous perceptual experiences to pop back and forth unstably between two or more alternative interpretations. This is seen for example in the Necker cube, and in Rubin’s Figure/Vase illusion shown to the right. Gestalt psychology is a theory of mind and brain that views the operational principle of the brain as holistic, parallel, and analogue, with self-organizing tendencies. The classic Gestalt example is a soap bubble, whose spherical shape (its Gestalt) is not defined by a rigid template, or a mathematical formula, but rather it emerges spontaneously by the parallel action of surface tension acting at all points in the surface simultaneously. This is in contrast to the “atomistic” principle of operation of the digital computer, where every computation is broken down into a sequence of simple steps, each of which is

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computed independently of the problem as a whole. The Gestalt effect refers to the form-forming capability of our senses, particularly with respect to the visual recognition of figures and whole forms instead of just a collection of simple lines and curves (Lehar, 2003). “In the same manner the reactions of an organism are not edifices constructed from elementary movements, but gestures gifted with an internal unity” (Merleau-Ponty, 1998, 130). If one transposes that view to the perception of speech, one sees this as the unity in multiplicity which I am talking about in relation to ego states and shifting between “modes of being” and through this, grasping the meaning carried by speech not as the meaning of the component parts (“bricks” in the “edifices”) but that of a whole, the “gestures gifted with an internal unity”. A parallel exists between the way we view “Gestalt figures” and the recognition/perception of speech. We do not see different figures because we “think” differently but because the mode of scanning of the presented picture changes. Once the “goal” is established, we see one thing or another, depending on that goal. So with words – we glide from one language to another or one variety to another thus employing our linguistic ego states. My recent experience presents a good example. I am sitting at Frankfurt airport, an international airport. A murmur of many voices can be heard in the background. The voices go up and down, merge with one another, fluctuate in clarity, pitch and volume. I am not making an effort to listen in, not really listening. The voices just glide past me, giving an impression of, at the same time, unity and multiplicity. The language texture presents itself like that of a glimmering piece of cloth, now grey, now silver, now purple, now green. . . and grey again. Likewise, the languages apparently shift from German, to English, to French, to Polish, to Russian, to another, vaguely recognisable variety. I do not recognise a particular language yet. It is only when I “aim” at a particular string of words, a phrase, that I start recognising the language in particular. My oneness as a multilingual results from the multiplicity itself. Like in the ego state theory of personality (I talk more about it in my introductory paper/chapter), in which, in a healthy individual, multiple ego states form a uniform whole personality capable, however, of fluctuating between various, mutually permeable ego states, drawing from them depending on the experience the individual is confronted with and, at the same time, being constantly in the process of creation exactly because of new experiences in life. Merleau-Ponty (1962) claims that it is the word that bears meaning. He refers to our common experience that we do not know really what we are saying until we have actually uttered the words. We often feel that “the most familiar thing appears indeterminate as long as we have not recalled its name” (Merleau-Ponty, 1962, 177). In other words, an unspoken thought is bound for

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oblivion; it “would no sooner appear than it would sink into the unconscious” (Merleau-Ponty, 1962, 177). Even for a child, “the thing is not known until it is named” (Merleau-Ponty, 196, 177). All “pre-scientific” thinking has always relied upon naming as the coming of the object to existence. This would have been impossible if speech were to rely on the existence of the “concept” first. Thus, speech “accomplishes” (Merleau-Ponty, 1962, 178) thought. One must bear in mind that this, of course, applies to authentic speech. We do not, in authentic speech, mull over the sense of what we are saying or picture the pronounced words (Merleau-Ponty, 1962, 180). While the chapter on speech in Merleau-Ponty’s Phenomenology of Perception is relatively brief, what is said about seeing, or even on the body in general, can easily be transposed to explain the understanding/perception of speech. Like the “object-horizon” (Merleau-Ponty, 1962, 68) structure, so the word-content structure both provides for the distinguishing of words and for their “disclosure” or understanding. Twas brillig, and the slithy toves Did gyre and gimble in the wabe: All mimsy were the borogoves, And the mome raths outgrabe. (Carroll, 1906, 21) “It seems very pretty,” she said when she had finished it, “but it’s rather hard to understand !” (You see she didn’t like to confess, even to herself, that she couldn’t make it out at all.) “Somehow it seems to fill my head with ideas –only I don’t exactly know what they are! However, somebody killed something: that’s clear, at any rate—” (Carroll, 1906, 24). Alice did know the meaning – the poem somehow filled her head with ideas, it carried meaning, the meaning was “pregnant in the sound”. University of Zululand, KwaDlangezwa, South Africa REFERENCES Berne, E. (1964). Games people play. New York: Grove Press. Carroll, L. (1906). Through the looking-glass and what Alice found there. London: Macmillan. Damasio, A. (2005). Descartes’ error. London: Penguin Books Ltd. Ego State Therapy. (n.d.). The Ottawa Anxiety & Trauma Clinic. Retrieved June 15, 2006, from http://www.anxietyandtraumaclinic.com/treatments/egostate.html Hogan, K. (n.d.). Miracles of hypnosis. Retrieved June 15, 2006, from http://www. kevinhogan.com/hypnosis-works-heal.htm Lehar, S. (2003). The world in your head: A gestalt view of the mechanism of conscious experience. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.

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Luijpen, W. A., and Koren, H. J. (2003). A first introduction to existential phenomenology. Pittsburgh: Duquesne University Press. (Original work published 1969). Merleau-Ponty, M. (1962). Phenomenology of perception. London: Routledge and Kegan Paul. Merleau-Ponty, M. (1998). The structure of Behavior. Pittsburgh: Duquesne University Press. Thompson, E. (2004). Life and Mind: From autopoiesis to neurophenomenology. A tribute to Francisco Varela. Phenomenology and the Cognitive Sciences. 3, 381–398. Varela, F. J. (1996). Neurophenomenology: A methodological remedy for the hard problem. Journal of Consciousness Studies 3, 330–350. Wait, E. C. (1989). The structure of linguistic behaviour: Using evidence from aphasiology to corroborate and develop Merleau-Ponty’s theory of language and intersubjectivity. Unpublished doctoral dissertation, University of Cape Town, Cape Town, South Africa. Watkins, J. G. and Watkins, H. H. (1997). Ego states. Theory and therapy. New York, London: W.W. Norton and Company.

ALI ÖZTÜRK

A RT E D U C AT I O N A S A N E X P R E S S I O N OF PHENOMENON

ABSTRACT

EXPRESSION Expression is often defined as a showing of feelings that come from the inner world. Expression, • is the natural or intentional reaction in which emotional processes are made and reflected as a concrete phenomenon. • is the product of commenting tools which are activating the feelings such as music. • is the self-reflection towards values of art, literature and technology products. Expression is the situation which paves the way for our inner feelings to explore their internal reflections. It is a phenomenon such as art. This phenomenon is on awaking process of our inner feelings to find a way out. The peculiarity and quality of the things we express out are also the ones that define our own life styles. Hence, this should be questioned whether the things we often express out are fury, curiosity, positive or negative, love or happiness. The fact is that our expressions can catch more attention as they reach a high level of quality. Otherwise, expression of inner feelings wouldn’t be more than a relief in existence. All the things that we do to relief our inner world or the things – having meaning themselves- can also be considered as expressions. This case also requires the sharing of inner feelings with other people as this phenomenon is an expression of one’s feelings through senses. It can be argued that a true expression of inner feelings make us sensitive to things that surround our social environment.

A R T E D U C AT I O N A N D E X P R E S S I O N The things that are happening in the outside world are felt through our senses. They gain emotional and comprehensive meaning in our minds. It means that we express our feeling out to define ourselves. This expression comes out with creativity. In terms of art education, expression is not only a way to express one’s inner feelings arbitrarily, rather it is a creative reflection in an artistic 87 A-T. Tymieniecka (ed.), Analecta Husserliana CII, 87–98. c Springer Science+Business Media B.V. 2009 

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form. Thus there is no need other than voice, gestures, roles and body in the making of reflection. In other situations, available tools which support this emotional expression can also be used. This situation will be the tools for artists in their reflection and definition. For example, words, movement, music, instrument or colors, pencil, paper, stone; each of which can be used as one of artistic tools. Following these things, we understand that we need things that have been carried out in a high quality performance. The quality of these things that are connected with our expressions, can be regarded as forms of our reflections. The most important forms of expressions are; • The personal and proactive expressions of feelings • Artistic expression Artistic expression can be considered as an aesthetic expression. For this reason, process of teaching should include rich but not over-intensive stimulus. If we use the materials in an artistic way, we help students for activating their feelings as this converts their experience into reflection. RESULT Reflections in an artistic expression can change our feelings. They make our life more meaningful and help us see the world in a different way. For this reason, we should pay special attention to the basic elements (emotional, physical and constructive development) of reflection. We need artistic feelings or elements to have improved personal development, so as to get insight into inner feelings. Through music, dance, word, picture, graphic, statue, we learn more about the quality of life. The reflection of the art-works helps producing more empathy between the creator and the art-work. The more we develop our understanding skills, the more desire for reflection comes out. Because, • In a more constructive environment, we are more likely to expect the reflections to come out. • If the techniques are used efficiently, creativity is expected to develop. • Availability of supportive environment develops the courage of artistic creativity. If there is a positive reception of reflection in society, we can expect to get higher creativity. INTRODUCTION

Right from the beginning of the human kind, human being has been a creature who has been trying to express himself and tries to understand the things that are going on around him. Living contradictions sometimes with himself, the

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nature and the society has led him find new ways of expression on every occasion. The things that are going on around him in his near environment and the nature are the first means of imitation of the human being. At first, he repeated what he saw, then developed peculiar means of expression which are related to the developments in information and technology since human beings live the phenomenon of “to be or not to be” in the level of “to be able to express or not to be able to express himself”. In other words, as much as he can express his feelings and thoughts, he can find a place for himself in the life. In this study, the concepts of expression and artistic expression are studied, and it was argued that this is necessary for art education. The judgements obtained from the review of the literature are thought to be helpful for the following discussions.

EXPRESSION

Expression is the condition in which our senses are put into work when our internal reactions cannot be stopped. It is a phenomenon just like art. This phenomenon is the process of “arising” of our feelings that are existing in our inner side, that are developing and that sometimes want to run out of our inner side. Expression is the reflection of feelings that arise as a result of the perception by senses. This condition can happen all of a sudden, or can require a quiet process as well. Internal and external processes lead us to expression by putting us in a process of action-reaction in every condition. Expression, in general, can be defined as the expression of felt or known from the inner world to the outside. When its main titles are considered, expression can be defined as: • a natural or intentional reaction in which an emotional process is concretized and reflected. • the products of intangible means of interpretation like music which is expressed through thoughts and stir the senses. • reflecting the values that the products of art, literature and technology carry in themselves. Russian painter Wassilly Kandinsky, who is thought to be the creator of abstract, painting, defined expression briefly as “a form is the explanation of essence”. Here if the form reflects expression, then the essence reflects the information and feeling. The quality of essence that is expressed is the determinant of our life style too. For that reason, the things that are expressed can be in the form of anger, rage, curiosity, positive or negative love, and joy because the things that we express, take interest from the environment according to their meanings from the quality point of view.

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Otherwise, our expressions cannot be more than a discharge or relief. The things that we do in order to take out of our inner side and in order to relax are a form of expressions too. The whole conscious actions that contain certain messages and by which the individual reflects and realizes himself are all expressions. The second condition requires sharing with the other people because this phenomenon is the expression of our feelings through senses and necessitates us to be sensitive to the things that are going around us, in our environment and in our age. Types of expression can be put forward in the following way: Firstly impressions that we have gained through the things that are going around us and the relationships among the people are perceived by our senses. We process these impressions through an emotional and informational processing and form a peculiar reaction. This reaction can be reflected in two ways: the first one is the physical reactions that are spontaneous and that we use to express ourselves by our feelings. The changes on our facial expressions, in our voice or in our posture can be the examples of this reaction. The second type of reaction is the expressions that aim artistic creativity by using not only our physical build but also the other instruments. A R T E D U C AT I O N A S A M E A N S O F E X P R E S S I O N

The things that are going around in the external world are perceived by the senses. They gain an emotional and informational meaning inside us. Then they are manifested in order to express ourselves. If this action is an artistic expression, it develops with creativity. From the art education point of view, expression is not merely “doing how to feel like” but it can be manifested by using the whole body as a planned type of showing oneself. In this way, there is no need for an additional instrument except for voice, posture, facial expression and our body. In other conditions, existing instruments that can support this emotional reflection can be used additionally. For artists, this condition will be a means of expressing themselves and reflecting their abilities. These instruments can be voice, word, action, music, musical instrument, colors, pencil, paint, paper, stone and other artistic materials. The necessity of art as one of the requirements of contemporary human kind is indispensable. This requirement can be sometimes met in the level of artistic production and sometimes as a consumer of art. Through symbols, it can transfer feelings, thoughts, images and values. Symbol is a thing that can be used instead of another thing. Some symbols and expressions are clear while the others have cultural and social meanings. The environment in which the people are in is not limited with the area that he himself formed and in which he will live by himself. This environment

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can be meaningful with the others. In the environment which is defined by Hesserl as a place that the man shares with the others, the man himself does not mean anything. According to him, the man owes his existence to someone else (Hançerlio˘glu, 1978, 309–313). In other words, he himself does not have a meaning at all. In accordance with this idea, it can be said that art is a phenomenon too because art can have a meaning when it is interpreted by the others and it is a creative expression. However, it should not be forgotten that every type of artistic expression can not exist together with a creative feature and every type of creativity cannot be in an artistic form. For example, while in science the process in creativity is important, the creativity in art can sometimes include the coincidental and spontaneous one as well. Although sometimes it is harsh, creative power is directly distinctive in the formation and expression of critical thinking. Creative power in art appears by setting relationships that have never been set. The feature of its being unique and original differentiates artistic creativity from scientific creativity. Forming peculiar aesthetic care and new means of expression by taking the historical and social conditions into consideration shows its inciting side. On the other hand, in the process of transforming the inciting one into an idea or a work of art, there seems to be the requirement of art education. Developed countries where the necessity of art education have long been realized, the training of creativity has been placed in the whole education and programmes beginning from the family to the preschool and primary education institutions. The idea that art is necessary like various branches of science in order to understand the world consciously constitutes the main foundations of these programmes. Art provides us with a basic lens of understanding by which we can analyse and interpret the world we live in. The children who do not take a proper art education are in fact deprived of a balanced and comprehensive general education, and are excluded from several educational speeches and researches. Until now a lot of art educators from all over the world have shown the conditions of education and art and have contributed the development of education and art (Alaku¸s, 2003, 2). Art is a fact that addresses the feelings of people and leads them to deeper thoughts by giving some messages. It doesn’t make people good or bad, but it makes them ask questions and look for answers in themselves. In order to understand the invisible, an artist has to comprehend the visible. It means that an artist’s expression is a challenge to social and cultural existence. Art as a means to go beyond reality or to create another reality is a bridge between the dream and the reality. It is an activity to establish a connection

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between rational and irrational, imaginary and real, and images and objects. In other words, art is the adventure of the man to know himself. The artist, on the other hand, is the person who can reflect the secrets and mysteries and importance and value of both life and human. As long as man’s necessity to know himself lasts, art will last as well (Fischer, 1995, 151–154). Art education begins with play and provides an environment for the man to discover his own tendencies, abilities, and inclinations. It aims to provide a power of expressing one’s feelings and thoughts through art. The aim of general art education is not training artists. Art education starts with the individual. His past experiences, feelings and thoughts can be a starting point. Art education contributes to forming the feelings of people who have very different psychologies. It helps the individual realise himself and be free in order to be really happy. Although in a work of art, nature, external world and external reality are described, this is a world which was changed by the artist’s feelings, and the important thing is not describing the reality correctly, but depicting the feelings that the reality evokes in the artist (San, 1985, s.49). However, it cannot be said that art education has not yet found an exact equivalent as a term, concept and extent as it is usually tried to be described as painting, art training, education through art, aesthetics education, fine arts education, plastic arts education, education to art, basic art education, etc. Thus, this causes a confusion. Another problem is the question of whether the process or the result is important in art education. The discussions made on that subject have focused on either one of the concepts at different times. However, both of them are important in the world of art. If art education prerequisites all aspects of individuals’ progress, the process becomes more important than the product. Because the important thing here is the individual’s using the art as a means of expressing himself. In fact, there is not a care for an artistic form. It is important to apply aesthetic liking and various means of expressions. Yet, when it has a focus of training artists, the effort beginning with a good idea results in a process in which a good mastery is displayed. Art education generally includes two meanings and aims: the first one is the art education that aims to train artists and necessitates a special education. It is the education in which individual creativity and ability are taken into consideration. Obtaining a speciality and a profession is a priority. The other one is the general art education which aims to train individuals who are sensitive and have critical thinking in the conditions of the age. The role of art education is enormous in forming the aesthetic care and finding solutions. In addition to its being the education of pleasure and feeling and aiming to create good forms today, it is seen as a process of activities of new, original,

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rash, suggesting to create contemporary ideas. Today art education stands on scientific and rational bases. The aim is gaining people who trust themselves, who are free and can use all his skills forever, who can prepare himself not only for today but also for tomorrow, who can lead his environment in addition to himself, who feel respect and responsibility for the environment and the society, who are enthusiastic but balanced, who are clever and sensitive (San, 1984, s.178). Another misunderstanding about the art education is that because when art is considered, plastic arts come to the mind; art education is thought to be the education of plastic arts. However, when art is considered, not only plastic arts but also a wide area of arts such as phonetic, rhythmic and dramatic arts should be taken into consideration. If so, the extent of educational activities about arts should contain not only merely plastic arts, but also the other branches of art mentioned above. Art contains contemporary ideas that are the products of accumulation in the study of education, individual’s understanding and learning the art as a whole, having communication and interaction and having creative activity, and thus the area of art education gains a new and contemporary quality. Therefore, we can define the place of art education in formal and mass education: all of the educational activities in order to be able to express one’s feelings, thoughts and impressions and to make his ability and creativity reach to an aesthetic level. While art education aims to help individuals in the subject of having aesthetic judgements, it teaches them how to feel new forms, enjoy themselves and guide their emotions correctly. So art education should not be for training artists, but guiding everybody who should be trained, and meeting their informational, informative, sensorial and emotional needs. Art education is necessary for all individuals in all age and has an important place in humans’ life. Art education is necessary for training the individual’s creative power and potentials and organising aesthetic thought and consciousness. Art is necessary, for it provides with arranging the individual’s social relationships, cooperation and collaboration, choosing the right and expressing it, tasting the happiness of beginning and completing a job, and being creative. Art education supports observation, original findings and personal approaches and practical thoughts. It increases the power of realising the things when they have not happened yet. It increases the individual’s hand skill and helps him reach synthesis. Dealing with art just by producing, or watching or listening or reading not only activates feelings and thoughts but also makes all of the mental processes active by its informational emotional sides. The ability to imagine and present the ideas by means of several instruments contributes to the educational success of the people both in the artistic and scientific professions. Art education

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is necessary for guiding the creative effort which will develop the skills that activate the imagination by dramatising and animating. The child who has an opportunity to have art education at home and preschool institutions can gradually utilize the artistic events and forming in his environment and understand the beautiful and look for it as he progresses through the classes in primary school. Although art education can coincidentally bring out some inclinations, skills and abilities, the mere basic aim of art education is not those per se, but to make the life worthy and to gain pleasure from it. In other words, art education focuses on human and aims to train generations that are suitable for the concept of human for his happiness. Art education aims to create an aesthetic care among the spectators, listeners and readers targeted by each work of arts, to feed and develop the artistic intelligence which is a dimension of mind and in addition to this, to convey the values that are relevant to human. The person who uses the artistic expression and its special language can reach the previous and contemporary works of arts, using his judgements by the help of this language. He can become aware of the quality of the works that he comes across. Another function of art education is to provide to reach at the environment and every kind of visual objects as well as the works of arts with aesthetic criteria. The aesthetic look and views of a person who learns to think with values and be aware of the qualities expand. Instead of the people whose views are shallow and who thinks that only the things that they like are beautiful, training people who value their environment and the works of arts by their own qualities, artistic languages and cultural experiences are among the aims of art education. It tries to train the creative power and potentials and organise the aesthetic thought and consciousness. Art education is an in-school and out of school creative education that contains all areas and forms of fine arts. The aim of art education is to train people who are not repeating the things that have already been done, but who have the ability to do new things. It is to make the child and the adult used to seeing, looking for, asking, trying and concluding. However, it should not be forgotten that the origin of art education technically depends on folk arts and the education of mastery. Art which previously focused on specific areas, diverted concentration into child focused education, and as a result of this concept, the terms “free expression” and “expressing oneself” have become distinctive in art education. Art education in the extent of general education is an area of education that aims to make the individual gain an aesthetic personality by using the rules and techniques of arts. In the process of art education, the behaviours of perception, obtaining information, thinking, planning, interpreting, expressing and criticizing can be gained by using the languages of arts in the way of aesthetic

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principles. The individual in the area of art education can find the opportunity to express himself by having a chance of choosing the appropriate language for his own in the limitless world of arts such as painting, music, theatre, dance, poetry, story, novel, sculpture, ceramic, photography, creative drama, film and video. When the nature of the action of artistic creation is analysed, it is seen that it consists of three basic stages. These stages are the basic stages of art education as well. The art lessons in education system should be taken into consideration with this thought. Art, both as a source of information and as an experience, should be there in schools to realise its aims like the other subject areas. While setting the aims of art education, the contribution of real values of art to the individual’s artistic and cultural needs should be taken into consideration. From that point of view, the stages in the structure of arts are valid for the art lessons as well. They are, 1. the stage of obtaining information 2. the level of creative thinking 3. the level of artistic expression Art education, with its three levels, covers the individual with his all mental, sensory, emotional, psychological, social and physical features. While the individual who has gone through these stages can gain several important and positive behaviours, he can develop an aesthetic personality at the same time. Art education is necessary for the people in all ages and levels. It does not require a special ability. The human is the whole with his mind and feelings, subjectivity and objectivity, and reality and imagination. In order to protect and develop this wholeness, the lessons such as literature, painting, music, theater, and dance should be well balanced with the lessons that depend on science such as maths, science, history and language. Today arts education has replaced art education. Arts all together (painting, sculpture, architecture, music, literature, theatre, drama, cinema, dance, etc.) should be understood by the term “arts education”. According to this, it is the art education that completes one another and should be given in integration. Arts education can be defined as the activities for the individual that is thought to be educated in a constructive and creative understanding to percieve and interpret the human, nature and life, and convey his feelings and thoughts with different artistic ways. Art education is a reliable way of education in which creativity is first in importance, critical thinking is developed and each student is tried to be guided in parallel with his own development and tendencies. The activities to be followed in every stage should be in the ways that will bring out the students’ creative thinking power, will not stereotype them, and let them express themselves freely.

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Expression can appear by means of body (voice, facial expression, posture, movement), spontaneous objects and several art instruments. In this case, in order for an individual to be realised by means of his own experiences, every kind of expression should be accepted. For artistic expression, a secure environment is formed by respecting all kinds of creative efforts. Art education has a wide range of responsibilities in reflecting diverse feelings of the human beings. Because art education is a part of human education. For that reason, we need stimuli that have aesthetic care and require quality. The quality of the stimuli around our environment is directly related to those we reflect. In art education, the most important ways of expression that we distinguish are as followings: • Personal and spontaneous expression of feelings • created artistic expression Artistic expression can be regarded as aesthetic expression. Thus, the process of expression should contain rich but not very intensive stimuli. If we present a variety of materials that attract the students’ attention in a realistic and artistic way, we can help their perception develop, their senses activate and treat them in an informational process. A consciously formed artistic expression can have different forms in different periods. There can be different examples in arts history. According to the aesthetic understanding of a period, artistic expression can show itself as an objective reflection of a subjective perception, or it can consciously turn to a “neutral” performance (Haselbach, 2000). The theoreticians who analyse artistic expression stress the importance of emotional and symbolic feature of a work of art. According to them, viewers approach to a work of art by the feelings they taste in the vivid colors or the use of lines they see. Some works of art are carried out with excessive nostalgic or exaggerated elements in order to provoke feelings. However, one of the aims of art education is to develop aesthetic taste. This condition will also help critical thinking. In order to be integrated with the work of art and in order to understand it better, there should be some accumulation of aesthetic perception. We learn more as a result of each living and experience with different types of art. The empathy we set with the work of art becomes deeper. The more the ability we understand, the greater the desire to reflect the things in our inner side completely. This can only be realised if there are supportive abilities and techniques we use. The need for expression creates the motive of obtaining a technique. However, obtaining a technique itself is not a solution at all. It can only be

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helpful to clear and diversify the message we want to send. Technical information enriches artistic creation, but it should not be confused with the creation and expression. DISCUSSION

Today, education should be based on the cooperation of science and art. The common aim of science and art is to serve human and discover the new. In school or education systems that give importance to the education of art and feelings, while feelings are trained, it is seen that mental abilities, thoughts and intelligence develop as well. While art stresses the interrelation between feelings and thoughts, it is an active helper of the learning and development process. In order to enrich personal and social development, we need some aesthetic perceptions to be more different, to investigate the deeper side of what is expressed, to be integrated with the work of art, and to understand better. After each experience related to the arts of music, dance, word, painting, sculpture, and graphic, we learn a bit more. The empathy we set between the work of art and us becomes deeper. Expressions change our perceptions. They make the life more meaningful. They help us see the world more different. For that reason, an equal importance should be given to sensory, informative and physical developments, which are the main components of expression. Instead of understanding them as features of being a human, we should consider them as the systems that are supporting and affecting each other. Expression that is formed by a direct reaction should be accepted, while artistically created expression should be supported. The evaluations to be done should be innovative and leading. In education process, rich but not intensive stimuli should be used. Provoking and attractive tools will take the children’s attention. The arrangements that create opportunity to make relationships that have never been made before will support their creative expressions directly. The necessity for the individuals who can express themselves instead of the ones who are always watching what they see are becoming more and more important. When we look around, we see that the people whose expressions in their childhood were taken into consideration do not have any difficulty at all when they can react directly and spontaneously. The more the ability we understand, the greater the desire to express the things in our inner side completely because: When the secure environments are provided, expressions increase. When the necessary techniques are used consciously, the products are of good quality.

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The helps in need can bring out more different artistic creations. Being supportive in the process of evaluation increases the courage. Anadolu University, Eskisehir, Turkey BIBLIOGRAPHY Alaku¸s, A.O. (2003). In View Of Individuals Primary Age The Necessity Problematic Of Art Education, www.e-sosder.com Etike, S. (1995). Sanat E˘gitimi Yazıları, Ankara: ˙Ilke Kitabevi Yayınları. Fischer, E. (1995). Sanatın Gereklili˘gi, Çev. Cevat Çapan, ˙Istanbul: Payel Yayınevi. Gençaydın, Z. (1990). “Sanat E˘gitiminin Dü¸sünsel Temelleri”, Ortaö˘gretim Kurumlarında Resim˙I¸s Ö˘gretimi ve Sorunları, Ankara: TED Yayınları. Hançerlio˘glu, O. (1978). Felsefe Ansiklopedisi (4.Cilt, L-O) ˙Istanbul: Remzi Kitabevi. Haselbach, B. (2000). The Phenomenon of Expression in Aesthetic Education, International OrffSchulwerk Symposium: Expression in Music and Dance Education, Orivesi: 24–26 March 2000. Kırı¸so˘glu, O.T. (1991). Sanatta E˘gitim (Görmek, Anlamak, Yaratmak), Ankara: Demircio˘glu Matbaacılık. San, ˙I. (1979). Sanatsal Yaratma ve Çocukta Yaratıcılık, Ankara: T. ˙I¸s. BankasıKültür Yayınları. San, ˙I. (1984). “Ça˘gda¸s Sanat E˘gitimi”, Ö˘gretmen Dünyası Dergisi, Sayı 49. Ankara. San, ˙I. (1985). Sanat ve E˘gitim, Ankara Üniversitesi, E˘gitim Bilimleri Fakültesi Yayınları: Sayı 51, Ankara.

S E C T I O N II CIPHERING REMEMBRANCE: SIGNS, SYMBOLS, SPIRIT

MARIA-CHIARA TELONI

T H E F U N C T I O N S O F M E M O RY I N E D I T H S T E I N A N D I N A N N A - T E R E S A T Y M I E N I E C K A’ S PHENOMENOLOGY OF LIFE

ABSTRACT

This study aims mainly at showing the functions of memory coming out of Edith Stein’s phenomenological route, passing on to the innovative ontopoietic context of the Anna-Teresa Tymieniecka’s phenomenology of life, both feed on the common source of phenomenological research. In Edith Stein, the theme of memory emerges as a basically anthropological matter, that is concerning the specific human condition of the flowing of life. The man in his wholeness, indeed, that is in his multiple dimensions, physical, psychical, spiritual and intersubjective, is the starting point and the main thread of the entire philosophical research carried out by Stein since her dissertation, On The Problem Of Empathy. On the other side, in Anna-Teresa Tymieniecka’s treatment memory has a wider range, owing especially to the fact that it is still anchored to the extended background of the ontopoiesis of life. Tymieniecka, indeed, presents memory as an essential element of the ontopoiesis since its dawning, not only as it is subject to this process itself, but as it constitutes and plays an active role in the progressive positive self-individualizing deployment of the logos-of-life. An interesting possibility of integration between the two positions appears, that would need, however, further specific analyses.

INTRODUCTION1

The theme of memory is tightly connected to the dimension of temporality, which pertains the overall complex varied world-of-life, as one of its essential dimensions. Time scansion, rhythm, indeed, involves all real life, as it appears to us, starting from the lowest rung consisting in the so called inert matter, to reach the process peak that Anna-Teresa Tymieniecka indicates with the pregnant words of ontopoiesis-of-life, marked, in turn, by self-individualization. This peak consists in the specific human condition. Consequently, the issues concerning the role of memory within this process, where there is a gap 103 A-T. Tymieniecka (ed.), Analecta Husserliana CII, 103–124. c Springer Science+Business Media B.V. 2009 

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between cosmos and mankind, consisting in the common background of life in its onto-metaphysical basic-level,2 emerge as a matter of double importance: cosmological and anthropological. The use of these terms is not meant to recover the “stereotyped classification of philosophical issues in their scopes split by the research”,3 that Anna-Teresa Tymieniecka’s phenomenology of life proposes to abandon, instead, through an “intuitive incursion” in the level of the primitive logos-of-life, as a common ground for all philosophical and scientific issues. The help of this language is just considered necessary for the research itinerary arranged in this study. In Edith Stein, indeed, as it will be checked and explained below, the theme of memory emerges as a basically anthropological matter, that is concerning the specific human condition of the flowing of life. The man in his wholeness, indeed, that is in his multiple dimensions, physical (in connection with the rest of creation meant as nature), psychical and spiritual – and, then, intersubjective (with reference to God and the other human beings) – is the starting point and the main thread of the entire philosophical research carried out not only by Stein but also, before her – still in the field of phenomenology – by Husserl and his first followers, among whom Max Scheler, Steins favorite interlocutor and term of comparison since her dissertation, On The Problem Of Empathy (1917).4 The purely anthropological value of memory in Stein’s considerations already represents a divergence with Anna-Teresa Tymieniecka’s treatment, where memory has a wider range, owing especially to the fact that it is still anchored to the extended background of the ontopoiesis of life, and that it represents the novelty and undoubted originality of the phenomenology of life proposed by Tymieniecka. Tymieniecka, indeed, presents memory as an essential element of the process of ontopoiesis of life since its dawning, not only as it is subject to this process itself, but as it constitutes and plays an active role in the progressive positive self-individualizing deployment of the logos-of-life. Therefore, we are once more in front of the essential gain of the phenomenology of life, that is the news field of phenomenological research ushered in by Anna-Teresa Tymieniecka: the recapture of the world of life. Thus, in this sense, every philosophical matter receives a new light. This enlargement of the phenomenological research field, as well highlighted by Daniela Verducci,5 had already been wished and, someway, undertaken by Husserl himself, who was ensnared, anyway, by the transcendental consciousness, which he eventually considers absolute. It is necessary to explain and check the difference between Stein’s approach and Anna-Teresa Tymieniecka’s, even if they both feed on the common source of phenomenological research.

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M E M O R Y A S P R E S E N T I F I C AT I O N : R E C O L L E C T I O N

The main difficulty in the research of Stein’s conception of the essence, constitution and functions of memory lies in the fact that this theme is not specifically and systematically treated by her – at least in the first works that will be analyzed, On The Problem Of Empathy and Psychology And The Sciences Of The Spirit.6 This does not mean that it is not possible to trace some significant contributions for the issue considered. We just have to patiently follow Stein’s philosophical itinerary present in her works, in an attempt to catch some cues for our considerations and dig deeper into the themes at issue, maybe overcoming Stein’s very intentions; which means, starting from what has been already cleared about it to catch someway the “unsaid”, that is the possible developments of her studies in connection precisely to memory. This operation is certainly very delicate from a philosophical point of view, and its risks have already been highlighted by Plato – one of the sources from which Stein draws (also through the meditation by Augustine from Hippo) to draw up Finite And Eternal Being7 – who, through the Theuth myth told in Phedrus,8 warns the reader against the dangers of writing, especially if compared to the oral tradition based on memory. In short, according to Plato – through whom we get to the heart of the treatment on memory – the success of writing, as principal means of thought expression, memorization and transmission, will lead to a substantial weakening of the memorative faculty. But most of all, true knowledge will cease, that knowledge which, according to Plato – who draws this teaching from his master Socrates – is linked to dialectics, that is to the possibility of oral confrontation between the pupil and the teacher, which is the heart of the philosophical method. Finally, another risk is for the writer himself to be misunderstood and to be unable to defend himself after his death. Therefore, whatever he thought and stated during his life and his philosophical work is, someway, entrusted to posterity, who, in his absence, are free to interpret him, to the point that they will misrepresent the author’s real intent. From this point the necessity also arises for our philosopher to shelter from such drawbacks the essence of his philosophical doctrine, usually known as unwritten doctrine. This theme was already cherished a lot by Socrates, who, unlike Plato, put none of his teachings in writing. On the other hand, the very theme of memory, beyond these considerations, is a central one in Plato’s reflection, where the very process of knowledge, expressed with the famous myth of the cave,9 is described precisely as reminiscence. This datum should be kept in mind for our later considerations, in the hope to avoid the misrepresentation feared by Plato, while presenting Stein’s writings. I think that the phenomenological method itself may help us to do this, as well as the support of those who have undertook such a delicate enterprise before me.

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For obvious reasons, due to the vastness of the topic, we will confine ourselves to some of Stein’s works that seem to provide more starting points for a discussion; then we will compare the results of our analysis with the novelties emerging from Anna-Teresa Tymieniecka’s phenomenology of life. Let us start, therefore, from the above mentioned Stein’s dissertation entitled On The Problem Of Empathy. As the title suggests, the main goal of the study is investigating the peculiar experience of consciousness of empathy (Einfühlung) – through which we know the foreign experiences catching them intuitively as alter ego – and the identification of the differences between the definitions given by Theodor Lipps and Edmund Husserl. Even if memory is not the main topic of the treatment, however it receives, as recollection, an early clarification of its essence in connection to the description of the act and of the empathic experience, with which it shares some essential features. Therefore, here Stein, rather than memory, meant as mnemonic ability, that is the ability to collect and record the data coming from the different experiences (egologic and non-egologic), refers to recollection. Stein does not express clearly this distinction, at least in her early writings. Different is the case of Finite And Eternal Being and The Science Of The Cross.10 However, the simple comparison with the observation of daily experience shows that they are two distinct concepts. Common speaking, indeed, generally refers to both with the univocal term of “memory”. The recollection, according to Stein, pertains to the genre of presentification, which also include expectation and fantasy, and which has analogies and differences with the recollection. First of all, memory shares with the presentifications and with the empathic act the characteristic of non-originarity. With originarity (Originarität) Stein means “that aspect of the act which is the experience lived” (BBP 131). Or better, we can state that original is a production which is realized for the first time, while non-original is a repeated production: “the original production is that on the strength of which an evidence enlightens me for the first time, or for the first time a categorical objects comes to actuality to me. This is contrasted by repetition [Wiederholung], as reproduction where, for example, I am clarified again a theorem that I have already had the opportunity to meet” (BBP 131). This feature needs a further distinction. Indeed, it can refer both to the content (received in the conscience) and to the living (the being grasped in the conscience) of an experience itself. In the first case, recollection and, therefore, expectation and fantasy (and empathy), can be defined as non-original. Indeed, Stein states: “original are said all our present experiences meant as such: what, indeed, could be more original than the very experience lived? But not all our experiences are originally offering themselves, are original for their content: the recollection, the expectation, the fantasy have not their object in front of them, present in flesh and blood,

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but only if they make it present; and the characteristic of presentification is an essential moment immanent in these acts, not a determination obtained from the objects” (PE 74, our italic). On this point, Stein gives the example of joy: the recollection of a joy brings along all the characteristics of joy, which is non-original, however, as it is not present in flesh and blood, but therefore as it had been previously lived. Thus, “the non-originarity of ‘now’ sends back to the originarity of then: then has the trait of a ‘now’ which has been” (PE 75). For this, “the recollection has the trait of position, while what is recollected has the trait of being” (PE 75, o.i.). Indeed: “the very recollecting can have the trait of doubt, of conjecture, of likelihood, but never the trait of being” (PE 76, o.i.). And, still referring to the experience of joy, that she cherishes a lot (like Augustine), she states: “The recollection of a joy is original as an act of presentification accomplished now, whereas the content of the recollection – the joy – is non-original” (PE 74). Finally, the recollection emerges as original compared to the experience, but non-original compared to the content, presenting a remarkable analogy with the acts of empathy, expectation and fantasy. Stein continues, stressing another characteristic of recollection, that is the difference between the original Self that recollects and the non-original Self that is recollected. It can be noticed, indeed, like “the Self, the Subject of the act of recollecting, in this act of presentification can look back to the past joy” (PE 75), having in it and with it its Subject, too, that is the Self of the past. Therefore, “the Self of the present and the Self of the past face each other in the relationship between Subject and Object, and it is excluded that one can coincide with the other, even if the consciousness of identity is present” (PE 75,o.i.). Indeed, “the recollection still remains just a presentification where the Subject is non-original in contrast with the Subject which makes the act of recollecting” (PE 75–76). Consequently the act of recollecting occurs inside a precise process of development peculiar of the human being as a living being. This consideration also helps to understand the precise meaning to give to the issue of the identity of the human person – and the role that memory plays in his construction – that, as stated by Tymieniecka, “in his prominent specific features, is not an entity established once for all. On the contrary, it is first of all, as a genre, the result of a long line of development in the scope of the natural flowing of life”.11 Not only the genre, however, but also the single human individual, in its vital execution made of growth and contractions, reveals his dependence from its natural environment, its rules and laws. Therefore, Tymieniecka continues, he “cannot be defined from his specific nature, but from the entire whole of life that individualizes, of which he is an integral part”.12 This is why, previously, we also chose to talk about human condition, rather than of human nature, following these observations, just to stress the unity of the human being with every-living-thing. However, even inside this unity and the

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“existential dependences” that it outlines, the human being stands out in an exceptionally autonomous way, not so much in virtue of the cognitive act, but rather for the creative act, that connotes the specific human condition, where memory plays a basic role, as explained in the last paragraph of this treatment. Let us go on with Stein’s studies. She underlines how the process of development proper of the act of recalling, which through the reproduction of the past experiences aims at achieving a filling clarification of them, at first “confusedly intended”, may be carried out both actively and passively. That is to say, it is possible for me to carry out the succession of recollections moment by moment, namely that “I deliberately bring back myself to that specific moment of the uninterrupted flow of my past experiences, and that I let the sequence of my past experiences awaken, living in the experience remembered and not turning to it as an Object” (PE 75); or rather, it can unfold without my reflection, without considering the Self-of-the-present, of the Subject fulfilling the act of recollection. In the first case, as I move to the experience lived in the past, that had previously emerged in front of me as a whole, I perform a decomposition, and afterwards a recomposition on the basis of a “apperceptive taking”, achieving, at the end of the process, a new objectivation. I think that the analyzed process of decomposition-recomposition – two terms that, I think, remind those of destructuring and reconstruction usually used to indicate the current culture generally denoted as culture of the fragment13 – is very similar to the process occurring through the hermeneutic circle, intervening in the comprehension of the historical events, where memory clearly plays a core role, and where the action of the specifically human virtualities can be undeniably recognized. M E M O RY A S R E C O N S T RU C T I O N I N H I S T O R I C A L COMPREHENSION

Between the Self-of-the-present and the Self-of-the-past – which are not a single Self, but should however be considered separately – a hiatus is inevitably created, due to the temporal distance between the two Selves, taking shape both as extraneousness (Entfremdung) and as co-belonging (Zugehörigkeit), achieving, in the end, that “fusion of horizons” (Horizontverschmelzung) foreshadowed by Gadamer,14 and in which the process of interpretation consists. The recollection, indeed, usually leads to a critical rereading of that particular situation of the past life which is remembered, thus reaching a sort of reconstruction – it is not an accident that the terms used are decomposition and recomposition – that cannot set aside either the vital process where events and words are located or the precomprehension of the Self-of-the-present, implied in every interpretative act. However, the awareness of this distance goes with

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as much aware perception of the cobelonging to that very unitary flow of events that history is, and, in this case, the history of personal life: we all belong to history. It is right on the basis of this awareness that a communication, even if difficult, between the two vital worlds, one of the present and one of the past, is possible, achieving, in the end, a comprehension of meanings. Not only: the even more productive possibility also emerges that the past, caught in the opening up of its potentialities, offers an adequate incentive to change the present, structuring it broadly: thus memory becomes able to give rise to new future, impressing a precise direction to the action. Therefore, we reckon it possible to affirm that memory enters with full rights the properly human dimension of life of ethics, intended as world of praxis, as motor and guide of action itself – intellective, practical (in the proper sense of the word), or poietic. The following paragraph clarifies how this happens. We can just mention that it is something tightly connected to the essential phenomenon of motivation (Motivation). It represents, indeed, the thrust, aware or not, to action, aiming at achieving a desired target, that can be determined by several factors (biological, psychological and social). It gives aim and sense to our behaviour, as suggested by the very etymology of the word, that refers to the Latin motus, which means precisely motion.15 It can also be noticed, from the considerations above, that the cognitive act itself, fulfilled through the historical comprehension, connected both to personal life and to the life of mankind, emerges as relatively creative. This imaginative creativity also emerges where Stein states: “nonetheless the recollection (in its different ways of fulfilment) can prove incomplete in more than one part [. . .]. Whereas, going back with my thought, I try to recall the same situation, I find myself in front of a substitute instead of the recollections faded, that, however, is not a presentification of the situation of the past, but comes to my aid to give completeness to what is remembered and that is requested by the sense of the whole” (PE 76). A creativity, therefore, not free of sense. M E M O RY I N T H E L I F E S T O R I E S

It is interesting, in my opinion, to refer, on this point– on the basis of interdisciplinarity that the phenomenological research allows – to the contributions offered by the latest studies in the pedagogical and sociological field about the life stories – a more and more frequent research method among the field specialists – and particularly in the psychological dynamics that arise and that affect directly the field of memory, with regard to the phenomenon of learning. The life story does not coincide with autobiography, but rather with the reconstruction of an experience, which may be more or less complex, restricted to a limited period of time, and prefers to recur to the evidence offered by the

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so called oral sources, with a particular attention to the history “from below”, concerning above all daily life and the subordinate social movements. Moreover, it is founded in Dewey’s assumption that “every communication (and then every genuine social life) is educative”.16 “To be recipient of a communication is”, indeed, “to have an enlarged and changed experience. One shares in what another has thought and felt, and in so far, meagrely or amply, has his own attitude modified. Nor is the one who communicates left unaffected”.17 This participation to the others’ life occurring in communication, is similar to Stein’s conception of empathy, and intervenes especially in the stories of life, usually obtained in the form of interview, where different levels of relations are established (the one between the two Selves-of-the-present, of the interviewer and of the interviewee, the one between the Self-of-the-present and Self-of-the-past of the interviewee, the one between the Self-of-the-present of the interviewer and the Self-of-the-past of the interviewee, and the one between the two respective Selves-of-the-past), and where memory plays a fundamental role. The narrative flow of the story from the interviewee in founded, indeed, in the flow of recollections, namely in the presentification of a particular segment of his past life. On the other hand, the ability to empathize, both from the interviewee and of the interviewer, increases the positive results of the research itself. In order to better understand the foregoing, it is enough to rely on everyone’s personal experience, as the dynamics of the story of life is experienced by everybody even several times during our life, both consciously and unconsciously. Or better, it is actuated in the very act of remembering, without even making it explicit to others. The interview, or anyway the presence of an interlocutor, just provides the occasion for a more aware expression of this process. What happens, indeed, is a substantial change in the attitude towards our experience, every time we are requested to recall it to our mind, and to communicate it completely and accurately. The wording of the experience forces me, someway, to bring myself outside it, say to objectivate it, “seeing it as another would see it, considering what points of contact it has with the life of another so that he may be got into such form that he can appreciate its meaning. One has to assimilate, imaginatively, something on another’s experience in order to tell him intelligently of one’s own experience”.18 At this point we can refer back to what Stein defines analogic interpretation of the stranger through one’s proper and of one’s proper through the stranger, so a part of what is we perceive in ourselves and of ourselves is determined by virtue of the analogy with what we catch in our external experience as similar to us, and what is stranger is interpreted through the analysis of what is proper to us.19 Hard to establish to what extent.

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Moreover, we could observe how during some stories-interviews the interviewers’ recollections often emerge in a confused, selective, incomplete way, that is to say limited to some details, often indifferent or incoherent compared to the historical context, and on the basis of free associations of the subject that bear a weak or no relation at all with the real course of the historical events, but that represent instead some important elements for the subject’s personal experience. A sort of process of recollections selection thus takes place, more or less aware and intentional, performed by the subject, right on the basis of the phenomena of the psychic causality and of motivation, analyzed by Stein in Psychology And The Sciences Of The Spirit. This selective process will be better treated in the last paragraph, in connection to Tymieniecka’s phenomenology of life. The presentifying act of recollection, therefore, appears not only as a purely mechanical process, but tightly connected to intentionality and will, even though unconsciously, as it occurs with removal (more connected to forgetting than to remembering, but that here is useful for the comprehension of some psychic dynamics), a phenomenon so cherished by traditional psychology. Indeed, as seen in the analysis of the life stories, it happens that of a particular event I can remember only some special elements, or better those which have mainly stricken my attention, either for their intrinsic value or for the subjective value that they have for me. For example, if in this moment I am interested in carrying out a research on the faculty of memory, it is obvious that my interior eye will be looking mainly at whatever around me refers to these specific theme, and that this arises a special interest in me and, therefore, that it leaves more easily a lasting “impression” in my memory. Likewise, the opposite may occur: namely that the subject proves to be closed to a specific value, or better, to what he happened to perceive as a dis-value in that moment or, generally, in his life. In that case he will refuse, more or less consciously, to accept this dis-value, and whatever is associated to it, in the flow of his experiences, holding it through a spontaneous position statement (Stellungnahmen) towards it, or also following a precise free act (frei Akt) of reflection, unimportant, undeserving, if not harmful for a productive continuation of his life, that is to say for his growth, meant as a constructive progress. Namely, it is caught as not answering to the logos, not attuned to the sense: a in short, a note out of tune. However, there is also a third possibility: namely, that what has been memorized in the flow of the experiences of my consciousness in a totally unintentional and unwilling way (that is without the Subject turning consciously to a particular object) continues to act in me latently on the background of my experiences (both positively and negatively, as it happens for removal), and that, either by simple association or by express will of the subject, through a presentifying act, they re-emerge from the bottom with different

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degrees of clarity and plainness, to the point that they determine vigorously my acting: the link between memory and praxis has already been highlighted. On this point Stein states that what is inside the flow of the psychic experiences is considered “dead”, has actually not become an “absolute nothing”, but has still a way of existence, remaining in its place in the established flow. Indeed, even if it remains on the background of the living flow there is the possibility for it to re-emerge another time, and re-emergence – which is nothing but a presentification – “it is assumed consciously as something that has remained in the flow after its death”(BBP 46). In my opinion, from this description an extremely important weave between memory, will and motivation emerges (and, therefore, also desire, love), that can be found also in On The Problem Of Empathy, where Stein refers to the presentification of recollection, and to the very succession of recollections, as a process that can be performed in the human subject passively or actively. Precisely this being active or passive can slightly show an anticipation of the relation between memory and will, and their link with constructive and selfindividualizing creativity which is specifically human. Therefore, towards a recollection I can express a critical judgment, as, even if I am aware of the identity of the two Selves, however the Self of “now” is not actually the Self of “then, because in time and with time, and therefore owing to the passing of time and, then, of the process of becoming that connotes the finite being of the man and of the universe around, it is enriched by several experiences either direct or indirect” (that is stranger, like with empathy): perceptions, sensations, recognitions, spontaneous position statements or free and reflexive acts. The universe of the humans’ interior life is so varied that it emerges from the weave of psychic and spiritual sphere, and that Stein describes rigorously and in detail, following Husserl’s analyses, and the pressing and rather critical confrontation, on an eminently phenomenological basis, with the psychology of her times (especially the naturalistic one). All the experiences lived should, then, be placed, according to different criteria that are deeply analyzed in Psychology And The Sciences Of The Spirit, inside that continuum of the flow of psychic experiences that, together with spirit, corporeity and the individual’s specific personality, build the human person’s identity – an identity that, as stated by Tymieniecka too (see above), appears to us in a vital way, and, then in embryo, under construction – offering the Subject the suitable instruments to form a unitary evaluation of his life, as his personal history, and a new vision of the world, that is to find a new logos, as sense, of all things, or simply find a confirmation of the logos that he had previously caught. Indeed, the different components of that psycho-physical individual that man is interact and intervene, influencing him, and, sometimes,

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even causing him, or better motivating him, even in the very act of remembering. I think it also possible to catch some evidence of the foregoing where Stein states: “the unitary act of presentification, during which the recollected events emerge as a whole to me, implies some tendencies that – developed – show the ‘traits’ contained in their temporal process, namely how the recollected totality of the experiences originally sprang up” (PE 75, o.i.). The important element to be focused here is the reference to the development, linked to the temporal process that, as already hinted, is the distinctive characteristic of life, as an oriented becoming, included between the two essential moments of potency and act, as well stressed by Thomas Aquinas following Aristotle, and as Stein herself explains in Finite And Eternal Being, especially in connection with Martin Heidegger’s existentialistic philosophy. In this sense memory serves as a witness of the phenomenon of realization carried out on the basis of the human being’s vital and spiritual strength, and gives this process of development and progressive growth the feature of unitariness, included in the sense of the totality recollected. Indeed, it is the faculty of memory which lets us sum up years and years of events in few minutes, therefore, as Stein affirms, “going over the past experiences mostly represents an abrégé of the original process of experiences” (PE 75, n. 3). The logos, an expression of the unitariness of the vital process, is tightly connected with the questions concerning psychic causality and motivation, which are a specific object of Stein’s following work, often mentioned above: Psychology And The Sciences Of The Spirit. M E M O RY B E T W E E N P S Y C H I C C AU S A L I T Y A N D M OT I VAT I O N

Here Stein investigates the foregoing theme in On The Problem Of Empathy, continuing it. There, starting from the study of empathy, she had outlines the constitution of the human being, made of body, soul and spirit, considering, however, only the level of sensitivity, or corporeity. In Psychology And The Sciences Of The Spirit Stein goes further, and analyses specifically the psychic causality (concerning right the psyche and its internal connections) and the spiritual motivation (concerning the sphere of spirit), also involved, even tough in a different degree from the empathic cognitive process. Therefore, we are again in the purely anthropological field, although the very psychic causality is first studied in comparison with the physical causality proper of nature. One of the central cruxes of this reflection, indeed, is demonstrating how unreliable a certain deterministic conception of the psychic typical of the experimental naturalistic psychology of those times – with which Stein starts a pressing confrontation in her work – which reckons it possible to understand the complexity of the human being merely on the basis of the laws typical of the natural and, therefore, necessitating causality, is. Then, the complicated

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relation between man, nature, freedom and necessity is disputed. Stein wonders, indeed, “if the man’s physical life, meant in its wholeness or just in a part of it, is included or not in the great causal connection of nature” (BBP 39). To answer this question, in her work she highlights how the basic mistake of this deterministic, positivistic-style, psychological conception lies in the confusion between consciousness and psyche, according to which consciousness would be overwhelmed by psyche itself. Hence, the division between psychology, which studies the psyche, and the so called sciences of the spirit (among which phenomenology), which study the conscience and its correlates, the philosophical foundation of which is the main aim of the work. Let us start from the essential distinction between causality and motivation, as presented by Stein, to later understand the role of memory in both phenomena. As for the psychic causality, it is essentially anchored to the subject’s vital strength (Lebenskraft), concerning particularly the sphere of the pure experiences. The vital strength is the very source of causality. Indeed, Stein states: “living is the point where causality starts” (BBP 58). And causing events are the conditions of the vital strength that are shown in vital feelings. The vital strength is the necessary precondition for life itself. It is a persistent quality that is revealed in the change of the vital states of one’s own Self. However, it proves to be not quantitatively measurable, although it can be determined qualitatively. Indeed, Stein states: “The vital feelings that are communicated to us are something qualitatively multiform and cannot be brought back to a common denominator, that cannot be thought as a compound of equal unities”. Moreover, the vital strength can run out, in correspondence to a vital feeling of a high degree of tension. When the living becomes more intense, the vital strength tends to decline and tiredness takes its place, affecting, in its turn, the degree of tension of living, which results softer. In these junctures every experience of ours happens to take softer profiles, almost faded, it seems to lose its colour. Indeed, every transformation in the sphere of feeling or of the vital feelings determines a change in the course of current experience. However, a period of rest is enough to acquire again the original freshness. At this level we can say that the psychic causality does not diverge much from the natural one, that is from the mechanical happening. The difference, however, lies in the impossibility to determine quantitatively, that it to measure, the strength itself. Every prediction, then, seems fallacious and the role of memory seems to vanish. It seems evident, however, that the vanishing of the vital strength is often overwhelmed by another source to draw from all the energies necessary for action, namely the spiritual strength, that springs from motivation. Indeed, as

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Stein states, “the more a sensible vital strength is lost, the more it is spiritually fostered” (BBP 113). Therefore, it is necessary to “distinguish, in the vital sphere, between a sensible and a spiritual degree and at the same time a sensible and a spiritual vital strength as different roots of the psyche” (BBP 112), that increase each other, through a “mechanism that allows to build a capability depending on the other and diminishes it if the other capabilities are increased by a greater strength” (BBP 114). Indeed, Stein talks right of a weave of causality and motivation. The spiritual strength seems to draw new impulses and incentives for its increase, coming from outside. But, in my opinion, we can affirm that the spiritual strength, and therefore, the motivation connected to it, draw their source form memory too. Indeed, in order for the experiences to be perceived as lasting, we must imply in the individual the ability to preserve them, that is memory. Then, the functions of memory are the material foundations of the psychic and spiritual life. The stream of consciousness, indeed, as presented by Stein, is a pure becoming where the original “whence” remains in the darkness. The new adds to it in a continuous production, where the phases flow into one another, without ever being a sequence of uninterrupted phases, but just an undivided and indivisible continuum. Therefore, it would seem impossible even to talk about connection. But observing close to the very modality of the flow becoming, we realize that if on one hand it is true that “there is not between the phases such a division that, with the becoming of the new one, the old one dissolves every time, vanishes into thin air”, it is also true that “even what is produced every time does not stiffen in the becoming and remaining in that point persists dead, fixed and unchangeable, while the new becomes and adds to it, as in a linear development” (BBP 45). Instead, a “living” persisting of the “past” occurs. Indeed, there is no death for the experiences, intended as a sinking in full sense: “the past is there in its liveliness, but leaves behind a knowledge more or less empty and the past life, remaining preserved in this change and being followed by a new one, increases the unity of a flow of experiences” (BBP 46). Indeed, “it can also be said that the flow is one, as it comes from a self. Then the self is what persists in the future of the past, what feels a new life spring from it in every moment and that brings along the whole aftermath of the past” (BBP 49). This passage is essential for the role of memory in the constitution of the personal identity, above explained. With the acts and their motivations “the reign of ‘sense’ and of ‘reason’” starts: “here are the right and the wrong, the evidence and the non evidence, in ways that cannot be found in the conscience ‘devoid of acts’”. Therefore “in a sphere there is a blind happening, in the other, instead, a conscious doing or, at least, in the case of implicit motivation, a happening that can pass to a conscious doing” (BBP 78). In motivation, indeed, a happening is carried out on the foundation of the

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other. Therefore, for causality we can speak about necessity of happenings, while for motivation of fulfilling of the awareness originally obtained. Just think, for example, of the deductive process or of a wilful action. However, even in the lower degrees (as in perception) there is still a “‘veiled’ rational activity, where the motivations are carried out ‘in the darkness’ and must be brought to the light through an accurate reflexive analysis” (BBP 79). Motivation is founded on a connection of sense between the motive and the motivated. Indeed, during the motivation what really motivates is not so much the fulfilment of the starting, but rather the content of sense of this act. And as seen above, this unity of living given by the sense is proper of memory. It is through memory, indeed, that I can give a unitary sense to the whole because by means of it I can collect more acts, or experiences, in few moments. The duration of the experiences is necessary for the progression of the flow, and this duration is founded on memory. Indeed, Stein states, the experiences do not simply pass one in the other, “but it is possible that many of them are contemporary or that they remain hidden for a certain length of their duration and that accordingly to the experience may always be at hand” (BBP 47). With the succession, indeed, it is necessary to “pay attention to what in the time of the experiences is contemporary”. This contemporaneity is at the root of the so called association by contiguity, for which all that has arisen in the same moment or, more generally, that has been together for a certain moment, is reunited also in the past and in all the transformations of its being, thus forming a whole. Moreover, what has past (and is not dead, which is different, as seen above), and then is closed and does not receive any further enriched, can also newly grow in the unity of an experience with a subsequent phase that continues living, that is that lasts. That is, it can come up again through presentification. Besides, whereas causality has its analogous in physical nature, motivation has none. This is why, with reference to causality we can speak of reproduction of the experiences, whereas about motivation this is impossible and this is an irreconcilable difference, that cannot be overcome in any way. Memory, therefore, on one hand offers the material, say, the substratum, of the pure becoming of the flow, right because as a becoming and, then, continuously actuating itself in time, and of its incessant progressive enrichment, through the preservation of what has been actuated or lived in the very living, both resumption, through repetition, reproduction or presentification of remembering. On the other hand, giving an immediate unitary image of the flow, it allows to catch the relationship between cause and effect in the acts, and to extrapolate the sense.

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The link between the functions of memory and the temporality of being, especially of man, receives another and clearer definition in Finite And Eternal Being, where we can read: “the past being and the future being are not simply equivalent to non-being. This does not only mean that the past and the future have a being identifiable in recollection and expectation, an esse in intellectu (sive in memoria)” (EES 75). Indeed, “the real [actual] present being of the moment is not thinkable as existing only for itself” (EES 75, o.i.), as, even being a being with a duration, it is not actual through the whole duration. Indeed, “in what I am in this moment, something hides that I am not currently, but that I will become actually in the future and what I am actually in this moment, I already was, but not actually” (EES 75). And this is just because my being comes out as a being that is “together actual a potential being, real (wirkliches) and possible” (EES 75, o.i.). It is clear that Stein draws this teaching from Thomas. The aim of her work is, indeed, the research of both Thomas’s categories, got in turn from Aristotelian metaphysics, of potency and act, that define the temporal finite being, as living and, then, becoming, incessantly realizing. Stein continues: “my past being and my future being as such are totally nothing: I exist in this moment, not before and not after. Only because in recollection and in expectation I spiritually keep my past and future being within a certain field, not rigidly delimited, the image of a past and of a future full of permanent being is outlined to me, namely of an extension of existence or being (Daseinsbreite), whereas my being is in fact on a knife’s edge” (EES 75–76, o.i.). We can notice that what Stein affirms seems to agree with what was previously deduced, even if only mentioned, in On The Problem Of Empathy, and in Psychology And The Sciences Of The Spirit, where these conclusions were already present, even though in embryo. Instead, here is the full metaphysical development of the questions concerning memory, and all the previous considerations receive a new light on the metaphysical background. Thus, Stein’s very philosophical progress also comes out in the form of progressive advancing. Here “opens all the problematic nature of time and temporal being as such” (EES 77), so our Self appears temporal, “or like a dot-like actuality, that continuously comes out to the light in an ever new way” (EES 78, o.i.). This has already been found in Psychology And The Sciences Of The Spirit, where the flow of experiences was defined as a pure becoming. This theme is taken up again in the section of Finite And Eternal Being dedicated to the analysis of the innermost part of the soul, where it is written: “the sensible perception as the knowledge of the intellect is a unity of experiences of longer or shorter duration. It proceeds and breeds vital motions. But if it disappears its content is not lost, but kept in the innermost part of the soul, for a

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more or less long time, or possibly also forever” (EES 451, o.i.). The first type of this acceptance and preservation, Stein states, is memory. Here Stein refers essentially to the Augustinian conception of memory, more that to the Thomist one, as according to Thomas, it “should” not “be considered an essential faculty with the intellect and the will, but a spiritual sensible faculty subject to the inferior and superior cognitive powers” (EES 451, n. 92). Augustine, on the contrary, well highlights that without the conscious action of memory no knowledge would be possible. This reference to Augustine is not unusual. It is due not only to the rediscovery of the Christian philosophical thought by the Author, after her conversion, but also to the reference to it made by Husserl in The Phenomenology Of Internal Time Consciousness, where he writes in 1905: “The analysis of time consciousness in is an old cross of descriptive psychology and of the theory of knowledge. The first to face thoroughly the great difficulties of this field and to work hard around this theme almost to desperation was Augustine. Chapters 14–28 of the eleventh book of Confessiones should be accurately read by those interested in the problem of time. Indeed, the modern age gave no better and more important contribution than that offered by this great thinker, seriously engaged in the research. Today we can still affirm with Augustine: si nemo a me quaerat, scio, si quaerenti esplicare velim, nescio”.20 The reference to Augustine cannot be renounced, it seems. As Stein stresses, he prefers the triad memory-intellect-will, analysed in De Trinitate (books VIII–XII), as he considers it more significant than that of spirit-love-knowledge to understand the presence of the Triune-God in the man’s soul, namely as a sign of the analogia Trinitatis. It “is derived from a thorough examination of the relationship between love and knowledge: no one can love something completely unknown” (EES 462). That is, love implies a precedent knowledge. But knowledge operated by the intellect would not be possible without the help of memory. And with memory Augustine means several things. With reference to spiritual life it is necessary to speak about the action of memory, in different senses, or as: being in, “proper of every spiritual life, through which it is aware before it is known in a special act directed towards that sense” (EES 465); holding what has been known; and recollecting, that is giving new life to what has been held. Memory, then, “in its triple activity is a Trinitarian unity in itself” (EES 468). Likewise, it is essential to the will, as “without memory there would not be any flow of spiritual life, and then, there would not be any spiritual being” (EES 465). It is clear, then, that in Augustine, like in Stein, memory, far from being subordinate, holds a leading position in the spiritual life of that finite-temporal being that man is. Indeed, in the Trinity, it is attributed to the person of the Father, Creator of the universe, and, therefore, the beginning and origin of all. This, memory is also the foundation of love in its highest degree, brought by knowledge and by will

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(or wilful action), that is as a gift of oneself. This love, indeed, is possible only thanks to memory, as without memory “the spiritual person could not possess itself and then give itself, either, that is love”. However memory, in turn, “has its surer foundation in love” (EES 467), just as knowledge and will result to be conditioned by it, showing a reciprocal action between all of these components. Indeed, “how long [a unity if experiences] remains in memory depends – not solely – but mainly on its degree of original penetration” (EES 451). Is this depth of penetration not linked someway to the love towards something that we recognize the value of? In my opinion, this can be perfectly associated once more to the foregoing statements about the stories of life. Indeed, “life and the spiritual patrimony are possessed and kept the more firmly, the more deeply they occurred in experience or learning” (EES 467). This happens, Stein continues, when we think with the heart, which “is the true centre of life, is the organ of the body to the activity of which the life of the body is linked”. This way “the contents absorbed from outside and penetrated do not remain only as a patrimony of memory, but can be transformed into ‘flesh and blood’. Thus, they can become a source of strength dispensing life” (EES 452). Personal-spiritual life, indeed, “is inserted in a great meaningful whole, that in turn is also cohesion and action: every sense, once understood, needs a behaviour corresponding to it, and has also the strength to move and stimulate the latter to the action requested to indicate” (EES 453). To indicate this “setting” the soul “in motion” by a sensible element and towards a behaviour full of sense and strength, Stein uses the original word of motivation, that, as seen above, had been one of the basic themes of treatment in Psychology And The Sciences Of The Spirit. Therefore, “intellect, will and memory have their foundation and end in love although indicating different directions of spiritual life” (EES 467). Whereas, indeed, with knowledge and will spirit gets out of itself, with the activities of memory it remains in itself, as keeping and remembering, namely being in, proper of spiritual life, show themselves in the innermost part of the soul. In its innermost part, the soul opens towards the interior, and, if the personal Self lives from here, it lives a full life and reaches the peak of its own being, having all the strength of the soul and being able to use it freely. The ‘interior being’, however, is not exhausted with memory. Indeed, “we have a triple interior life: a being-in, that knows its own being in the essential form of memory, that in the same time is the first form of knowledge, a feeling-oneself and an adhering wilfully to one’s own being” (EES 468, o.i.). But “what can the life of the soul consist of when it does not receive any further impression from the outer world, and is not interested in how much it keeps in it in memory” (EES 455)? When, indeed the Self withdraws in itself and closes itself to the outer world, it obviously does not find much, because not only it closes the doors of sense, but it also sets aside what its memory remembers.

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This sort of interior life is described by Stein more in detail in The Science Of The Cross, where she speaks of the mystical grace granted by God to those who seek Him where he dwells, namely in the innermost room of the interior castle, in the innermost part of the soul, where “they strip themselves of the senses and the images of memory, of the natural practical activity of intellect and will to withdraw in the desert interior solitude, and remain there in the dark faith, in a simple lovely look of the spirit towards the hidden God, who is temporarily veiled” (EES 457). We are exactly in the second chapter of Scientia Crucis, where Stein describes the stripping of the spiritual powers of the soul, made necessary by the transforming supernatural union of the soul itself with God, and carried out in the intellect with faith, in the memory with hope, in the will with love. Therefore, Stein states “we must free memory from all the natural obstacles that interrupt the course, and then raising it upon itself”. It “must be stripped from every knowledge and image acquired by means of the sensible sense” (KW 91), in order to understand God and rest totally immersed in the supreme good in total oblivion, without the least memory of anything. God, indeed, is knowable more from what He is than from what He is not. To reach Him, therefore, al perceptions, natural and supernatural, must be given in, so that memory and, then, the soul, may result “disposed to the reception and ability to immerse in the abyss of faith, where all the rest is swallowed” (KW 94). The reference to The Science Of The Cross, despite its mainly mysticaltheological character, came from a need to treat the theme of memory exhaustively and comprehensively, in Stein’s philosophical-existential course, and I think that it can also meet the interdisciplinary character herein. Therefore, with it we have reached the end of this route, highlighting the crucial points. M E M O RY A N D P H E N O M E N O L O G Y O F L I F E

Therefore, we can proceed to analyse memory in Anna-Teresa Tymieniecka’s phenomenology of life. With this respect we found it appropriate to refer to the treatment present in Phenomenological Inquiry, volume 13, entitled Vindicating Reason,21 where she refers to her chief treatise Logos and Life, Book 1.22 Here Tymieniecka highlights the basic link between memory and reason, in the constructive progress of life, as it shows itself in the specifically human condition. However, her study starts from far, tracing the basic function of memory, present since the beginning of the self-individualizing development of life in its different phases, preceding the appearance of the crystallizing human creative act, which constitutes its peak of fulfilment. Indeed, Tymieniecka states

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that if in the lucid human consciousness, and so in the conscious processes of memory, the meaning-acquiring processes of life reaches its peak, nevertheless “this highest degree is preceded by and prepared for several stages of the self-individualization of life, beginning with the primogenital condition” (p. 99), on the basis of significant data at hand. Indeed, “memory stretches its activity throughout all spheres of unfolding individual life” (p. 98) and “is present in the work of onto-poiesis of life from the start” (p. 95), performing a crucial life role, as well shown by cognitive processes: “it saves significant life accomplishments from being haphazardly dismembered and annihilated in the rushing, recklessly advancing currents of life” (p. 99). So we can find the three basic features of memory throughout all the phases of life’s constructive progress. They are three: “the deposition of a datum of significance which emerged in an event, process, act, etc., and which would vanish with this act were it not in some way recorded” (p. 96); the preservation of this significant datum, as a step forward of the process; and finally – and this constitutes the main point –, the retrival of the significant datum “from the passive state in which it was ‘lying in waiting”’ (p. 96). These functions of memory, I think, are strictly connected to those set out by Stein, and accurately quoted here, in Finite And Eternal Being, and that she herself drew from Augustine. This is, therefore, an initial contact with the two phenomenologists. Moreover, the essential role of these three features is contributing to the connectedness of process and acts, to the continuity of life, creating a consistent pattern of continuity of experience and the world. Indeed, memory is the guarantee for the succession of appropriate significant steps, and thus for the continuity of life’s unfolding, for the constructive progress of life as such. The role of guarantor of the continuity of the self-individualizing process of life is similar to what was declared above about the function of memory in historical comprehension and in the stories of life, where we spoke of memory as a witness of the unity of the sense of life and of reality, stating that it is right thanks to memory that we can speak of logos of life, as becoming. Here comes to the surface again the deep link between memory and intellect, that is reason, proper of the creative human condition, also stated by Stein in Finite And Eternal Being, following Augustine’s triad memory-intellect-will. Indeed, as Tymieniecka states, “the full register of human functioning unfolds under the aegis of Imaginatio Creatrix and the three other faculties which emerge: will, intellect, and memory; and of these, as they work in tandem, memory is not the least important” (p. 100). But, while “will, imagination and intellect are the new products of the specifically human individualization of life”, “memory has been at its work from life’s first bursting forth” (p. 108). So in the creative act “the human being transmutes the vital forces into the specific functions

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and faculties of the creative orchestration” (p. 101): will, imagination, intellect and memory. “These are indispensable to each other as each assumes its respective role within the ‘creative orchestration’ of the emerging human type of self-individualized being (or self-interpretation-in-existence)” (p. 101), and “together conduct the course of the expanding Logos of Life, ‘Universal Reason”’ (p. 108). Indeed, “‘memorizing’ is an active effort to bring together an entire segment of data and by conscious effort to deposit it and record it so firmly that it can be re-called into the active field of consciousness at will and in its integrity”. So we can also connect the re-called significant data of experience with the present. Stein also speaks in Psychology And The Sciences Of The Spirit, as seen above, of the role of memory in the flow of experiences, namely that of preserving their data, and assuring their duration for the reflexive activity of the intellect, and recalling, wherever necessary, also the data which are apparently dead, in order to readmit them in the flow of events. In my opinion, Tymieniecka seems to confirm this position, stating that the depositary role of memory “is essentially related to the proficiency of deposition as such which allows this ‘in waiting’ passive, static, existential status of data which can be readmitted into the active flux of life” (p. 98). Moreover, as regard imagination, the role of memory is indispensable to sustain the energy “by capturing the host of imaginings that appear in the focus of consciousness, and by keeping them in focus throughout successive experiential processes more or less vividly, but sharply enough so that the deliberative functions of the intellect can dwell upon them” (p. 102). Here also comes out an explicit reference to the deliberative activity proper of human intellect, that cannot set aside, in turn, the contribution of will, and, then, motivation. Therefore, the problematic weave between the different faculties of the human soul, treated in Psychology And The Sciences Of The Spirit, and reasserted more vividly in Finite And Eternal Being, comes up again, showing then another confluence of the two point of view expressed, respectively Stein’s and Tymieniecka’s. In the quotation, moreover, there is an allusion to the vividness of imagination. In my opinion, there can be found another affinity about this with Stein’s statements on the original penetration of data in the conscience which occurs by the act of remembering, so that imagination appears more vivid, when the similar images offered by memory are accepted deeper in the conscience. Furthermore memory is involved in the valuation process, preserving significant data and giving a basic register of items to choose from. Then significant data must be “retrieved” and reactivated to be combined with additional relevant data. So in the valuation-selection process, significant data recorded and retrieved by memory become the foothold for a succeeding step. It is possible to notice a coincidence with the previous assertions about the connection between memory and action. The process of assessment and selection based

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on memory is, in the final analysis, oriented to the action, by which the constructive progress of the world of life is realized, that is the passage analysed in Finite And Eternal Being, from potency to act, proper of the becoming, as a finite and temporalized being. So, with the advent of the lucidity of the human consciousness in the world of life we watch the appearance of both flexibility (of the selecting process) and a self-projecting capacity. Moreover, while memory in pre-human spheres of functioning operates on the basis of satisfaction, within the prototypic creative act of the human being “acquires the translucent expansiveness of experience in the temporal horizons of the lived present, the past, and the future” (p. 103). Finally, but it is of primary significance, it is memory which establishes and maintains the lived world for us, through instantaneous acts “within the objective sequences of experiential patterns” (p. 107). And this is in contrast with Husserl and traditional phenomenology, which attributed to the intellect the constitutive role of the time sequence of present, past and future. The protophenomenology of Anna-Teresa Tymieniecka, instead, “avoids the anthropocentrism which takes consciousness and the role of the intellect as its starting point” (p. 105). Although, as Tymieniecka herself states, the moment of the individual transition from the vital/psychic functional stage to the actualized Human Condition remains to be envisaged with any acuity, we can assert from the analysis carried out so far, that there are several analogies between Stein’s reflection and Anna-Teresa Tymieniecka’s phenomenology of life, that we have focused on. However, whereas the ontopoiesis of life allows us to investigate an inferior level of action of memory, that is to say the prototypal one, Stein offers the possibility with her following reflections23 to enlarge the horizon of research to a superior level to the human subject, that is the community, that however, does not provide any precise and thorough explanations about the theme of memory. Consequently an interesting possibility of integration between the two positions appears, that would need, however, further specific analyses. NOTES 1

All English translations from Italian editions hereinafter are by the Author. As suggested by Tymieniecka in her intervention in Falconara (Italy), in November 2006, entitled: Human development between imaginative freedom and vital conditionings, during the philosophical conference promoted by the Università degli Studi di Macerata, on development in its multiple aspects. 3 Ibidem. 4 Zum problem der Einfülung, Buchdruckerei des Waisenhauses, Halle 1917. It. tr., Il problema dell’empatia, edited by E. ed E. S. Costantini, Edizioni Studium, Roma 1998. Hereinafter PE with the number of pages in the Italian translation. 2

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5 D. Verducci, Anna-Teresa Tymieniecka. La trama vivente dell’essere, in Il filosofare di Arianna, AA. VV. 6 E. Stein, Beiträge zur philosophischen Begründung der Psychologie und der Geisteswissenschaften: (1) Psychische Kausalität; (2) Individuum und Gemeinschaft, in “Jahrbuch für Philosophie und phänomenologische Forschung”, Band V, Halle 1922. Published with the essay Eine Unterschung über den Staat, by the editor M. Niemeyer, Tübingen 1970. It. tr. Psicologia e scienze dello spirito. Contributi per una fondazione filosofica, edited by A. M. Pezzella, presentation by A. Ales Bello, Città Nuova Editrice, Roma 1996. Hereinafter BBP with the number of pages in the Italian translation. 7 E. Stein, Endliches und ewiges Sein. Versuch eines Austiegs zum Sinn des Seins, in Edith Steins Werke, Band II, Herder, Louvain-Freiburg i. Br. 1959. It. tr. edited by L. Vigone, Essere finito e essere eterno. Per un’elevazione al senso dell’essere, revision and presentation by A. Ales Bello, Città Nuova, III edizione, Roma 1999. Hereinafter EES with the number of pages in the Italian translation. 8 Platone, Φα´ıδρoς . It. tr. Fedro, 274c–276a. 9 Platone, Π oλιτ εíα. It. tr. La repubblica, Book VII, 514a–518b. 10 E. Stein, Kreuzeswissenschaft. Studie über Joannes a Cruce, in Edith Steins Werke, Band I, Ed. Nauwelaerts, Louvain 1950. It. tr. edited by C. Dobner, Scientia Crucis, Edizioni OCD, Roma-Morena 2002. Hereinafter KW with the number of pages in the Italian translation. 11 Tymieniecka, Human Development, Falconara 2006. 12 Ibidem. 13 Cf. A. Danese- A. Rossi, Educare è comunicare, Effatà Editrice, Torino 2001, pp. 20 and following. 14 Cf. H.G. Gadamer, Wahrheit und Methode: Grundzuge einer philosophischen Hermeneutik, Tubingen, Mohr, 1965. It. tr. Verità e metodo, Milano 1985. 15 L. Genovese, Insegnare e apprendere. Temi e problemi della didattica, Monolite Editrice, Roma 2006, p. 77. 16 J. Dewey, Democracy And Education, see http://books.google.it/books?. It. tr. Democrazia e educazione, 1916, p. 5. 17 Ibidem. 18 Ivi, p. 7. 19 Cf. E. Stein, Der Aufbau der menschlichen Person, in Edith Steins Werke, Band XVI, Herder, Freiburg i. Br.-Basel-Wien 1994. It. tr. edited by M. D’Ambra, La struttura della persona umana, Città Nuova Editrice, Roma 2000, pp. 121–122. 20 E. Husserl, Zur Phänomenologie des inneren Zeitbewusstseins (1893–1917), Husserliana Bd. X, M. Nijhoff, Den Haag 1966, p. 3. 21 Cf. A.-T. Tymieniecka, “Memory and rationality in the onto-poiesis of beingness”, in Phenomenological Inquiry, Volume 13 (October 1989), pp. 92–108. 22 Cf. A.-T. Tymieniecka, “Logos and Life. Book One”, in Analecta Husserliana, 23 Cf. E. Stein, Eine Unterschung über den Staat, in «Jahrbuch für Philosophie und phänomenologische Forschung», Band VII, Halle 1925. It. tr. Una ricerca sullo Stato, edited by A. Ales Bello, Città Nuova Editrice, Roma 1993.

´ DEREK JOANNA HAN

T H E S Y M B O L – C O D E O F T H E PA S T, R E C O R D OF HUMAN (EXISTENCE) LIFE, AND ONTOPOIESIS OF LIFE

ABSTRACT

The article focuses on the analysis of the memory in the aspect of it’s functioning in culture as a symbol. Starting from Ernst Cassirer, the author shows, that the symbolical consciousness is the basis of cultural world of man. In Cassires’s philosophy the man, as a animal symbolicum cannot free himself from symbolizing. Ipso facto, the reality is given to us in an intermediary, symbolical from. The symbolical forms constitute background for language, thinking and what is the most important, the memory in historical and psychological aspect. Going further to the concept of Paul Ricoeur, one can grasp the complex structure of the symbol and its importance for man’s culture. The symbol is, above all, the space of human communication, reciprocation, myth, consciousness and memory. The memory is understood as a cultural phenomenon, which unifies with tradition and creates the identity of man. As Paul Ricoeur wrote, The symbol gives rise to the thought, which means engagement of man in culture and it’s various contents. Such engaging symbol doesn’t allow indifference to appear, making from memory’s ambiguous contents the foundation of existential development. Paul Ricoeur, in his already classic dissertation about the symbol proposed his understanding of symbol which approached a hermeneutical interpretation. “Symbol gives rise to thought” is the opening line of the French philosopher’s said text. Looking closer at this expression, we instantly see its ambiguity. This ambiguity leads us to a certain understanding of the multifarious meanings of the object described; that is symbol. Let’s ask then, after Ricoeur, what does it mean that the symbol gives rise to the thought? First of all, the symbol, giving rise to the thought describes symbol as or, in the nature of representation. In the act of “giving”, something is passed on, visualized, emphasized. Something is given here, and as a “gift” it cannot be ignored. 125 A-T. Tymieniecka (ed.), Analecta Husserliana CII, 125–141. c Springer Science+Business Media B.V. 2009 

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The symbol that is given makes, in this moment, a stimulating, or even engaging claim towards the recipient. This way the symbol forces upon the man an activity and an engagement. This is a stimulation to go deeper into the represented layers of meaning. On the other hand, the symbol, as “given” gives rise to the thought in the sense that we are “presented” with the act of thinking itself. The activity, to which we are motivated in the presence of the symbol is of an intellectual character. This act of thinking opens us up to a whole hermeneutical process, in which the engaged subject searches for a sense of represented content. This act, primarily understood as a way of searching for the truth, will constitute “the way” in this philosophy, which going from one sense or meaning to another, leads the thinking subject to an ever deeper meaning which is enclosed in the symbol. The symbol turns out not only to be a stimulating structure, but also an ambiguous, or even a multi-layered sense construct, which, crucially, cannot be left without being rethought. This way, the “presented” symbol becomes a provocation. Such a provocation of the symbol is linked with its multi-layered ontic structure1 . Each ontic layer of the symbol presents us with a new sense, a deepened and deepening meaning of itself. In every layer of the symbol, a new “level” of the representation is given, sequentially improving understanding of the essence of the analysed “problem”. The first ontic layer of the symbol is always a layer of literal understanding, but the symbol in its representation quickly enters the next levels thereby “revealing” a “higher” generality. Let’s consider an example of a rose. Its first ontic level will be the appearance and shape of the flower and its direct, that is sensual expression of beauty and pain (thorns). In medieval symbolism, a red rose represented Christ (here we reach the second ontic level of a symbol) – a blood droplet from the dying Christ, fell on the earth and fertilised it, causing such a flower to flourish. A white rose symbolised the Holy Mother – the white colour emphasized innocence and attributes of divinity. In the same period of time, this symbol starts to evolve in complexity. One could say its new ontic levels start to appear. And so, the rose, together with holiness, divinity, sacrifice and humility of the Holy Mother, starts to signify innocence and purity as such. This way, new ontic levels of this specific symbol started to emerge. And so, the13th century brings Roman de la rose altogether with a secular interpretation of this symbol. Hence, another ontic level of the symbol appears, in which a rose stands for a young woman, a virgin, an innocent person in concreto. Coming back to Ricoeur and his interpretation of the symbol, the many ontic levels of the symbol demands of us a reconsideration, the process of which can

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only have the strongest of influences on us. Ricoeur clearly shows that the symbol doesn’t lead us to “understanding” the problem; instead it opens before us a whole road of reflection. Cognition in the hermeneutical tradition means a constitution of a certain knowledge whereby an act of defining gives an apparent closure to the problem. This way “understanding” implies the satisfaction of a finished cognitive act. The act of thinking as “interpretation” on the contrary, is an infinite, unceasing effort. The discovery of one meaning cannot set us free from any such “thinking”. New meanings and contents constantly reveal themselves as consecutive levels of the ontic structure of symbol. Ricoeur himself finds two levels of meaning in a symbol: primary and secondary. The primary level is a direct one, having some kind of “literalness”. The second is derivative of the first, but is in contrast “non-direct”, that is metaphorical. In The Symbolism of Evil, a great study of evil and its symbolism, he shows in practice what it means for the symbol to give rise to thought. Since the primary sense is constituted through physical stimulation, and the second level is derivative of the first, its physicality is what continues to endow the symbol and those who contemplate it with meaning. This is the moment of inspiration for human act of thinking. The symbol transfers our acts of thinking to the area of questions about humanity, culture or eventually transcendence. Of course at this point in the exposition, the reader has the right to ask, what for is this whole theory of the symbol? After all, the problem as it was first given here pertains to memory? The answer here is, that the symbol, understood as a source of anxiety, an irritation of and to thought, challenges human consciousness. However, this challenge is best understood against the important fact that symbol is perhaps first and foremost a repository of memory; that is a mechanism of reproduction. It is a special kind of carrier or repository of course, similarly, it is a special kind of “memory” we speak about here. The symbol keeps in its content a trace of what is past, stores for us memories of a world of not-quite-lost meanings, evoking in the present what has been important and “embedded” in culture. The symbol is Culture’s memory, a record of meanings, which can always be “obtained” and to which we can always come back. Undoubtedly though, what takes place in the relation between the symbol and consciousness is a fundamental “event”. Ricoeur himself will suggest this dimension of symbol as memory, pointing out how interpretation of the symbol is above all based upon a fundamental feature of human existence.2 For the symbol opens before us the experience of existence and that which is essential to it. Let us look at two philosophies and their consequences to our deliberations, as an illustration to the above thesis. Firstly, Søren Kierkegard, analyzing the problem of Abraham points out two phenomenons: the necessity of coming back to the issue of Abraham and

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silence. In the problem of Abraham, according to Kierkegard, an unsolvable problem is hidden. It makes manifest a mystery of human existence, its clash with transcendence and the inability of embracing faith with reason as the individual comes face to face with the terror of God’s transcendence. Abraham can be treated as a symbol, because in Kierkegaard’s interpretation, he gives rise to thought. Therefore, as the philosopher concludes, he cannot stop thinking about Abraham, he cannot divert his thoughts. The “issue” of Abraham constantly comes back to the thinker, demanding, what we have been calling, rethought. One cannot pass by undisturbed or unperturbed. As for silence, it becomes, for the Danish philosopher, a form of symbolic action. Silence says here the most, not only about suffering, experienced by Abraham while going to Moira mountain with his son, but above all, about faith itself. What could the story of Abraham explain in a rational discourse? That God wants to test him; that such an act is required by faith itself? As the Danish philosopher rightly presumes, such an explication would lead the whole case to nothing more than a cliché. The silence allows us for reflection, enabling us to reach what disappears in simple unambiguous statement. The symbol in its ambiguity and diversified interpretation allows man to explain reality, in the moment in particular when the usual methods of communication and being in the world fail. The symbol in this way “responds” to the anxiety, transcendence or even absurdity of existence. To grasp something in a symbolic form would thereby mean to get in touch with the truth, which had remained hidden to human cognition. This is why professor Stróz˙ weski will point out that the true nature of the symbol belongs to the domain of the sacrum, or stating this differently, sacrum is revealed in symbol. Paul Ricoeur will write about the symbol in this context in “The Symbolism of evil”. The interpretation of the symbolism of evil leads to the question of guilt, sin, metaphysical evil. Ipso facto he shows the bond between human existence and the domain of the sacrum. Man’s actions and its consequences lead to the creation of values, the world of culture, demanding of him in turn a rigorous interpretative praxis. Man’s actions can often guide us to the sacrum and the transcendent. For Ricoeur, the question about the nature of evil is thereby an ambiguous question (as is every question about the symbolic); a question about that which in man’s action and thought binds the dimensions of existence and transcendence. In this sense we say that an investigation of and into symbol is in fact an investigation of and into the “problem” of man. The second philosopher, whose tale about the grand myth – as the biblical parable in Kiergegaard’s analysis – likewise becomes in similar way a contribution to the investigation of human nature, is Herbert Marcuse. Writing about

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the myth of Prometheus versus the myth of Narcissus and Orpheus, Marcuse points out two symbolic groups, which in man’s action are transposed into two methods of cultural behaviour. The myth of Prometheus depicts strength, courage and dedication. With these elements, betrayal, mutiny, guilt and punishment can also be seen. Guilt and punishment are consequences of mutiny, Prometheus’s oppositions to the Gods’ sentences. This rebel becomes the symbol of sacrifice and obstinacy. For Marcuse, he represents negative values however, coding into the world of human nature values of mutiny, “objection”, even deception in the service of labour as the superior value. Prometheus is stimultaneously the symbol of change, leading the human condition out of a primary helplessness in confrontation with experiential reality into a state of culture and progress of civilization. Orpheus and Narcissus belong to the myth representing contemplation, art and love for beauty itself. In man’s thought these two myths, which run in parallel according to Marcuse, work towards producing the symbology of pure contemplation which is an act of creation heading towards the truth, the domain of the sacrum. Above all, these myths allow man to realise his primal unity with nature, his natural ground. In contrast to Prometheus, neither Orpheus nor Narcissus possesses the power to change reality; they are not capable of creating a civilization. The only thing they can do is describe the world and human experience and eventually “lose” what they sought, but lose in the name of Value. In his book, Eros and civilization, Marcuse values, or shall we say revalues the two myths. For him understanding they represent above all archetypes of human attitude and behaviour. The myth of Prometheus brings with it a series of normatively negative symbols which promotes an attitude of active appropriation and reorganisation of the world. It builds in man not only the desire for change but, above all, making him believe that every change, even the most brutal, is a positive act. Gods can be opposed, and if so, there are no values, restraining man from building his Civilization. The situation is different with Orpheus and Narcissus. Marcuse values positively these two myths, finding inside them the innocence and lack of self-interest in action, lost by man. These values are represented by Narcissus especially since he doesn’t in actual fact know that he has fallen in love with his own reflection. This means he contemplates the beauty which he sees for the beauty itself and in this way builds a model of pure love grounded in emotion, which lasts independently of any measurable “benefits”. The myths and symbols created by them constitute a space in which human culture realises itself. They are models of human functioning in the world, so

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ipso facto, symbols according to the philosopher determine the man in his existential attitude towards reality. The symbols build the space, in which the man not only expresses himself, but simultaneously creates himself in his searches for identity, that is his specificity as a mode of being in the world. Examples found on the one hand in the obsession of asking about Abraham in Kierkegaard’s philosophy and the analysis of Orpheus and Prometheus myths in Marcuse’s thought on the other, exemplify what Ricoeur called giving rise to the thought in the multilayered ontic structure of the symbol. Above all, they allow us to realise, that by asking about the symbol, we are asking about something more than just an element of art, science, language or “human culture”. In fact, we are asking about ourselves; the possibility of expressing the human condition, it’s shaping in confrontation with the world into which (as Heidegger would state it) we are thrown. These examples show at the same time, that a group of supertemporal symbols exists which functions as a permanent carrier of supergenerational memory. However, these as best understood as functioning as references or scripts for the inter-generational dynamic process of interpretation. This process of “interpretation” is a process of cultural and social change. Therefore it is impossible to understand Man without referencing that process. Coming back to the interpretation of the symbol as a carrier of a specific type of memory, we can now say: since symbol brings with itself the content or “meaning” of shared culture and history, it “gives rise to the thought” concerning, above all, our collective cultural identity. This way we are confronted with the question about who we are becoming over time and in the presence of our history. Undoubtedly, the content stored in symbol influences us; the layers of meanings, growing in time, give us a medium through which to understand reality as well as the human condition persisting throughout history. Ricoeur’s formula refers to one more important aspect. The fact that the symbol gives rise to the thought means that we are dealing with the interpretative effort as an imperative. That is, symbol presents itself as a mystery to be solved. As we have seen, it is this imperative that is responsible for the creation of new meanings. From this perspective the structure of symbol is revealed as dialogical. The symbol is a space between you and me, between the one who gives the symbol and the other who takes it to himself and in so doing interprets it. The symbol by its nature is a task for somebody. If we treat the symbol as a sign of the past, which in its representation gives itself to us regardless of the flow of time, we can then say that this is a sign left by past generations for the people of today. Stating it differently, in the symbol the memory of that which is past is expressed. In this aspect the dialogical structure of the symbol is above all a relation which appears between an unseen subject and a searching interpreter. The symbol hides in itself a task, left for us a long time

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ago. It gives rise to the thought, building a new dimension to our memory, which reaches over the dimension of individual experiences, drawing from the cultural endowment of man. As dialogical, the symbol will not only guide us to a multilayered structure of its senses and meanings, but also to the one who sent the symbol to us. The question about the content of the symbol points to the question about the “one” who created this content. The imperative of interpretation presents to us the existence of another or other human being(s), thereby enriching our own existence, making the world of human relations expanded by the experiences presented by the past and its symbols. Ernst Cassirer deepens such an understanding of the symbol in his grand concept of the human being as animal symbolicum, and culture as the realm of realisation of symbolic forms. Cassirer takes us however to some other regions of thinking about the symbol and human memory. For Cassirer the symbol is not only an ambiguous structure, a multilayered ontic space. The symbol is a transcendental category, and therefore, an important dimension of human ways of perceiving reality and the world. Symbolizing is an ability of man’s mind, being in fact a specific necessity. The human being, according to this philosopher cannot cut himself off from symbolizing; it is inherent to his nature. Man brings symbol and symbolizing to the world as an element of perception and organisation of empirical data. The spirit of kantian philosophy pervades Cassirer’s conceptualizing. Because of that, symbolising has a transcendental character, becoming a common human activity, a typically human method of organising sensually given reality. Above all, the act of symbolising bonds the contents of the human spirit with material signs, uniting the sensual with the intellectual. The finding of unity in affinity between the sign and its meaning, between, that is the material and spiritual is accomplished in this vision of world. In this sense, the material, becoming the exponent of spiritual contents and their carrier moves on to a different level of being. Culture is for Cassirer the world of symbols, which are made by man and in which man lives. As in kantian thought, where the senses cannot reach the thing-in-itself, in Cassirer’s philosophy it is impossible to reach the culture initself. What we are given are, above all, its creations, artifacts through which we can eventually analyze culture itself. Culture is given to us through what is created, called by Cassirer monuments of human culture. Although made of different “materials” and from different attitudes of the creators, they all constitute a trace, a symbolical recording of human presence. That is they all bring with them memory of the creator, and with it the possibility of interpreting human existence. Pointing at the language, myth, history and art as the world of symbolical forms the German philosopher creates a net of cultural

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symbols in which the memory of our existence and the possibility to interpret knowledge about cultural existence of man is woven. The symbol reveals itself in this light as common to all human forms of perception of the world, a typically human reality, through which the man not only can “express himself”, but, above all, can create culture. The world of symbols belongs to the order of culture, which in Cassirer’s interpretation is different from the order of the world of nature. Analyzing Man from the point of view of his anthropological endowments, Cassirer points to symbolizing as the characteristic feature, distinguishing Man from other species. In other words, for Cassirer, the man, along with other animals, inherits some features of instincts and the like; however, all these common features do not determine the specificity of the human being which is of primary importance to the philosopher. Man can only be understood and distinguished by his ability for and uses of symbol. This ability creates a unique quality, unprecedented in the animal world, not only separating Man from reality as it is given biologically, but above all determining his fundamental character. The ability to symbolize is the condition of being a man. With such an assumption we will not be surprised that the author of this theory sees the spectrum of human knowledge as given and as found in the symbol. This knowledge because of its specific character – its ambiguity, intermediation and the necessity of interpreting it – will not be given directly. Ricoeur’s formula, stating that the symbol gives rise to thought, also in this case preserves its vitality. It will relate though to a broader spectrum of problems and is therefore expressive of more. Briefly stated, language, myth, history and art will give rise to thought, as a sign, trace, in which the interpreting man has a possibility of finding himself and his past. It is my presumption that the paths as laid down in these philosophies lead inevitably towards reaching the historicity of man – historicity, which as we know, can only be ambiguously understood. (But what isn’t, we may ask, ambiguous, especially, if we treat philosophy and philosophical anthropology the same: as the manifestations of symbolic forms?) For Martin Heidegger, Man was a temporal being and it was only through his temporality that he was possible to understand. Time for Heidegger was firstly “inner” time, a time of consciousness or rather a consciousness of time. However, this consciousness leads us to a “second” time, the perspective of historical time. Likewise Wilhelm Dilthey analyses man as an historical being. However, not only is man incomprehensible if viewed outside of time and history, he is also non-existent. In Cassirer’s philosophy this thought takes on both existential and historical dimensions. The man, building around himself the world of culture – thus a world of symbols – builds simultaneously the world

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of his own historicity. Here the reference to history then takes on a special significance. The problem of history, as a symbolic form of human culture, reveals the meaning of memory and its foundation in symbols. This understanding and this meaning is incorrigible. Let us consider, in detail, why this is so. Writing about historical material, analyzable by the historian, Cassirer interprets it in the following way: the historical material belongs to the domain of the past, irretrievably lost. What the researcher analyses belongs to the domain of memory, not contemporary facts – memory, which presents itself, like symbol, to us in an indirect way, through traces, left by the past in the present. His facto belong to the past, and the past is gone forever. We cannot reconstruct it; we cannot waken it to a new life in a mere physical objective sense. All we can do is to remember it – give it a new ideal existence. Ideal reconstruction, not empirical observation is the first step in historical knowledge.3

The past – which is worth repeating – belongs to the domain of memory. It is in consciousness and through consciousness that the possibility of reaching the past is given to us. The memory preserves, but, as we know, it doesn’t act in an unambiguous way. The memory “preserves” in creative way, we could say it reconstructs the past. Therefore recognition of the past, referring to the domain of memory requires a special kind of interpretation. Once again, the hermeneutical understanding may come to mind here. Starting from Droysen, through Dilthey and finishing with Gadamer’s grand work, we can clearly see that a special cognitive power is used in interpretation. It can not only reveal what remains hidden (in the symbol), but above all it can help make clear the tangled meanings, which at first might seem incomprehensible. Interpretation, according to hermeneutics, acts indirectly. As a way of thinking about an issue, interpretation constantly searches and asks questions. We could say it is an art of asking questions, tracking step by step the “answers”. Often the act of interpretation makes if not constitutes meanings – for together with the posed questions it broadens the possibilities of understanding and of reaching meaning. That is why interpretation as it is understood here is so effective for reading a symbol; it fully responds to its engaging character, harmonizes with its multilayered construction, incessantly searching for new meanings and new content layers. For Cassirer history as the domain of memory is exposed to interpretation, an art of reading that which is enclosed in the record of symbolical forms. That is why we can find the following statement in the German author’s work: But to what can the historian direct this question? He cannot confront the events themselves, and he cannot enter into the forms of a former life. He has only an indirect approach to his subject

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matter. He must consult his sources. But these sources are not physical things in the usual sense of the term. The historian finds at the very beginning of his research is not the world of physical objects but a symbolic universe – a world of symbols.4

A comparison of the work of a historian and a physicist brings out clearly the nature of the two worlds: natural, where the laws exist on a different basis than events ruled by the laws of human memory and consciousness; and the world of culture, where the specifically human ability to symbolise comes to the fore. The physicist, writes Cassirer, also interprets the world indirectly, employing the world of symbolic forms of language and all notional constructs. In “exact” sciences, attempts at reaching the world as it is, and not as it appears to be, are made. No matter how unsuccessful he is, or even impossible his task proves to be, the physicist continues to assume in the face of the fact of Man’s incessant symbolizing that the object and the “properties” of his cognition could be defined as “objective”. The historian cannot make such an assumption. Never will he be given an event of the past, as a physical phenomenon. He will always have to extract facts from memory, reconstruct them from traces left for him by past generations. Cassirer points out all types of documents and artifacts are symbols as we have rendered them, through which the past comes to us and indeed, the fact of intermediation, performed by the historian and his work seems obvious to us in this situation. What is most interesting, and at the same time the most important for Cassirer’s statement is his comments concerning the turn, performed by the historian. To start analysing his matter, he has to refer to the source, come back to the roots or the “essence” of thinking, the fundaments of interpretative possibilities. The question about history and its possibility becomes the question about the historian himself. The foundation or possibility of interpretation and also what provides for historical consciousness is in fact the foundation or the condition of the possibility of the human being and its specificity. Memory draws forth the past for us, but with this past it extracts the knowledge we have or come to have about ourselves. That is that the past provides us with knowledge about ourselves. The historian, referring to what is essential to him, encounters consciousness. What is more he is presented with the chance of obtaining self-consciousness. Thus, similar to the hermeneutic circle rule, the domain of generality refers to existence, and existence evokes generality. Evoking the past in interpretation, it broadens the meaning spectrum of today. As I have already mentioned, the meaning of the symbol can have a dialogical dimension – the symbol by its essence refers to another man – its creator or its interpreter. This way the symbol creates a space of interpersonal relation, as a specific communication which exists in culture. It is connected with the primal meaning of the Greek word symbol, which meant an object (it could have

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been a coin, a tablet), breakable into two parts. One half was kept by the original owner, the second, another. Such another with such a symbolon received a certain message and in so doing became contracted with the giver into a demanding relationship. This other had to “answer” the “call”, that is give back the incurred debt while showing his grattitude to the one who endowed him with the second half of the symbolon. In this way we see that from the very beginning this concept was related to meaning and its communication, the identification and dependencies which occur between people. The dialogical aspect of the symbol is thus a fact and as fact has the power to start a communicative act, bind people together and impose a relation of mutuality. This leads us straight to the role of the language. For Cassirer this latter fact is pointed to by what becomes the obvious fact that language, above all, belongs to the world of symbolic forms, and does so as one of the most important dimensions of human symbolizing. Understood in this way, language doesn’t only provide communication, but more importantly, it creates a space for community, that is dependency between participants of a culture. “Without speech there would be no community of men”.5 Language in its twofold dimension (of the recorded and the spoken word) creates a cultural space, and in its presence people concentrate together, finding a possibility not only to communicate, but above all to coexist. In this way language as a symbolic form unites us in meaning. It unites us in relation to certain vision(s) of the world and reality. Hence, according to Cassirer, language closely correlates with myth, fulfilling as it does a similar task in regard to man – they both serve as carriers of the laws of reality and ways of functioning in the world. Analyzing this unifying, culture making function of language, Cassirer presents us with a series of concepts concerning language. He engages in polemics especially with the researchers who are looking for Lingua Adamica. Lingua Adamica was an idea of language, sought for throughout the ages by many philosophers, and in XVIII century, still vital amongst thinkers, it shaped the means of thinking about language. Its adherents strived to find the “primal language”, which would not only be the “pre-language” of humanity, but also the fundament for all languages existing in the world. The search for this primal, “Adamica lingua” can of course be related to the myth of the tower of Babel which graphically shows the consequences of unlimited communication between people. Pride is the fundamental sin of an unfettered use of language. Language is a precious, yet dangerous gift. Philosophers, starting from Plato’s warnings, through to contemporary analyses of language and myth, have cautioned against the incorrigible ambiguity of the language. The finding of lingua Adamica would mean the discovery of the very foundations, common to all cultures and all language forms. Cassirer rejects this quest, perceiving in it, as he states, a search for a rule of “substantial

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unity”6 which can be nothing but a fools-gold. For Cassirer basic and of prime importance to language is its functionality. In other words, when we deal with language we deal with the primary symbolic form which as such performs a crucial and specific function: providing the possibility of communication, description of the world, expression of one’s emotions, experiences, knowledges – is the basis, according to the philosopher, of the universality of language. Language is a powerful tool in the hands of every man – a tool, which can be used to gain knowledge and maintain an attitude towards the world. Therefore it can arrange and systematize what emerges before us vaguely and non-specifically in pre-reflectivity. That is why the patent diversity of languages, words and possibilities of generating statements, as well as a not infrequent incommensurability of grammatical forms is of secondary importance to the fundamental function, which is its utility as a tool. It is this that unifies since it is this through which and in view of which people can construct their relations. In such an interpretation, language has, then, its symbolic meaning. Firstly, the world is given to man through language. The description and understanding of the world and its phenomenons creates the symbolic space of mediation. A similar formulation of this issue can be found in Roland Barthes’ thought where we find this forthright statement: “The myth is the word”. In the light of this assertion we can see an interesting illustration of Cassirer’s thought. For Barthes “The myth is the word” in a specific way. Above all, it is the word that constitutes reality. It appears as a response to the world of culture, human actions, history, and events that take place in man’s surroundings. Processing this “material”, man can more “completely” express what “appeared” and what “happened”. The world has then the power of stimulation, or as Barthes would state it, it is by nature mythogenic, it causes a reaction of human consciousness. Being in the world and experiencing reality, man creates mythwords through which he can understand what surrounds him. But, at the same time, in this understanding a “preservation” of what is past is effected. The myth-word is a trace of the past, a record in our collective memory of events, norms and values. Because the world is mythogenic everything can become a myth, every element of reality can be processed by man in this way – can be symbolised. This way a tree may stop “being” a tree and instead “become” a symbol of an element rooted to the earth, “reaching” for the sky; that which is “stretched” between earthly and cosmic order. The tree of life, axis mundi – these are all symbols created by the clash of man and his perception with his surroundings. In this understanding, the symbol evolves from experience and the attempt of understanding reality.

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Myth as speech is a multifarious record for Barthes, the myth-speech can be: speech as such as well as literature, photography, reportage, advertisement and the like. In “Mythologies” he shows us in a practical way what this might mean. He shows us attempts to grasp beauty, the dependence of eternality on temporality and the relationships between perfection and imperfection in human life. The philosopher speaks about different elements of everyday life and events. These man tries to understand, and in the process periodically “moves” them to another “dimension”, thus conferring significance on this “everydayness”. In a series of short myth-stories, in which all these elements of culture arise, as medieval transcendentals, Barthes shows what is the foundation for the most important symbols of culture. What is essential in Mythology is to show that myths (of everydayness) are the exhibition of man’s entanglement in ideals where the action of a Man is situated between or entangled in two borders – the first representing the limits of our possibilities, the second, our ideals as manifest in our utopian projects. Being in relation to the world in this context is being in relation to ideals and individual projects whose realisation can guarantee man his constitution. But, as we know from the existential commentary, this constitution is never to be finished. The myths of everydayness shown by Barthes point to one more very important rule. Its description was also attempted by Cassirer. Man is neither directly in his world, nor does he understand his reality in an unambiguous way. In human existence there is always the inherent activity of consciousness. That activity has the power to change human existence, taking it into another mythological “dimension”. Mythologising, or, as Cassirer would state it, symbolising points to the situation in which reality, on one hand is never privy to man from an extracultural perspective, and on the other allows man to transcend the biological foundations and mechanisms of nature. Symbolising places tasks in front of the man thereby building culture as a mediatory space. However, the difference between Barthes and Cassirer is a fundamental one. For the French thinker, word-myth is what appears in Man’s clash with reality and is conditioned by that same mythogenic reality. For the German philosopher symbolising, effected by man is possible because we possess, as Kant would state it, the apriori structures of symbolical thinking. In other words man can only always perceive the world through symbols. However, Cassirer shares with Barthes a belief about the adaptation of speech to the human world and the relation which appears between our surroundings and our descriptions of it. The world given in language is still the subject of our anxiety; it calls us to reconsider, and it inspires us. It is impossible to escape from this anxietyinspiration. Yet for Cassirer it is not that reality is mythogenic, but instead that our symbolising imposes upon the world additional meanings. Language has a special function, for through it the world itself is given to us.

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Analyzing this phenomenon, Cassirer shows how, in different languages, the slow process of the creation of abstract notions takes place. This process is related to the change in human perception and our reactions to the world. The “primal attitude” of man towards reality is the most “direct” one since then culture was embryonic and as such relatively uninfluential. Then, existence was proportionately more “concrete”: hot, cold, big, small, useful or distant. Every notion related directly to the described phenomenon. Abstraction appeared with time, and it allowed us to not only perceive, but also to describe whole classes of objects, thereby overcoming the individual perception of the world. That is why Cassirer calls it the process of “raising towards notions and universal categories” which are at the same time “developments of speech”,7 developing consequently our knowledge of the world. The language as a symbolic form is therefore a specific space where human consciousness and knowledge express themselves. Language has on the one hand the ability to preserve for us certain “stories”, becoming, in record, a form of memory. On the other hand, language, as a description leading to abstract notions – so also to broad issues concerning reality – preserves for us the “over-individual”, which our individual experience could have never grasped. “Memory” here the reader will recall is of a specific kind. It relates, as in Barthes’ word-myth to archetypes, general symbols of reality. For Cassirer it provides the possibility of expressing our vision of the world, providing then a certain way of cognition and with it formation of our vision of the world. Repeatedly, memory plays tricks on us. Sometimes it covers more than we think it does. Sometimes it unveils something out-of-date, causing surprise or renewed fascination. Memory, we could say, doesn’t act directly, and its functioning cannot be narrowed down to simple associations. When we say that there is a correlation of memory to symbol, we mean that symbol is a specific kind of culture-memory. This idea posits yet another definition of symbol. The symbol often doesn’t act directly. But frequently symbol covers that which is given to us directly and because of this we may say symbol acts in a “negative” way and paradoxically in so doing reaches a deeper level of meaning, hidden to our first perception. Writing of language, I deliberately didn’t make a distinction between the written word and speech. Cassirer himself pointed out this duality. It is difficult to forget it, for in philosophy a certain division along this line is entrenched. Let us go back to Plato for a moment, for in this philosopher’s thought, as in most cases, a suggestion solving this problem is hidden. Discussing speech and the written word both in Phaidros and in the 7th letter, Plato marks the qualitative difference between writing and speech. Writing preserves, it closes off meaning into a record that cannot be developed or revitalised. These meanings lend themselves to manifold interpretation and misunderstanding. They

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become defenseless to the indiscreet intrusions of the reader. Moreover, writing, as Plato emphasizes, relieves memory, that is, what is written may be forgotten – a piece of paper may contain all the necessary information, a book will present us its knowledge, to which we may return at our leisure. Ipso facto, writing is connected to forgetting, and as such is a negative process, in which man distances himself from the essential. The situation with speech is different. It demands engagement and memory. It is alive. In speech we most effectively develop our thoughts. But speech is open. It provokes. It allows us to ask questions and reconstitute meanings. Speech searches for truth. It does not provide for us a closed text. Above all, the speech is dialogical, so it opens us to cooperation with another man. Valuation which was made at the beginning by Plato emphasizes the role of memory which involves man in the process of thinking. Concentration, and the effort of memory which is required in speech is simultaneously an effort serving the purpose of cognition. Writing which as we have seen closes and disorganizes memory entails a degeneration of human thought. Although symbol is a record of meaning, a closure in a specific representation, it has, unlike writing, a provocative character. Rather, symbol is like speech: it acts indirectly, asks a question, provokes, gives rise to thought. Symbolic record is not an unambiguous record. It is an interpretative statement. It demands from man discussion, engagement. In symbol memory becomes stimulated. Through concealment, the symbol forces us to see things in a completely different light. It makes us bring back from memory details which surpass our direct or simple sensation of the world. By concealing, the symbol shows us the activity of memory and thus engages the man with his world – the world of culture-reality into which his being was thrown. To close this story about symbol and about memory as it was encoded into it, we must here emphasize an important, if not the paramount issue – time. Time and memory are linked inseparably together. Since Bergson and his “Matter and memory”, it is difficult to add here anything new. What we can do though, is to emphasize this dependence. Cassirer refers to Bergson’s concept, paying him homage and suggesting at the same time, that his ambition is to outline the problem from a different perspective – the perspective of phenomenology of culture8 . Time and memory are symbolic forms and as such mediatory. In this case the mediation stretches between our experiences and that which is past, and is recorded in our memory and, due to the flow of time, partially taken away from us. The past is always given to us in a symbolic representation, introduced to us by our memory. In Cassirer’s analysis we can see not only elements of Bergson’s concept, but, above all, a husserlian inspiration. The concept of “retention” and “protention”, understood as a consciousness of the passage

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of time, is a concept which points to the many levels of our experience or “imagining” of the future and past. This concept is helpful in reading Cassirer’s thought. “Symbolic memory is the process by which man not only repeats his past experience but also reconstructs this experience. Imagination becomes a necessary element of true recollections”.9 The human consciousness collects individual data, stores and organizes it. This motion of organization develops into constituted meaning. This moment refers to the concept of Sartre, who in his glorification of human freedom emphasized that even the past does not have a determining influence. This is because consciousness not only has the ability to decide which “moment” of the past to “bring forward”, but also it can change this past in its process of reevaluation and reconstitution of meaning. Ipso facto it is the man that decides his “vision of the past”, in memory. In this way we may say that it rules over the past. In opposition to Sartre, Cassirer does not here see Man’s “freedom” in operation, instead he emphasizes the “creativity” of memory itself. Memory operates on the representations given it. That is why not only the past, but also the present “reflects” in it. In other words, memory presents past events in an unclean way, applying new interpretations, desires and aspirations to them. Subordinated to the activity of consciousness, memory nonetheless co-operates and together they present us “the past”. The past has a symbolical aspect for Cassirer. Indeed, it cannot have any other since only through symbolic memory can we “reach the past”. This does not imply, however, that it is completely fixed. Nor can we say it is a process of falsification. In symbolic memory the activity of consciousness is revealed. It acts indirectly. It constantly forces us to interpret and reinterpret as it establishes new ground for new premises and outlines a new area of meaning. In an evident way, the interpretation of hermeneutics returns here since it is there that it is emphasized that it is impossible to experience the past in an objective and uncommitted way. Always we are engaged in the past in the present. This engagement is of an inquiring attitude which presents us facts from the past in the light of the present. Not without significance, while analyzing the matter of symbolic memory, Cassirer draws his examples from culture. Firstly, he points to Goethe and his biography with its telling title “Truth and fiction”. Here the past undergoes the rigorous processes of reconstruction. What is past is subjected to interpretation. This means that this past takes place, once again, but this time through the prism of contemporary re-reading. Cassirer concludes with a characteristic statement: Goethe “wanted to discover and describe the truth about his life, but this truth could only be found by giving to the isolated and dispersed facts of his life a poetical, that is a symbolic shape”.10

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Cassirer also quotes Henrik Ibsen, with his remark that the poet becomes the most severe judge for himself. This judgment, elicited by poetry, is the judgment of symbolic memory and consciousness, which, analyzing the past, makes it the object of its inquiry. The man, thanks to this analysis, can, once again, “understand” these past events, and ultimately “himself”. This “analysis” of the past leads to a “deeper” understanding of human existence. We can now see clearly that the adventure of symbolical consciousness confronted with time can guide our thinking about symbol and the understanding of the world in new directions. It’s not a question of grasping the meaning of poesis of life and the relationship between man and reality. Neither is it an issue of the visualization of cultural relations taking place between people thanks to the “symbolic record”, and through this record, developing more and more complex structures. This whole reality can become, through memory’s reconstruction, a mirror – not only of the world itself, but also of the individual’s being. In this way, symbolic memory can lead to an understanding of the complex relations in the world and between self and the world. Jagiellonian University, Cracow, Poland NOTES 1

W. Stró˙zewski, Sens i istnienie, Znak, Kraków, 1998, p. 238. P. Ricoeur, The Interpretation Theory. Discourse and the superplus of the meaning, Christian University Press, 1976, p. 45/55. 3 E. Cassirer, An Essay on Man. An introduction to a philosophy of human culture, Yale University Press, 1963, p. 174. 4 Ibid., p. 174/175. 5 Ibid., p. 221. 6 Ibid., p. 221. 7 Ibid., 230. 8 Ibid., p. 51. 9 Ibid., p. 52. 10 Ibid., p. 52. 2

SEMIHA AKINCI

O N K N OW I N G : W H E T H E R O N E K N OW S

ABSTRACT

I will start with a poem, which I intend to tie up to this poem firstly in response to one of my frequent lamentations concerning the lack of imagination common to most of us and secondly of Kant for the lead he gave the Romantic Idealist by refusing the possibility of knowing the realm of physical noumena. I have since regretted that, I do not do a good job of defending my criticism of the transcendental philosophy, confining myself rather to pointing out some of the unfortunate consequences of that approach, as rendered explicit in the evil of Hegel’s teaching. I would take the opportunity offered by this article to amend this failing by offering an internal criticism of the conception of knowledge on which the transcendental philosophy apparently rests. I will try to bring out the connection with the poem. INTRODUCTION

The words of the Persian poem translate roughly to the following effect: • Applaud and adore the one who knows, and also knows that he knows, for he has undoubtedly attained God’s blessing; • Alert and make aware the one who knows, but does not know that he knows, for he is missing the pleasure the most valuable treasure can give; • Do not despise or deride the one who does not know, but at least knows that he does not know, for he can conduct his lame as whither he will; • But beware and feared of the one who does not know, and also does not know that he does not know, for he is verily the worst curse of God. Kant’s theoretical philosophy seems to be based on the following two main premises: (1)The consciousness processes the data which reaches it directly from the realm of physical noumena1 and transforms this data into a product which is empirical knowledge. What is known is this product, not the source of the raw data; the realm of noumena is not knowable at all. (2)We know the truth of synthetic a-priori propositions because these are true in virtue of the way in which the processing consciousness is constituted; at least some of us, including Kant himself, can attain detailed knowledge concerning the structure of the consciousness, as a consequence of which it transforms the data from the realm of noumena into phenomena2 in the particular way it does. Oizerman argues 143 A-T. Tymieniecka (ed.), Analecta Husserliana CII, 143–148. c Springer Science+Business Media B.V. 2009 

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that while Kant did often relate the noumena to things in themselves, noumena are objects of pure reason, and have no relation to our sense perceptions. As such they lie outside the realm of knowledge and are unable to be proved. Things in themselves, however are not objects of pure reason, they affect our sensibilities through phenomena, or the world of appearances.3 Because we perceive these appearances, there must be something that is appearing. Since they are linked to the world of appearances, things in themselves are subject to categories of unity, plurality, causality, community, possibility, actuality and necessity. This assertion is exactly why many people object to the idea of things in themselves. Kant states that we can have no knowledge of them, yet Oizerman says that we can think of them in terms of those categories. Shaper discusses the thing in itself as a philosophical fiction. By this she means that Kant was not advancing the thing in itself as a truth that is evident from what he had proven in his theories, but a useful tool to understand phenomena. The thing in itself is a theoretical limit on noumena.4 The thing in itself, or the object, as opposed the phenomenon, the subjective effect produced in our consciousness. These two assertions are not immediately compatible, since while (1) says only phenomena, the products of the consciousness, can be known, (2) quite transparently implies that the consciousness, and the way it transforms data from noumena, can also be known, although knowledge concerning the structure of the consciousness is not itself among the items of knowledge produced by consciousness. One way of reconciling this tension is to introduce a distinction between directly phenomenal knowledge, which consists exclusively of the immediate deliverances of the consciousness, and obliquely phenomenal knowledge, which is attained through investigation of the pervasive relevant features of such immediate deliverances. Once some such distinction is introduced, it may consistently be maintained that (1) and (2) are about directly phenomenal knowledge, while they are themselves prima examples of obliquely phenomenal knowledge. While admitting such meta-empirical knowledge, as it were, may well go against the grain of radical empiricism, such an admission seems to be an unavoidable premises of the transcendental philosophy, and may be the most satisfactory way of harmonizing the claim that some synthetic truths may be known a-priori with the basic empiricist tenet that all knowledge is ultimately based upon experience of phenomena. Once the possibility of obliquely empirical knowledge is admitted, there seems to be little sense in restricting the knowledge obtainable by its means to the structure of the consciousness, for continuing to hold that the realm of noumena is not accessible to knowledge. For if knowledge of a processor is obtainable at all, say through investigation of its products, there

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would seem to be no reason why such knowledge is limited to the structure of the processor, to the exclusion of the general features of the data that structure is suited to process. In fact one of the most important features there is to be known about a processor is the sort of data it accepts as input. Knowing the structure of a processor, then, involves knowing the peculiarities of its input. But according to the analogy between a processor and the transcendent consciousness on which the present discussion draws, the output of the processor is directly empirical knowledge, whereas the hardware configuration is what gives rise to synthetic a-priori propositions; pursuing the analogy on the same lines, the input is some sort of message received immediately from noumena. Oblique knowledge should, therefore, be capable of showing not only that the consciousness processes data received from noumena, but also what these messages are, and how their content is transformed, by means of the processor in question, to the deliverances of direct experience, To say that one is totally ignorant of what it is that a processor processes does not seem to be compatible with a claim to know how the processor structure operates upon these mysterious messages to transform them into knowable items; the first thing to be known about a processor is what it does to what. Hence on the processor analogy those messages which are received from the realm of noumena and are transformed into empirical knowledge need themselves to be knowable, as the input of the processor whose structure is assumed to be knowable. For instance, it is clear that knowledge can only be generated when the understanding and the sensibility are employed in conjunction and can never operate independently of one another.5 On this account Kant is to be construed as asserting not that the realm of noumena is absolutely unknowable but that it is knowable only via an examination of the features of direct experience; so directly empirical knowledge does in fact convey information concerning noumena, although not by means of immediately passing on the messages they broadcast, but rather after processing and transforming those messages according to the way the processor is made to transform them. “Recognizing that it (the understanding) cannot know these noumena (i.e., noumenal objects) through any of the categories (since they apply only to objects of possible experience), and that it must therefore think them only under the title of an unknown something”.6 The relevant point is that given knowledge of the output, and of the rules according to which data is transformed by the processor in order to yield some output, a backward analysis of the output can, in principle, always be conducted so as to yield reliable information concerning the input data which was transformed into that output. On the processor model of consciousness which Kant was to all appearances endorsing, the messages from the noumena to the consciousness

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should themselves be known, howbeit in a roundabout way, involving the analysis of the experimental data into which they were perforce transformed in the process of becoming objects of consciousness. One notes that, on the model in question, this is also the way in which synthetic a-priori propositions are known. It appears that the same indirectly empirical process by means of which we learn how the consciousness functions should, at least in principle, be capable of informing us about the pervasive features of the noumenal messages which are transformed into experiences as a result of that functioning. So if most of the way of thinking behind the transcendental philosophy is plausible, the contention that the realm of noumena is not plausible; more specifically, the contention that synthetic a-priori propositions, and their source, are knowable is not compatible with the contention that the immediate messages from the noumena are entirely inaccessible to knowledge. The former sort of knowledge can not itself be among the direct deliverances of the consciousness, and if some sort of secondary, oblique knowledge is assumed as the source of contentions concerning the structure and rules of the consciousness, it can no longer be plausibly maintained that access to messages from noumena is not possible for this oblique manner of knowing also. This is emphatically so on the processor analogy of the transcendental philosophy, and I am not aware of any other analogy which would fit quite as well. This distinction, suggested by but not made in Kant’s philosophy, of directly empirical versus obliquely empirical knowledge, the latter of which is capable of attaining to knowledge concerning noumena, suggests itself as a good way of distinguishing scientific from philosophical knowledge, while not severing their mutual interdependence, and also retaining a robust, if obliquified, connection between experience and philosophy, in that philosophical knowledge is construed as ultimately depending upon experience, although on an interpretation rather than systematization of experience. Not the least repugnant aspect of Kant’s original theoretic philosophy is the difficulties it puts in the way of attempts to account for the distinction between knowing and not quite knowing, but, say, merely supposing.7 A claim to know is a claim have cognitive access to the structure of a realm which may be accessed but not created or modified by mental activity; in fact, error results from failing to distinguish between the objective structure confronting cognition and the subjective, mind-dependent contortions imposed upon data through which such confrontation is achieved. To assert that all minds contort data in the same way is to assert that all minds make the same errors, not that all minds equally veridical. Thus asserting that all knowledge is produced by the mind is to deny the distinction between fact and fiction, between

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knowledge and error; if output items cannot be checked against the initial data they are supposed to be transformations of the distinction between good and bad output, between knowledge and error, can no longer be made, as the romantic lovers of creation were quick to note. One would think that the primary motivation for discovering the structure of some processor would be the intention of discovering the standard distortions it imposes upon all input alike, with a view towards subsequently eliminating them in order to retrieve the original input data; this is the whole point to noise elimination. So if the original input is irretrievable, not only is the distinction between message and noise lost, but so is the distinction between a data processor and a noise generator. In terms of knowledge, it is not possible, on Kant’s original position, either to know that one knows, or to know that one does not know. Coming back to our Persian poem, Kant’s original position apparently prohibits anybody’s enjoying the supreme pleasures only the most valuable treasure can effort. Much, much worse, it bars the most vital distinction between those who can drive their lame asses to their modest destinations and the worst curses of God. The world would be a very much worse place if that distinction were not very real. Anadolu University, Eskisehir-Turkiye

NOTES 1 For Kant we can have no noumenal (objects of reason) knowledge. The word noumena has two senses, the positive sense which states the any knowledge of noumena is nonsensible, and a negative sense in which there can not be any knowledge of noumena through sensible means. Things in themselves can be thought about as noumena in the negative sense, but have no relation to the positive sense of the world. 2 Objects of empirical knowledge. Phenomena, much like appearance, is a much simpler term, and means that which is evident to the senses. Appearance then, can be understood as a phenomenon. 3 T. I Oizerman., Kant’s Doctrine of the “Things in Themselves” and “Noumena”, Philosophy Phenomenological Research and, vol. 41, No. 3, Mar., 1981, pp. 333–350. 4 Eva Shaper., “The Kantian Thing in Itself as a Philosophical Fiction”, Philosophical Quarterly, Vol. 16, No. 64, History of Philosophy Number. Jul., 1966, pp. 233–243. 5 Immanuel Kant., Critique of Pure Reason, (B 314). 6 Ibid., (B 312). 7 Ewing does this by pointing out Kant’s distinction between determinate knowledge and indeterminate thought. We have no knowledge of things in themselves, but it is useful to have thoughts about them. These thoughts are not based on any positive assumptions but rather on a lack of any features, spatial or temporal, that make up knowledge. Ewing, A. C., A Short Commentary on Kant’s Critique of Pure Reason. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1938.

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Ewing, A.C., A Short Commentary on Kant’s Critique of Pure Reason. Chicago: Chicago University Press, 1938. Kant, I., Critigue of Pure Reason, 1781. (B edition). translated by Norman Kemp-Smith. New York: Macmillan and Company, 1929. Oizerman, T.I., “Kant’s Doctrine of the ‘Things in Themselves’ and Noumena”, Philosophy and Phenomenological Research, Vol. 41, No. 3, Mar., 1981, pp. 333–350. Shaper, E., “The Kantian Thing-in-Itself as a Philosophical Fiction”, Philosophical Quarterly, Vol. 16, No. 64, History of Philosophy Number. Jul., 1966, pp. 233–243.

J.C. COUCEIRO-BUENO

W I T H O U T B E AU T Y T H E R E I S N O T R U T H

ABSTRACT

This paper aims to renew the questions that examine the “being of beauty” as a truth experience that can be studied and perceived (it must be remembered that in Greek the verb to be – tò kalón– evokes the concept of beauty, as only that which is whole, balanced and complete may be beautiful). Any experience of art and beauty contains an intrinsic call for an alternative truth –which is more complete and on a higher plane– to scientific truth. The aim is to demonstrate that beauty and works of art are capable of revealing themselves as a probable and alternative means of existence. To this end, we initially turn to Husserl, who considers that aesthetic experience perceived through aesthetic intuition is comparable to the essential characteristic of philosophical thought. It is also necessary to consider Kant’s belief that beauty is related to thought. In this sense the perception of beauty is removed from intellectual activity as it takes place within the complete freedom of the faculty of knowledge. In other words, according to Kant the perception of beauty, which aims for universality, represents a realm of freedom achieved through aesthetic and reflective judgement. The German philosopher therefore considers that beauty is something new and innovative (which in turn is a way of understanding freedom). Having presented the historical background and supporting arguments, I go on to draw attention to the fact that art and beauty enable religion to be seen as an inhabitable and ontologically real world. Unlike scientific truth, aesthetic truth (beauty), religious truth, the truth of myth are not accessible to man through methods and demonstrations. This type of truth would be simply too naive and internally secure; quite the opposite in fact, aesthetic truth (beauty, religion, myth, play, etc) must be seen as a truth experience that leads us to form a “global theory of the world”, without which the individual simply cannot live. As far as the concept of play is concerned, it must be said that play adds a sense of order to our existence, in the same way that the play on beauty, on religion, adds sense to the darkness of our existence. Play is therefore a representation of the truth. The play on beauty in sacred forms leads to the conviction that life is lived out on a plane that is superior to our everyday existence. 149 A-T. Tymieniecka (ed.), Analecta Husserliana CII, 149–163. c Springer Science+Business Media B.V. 2009 

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In the light of these reflections, the paper concludes with two assertions: a) Literature and religion are manifestations of beauty which, regardless of issues of history and faith, enable us to see the world from an integral perspective, conferring upon it a greater sense of dignity. All this is dependent on the experience of truth transmitted by beauty. b) Beauty which manifests itself in art and religion represents an authentic truth experience, as they add a depth or dimension to life that is not apparent through mere observation or method. T H E R E N E WA L O F T H E Q U E S T I O N T H AT E X A M I N E S T H E B E I N G ( O F B E AU T Y )

I am convinced that we are currently at the perfect time (kairós) to, in Heideggerian terminology, renew the issue that examines the being; in this instance, the “being of beauty”, taken as an “experience of truth” that can be both perceived and experienced. It is clear that the starting point is the romantic idea/force, once again relevant as a result of phenomenological hermeneutics, which leads us to the conviction that art and beauty are an endless source of “experiences of truth and knowledge”. Or, to put it another way, the work of art and beauty are capable of demonstrating the probability of alternative forms of existence. The work of art also provides us with the experience of our own awareness that helps us to become at home with ourselves (Heimischwerden) and with the world and which is the real task of existence. On the other hand, it is worth remembering at this point that in Ancient Times the arts were a way of spreading religious truth. Music in particular played a decisive role in acts of worship.1 Consequently, an initial claim may be made that the work of art, the experience of beauty, is a means of examining ourselves, albeit in a different manner from the historiographical document which appears to make a statement about the historian. The work of art makes a statement to each individual in what can be considered as a highly personalised manner, yet in a present and simultaneous way. Our starting point is thus the aesthetic supposition that makes a claim to the nature of truth and beauty of the work of art. Several modern aesthetic theories insist that aesthetic experience is in fact a cognitive experience of truth. Husserl2 believed that aesthetic experience perceived through aesthetic intuition is comparable to the essential characteristic of philosophical thought, which, in turn, contrasts the knowledge associated with natural science and psychology.

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It is important to emphasise the fact that for Husserl, philosophy represented a kind of “rigorous Wissenchafft”, the result of the phenomenological epoché, which would have no need whatsoever for worldly items. Consequently, according to the founder of phenomenology, it is possible to capture the essence of things thanks to an “eidetic intuition”, which relegates the existence of the world to a secondary level. In order to achieve this, it is essential to exclude all psychological considerations. Such a perspective allows for the observation of similarities between the Husserlian theory of knowledge and the properties assigned to aesthetic experience by modernity. In other words, the Husserlian epoché is similar to the concept of disinterest that Kant assigns to aesthetic judgement. Yet in order to position the question of aesthetics within our modern day context, recourse must also be made to Polish thinker Roman Ingarden,3 one of the precursors of the Rezeptionstheorie (reader-response theory) and author of the magnificent work entitled Das listerarische Kuntswerk (1972). This Polish thinker believed that the essence of the work of art is transmuted into a metaphysical characteristic of experience. It is precisely in art and beauty that rather than realising these metaphysical characteristics, they are instead determined and revealed. The truth behind art and beauty lies in the “essential concatenation of intuitive self-presentation”. In this sense, Ingarden claims that the heteronymous and intentional nature of the work of art (and specifically the literary work of art), consists of four heterogeneous levels: (a) vocal linguistic productions; (b) units of meaning; (c) multiple schematic visions; and (d) represented objectivity. From there, Ingarden determines the ontological nature of art, which he sees as acting as an intermediary between reality and ideality. Ingarden’s intention is to differentiate art from psychologistic naturalism, as he believes that the aesthetic experience, the experience of the work of art represents a distancing from facts. We could say that he does not intend to associate art with the essence; instead his vision is that of the work of art that focuses on apparently extrinsic and external phenomena, such as vocal-linguistic stratum. Phenomena which will be seen as essential to the work of art and which will prevent its projection towards ideal and unintentional contexts. In terms of the issue that concerns us, it is also worth considering the thinking of Baumgarten,4 who claims that the internal logic of sensorial (aesthetic) knowledge is completely removed from the internal logic of science. He considers that this concept, which he terms analogon rationis, implies that generalities are to be found within the specific. This analogon rationis points directly to a criterion of internal coherence. This concept of internal coherence

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obviously bears no relation to the classical truth concept of “adequatio in res” (adaptation to reality). In this sense, Kant’s5 Critique of Judgement represents the culmination of his thought to the extent that he puts forward the reconciliation between the worlds of nature and freedom, which are clearly divided in the two previous Critiques. In the light of these discussions, Kant clearly associates beauty with free thinking. According to the Kantian approach, it appears within the context of the finality. Beauty is associated with the object, and may therefore not be perceived through the limited concepts of understanding. Consequently, beauty as a non-determined finality must be perceived through cognitive activity. An activity which Kant associated with taste. In this sense, the perception of beauty implies the total autonomy of intellectual activity and involves the free reign of our knowledge faculties; it is a question of making a judgement (namely taste) in which two cognitive faculties are involved (imagination and understanding), although it is a judgement of taste that will assert its own autonomy within the intellectual order. For Kant, aesthetic judgements are those that judge beauty within nature or art based on a sense of pleasure or liking. Yet it is important to emphasise that this German philosopher established a connection between judgements made specifically about nature and those made about beauty. Kantian thinking on beauty could be summarised by stating that it (judging beauty is a representation of the kingdom of freedom through reflective aesthetic considerations) will serve as an organic introduction to nature (reflective theological judgement) compared with the mechanicistic consideration of the determining judgement. In other words, Kant saw beauty not as perfection but as novelty or innovation (which in turn is a vision of freedom). In addition, Kant finds in beauty an aspiration to universal validity. This is due to the fact that the grund of aesthetic judgement represents the aspiration of the sense of taste to universal validity. Perceiving and judging something with pleasure is limited strictly to the scope of sensation; yet by claiming that something is beautiful, it not only generates a sensation of pleasure, but also the imperious need for others to experience that same sensation. Perceiving beauty within the judgement of taste therefore implies an attempt to establish its universal validity. As it is widely known, Hegel, Hölderlin and Schelling –the founders of German idealism– came up with the project that was echoed in their famous work entitled Das ältete Systemprogramm des deutschen Idealismos. For them, art (and specifically poetry) represents a preparatory stage for the realisation of the kingdom of freedom. Shiller, in his series of letters entitled On the Aesthetic Education of Man (1975), follows a similar line of thought: like Shelling,

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Hölderlin and Hegel, he believed that the kingdom of freedom could be built up on the basis of a sensitive religion that should be set up as a monotheism of reason and the heart, a polytheism of imagination and art, which takes the form of a new mythology of reason. His writings are in line with the Kantian aim of understanding beauty as a symbol of morality. We can therefore claim that the Systemprogramm, the Aesthetic Education of Man and the Critique of Judgement all draw particular attention to the close link between art and religion. At all events, it is important to highlight the fact that art provides religion with the ability to portray itself as an inhabitable and ontologically real world, as well as a major historical testimony that impacts on those undergoing those aesthetic experiences. In Truth and Method, Gadamer6 determinedly re-raises the issue regarding the truth of art. Distancing himself from Kantian subjectivity, he raises the question that art is quite possibly totally unrelated to knowledge. He firmly believes that all experiences of art and all experiences of beauty contain an inherent call for truth that is different from the truth of science and cannot be subordinated to it. Gadamer believes that aesthetic experience, the experience of beauty will reveal the endless interpretations of any work of art. The experience of art is never-ending; indeed, it is renewed at each new encounter and impacts on anyone who experiences it. It must therefore be claimed that aesthetic experience is essentially a hermeneutic experience, a happening (Ereignis) of truth: as Heidegger7 tells us, “art is the setting into work of truth”. He goes on to state that art is not an objective that lies before us and whose horizon must be drawn up and its laws established. It is instead a poetic work that will educationally direct our existence and which is based on the being and therefore names it. In the light of these claims, it is clear that both Heidegger and Gadamer see art as giving truth a location to become, a work-place. In this sense, they claim that it is not up to philosophy to define what is or is not art, but it is art itself that will reveal the nature of philosophy to us. Along these lines, Gadamer believes that the sense and meaning of human reality, the life-world (Lebenswelt), is made up of types of consolidations or transmutations that the poets exert on the life experiences of a community in order to be able to preserve them, celebrate them and update them as references indicating identity and sense. They therefore represent the “fundamental essence of the life-world”. Consequently, it is the artists, the poets, who are constantly seeking a form

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of expression and the words capable of accurately describing a communal experience that we wish to preserve on a permanent basis. In the light of these findings, and to bring this section to a close, we may claim that the revaluation of aesthetic considerations brings us closer to the “truth of religion”. Likewise, it also involves a certain distancing from the objectivist imposition of a scientificist concept of truth. The critique of the scientificist truth, the truth of the scientific method, contrasts with the essentially aesthetic (beautiful) nature of religious truth and the implications of rejecting all reductionism of the myth, the metaphor and the symbol, etc. Going beyond the “objectivities” of science, the aim is to establish the truth, without the need for futile and redundant recourse to examining aesthetic, religious, mythological and poetical discourses that the rational-objectivist discourses of scientificist truth attempt to reduce and isolate. An attempt is therefore made to liberate the plural nature of discourse, narrative and “life experiences”. We are unable to reach aesthetic truth, religious truth, the truth of the myth by methods and demonstrations; indeed, such a truth would be far too naive and internally insecure. It would instead constitute a kind of “truth experience” as an internal “global theory of the world” that is essential to the individual and that is only no longer experienced under the categories of aesthetics and art. Or in other words, of beauty.

T H E C L A S S I C A L E D U C AT I O N O F B E A U T Y

This nature of this essay requires a brief mention of Greek culture (paideia) and its basic aesthetic categories. As in all Greek education, in Plato aesthetics plays a fundamental role. Consequently, concepts such as rhythm, harmony, symmetry, consonance, equilibrium, etc., all make a major contribution to education (we must not lose sight of the fact that the majority of Greek transpositions come from medicine, a field of vital importance in both philosophy and paideia). It is also a period in which no conceptual distinction was made between philosophy, religion and poetry. Nor must it be forgotten that this was a period in which the poet’s mission was a “religious” one, as he acted as a mediator between the gods and the people. The aesthetic element eventually pervaded the essential concept of nomos (as opposed to physis). In this sense we must remember that in Greek nomos can mean “song” as well as “law”. This is due to the fact that in the Platonic educational system, songs and poems were considered to be “laws”.

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As far as Aristotle is concerned, we must go back to that excerpt from Metaphysics that invites us to create a philosophical basis for education: “All men by nature desire to know” (I, 1, 980 to 21). Aristotle refers to the man’s uncontrollable desire for sophia (knowledge), which is an inherent part of his being. Seen from this perspective, knowledge possesses the intellectual truth of things, and even today this remains a universal desire. On the other hand, it is also an age in which education is seen from the aesthetic autonomy of the form and of training (Bildung), which refers to man’s needs in order to model man, seen from the perspective of a specific type of man. This view of education has much in common with the ideal of art, as it tries to compensate for the deficiencies of nature through beauty (the aims of education). In turn, W. Jaeger,8 in his colossal work Paideia, boldly claims that Greek education could not be understood with poetry and rhetoric. Such as statement succinctly sums up in just a few words much of our intention in this work. Greek tradition has taught us that highlighting rhetoric and poetry is simply the other side of the coin that considers language as the centre of all reflection and action. Naturally, the language that it refers to is not the propositional language of the logos apofántico, which, incidentally, is as irrefutable as it is dispensable, but instead to the type of language that consistently goes beyond the narrow limits of logic (rhetorical and poetical language). The language of rhetoric and poetry is not predetermined: on the contrary, its mission is essentially practical and always implies the realisation of some form of action. Aristotle sees rhetoric9 as a techne, as well as a system of rules that are obtained from experience, which allows us to show how an action should be carried out in a way that leans towards perfectionism. What is absolutely clear is that for the Stagirite, rhetoric is a paideia seen as an authentic reasoning of conjecturable issues. Rhetoric lies between the poetic and the ethos without forgetting that due to its “practical truth”, it impacts directly on the scope of the polis. As far as poetry is concerned we must once again reiterate the fact that the Greek poets were the first educators of the people; their poems contain a wide range of knowledge and teachings that met the citizens’ needs. As a result, poetry was responsible for the spread of culture and art amongst the people, turning it into a quest for a sense of articulation that would act as a Paideia, and with sufficient powers to guide our conduct.

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As Aristotle10 solemnly claimed in Poetics, “poetry is more philosophical and elevated than history, since poetry relates more of the universal, and history relates the particular”. In short, the aim of Greek culture was to convert man’s education and training into a work of art, one in which poetry occupied a central role. Seen thus, aesthetics can be considered as a form of philosophy that impacts on beauty and on the teaching of the concept of good taste.

T H E G A M E O F B E AU T Y

The concept of play is an elemental function of human life. From this basis, Gadamer11 claims that the being of art will not be determined as the object of an aesthetic experience –taking the subject as a reference–, but instead that aesthetic knowledge forms part of the process of representation and belongs essentially to the game as play. Inspired by Nietzsche, Gadamer sees the concept of play as a provocative element that examines us and introduces us into the game, the game of the work of art, whose dynamics control and eventually change us. In this sense, he claims that rather than interpreting a work of art, what we actually do is to play its game and act it out. The pull of this game, the irresistible fascination it exerts, lies in the fact that it manages to take control of its players, causing them to “forget themselves”, for the duration of the game. He did not consider this subjection of the player to the game as a loss of self-control or an inability to dominate the situation; quite the contrary –it was seen as an experience of freedom that would create a sense of plenitude in the player. In all artistic experiences, in all experiences of beauty, Gadamer would emphasise the active participation of the spectator, indicating that all works of art leave a space which the spectator would be expected to fill. According to R. Ingarden, in literary works these “play” spaces correspond to the indeterminate schematic structures that require the concretisation of the reader (Konkretisation). A concept which, according to the thinking of Ingarden, has a clear ontological character and represents a key element in the reader-response theory. Concretisation is successful when the reader is capable of filling the indeterminate moments (Unbstimmtheitssllen). Play is a key concept in phenomenological and hermeneutic aesthetics. Unlike Kant, Gadamer, the founder of contemporary hermeneutics, instead of questioning the subject, considers the way of being of play. Play is therefore considered independently from the player’s subjectivity. This means that the subject of play is not the player, but the actual game itself. It is therefore the game that is in play.

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Play is what matters. It is a question of sacred seriousness. And the player of this game, in order to play, needs to give himself up to the concept of play. Seen from this perspective, the players are the necessary requirement in order to enable the game to achieve its state of “self-representation”. This is because the essence of play is the game itself, and not the players who are absorbed and carried along by it. Play is a statement of movement seen as a constant to and fro. Play consists of renewed movements (like those of a living being) yet which have no specific objective. According to Gadamer, it could even be argued that the game could continue without the players. We therefore can conclude that play is an “ordered to and fro structure” which lacks a predetermined object that therefore frees the player from taking initiatives or making an effort, just like everyday life. Consequently, this German philosopher sees play as an “enclosed world” that lies outside the objectives of our existence. It is clear that he is thinking of the ontological nature of play, and that it is an essential component of cultural life that pervades to myth and religious worship. It must be emphasised here that play represents a breakaway from everyday life, from the world of work and daily existence. It is also important to highlight the fact that in play, the player acts “as if” what is taking place in the game is really happening. Play is therefore essential, as it completes the life of each one of us. The order and rules of play (the order of experiencing beauty, religious order, for our interests) help to clarify the confusion that exists in our daily lives. Play adds a sense of order to our existence, in much the same way that the game of beauty, the game of religion, contributes meaning to the obscurity of our existence. Play represents a breakaway from “the everyday world”, due to the fact that it always provides us with the possibility of “being different from the way we really are”, of assuming a form other than that we use in our daily lives. In this context, Gadamer associates the game with the sacred. This is because the sacred ritual (seen as a celebration) implies a pause in everyday life and work. The game is therefore also a true representation. Just like the religious representation in which the individual is convinced that he is on a higher plane than in his everyday life. This means that the work of art has the nature of a highly complex game, an ontological game that establishes the world and which provides us with a vision of the world. Gadamer’s concept of play as the self-representation of a game is based on the idea that the game achieves this self-representation due to the fact that its

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task is to represent itself merely as play, and avoiding all references to everyday objectives. Play is self-representation because the self-representation of the game is the universal aspect of the being of nature. A final point here is that the player experiences the game as an extension of himself, a transformation of the individual that gives us the opportunity of acting as another person. All these Gadamerian reflections reveal the way in which the importance of subjectivity is lessened within the context of play, the sacred game of the celebration: indeed, the individual and personal manifestations of belief and non belief are reduced to mere meaningless voices.12

T H E R E L I G I O N O F B E AU T Y AG A I N S T T H E B E AU T Y O F RELIGION

As an initial consideration, it is important to bear in mind the fact that in Classical Greece no distinction was made between religion and poetry. Poíesis was understood as doing things with words and an act based on a pretension of truth. Beyond the issues of history and faith, religion as literature represents the possibility of a sense of integrity for the world, a sense of dignity on a higher plane than a merely factual one. And this is attributable to the experience of truth transmitted by beauty. Religious culture (Paideia/bildung) is a mythical culture. Indeed, no-one would ever be capable of understanding any form of culture, including religious culture, other than from a mythical perspective. The difficulties begin to appear when certain religions (and Christianity in particular) start to take themselves seriously, creating a common place of thought: the shift from myth to logos. At all events, this is just another historical fact, and as such is susceptible to a chain of interpretations and reinterpretations. The shift from “myth to logos” is merely a trivial matter that certain philosophies throughout history have turned into an unquestionable truth (which, it must be said, is neither true nor unquestionable), as a result of the direct influence of positivist scientificism and historicism. But let us return to the question of myth. What exactly do we mean when we refer to myth? Myth is the need to experience a higher truth seen as a mixture of what is true and what is constructed, converted into an experience that contains so much truth that there is no need for verification and allows us the freedom to play the game of interpretation/reinterpretation.

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Myth is made up of “literatured voices” from a past that is symbolically richer than our own. This was clearly acknowledged by Romanticism with its new sensitivity for mythical (or religious) and symbolic (or metaphysical) forms. Indeed, myth is a narrative that transmits its truth through emotion and commotion, through the “motion of feelings”. They represent a truth that needs no verification (obviously, because for all human beings, their feelings always hold more truth than their thoughts). Myth is essentially anything that can be told or narrated without anybody being able to wonder whether it is actually true. Myth is anything that is out of the reach of scientific procedure. In Platonic terms, myth is the “experience of truth” when someone narrates something to us and we realise that what we understand has sufficient dignity to be considered as “the truth”. Or to put it another way, truth is comprehension. And this “truth” is the truth of myth and of religion. The significance of myth and its relation with religion has come up against a major obstacle in the form of monotheist religions (book religions) which, officially at least, renounce myth, although they are actually unable to prevent myth from forming the original source of their truth. An abysm has appeared between myth and monotheist religions. And the seriousness of this situation lies in the fact that this “distancing” from myth has led to a confrontation between their “truth” (of mythical origin) and that other “secularised” truth, which is the truth of science. In the light of this situation, the pretended truth of religion, distanced from myth, clashes with the truth of modern science. The result is the “endogenous secularisation” that monotheist religions (and Christianity in particular) are currently experiencing. This endogenous secularisation has brought about a process of decline and delegitimisation in the Christian religion which, contrary to the beliefs of its official exegetes, is not the result of the progressive disenchantment of the world or the process of secularisation which has spread throughout the West since the Age of Enlightenment. The real reason behind this process of secularisation is the result of Christianity’s insistence on confronting its “religious truth” (of mythical origin) with the truth of science, which is a truth consisting of mere “resignation to fate”. Somewhat surprisingly, religions seem to be unaware of the fact that all areas of science (following the harsh criticism of phenomenological hermeneutics of truth as an adaptation, as a verifiable conformity to intention) display a tremendous fragility and lack of security in their supposedly true evidence. They are transmitted to the mass media as “unquestionable truths”, as modern-day science (and especially scientificism) is more an ideology (in the style of a “naturalised religion”) than a programme and method of research. Religions possess their

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own “truth experiences” that are free to break the shackles of the scientific ideal of “objective truth”, which is simply an underlying “civil and mundane totalitarianism” and a means of tentatively negotiating our way through our fear of finitude. It was Heidegger who invalidated the closed and metaphysical ideal of truth as adequatio, thereby providing religions (and myth) with a second opportunity to give up on their confrontation with scientific truth. It is obvious that the censorship of the phenomenological hermeneutics of scientificist objectivism is deeply rooted in the writings of Heidegger, Gadamer and Wittgenstein, who have revealed the metaphorical nature of all forms of language. This has discredited the supposedly true language of science, which in reality is merely lexicalised metaphorical language.13 A review of objectivist truth from the perspective of phenomenological hermeneutics reveals that while it may distance itself from Kant’s aesthetic subjectivism, it will willingly accept the universality of truth based on the Critique of Judgement discussed earlier. In the light of the above, it can be claimed that religions need to grasp the fact that art is the only way of spreading the innocence of the religious message. Religion cannot spread its message by asking experts and technicians to verify whether their “scientific truth” agrees with the “religious truth”. As I have said earlier, religious truth has its “own truth”, the truth of myth, which is so overwhelming that instead of controlling it, it controls us. The truth that provides us with the only means of picking our way gingerly through the obscurity of our lives. Naturally, this is also the truth of love, of falling in love, of the religiousness of love: seen in terms of the experience of both religion and love, we discover the tide of passion that sweeps us along, leading us to forget ourselves. Such is the strength of this truth, that any attempts to verify it would arouse deep suspicion. Unfortunately, all the major religions (and Christianity in particular) have their own “endogenous secularisation” that leads them to cast aside the tremendous force of the truth of art and of beauty, in an attempt to hypocritically “keep up with the times”. What these religions should really do is to try to “keep and live up to their origins and history”. Perhaps they are unaware of the value of the work of art, of beauty as a substratum of religious truth which, imbued with mythical truth, is a plural experience, unlike the truth of science. Of interest here is Gadamer’s concept of the festival.14 He sees the festival as a break from daily chores and routine and a time when men may encounter the gods. According to Hegel,15 religion and art are forms in which the spirit is already present, but which is manifest in an inappropriate, representative and sensitive manner.

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For Hegel, the festival is a “living work of art” which man makes in his own honour. In his Theological Writings, Hegel16 describes the festival by invoking the nostalgia of Greece, whereby all those participating constituted the aesthetic representation of freedom. Festivals are not for attending, they are for taking part in. According to Gadamer, the most important aspect of the festival is that it is an event in which active participation is required, from the theoros. Greek philosophy conserves the characteristic of the religious background to reason. Theoros is the person that takes part in a festive mission, as a spectator in the truest sense of the word. Theoros represents true participation, a sense of feeling possessed and pulled along by active observation. The attendance of the theoros17 implies a sense of self-oblivion, as the spectator must give himself up to contemplation or celebration, putting his own individuality aside. It is therefore a participative extroversion, which in Greek is termed enthousiasmós (like Plato’s “superior power”). F I NA L C O DA Art and the manifestation of beauty are a form of understanding life. Between knowledge and action, life opens up to a dimension or depth that is inaccessible to both observation and method. Art and beauty are the closest we can aspire to. They speak to us with a familiarity that takes over our whole being, reducing all sense of distance. Any encounter with a work of art is a reencounter with our own being. It must be remembered here that Hegel positioned art amongst the figures of the absolute spirit. This means that he saw art as one of the means to knowledge and the education of the spirit, free from any foreign beings and all lack of comprehension. It must therefore be claimed that the experience of art enables us to identify ourselves, to recognise the world we belong to and its meaning. When the great religions are finally able to find a space for the authentic experiences of truth in our lives, in art and beauty, then they may well manage to recapture their real essence and fundamentals. When monotheist religions finally become aware that science is merely a fundamentalist and lay monotheism, then they will probably lose all interest in the reports that come from the fields of science and technology. When religions finally discover that science is a space that limits freedom, in which there is only one possible form of expression, namely the monologue, then they will finally be able to invoke their mythical past without fear, thereby creating the spiritual experiences that are also those of art, the experience of beauty and literature, whereby things are expressed in one way, but they may well be another way, without altering the essence of spirituality, but increasing

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the spaces of liberty and interpretation that in science are simply non-existent (especially in scientificism). When religions finally recognise the sacred function of art and beauty, then they will once again find the path of true religiousness. It is clear that our broken, fragmented and dangerous world is a serious threat, and that the only way of creating a full and meaningful life is through art or religion. Yet my point throughout this paper has been that in order to catch even the slightest glimpse of an integral and full world we must recognise religion as a form of art and art as a form of religion. In truth, a work of art is already in itself a sacred object. Religion should learn from the experience of art how it manages to transform a strange object into something reassuring and familiar. It is unquestionable that it is the experience of beauty that will provide us with a privileged access to truth. Religions should take good heed of this message if they wish to survive in a constantly shifting world. La Coruna University, Spain NOTES 1 The disappearance of manifestations of beauty, as is occurring in Catholic churches, is pathetic. It is devastating to visit a modern-day place of worship and observe a complete absence of beauty, which rids them of all sense of an invitation to religious experience. How sad and embarrassing it is to listen to a priest struggling to keep in tune whilst singing vulgar tunes in front of a shrill-sounding microphone! What an image of decadence and above all of spiritual abandon! I believe that Cioran has captured the essence of this problem when he states that beauty (especially musical beauty) is the only thing capable of convincing you that the Universe is not a complete failure. It is easy to see what this Rumanian philosopher meant. 2 E. Husserl, Lettera a Hugo von Hofmannsthal (1907). 3 R. Ingarden, Das listerarische Kuntswerk. Eine Untersuchung aus dem Grenzgebiet der Ontologie, Logik und Literaturwissenschaft, Niemeyer, Tubinga (1972). 4 H. Baumgarten, L’Estetica, Palermo, Aesthetica Edizione (2000). 5 Kant, Kritik Urteilskraft, 1970 (Crítica del Juicio, Madrid, Austral, 2001). 6 H. G. Gadamer, Verdad y Método I. Fundamentos de una hermeneútica filosófica. (Salamanca: Sigueme, 1977), 121–142. 7 M. Heidegger, Der Ursrung der Kunstwerkes, en Holzwege (Frankfurt, 1950). 8 W. Jaeger, Paideia. Los ideales de la cultura griega (México: F.C.E, 1967). 9 Aristóteles, Retórica (Madrid: Gredos, 1974). 10 Aristóteles, Poética (Madrid: C.E.C). 11 H. G. Gadamer, op. cit., “La ontología de la obra de arte y su significado hermenéutico/El juego como hilo conductor de la explicación ontológica”, 143–181. 12 Religiousness, transcendence, the need for personal continuity, literature, poetry and myth do not depend on our opinions. In contrast, they are subjected to linguistic structures that speak to us and transmit their experiences in order to create our Weltchaunntaungen.

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In order to confirm my theoretical suppositions, I must say that I have always been highly amused by public manifestations of “fervent belief” or of “recalcitrant agnosticism or atheism”: I never fail to feel surprise at the “religiousness” of the words and writings of the most eminent atheists or agnostics. Similarly, I am also always dumbfounded by the worrying “secularised” doubts and conduct of those individuals that publicly manifest a belief beyond question. In other words, in the face of original religiousness, in the face of the myth and the existential possibilities of literature, in the face of the opening up of the world of poetry, the human being is of very little significance indeed. He is trapped within linguistic structures that are actually far more important than he is. It is not so much a question of a personal decision of whether to “believe” or “disbelieve”. It is definitely more a matter of the need for the linguistic structure of the myth. 13 J. C. Couceiro-Bueno, “Ontofiction: the altered comprehension of the world” Analecta Husserliana: The Yearbook of Phenomenology (Boston: Kluwer Academic, 2000), vol. LX. 14 H. G. Gadamer, Die Aktualität des Schönen (Stuttgart, 1977). 15 Hegel, Vorlesungen ubre die Ästhetik (Berlín, 1835–1838). (Lecciones de Estética, Akal, Madrid, 1989). 16 Hegel, Theologische Jugendschriften (Tubinga, 1907). 17 H. G. Gadamer, Lob der Theorie (Frankfurt del Main: Suhrkamp, V., 1983).

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E L A P R I O R I C O R R E L AT I V O Y O N T O L Ó G I C O D E L L E N G UA J E Á N G E L A M O R RU I BA L ( 1 8 6 9 – 1 9 3 0 )

ABSTRACT IN ENGLISH

At the beginning of the 20th century, the linguist, philosopher and Galician theologian Á. Amor Ruibal outlines a theory of language based originally in L. Hervás y Panduro, G. de Humboldt., M. Bréal and the Indian, Hebrew, Greco-Roman, Patristic, hermeneutic, positivist and comparatist traditions. From them he infers a synthetic – historical method that combines both morphology and syntax while discovering a relational and translative principle that concerns also the pre-logical or notional foundation of knowledge. The nominal act happens, as the cognitive one, fusing in a nucleus of entitative assignment the qualities proceeding from the object. Such a nucleus is also a designation of the entities that it includes as its own ontological extension and as radical projection, in language, of the morfo-syntactic basis assisted by infixes, metaphony and other modes of the lexical and syntactic course. This is made possible because the nominal and cognitive act re-flow on the pre-logical qualities taking now as their predicate the reality thus perceived, processed and judged. The idea postcedes the judgment and contains already, as the word, a basis of underlying predication instituted by the notional a priori, so that there is a predicative process previous to the constitution of the nuclearized subject. Reality predicates from the entitative nucleus formed on the sensitives that proceed from it. Amor Ruibal establishes thus a principle of real entitative relativity that affects language and objective thought of things. The syntactic form turns into ontological link. The object is processed discursively in its qualities and these are attached in a nominal thematic synthesis: the objet of the subject cognoscens, subject of attributions whose inherent relation is the ontological entity, in a pre-propositional relation. The implicit response to the Hegelian dialectics runs parallel with the system of Amor Ruibal while agreeing with Husserl, since both philosophers discover, each one on his own, as they never knew each other, the ontological conditions of signification, the structure of language and conscience. Once produced, the word re-flows on the cognitive act and assists with its own modality to the constitution of meaning and the expression of the objective essence. It assumes the mental space in which this happens as genetic tension of knowledge. Amor Ruibal thus precedes 165 A-T. Tymieniecka (ed.), Analecta Husserliana CII, 165–193. c Springer Science+Business Media B.V. 2009 

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in several aspects F. de Saussure, both from common readings and personal reflections. He creates a linguistic gnoseology of philosophical scope that is still challenging, after being marginalised for one century, isolated. The structural, generative and cognitive linguistics already find an appealing precedent in this gnoseological system. A B S T R A C T I N S PA N I S H

A comienzos del siglo XX, el lingüista, filósofo y teólogo gallego Á. Amor Ruibal esboza una teoría del lenguaje basada originalmente en L. Hervás y Panduro, G. de Humboldt, M. Bréal y las tradiciones india, hebrea, grecolatina, patrística, hermenéutica, positivista y comparatista. Infiere de ello un método sintético-histórico que conjunta morfología y sintaxis al tiempo que descubre un principio relacional traslativo que afecta también al fundamento prelógico o nocional del conocimiento. El acto nominal acontece, como el cognitivo, fundiendo en un núcleo de asignación entitativa las cualidades procedentes del objeto. Tal núcleo resulta asimismo designación de los entes que comprende como extensión ontológica suya y, en el lenguaje, como proyección radical de la base morfosintáctica asistida por los adláteres, infijos, metafonía y otros modos del decurso léxico y sintáctico. Esto resulta posible porque el acto nominal y cognitivo refluyen sobre las cualidades prelógicas teniendo ahora por predicado suyo la realidad así percibida, procesada y enjuiciada. La idea poscede al juicio y ya contiene, como la palabra, un fondo de predicación subyacente instituido por el a priori nocional, de tal modo que hay un proceso predicativo anterior a la constitución del sujeto nuclearizado. La realidad predica a su vez del núcleo entitativo configurado sobre los sensibles que de ella proceden. Amor Ruibal establece así un principio de relatividad real entitativa que atañe al lenguaje y al pensamiento objetivo de las cosas. La forma sintáctica se convierte en vínculo ontológico. El objeto se procesa discursivo en sus cualidades y éstas se adjuntan en síntesis nominal temática: sujeto de atribuciones cuya relación inherente es la entidad ontológica, el objeto del sujeto cognoscens, relación prepropositiva. La respuesta implícita a la dialéctica hegeliana corre paralela con el sistema de Amor Ruibal y sus consonancias con Husserl son varias, pues ambos filósofos descubren, cada uno por su parte, pues no se conocieron, las condiciones ontológicas de la significación y estructura del lenguaje y la conciencia. Una vez producida, la palabra refluye sobre el acto cognitivo y asiste con modalidad propia a la constitución del sentido y a la expresión de la esencia objetiva. Subsume el espacio mental en que acontece como tensión genética del conocimiento. Amor Ruibal precede en varios aspectos a F. de Saussure desde lecturas comunes y reflexiones propias. Crea una lingüística gnoseológica de alcance filosófico prácticamente

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aún hoy, después de un siglo, marginada. La lingüística estructural, generativa y cognitiva ya encuentran antecedente notable y diferenciado en su sistema gnoseológico. A comienzos del siglo XX, justo en el año 1900, publica el filólogo y lingüista español Ángel Amor Ruibal un breve ensayo titulado Ciencia del Lenguaje en el que expone las tesis principales de lo que será, primero, su sistema lingüístico y, más tarde, la base del filosófico y teológico. Es en tal sentido el autor más moderno que estudia el lenguaje como antesala de la Filosofía. Y lo hace a la edad temprana de treinta y un años de edad. El ensayo aludido consiste realmente en una “Introducción” a la obra Principios Generales de Lingüística Indo-Europea del lingüista francés Pierre Regnaud, que Amor Ruibal tradujo sirviéndose de ella más bien para exponer los fundamentos del sistema que estaba esbozando. Dos años más tarde, en 1904 y 1905, retoma y continúa este ensayo en dos volúmenes importantes que asientan los cimientos epistemológicos de la Ciencia del Lenguaje. Son Los Principios Fundamentales de la Filología Comparada.1 Amor Ruibal elabora esta obra en paralelo con otras publicaciones concernientes a teología, derecho canónico, lenguas bíblicas, gramática comparada, indoeuropeo y siríaco-arameo, cuyo estudio le valió en 1892 un premio de la Altorientalische Gesellschaft de Leipzig, siendo aún estudiante. Fue profesor de estas materias en la entonces Universidad Pontificia de Santiago de Compostela. A partir de 1914 y hasta 1921 inicia la publicación de los seis primeros tomos de Los Principios Fundamentales de la Filosofía y del Dogma, a los que seguirán, ya póstumos, otros cuatro entre 1933 y 1936. Posteriormente se recogen algunos textos más en 1964 con el título de Cuatro Manuscritos Inéditos.2 La obra filológica es un resumen ecléctico de numerosa y sorprendente atención bibliográfica al fenómeno de las lenguas, su cultura y pensamiento desde las primeras tradiciones sagradas, hindú (Rig-Veda), hebrea (Biblia), sirio-aramea (código de Hammurabi), persa, egipcia, china, greco-romana, patrística y la tradición tanto filosófica como científica -del positivismo al evolucionismo y fenomenismo- hasta la revolución intelectual provocada por el descubrimiento del átomo y la teoría de la relatividad de Einstein. Es el primer pensador que atiende a esta fuente en la fundamentación del lenguaje. El enfoque humanista de la ciencia es propio del Modernismo, movimiento intelectual que sigue nuestro autor desde una posición cristiana y católica renovadora. Podemos decir que Amor Ruibal impulsa la transformación del pensamiento eclesiástico en la frontera de los siglos XIX y XX. Para ello emprende un análisis crítico de la mentalidad, historia de las ideas y sistemas

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más notables que las fundamentan. Esta crítica afecta sobre todo al platonismo, aristotelismo, racionalismo, empirismo, escepticismo, idealismo fenoménico y dialéctico, cientificismo y, en particular, al sistema tradicional escolástico, cuyas fuentes, especialmente el trasfondo platónico y aristotélico, tesis y conclusiones hallan en él particular controversia. El estilo de su escritura es aún, no obstante, y en cierto modo, neoescolástico, pero ceñido al fundamento moderno de ciencia en consideración filosófica. Una ciencia cuya exposición parte de los principios generales y ontológicos del conocimiento y que, por tanto, atañe al pensamiento en su dimensión gnoseológica, positivo o especulativo. En ello coinciden filosofía y ciencia: “Descubrir los elementos que dan la virtud primaria del ser en sí como fuente de toda su actividad y cualidades”.3

IDEAL CIENTÍFICO

El estudio de la tradición filológica y del sistema del lenguaje le descubre desde muy joven un ejemplo vivo de confirmación activa del ser humano a través de las cualidades que la naturaleza opera en su entendimiento. El lenguaje refleja las operaciones de la mente al conocer el hombre algo con los sentidos e interpretarlo desde el juicio mediante conceptos e ideas. La gramática contiene, como en W. von Humboldt, Hegel y el lingüista A. Sayce, un modelo implícito de la relación de elementos en un sistema según principios y categorías que la inteligencia descubre en los hechos verbales. La realidad del lenguaje no coincide con la conceptual del pensamiento, que es quien determina la forma de aquél, pero, al hacerlo, se proyecta de modo particular en su estructura y organismo. La constitución y evolución de las palabras, el estudio comparado de lenguas en una misma época o períodos históricamente diversos, permiten acceder a la actuación cognoscitiva del entendimiento. La investigación del lenguaje se constituye también como ciencia. Sus principios son tan gnoseológicos como los de la ciencia crítica al sistematizar objetos de la naturaleza y sus relaciones. El lenguaje resulta además un objeto especial por reunir en sus formas y conexiones los componentes objetivo y sujetivo de todo acto de conocimiento y en las dimensiones estática y dinámica de su proceso histórico. Es un ente externo que encierra una actividad del espíritu y, por tanto, un objeto inexplicable sin esta relación mutua, algo nuevo en el entorno de los seres naturales. El análisis del lenguaje precisa bajo tal consideración un ejemplo de la inmanencia y trascendencia del ideal humano científico al poder obtener el “plan interno que preside al ser y obrar” de la realidad cósica. Ese plan es la forma que lo integra y determina, la forma interior y procesual que Humboldt y

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Hegel observan también en la gramática y actuación de la naturaleza. Amor Ruibal reflexiona sobre ella analizando el principio activo de las raíces de las palabras, cuyo tema remonta a una larga tradición filológica de importantes consecuencias para la filosofía, al gramático español Francisco Sánchez de las Brozas, del siglo XVI; a san Isidoro de Sevilla, cuya vida transcurre entre los siglos VI y VII; a los gérmenes primitivos de la palabra y del pensamiento en Filón de Alejandría; a los estoicos, Platón, las culturas bíblica e india, etc. El renuevo evolucionista del siglo XIX incrementa la comparación de las raíces filológicas con la tradición seminal del pensamiento (estoicos y san Agustín) y las “células vivas” del principio vital, expresión muy frecuente entre los teóricos del lenguaje que investigan en esta centuria una razón también universal de la gramática. Pervive en este tema el debate de los siglos X y XII, XIII y XIV, en torno a las relaciones lógicas del lenguaje y del pensamiento (G. de Aurillac, san Anselmo, P. Abelardo; los modistas, G. de Ockham), que en el XVII sistematiza la escuela de Port-Royal, continúa en el cartesianismo, culmina luego en Humboldt y aún resuena hoy en la Gramática Universal de N. Chomsky. La constitución gnoseológica del lenguaje evidencia el nexo ontológico de objeto y sujeto, del que Amor Ruibal infiere una relación prelógica indispensable en todo conocimiento crítico y objetivo de la realidad. La ciencia se presenta bajo este aspecto como el conocimiento de las cosas a través de las nociones que su presencia induce en la mente y de las ideas que explican la realidad mediante principios y categorías desarrolladas en el proceso así elaborado. Es por ello algo ideal que “envuelve y entraña un estado de lo real”.4 El concepto conecta la formalidad de la mente con la sensibilidad que las cosas imprimen en nuestros sentidos. Su noción es lo común de la realidad a la que pertenecemos. Lingüísticamente hablando corresponde al hecho de “tener noción o noticia de algo”, aquello que presenta algo a la percepción y despierta su principio operativo. El entramado científico depende del modo como expliquemos esta relación prelógica. Y el lenguaje lo hace efectivo al establecer una instancia común de entendimiento entre los hombres y la realidad que los envuelve. No hay ciencia sin diálogo. Su objetivo comprende también la comunicación a los demás interlocutores del resultado verificable, sin cuya ratificación no existe ciencia propiamente dicha. Amor Ruibal observa además que los fundamentos de las ciencias históricas, y hasta de las positivas, dependen de una razón tropológica en sus principios, como el lenguaje, según veremos. La orientación epistemológica procede de análisis y reflexiones en torno a la gramática comparada y el mínimo de reducción activa de un elemento que, siendo acto de habla, encierra una virtualidad operativa confirmada luego

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históricamente. Son las raíces. Los gramáticos indios observaban en la constitución del sánscrito que las palabras giran en torno a un centro mental común por áreas de designación de objetos, acciones y cualidades primarias de la vida. Sus atributos presentan una conexión fundamental con las creencias y tradiciones antropológicas de su cultura. Son comunes en varios aspectos al dinamismo de la realidad y el correlato imaginario de adjetivos concernientes a representaciones de la divinidad y su culto enraizado en las costumbres ordinarias. La síntesis mental de tales actos refleja el conocimiento del pueblo y civilización india. La raíz de las palabras sintetiza a su vez este proceso. Al designar una cualidad, incorporar nuevos elementos o desarrollar otros mediante adjunción, yuxtaposición, metafonía, derivación y composición, como se observa también en distintas culturas e idiomas, hebreo, egipcio y turco, por ejemplo, la raíz muestra una sustancia dinámica, un cuerpo vivo que contrasta con su aparente fijeza. Observamos en ella que un elemento constante actúa en el entorno y se desarrolla según el medio, circunstancia y actividad de los hablantes. Tiene carácter plástico y efectividad doblemente refleja, pues incide en la realidad denominando las acciones humanas y es determinada por ella a la par de su dinamismo y desarrollo. Existe una razón mediada en su constitución, un logos del medio y circunstancia que la rodean e incetivan: una mesología. La hipótesis centrada en este dinamismo interno y de entorno deja entrever que las raíces más antiguas responden a un impulso o moción locutiva centrada en breves emisiones de voz que fijan el contorno vocálico así constituido. Es la conocida hipótesis del monosilabismo en torno a una, dos o tres consonantes en sílaba originaria. La energía en ella impresa sigue actuando conforme al reflejo antes indicado, de flujo y reflujo, y genera la unidad que denominamos palabra. De su constitución podemos deducir que el tacto inicial articulatorio comprende índices de variación posible en consonancia con el entorno objetivo y sujetivo del habla. Su potencia abre una explicación posible del lenguaje. Es obvio que no alcanzamos el origen histórico de las raíces iniciales, pero observamos el desarrollo de las constatadas como más antiguas y el nacimiento de otras en su medio vital. La acción que integra a alguna de ellas o elemento suyo, tanto la física que el objeto designado implica como la moción sujetiva que la impulsa, dejan reflejos en casos aún hoy activos de ciertas lenguas, como las onomatopeyas. Se une a ello el efecto semiótico de ciertos pictogramas y escrituras primitivas donde la imagen simbólica del objeto, el grafo y el fono tienden a fundirse en una sinergia de funciones. A medida que las lenguas se desarrollan, esta función deja paso a otras más complejas en su formación histórica.

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El estado incierto de muchas de estas hipótesis elaboradas sobre el concepto de raíz no permite fundar un criterio de reflexión fiable y atribuir sin más fundamento carácter de ciencia al análisis filológico e histórico. El grado, norma de evolución y parentesco de algunas raíces en diferentes lenguas dejan establecer, sin embargo, otras hipótesis que sí fundamentan una razón científica al organizar los datos y ver que se repite en ellos un principio constante de formación en todas o gran parte de las lenguas conocidas. Pasamos entonces del concepto de raíz al de Etimología.

ETIMOLOGÍA Y PRINCIPIO D E RELACIÓN

El método comparativo, basado en semejanzas y diferencias opositivas de distribución de elementos a partir de un tronco común, avala como criterio la constatación de que toda palabra tiene una etimología aunque no podamos reconocerla como su raíz originaria. Es el método aplicado por la escuela comparatista en la reconstitución hipotética del indoeuropeo. Amor Ruibal observa que en su complejo epistemológico intervienen factores hermenéuticos de interpretación sobre las nociones de los elementos considerados, sus relaciones, esferas y orbes de integración gradativa en niveles y estructuras siguiendo operaciones mentales de asociación, yuxtaposición, agrupamiento, nexos, tipos, series, clases, dependencias, subsunciones, oposiciones, principios subyacentes, organizativos, y categorías que forman y explican el sistema así formado. Este método nos revela actividades y actos del pensamiento. La peculiaridad es tan específica que, aunque observemos sus factores en otras ciencias, nos remite a su fundamento conceptivo. La etimología resume aquel ideal objetivo y sujetivo de ciencia o “plan interno” del ser y actividad del lenguaje. Tiene una base aparentemente fija y elementos adjuntos o caracteres desarrollados en consonancia con la designación y acción mental en que aparece inmersa. Estática y al mismo tiempo dinámica, no sólo es objeto de conocimiento, sino que muestra una formalidad suya precisa. Y ello al margen de que la designación sea arbitraria o natural, pues siempre resulta adecuada a la circunstancia según mesología del hecho acontecido. E esto no presupone identidad de lenguaje y pensamiento. La raíz comporta un campo previo inabarcable, perdido en un tiempo inmemorial que, sin embargo, nos afecta de algún modo en sus restos compositivos ya registrables en un momento hipotético, plausible o preciso de su historia. Nos permite concebir un esquema suyo de operaciones concertadas y correlativas:

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Idea

Raíz

Relación (F)

(Palabra)

Decíamos, no obstante, que, una vez establecida la palabra, resulta más apropiado hablar de etimología en cuanto su forma permite desgranar un centro y entorno de relaciones compactas según los conceptos ya lingüísticos en ella implicados, tales como la significación y su estudio metodológico, la Semántica; el sonido y la ciencia que lo registra descubriendo en él y sus conexiones las leyes que lo conforman según la elación procesada en el acto de habla, la Fonética y, a su vez, Fonología, pues las unidades básicas parten de una configuración mínima en torno al acento; y todo ello presupone una relación interna funcionalmente objetivada, la Morfología, que se expande por despliegue hacia otras unidades homólogas o apresentadas en función de un nuevo lazo comprehensivo, la Sintaxis. Tenemos, entonces: Significación (Semántica) Etimología

Morfología (F): Sintaxis

Sonido (Fonética)

Si consideramos además el proceso subyacente entre un mínimo y un máximo de ocurrencia posible de unidades, es decir, la polaridad que la relación establece entre un principio y un fin, una posición tética, fónica o lexemática, y su clausura articulatoria, la Etimología resulta siempre Relación de la correspondencia adecuada de sonido y sentido según una función dada en un eje (α) . . . . . .. N (Fx) . . . . . ..(ω). Es lo que luego se denominó MorfoSintaxis. Este esquema será entonces parámetro general de conocimiento lingüístico: Sº Etm ------ R Sn

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Ahora bien, dado que el proceso filológico desentrañado del estudio comparado de lenguas y de la Gramática histórica de algunas de ellas favorece una hipótesis temática inicial (Humboldt, M. Bréal, É. Benveniste, Agustín García Calvo en nuestros días, etc.), de carácter deíctico, asociada con desinencias que serían otros elementos demostrativos, cabe concebir un campo pronominal básico, entendido como potencia tensional (diátasis) que asocia unidades separando al mismo tiempo el nexo así formado (diástasis) y distribuyendo sus partes conforme a un organigrama interno de significación o acto nominal (Sinngebung fenomenológica): la diátaxis que engrana unidades sucesivas nuclearizando una de ellas respecto de otras. Se configura así lo que entendemos por relación proposicional originada desde la asociación primera de elementos, sus implicaciones paulatinas en nexos y los núcleos. Son los tres órdenes que Husserl escalona en la semiogénesis de las formas lógicas desde la pasividad constitutiva hasta los recubrimientos nodulares de las formas ontológicas. Amor Ruibal ya preconiza esta configuración de algún modo. Cabe proponer entonces el esquema etimológico como parámetro cognitivo del lenguaje: (Acto nominal) N (V) Etm ---------- R Pro

El Pro-Nombre figura en realidad el campo expansivo de la nominación mostrativa a la que acompaña un de procesivo tanto interno cuanto sintagmático: la de-signación, el factor intencional y deícticamente fenomenológico del signo lingüístico. A él pertenece incluso la surgencia antepredicativa del nombre y el campo correlativo de designaciones pronominales que lo circundan designando una acción, el objeto envuelto en ella, la circunstancia o estado mesológico de su eventualidad e incluso, ya desarrollado el proceso en función sintagmática según el despliegue intersubjetivo del diálogo entre sujetos intervenientes, el dinamismo resultante: el verbo. Así interpretamos nosotros la razón fundadora del lenguaje según Amor Ruibal. La activación del fondo estático y el dinamismo consecuente de la etimología resume también el ideal científico al considerar su forma como un objeto que contiene la moción psíquica que lo comprende, de donde se deriva “un nexo real-ideal” u objetividad gnoseológica. Ejemplifica la designación según se manifiesta la realidad ambiente o mundo vivido en el conocimiento. Es el “valor objetivo” de la significación que fundamenta el estudio del

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lenguaje como ciencia propia. Amor Ruibal se sitúa de este modo a la par de Humboldt entre los fundadores científicos de la Lingüística. El análisis de la etimología nos muestra además que su reducción tiene límites, máximos y mínimos, de los que depende la organización y expansión léxica. En orden mínimo aparece el fonema como unidad irreductible y en el máximo la sílaba y la palabra. Son los tipos elementales de organización y constitución del lenguaje, el paralelo lingüístico de la teoría atómica de la realidad según la física moderna. Amor Ruibal comprueba en la formación de la unidad básica fonoacústica el modelo expresivo de actuación concreta de relaciones adunadas según un principio de abstracción que las integra y tipifica: el tipo o categoría fonética. Hay en ello operaciones de selección de rasgos articulatorios, de filtro acústico, de elaboración e interpretación configurativa, pues el fonema, al establecerse, depende de otras unidades homólogas que lo posibilitan y cuyo funcionamiento repite las relaciones que lo constituyen al tiempo que revela otras más complejas. Se puede definir en función de otra unidad que lo engloba. Pero lo importante aquí resulta de su realidad objetiva concreta al agruparse con otros fonemas en tipos según principios de organización propia y que sirven de paradigma común a diferentes actos de habla. Existe, entonces, una unidad mínima concreta predicable por extenso de otras unidades como su principio abstracto. Hallamos una concretud totalizable. El sonido [b] se realizará siempre en español con los rasgos oclusivo, bilabial y sonoro. Esta capacidad de replicación efectiva integrada en grupos más complejos y siguiendo una actitud intencional de significar algo en la realidad viva nos sitúa ante un proceso de conocimiento diferenciado. Los fonemas organizados en sílabas exponen el comportamiento de las unidades respecto del principio que las forma y les asigna funciones. Actúan como las células en el organismo vivo (gérmenes vivientes) o los átomos en la realidad física y manteniendo su propio dinamismo como constante de acción determinada y constitutiva. El acento anima y modula la uniformidad de la frase y de la palabra. Amor Ruibal mantiene esta explicación precisa como modelo explicativo y cita en concreto la imagen celular y el relativismo atómico al exponer el tipo fonémico y ejemplificar la organización léxica y conceptual de una palabra y su significado. Lo decisivo para el caso es la unidad de idea y sentido surgida en la agrupación tipológica. “Todas las expresiones fonéticas, como originariamente reflejas y recibidas de los sentidos, pueden considerarse como imitación de un sonido ó expresión de una sensación, y también como significación del objeto que produce aquel sonido ó aquella sensación. La reunión de muchas expresiones fonéticas de la misma naturaleza forman un todo que da origen

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á una idea común á todas ellas: de este modo, por un procedimiento naturalracional, que consiste en fijar algunas expresiones generales entre las infinitas posibles, se forma un patrimonio relativamente pequeño de tipos fonéticos, manifestación y síntesis de aquellas cosas más necesarias á la vida humana. Estos tipos fonéticos son los puntos centrales y fundamentales del lenguaje, y lo que constituye el objeto y el resultado de la ciencia del lenguaje, más allá de los cuales la Filología no puede pasar”.5 La actividad fonoacústica revela un caso singular de conocimiento en el que se juntan el método positivo, basado en la experiencia verificable, y el racional, la inducción y abstracción. Constituye además un objeto que contiene en su naturaleza los dos principios gnoseológicos. Al lenguaje lo asiste el fundamento que lo explica. Contiene el principio que determina “la idea abstracta y la realidad concreta de su categoría”. Es objeto único y paradigmático. Y esto se confirma por el hecho de que las palabras expresan además de la idea “una relación no contenida” en ella y por eso son las raíces “los átomos indivisibles de la lengua y los elementos primitivos de las palabras”.6 La relación funda el lenguaje y la concepción de la materia. Comprobamos también su acción constitutiva en el léxico, semántica y física teórica. Así como los conceptos de jardín y árbol se relacionan entre sí a través de los de tierra y rosas, y estos mediante los de tronco, raíz, ramas, hojas, lo mismo acontece con los átomos y el concepto de fuerza en la materia. La relación da “ser al conocimiento”, resume Amor Ruibal,7 quien adelanta con estas reflexiones fundamentos que, con otros establecidos por Friedrich M. Müller y Bréal, a quien por veces sigue de cerca, dieron lugar más tarde a la institución de la Lingüística como ciencia moderna a partir de F. de Saussure. L. Bloomfield y L. Hjelmslev. La fundamentación científica del lenguaje es uno de los objetivos intelectuales del siglo XIX. Amor Ruibal parte del proceso filológico e invierte su perspectiva. Hasta entonces la relación era algo significado por el lenguaje mediante la flexión, casos, preposiciones, recursos derivativos, composición, concordancia, etc. A partir de ahora es ella quien lo funda y sistematiza. Así pues, las unidades básicas o tipos fundamentales ya exponen el “plan interno” y organización compositiva, sistemática y orgánica, del lenguaje. Una unidad funciona como parte respecto de otra en el conjunto y su relación mutua evidencia el todo que las engloba sin igualarse con ellas como resultado de suma. Y este fenómeno descubre a su vez una gradación intensiva y extensiva. Al formalizarse el conjunto observamos un proceso orgánico de implicación creciente. La unidad general se concentra sobre los particulares y estos convergen en ella como en núcleo que explica su fundamento, con lo cual adquieren una función determinada.

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La Etimología no se confunde con la Fonética, que es sólo un medio suyo. Al unir un sentido con un sonido en forma de palabra, su proceso comprende cambios respectivos cuyas causas y transformaciones nos sitúan mediante análisis en su fondo real y científico.8 Los correspondientes al sonido constituyen las leyes fonéticas y los del sentido la semántica, también denominada semasiología y sematología.9 Estudia ésta además los valores significativos de las palabras y la base tropológica del lenguaje, que evidencia a su vez los principales mecanismos de constitución (sinécdoque), correspondencia (metonimia) y semejanza de sentido o sonido. A ello añade Amor Ruibal otras operaciones que exponen de nuevo su implicación gnoseológica: ampliación, restricción, transformación, polisemia, analogía, categorización gramatical, relaciones lógi cas, psicológicas, etc. La semántica agrupa de este modo la Retórica y Sintaxis, en cuyos límites se sitúa como división científica del lenguaje. La combinación de los cambios así correlatados de sonido y sentido aporta además el concepto fundamental de valor lingüístico, que Amor Ruibal extiende al estudio filosófico y teológico a veces con el nombre de grador y de intensidad conceptiva. Bajo tal aspecto, la Etimología representa en principio la unidad paradigmática del lenguaje. Comprende como base material la Fonética y Semántica, es decir, las ciencias subsidiarias del sonido y sentido representadas en el lexema, mientras que la “parte formal” corresponde a la Sintaxis. El estudio histórico de las funciones sintácticas revela el valor apofántico de la parte y del todo, la lexis y el logos, de las categorías y de la proposición.10 Su estudio corresponde a la Morfología, con lo que entramos en la morfosintaxis o aspecto tensional combinatorio, expansivo y distributivo del lenguaje, de cuyas relaciones y funciones depende que su método científico alcance “un período prehistórico” y asista “á la creación misma de las formas lingüísticas”. La sintaxis queda entonces definida como “la razón formal de los idiomas y su valor ideológico, que es, en resumen, el valor único que las caracteriza”.11 Atañe también, por tanto, a la conexión de las formas semánticas. La relación interna de lexis y logos da cuenta, pues, del valor que en este “período prehistórico” corresponde al enlace de sufijos y raíces antiguas, del que depende la categoría inicial de las palabras, que sean, por ejemplo, “verbo ó nombre, sustantivo ó adjetivo”. Alude el autor con ello a la hipótesis de aquella base radical primitiva funcionalmente indiferenciada, monolítera, bilítera o trilítera, con los fonemas o “huecos” suyos, por ejemplo las vocales, a cuya moción mínima corresponde su expansión interna y externa, según los tipos básicos de organización etimológica en sánscrito, hebreo, copto, egipcio y turco. Esta observación resulta importante en perspectiva fenomenológica. Antes aludimos a la posibilidad científica de entrar en “la creación misma de las

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formas lingüísticas”, es decir, en la formación de la forma, peculiaridad exclusiva de esta ciencia, pues en otra no asistimos al proceso formativo del objeto estudiado. No estamos dentro de él. Habría, pues, una tensión fónica cuyo acto es nominal o, como dice luego Husserl, donación de sentido (Sinngebung), y cuya moción determina un enlace con otros actos semejantes. Y según sea el resultado de tales acciones tendremos en esta unidad mínima de carácter energético un verbo, sustantivo o adjetivo. El nombre nombra bien una acción que implica un objeto corpóreo o incorpóreo, bien una acción en sí, pero no de modo exclusivo, o el acto mismo. El verbo viene a ser un accidente gramatical determinativo de la raíz, “que de suyo no lo representa”, o de la actividad comprendida como objeto ontológico, es decir, una determinación o ejercicio suyo: el hecho nominal, su actuación efectiva. El verbo depende, por tanto, de una actuación gramatical correlativa al ejercicio de llevar a término la tensión de la raíz y de la acción lógica que esto supone, la cual puede ser objeto designativo de un verbo determinado. La diátasis expansiva comprende el campo pro-nominal y dialógico implícito. Al verbo lo prelata también el medio demostrativo y pronominalizante. Amor Ruibal critica la definición que Aristóteles da de verbo asociada al tiempo que implica en tanto conexión interna de la sucesión del movimiento. El predicado extiende su dinamismo al sujeto considerado como parte del conjunto así subsumido y significado: la proposición, el discurso. El acto predicativo de Aristóteles implicaría entonces un tropo. Incluye al sujeto en el movimiento compositivo del tiempo. Lo yuxtapone, coordina y subordina según el recubrimiento de actos implicados. Para Amor Ruibal el lexema del verbo ya presupone tiempo y algo objetivo. Prima la razón nominal, el acto nombre, sobre sus variaciones adjuntas o accidentes gramaticales, discursivos, pronominales. La predicación aristotélica avanza una consecuencia del tiempo como fundamento suyo. Es un caso, podríamos decir, de hysteron proton. “El tiempo, pues, como tal, no necesita palabra, y, sin embargo, la tiene siempre”.12 La palabra es tiempo porque remite al instante articulatorio y en forma actual de presente, el del habla, que implica una afirmación o negación lógica y, por tanto, una conveniencia entre al menos dos entes, actos, situaciones, etc. Hay, pues, una prelación lógica deducida a posteriori que responde, no obstante, a otra ontológica: la diferencia instantánea de objeto y sujeto en posición de conocimiento y de habla. El acto nominal incide sobre una relación prelógica cualificando como nombre un acto sustantivo de referencia objetivo-sujetiva. Ya acota una predicación. Contiene verbo, el verbo, el verbum mentis, y es verbum oris. Amor Ruibal retoma la denominación de san Agustín y otros teóricos del lenguaje para cifrar el momento de posición articulatoria, la primera forma

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denominativa a la que dirigir otras subsecuentes como morfemas suyos o adjuntos procesuales del discurso y del orden ontológico de las cosas. La articulación fónica pone también una marca en ese instante denominativo. Es índice cualitativo de un proceso cuyo resultado remite a un concepto y al nombre, sea sustantivo o verbo. La primera posición nocional y articulada sustancia algo en el fondo relacional, no estático, sino procedente. Es el sustantivo ser, el dinamismo interno de toda posición originaria, lógica y lingüística; lógica porque circunscribe un presente nocional designativo al que se refiere cualquier otra consideración posible y que se cierra afirmándolo o negándolo; lingüística, porque, designando, el nombre ya contiene una propuesta de posible sanción también judicativa. El punto nocional abre o acontece en proceso. De ahí que todo otro verbo resulte adjetivo en relación con esta base sustantiva. Es energeia, y el nombre, es ergon, denominaciones heredadas de Humboldt, pero que la tradición ya usaba, sobre todo la primera, desde tiempo antiguo. Ahora bien, el producto o ergon del nombre expresa asimismo el proceso mental de las cualidades que determinan sucesivamente el concepto de algo, mientras que en el verbo no sucede lo mismo.13 El verbo indica “la conveniencia o discrepancia” del concepto en relación con las cualidades que integra, lo cual ya lo convierte en sujeto suyo preverbal o predicado de una relación ontológica, pues va implicada en ello la referencia de donde proceden aquellas cualificaciones. El nombre contiene verbo. Entiende Amor Ruibal con Santo Tomás de Aquino, pero la idea proviene de Aristóteles, que en la frase Pedro vive se da un proceso implícito igual a Pedro es viviente. La forma verbal se desglosa en verbo sustantivo (es) más nombre. Quiere ello decir que las notas o cualidades de Pedro ya realizan la acción viviente y que la forma verbal ratifica aquel juicio previo de adecuación o discrepancia entre sujeto y predicado implícito. Presupone además que la presencia espontánea de la noción implícita ser se da en todo acto perceptivo de cualidad, es decir, aquel aspecto nocional antes resaltado como marca simple de existencia mental o de fonación articulada. Y por eso distingue entre orden lógico, nocional y judicativo, y gramatical.14 En el primero se da siempre verbo ser y está inmerso en cualquier otro verbo, pues representa el acento perceptivo de lo inteligible. Puede encontrase equivalencia suya en toda proposición, pero esto no presupone que haya un verbo único matriz de los demás o que todos se reduzcan gramaticalmente al verbo ser.15 Una cosa es el lazo lógico y otra el gramatical, que pueden coincidir o no en las expresiones verbales. Un ejemplo del contenido verbal cualitativo del nombre y de desplazamiento del sonido de la raíz a otra forma fónica que, no obstante, mantiene el sentido verbal es la palabra ente. El autor recurre aquí de nuevo a observaciones de Bréal.16 Tal sustantivo procede de la forma primitiva ες del verbo eimí cuyo

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participio presente es-on elide la s, fenómeno frecuente en griego, y de e-on, e-ontos pasa a ente, desinencia que adquiere valor nominal de sustantivo reteniendo en su forma el proceso que la constituye. He aquí un ejemplo de aquella entrada en la formación de la forma. La unidad morfológica contiene el principio de organización de la materia elemental. Su forma posibilita la unión de la energía incursa en la raíz y el logos del medio, en el que entra también como entorno suyo la articulación fonológica del sonido natural según una intención significativa, el acento, el cual refleja el culmen de organización y la tendencia relativa hacia otra unidad adjunta. Reencontramos así de nuevo el principio formal de la palabra y la tensión traslativa en orden a la acción psicológica que la potencia y el medio por ella designado. Se crea un flujo reversible de interrelaciones objetivas y sujetivas, pues el dinamismo atañe tanto a la acción en que se muestra el objeto como al decurso intencional del proceso. La Sinnesartikulation es el modelo formal del lenguaje. Si descubrimos los principios fundamentales subyacentes en ella y las categorías a que ha lugar, obtendremos su plan organizativo y un paradigma a su vez de cómo funciona en el sistema la estructura del conocimiento. Amor Ruibal indaga el fundamento gnoseológico de la conciencia crítica al determinar sus actos mentales. Obtiene así una lingüística verdaderamente fundada en el conocimiento. Y a su vez, en orden reverso, la filosofía descubre en el lenguaje un cauce hermenéutico de la moción intelectual de los actos cognitivos. Desarrolla de este modo el giro lingüístico operado por Humboldt, pero desde una fuente común a ambos, la obra de L. Hervás y Panduro, en la que ve el comienzo de la lingüística en sentido moderno. El estudio comparado de lenguas orientales, indoeuropeas y americanas, el gran aporte de la gramática histórica, dejaba entrever dos o tres paradigmas de articulación que, en el fondo, se resumen en uno solo. En el estudio gramatical indio atiende al proceso de análisis etimológico; en el hebraico, chino y egipcio, al especial modo de incremento morfológico a partir de la sílaba; del griego cifra la intuición sintética de la palabra y frase; del turco y náhuatle, el proceso de inflexión incorporada y la función de ciertos elementos al determinar el sentido general de la frase. A su vez, el análisis histórico del comparatismo descubre relaciones profundas en la evolución y desarrollo de las lenguas, tanto en la vertiente paleogramática, con F. Bopp a la cabeza, como en la denominada joven gramática alemana. El jesuita Hervás y Panduro ofrece listas taxonómicas de vocablos de lenguas diferentes referidas a un mismo objeto o acción, por ejemplo las del Padrenuestro, y en ellas se observa la razón comprensiva del medio vital y la concepción del mundo. Humboldt se inspiró en este aporte antropológico y lo mismo hizo por la misma época, un poco antes, el fraile gallego Martín Sarmiento, cuyo Onomástico Etimológico de la Lengua Gallega17 es ya un antecedente lexicosemántico de estructuración

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lingüística. Amor Ruibal examina desde este enfoque la contribución de un sistema a otro y suple sus deficiencias con argumentos complementarios y nuevas reflexiones. El análisis del lenguaje manifiesta una razón objetiva y un método propio, según veíamos anteriormente. Y ello no implica que la palabra haya de objetivarse de un modo preciso y según una concepción determinada de realidad, sino que más bien lo hace en todas las lenguas siguiendo un proceso objetivo de fundamentación. Y ésta es la vertiente filosófica del estudio lingüístico, que no se confunde con lo que hoy entendemos por filosofía del lenguaje, y que propone una lingüística del pensamiento. MÉTODO SINTÉTICO-HISTÓRICO

El análisis filológico o paso de la etimología a la idea, cuyo modelo es para Amor Ruibal la lengua india; el proceso sintético de la idea en las partes y conjunto de la frase griega; la evolución contrastada de lenguas indoeuropeas o la exclusiva de una concreta, como la latina respecto de las lenguas romances, o aún cualquiera de éstas referida al latín, tales modelos, analítico, sintético e histórico, es decir, el análisis filológico de la gramática comparada, histórica, y el método crítico y hermenéutico de la ciencia en sentido filosófico -búsqueda de la razón objetiva-, concluyen en una propuesta de método sintético-histórico, pues no hay análisis que no proceda por síntesis ni realización concreta sin decurso histórico. En el análisis prima la inducción o “proceso ascendente de efectos a causas”; en la síntesis, la deducción, “que baja las causas a efectos”;18 y la historia, cuyo concepto comparte con Hegel, “es, objetivamente y en general, la evolución de todo sér en el tiempo y en el espacio. Sin esta razón evolutiva, inconstancia presente de todo lo sucesivamente actuado, no existe realidad histórica”.19 El lenguaje sirve de vivo ejemplo. Amor Ruibal sintetiza una larga tradición cultural, filosófica y filológica partiendo del Rig-Veda, la Biblia, otras escrituras históricas -copta, egipcia, persa, china, turca-, Platón (principio fonológico e ideal científico), Aristóteles (categorías), la patrística (verbum mentis de san Agustín, gramática hermenéutica), Locke (formación de palabras y conceptos), Descartes (valor conceptual innato), Leibniz (característica universal), Kant (a priori nocional de las categorías), Hervás y Panduro (antropología lingüística), Humboldt (forma interna energética), Hegel (dialéctica), etc. Nace así una lingüística filosófica de carácter gnoseológico. Figura en ella una fundamentación científica intencionada antes de los aportes de E. Cassirer, Saussure, Hjelmslev, R. Jakobson, Chomsky, Benveniste, y en paralelo con Ch. S. Peirce, Husserl, antes también que E. Sapir, el primer Bloomfield, pero en línea y a la zaga de Humboldt, G. Gerber, H. Steinthal, F. Müller, W. D. Whitney, Bréal, otros pensadores, analistas del lenguaje y científicos. Y a pesar de ello, esta teoría del lenguaje

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sigue aún hoy prácticamente sin crédito ni presencia en la historiografía lingüística. Amor Ruibal introduce en España la escuela de Leipzig y funda una lingüística gnoseológica que sirve de claro antecedente a la denominada cognitiva, pero con implicaciones muy diferenciadas. Y esto sin más estancia en el extranjero que un año de estudio, en Roma, de lenguas orientales. La Ciencia del Lenguaje se constituye, pues, con criterio propio y particularidad específica a partir de tales precedentes y la reflexión que la Filología general, la Gramática histórica y la Glotología aportan con registro e investigación de datos más que suficientes. No es ciencia como la exacta y metafísica, sino de carácter histórico, pero bajo los principios generales y ontológicos del conocimiento, educidos de la realidad misma del lenguaje. En principio, el concepto de Ciencia del Lenguaje coincide con el de Gramática comparada al establecer ésta una teoría racional, sistemática y activa sobre aquellos datos filológicos y articulatorios, de los que se infieren procesos que evidencian una relación con el espíritu y permiten indagar “el por qué [sic] de sus aserciones”; los principios físicos que atañen a la naturaleza del sonido articulado; los filosóficos que intervienen en las relaciones del signo y la idea; los físicos, morales y sociales correspondientes a las causas de igual índole intervinientes “en la vida real de las lenguas”.20 Este planteamiento y justificación responde al de la ciencia en general considerada como demostratio rei per causas, pues su método y estudio analítico sigue “la naturaleza y propiedades de su objeto dentro de una teoría racional que dé la razón del sistema, y constituya por lo mismo la demostración conveniente del objeto una vez conocida la forma de su existencia”.21 Queda así patente el ideal filosófico de ciencia, que Amor Ruibal resume en consonancia con la aplicación de Locke a las relaciones entre la idea y las cosas, por una parte, y el nombre con la Idea, por otra. Según el filósofo inglés, la palabra designa los objetos oblicuamente a través de las ideas que los representan y Amor Ruibal dice que la ciencia “se refiere de una manera directa y primaria, á los principios de la teoría que trata de explicar el sér objetivo de la cosa, y sólo indirectamente á la cosa misma, cuyo es el sér objetivo”.22 Se trata, en el fondo, de un replanteamiento de la significación según la concibe Aristóteles al comienzo del Peri Hermeneias. En el concepto de Ciencia del Lenguaje queda integrado entonces el de Gramática comparada, pero también la Gramática General aludida constantemente en el siglo XIX. La naturaleza histórica del lenguaje muestra el concepto objetivo o acciones, los actos y hechos de habla, al tiempo que el sujetivo, sus razones y causas, y la razón teórica del sistema: las leyes generales de la historia, esto en consonancia con Humboldt y Hegel. Ahora bien, creemos que el eclecticismo de Amor Ruibal une a la causalidad de energía latente, inspirada en la física y biología modernas, la finalidad implícita del proceso en cuanto todo desarrollo se dirige a un fin sólo conocido a posteriori, una vez que se han

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analizado los datos, el proceso que los engloba y los principios que lo asisten. Pero esta causalidad es más bien tipológica y arquetípica, el resultado que las relaciones de elementos, partes y todo evidencian en el doble movimiento de flujo y reflujo, como si el lenguaje poseyera un carácter intuitivo especial. De hecho, el siglo XIX tiene una imagen arquitectónica de las lenguas. Eduardo Benot, lingüista valenciano también presente en la reflexión de Amor Ruibal, publicó un libro con este título, Arquitectura de las Lenguas, y una Gramática Filosófica de la Lengua Castellana en la que se observan reflexiones comunes sobre la determinación de los valores semánticos universales, en consonacia ambos autores con Bréal.23 Todo ello nos remite al intellectus ectypus o imagen mental que va determinando en el proceso el prototipo de un todo capaz de explicar la razón y funciones de las partes en él consideradas. Se genera así un modo intelectual de razonamiento basado en aplicar a la naturaleza el conocimiento que de sus datos obtenemos por reflexión, pero que en sí mismos resultan insuficientes para comprenderla. Quien vea labrar una piedra a un cantero aislado del lugar donde se construye el edificio no comprenderá el porqué de su acción hasta que no observe el plano general o la parte ya construida donde encajará el bloque cincelado. Es el intellectus archetypus de Kant. Amor Ruibal pretende la síntesis del conocimiento discursivo e intuitivo, de lo analítico-universal y lo sintético-universal, que en Kant proceden diferenciados, pero se implican en orden a una razón suficiente del Juicio que explique el conocimiento de la naturaleza y la reflexión que éste suscita más allá de los datos verificables24 . El habla procede entonces teleológicamente, hacia un sentido de las cosas. Y su resultado es el período, la frase, proposición, diálogo: el discurso. Une así la base inductiva e intuitiva del lenguaje con la especulativa de la razón y responde a Bacon, Descartes y Locke, a Kant y Hegel, a la polémica de F. Müller y W. Withney, al tiempo que continúa en el plano filosófico las intuiciones de Humboldt. Los hechos priman sobre las reglas, pero unos y otras dependen de principios fundamentales internos que los y las explican25 y no conocemos directamente, sino después del análisis y tras la deducción de categorías que la síntesis así obtenida permite establecer. El lenguaje configura además las bases críticas que rehacen los supuestos platónicos y aristotélicos de la tradición escolástica. De este modo, Amor Ruibal cree ofrecer al pensamiento universal de la ciencia y de la filosofía un modelo verdaderamente nuevo, lingüístico. EL SIGNO LINGÜÍSTICO

La Etimología comprende, decíamos, las tres unidades básicas, tipo fonético o sílaba, palabra y, por extensión o implicación, la frase, más el principio

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formal sintáctico que la expande mediante la determinación predicativa en proposición. Una sola unidad funde, pues, la estructura del signo lingüístico y cognitivo con diferencia de funciones y entidades. Dijimos que la concepción general del pensamiento de Amor Ruibal es trifásica y añadimos ahora que su modelo de teoría lingüística ya configura los principales y más notables del siglo XX. Así sucede con el triángulo semiótico y perceptivo que podemos educir como fondo dialéctico y arquitectónico, al tiempo que germinativo y energético, del lenguaje. A una primera triangulación del signo cognitivo como: Facultad cognitiva

Potencia activa Cosa u objeto

Sensación (Sujeto)

le corresponde otra psicológicamente dinámica que representa la acción del pensamiento y comprende en sus vértices respectivos el acto de palabra para el superior, el psíquico en la representación de la cosa y el fonético correspondiente a la sensación sonora. La íntima relación establecida entre ellos procede de la potencia activa. Resulta así un signo intermedio entre cosa representada como idea, que es la significación incursa en el lenguaje, y acto fónico ya conceptualizado, pues el sonido experimenta una elación ideológica en el proceso. Ahora bien, el signo así elaborado responde a un hecho espontáneo de intuición locutiva, de habla. La distinción de partes y conceptos es refleja, deductiva. Por eso cabe concebir en la base intuitiva del signo la misma noción que Amor Ruibal considera espontánea en todo acto de conocimiento por el simple hecho de situarse uno en actitud perceptiva ante las cosas y la naturaleza. Es la procesualidad propia del hombre como ser cognoscente, el darse cuenta de, tener noticia de, sentir algo, etc. El algo acontece en una película o retina intelectual común a lo conocido y cognoscente. Es la noción general de ser antes de analizarla, aquello que precisamente nos mueve a conocerlo por hallarse dentro de nosotros sin que lo sepamos. La actitud natural del lenguaje acontece del mismo modo. La palabra impulsa a conocer cuanto expresamos, decimos y manifestamos a otros. Es el trasfondo intenso de la formación tética prelógica, el cursor intuitivo del pensamiento. Resulta entonces, y con ella el signo lingüístico, proyección refleja del proceso gnoseológico, por lo que

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debemos considerarla como ámbito resonante, expresivo, del volumen e intensidad engendrada por la rotación del pensamiento al conocer la realidad y sus implicaciones: Idea

Objeto (Designación)

Noción

Sensación (fono)

signo

Palabra

Indudablemente, el modelo de figuración geométrica formalizado después por C. K. Ogden e I. A. Richards, S. Ullmann, K. Baldinger, y ampliado en forma de trapecio por G. Hilty y K. Heger,26 ya se perfila aquí con sólo considerar la imagen fónica de la palabra y del objeto representado, al que corresponde la significación mediada por la idea. Caben diversas posibilidades de representación. Amor Ruibal cita a este respecto y el del valor simbólico del lenguaje, en consonancia con la Enciclopedia y Estética de Hegel, la figura de la pirámide.27 No olvidemos, sin embargo, que el aire de la fonación forma volumen y períodos de onda, y que, por tanto, toda figura ha de entenderse aquí como el espacio-tiempo inscrito en su esquema.28 Lo importante es sensibilizar el código mental del signo en función del acto de habla, que se complica aún más si tenemos en cuenta la intersección producida al comunicarse los hablantes entre sí. Su relación es inversa, asimétrica, y supone, como el diálogo en Humboldt, una serie de actos y distinciones superpuestas que patentizan el efecto reflejo y reflexivo del lenguaje.29 La locución comprende aquel nexo real e ideal del habla o valor objetivo de las intenciones de hablante y oyente. En el primero supone: entender la cosa (objeto); entender la palabra; conocer el enlace entre entendimiento y palabra y entre ésta y la cosa. Y por parte del oyente: entender la significación de la

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palabra; conocer la relación “ideal-real” que permite atribuir a la significación “el valor objetivo que intenta el que habla”; pero no requiere, en cambio, el conocimiento de la cosa, aunque se dirige a ella oblicuamente por el concepto o idea. Ya conocemos este tipo de relación mediada.30 El signo se constituye en el ámbito de irradiación más comprehensivo de la palabra y como intersección locutiva de las intenciones de hablante y oyente. Implica diálogo. Es el código. Amor Ruibal lo caracteriza bajo diferentes aspectos y del modo más preciso posible respecto de las aporías tradicionales y alternas entre naturaleza y convención social, motivación y arbitrariedad, respondiendo así a cada una de las propuestas históricas que se hicieron. Por eso lo situamos en el esquema piramidal dentro del reflejo de la palabra como código suyo. Es uno de los análisis más exhaustivos realizados hasta el momento. El autor lo describe atendiendo a las relaciones internas y externas en orden a sus componentes, la realidad designada y el intersticio de comunicación indicado, así como la razón ontológica, causal, que en el aspecto científico le corresponde. En cuanto al núcleo, referido a la potencia cognoscitiva que lo produce, se divide en formal e instrumental; en cuanto a la designación o referencia hacia la cosa u objeto, en natural y arbitrario. Esta diferencia corresponde al instante interno de constitución de la idea y elación del sonido al formar unidad nueva e independiente. Según el primer aspecto es verbum mentis, denominación que hereda un trasfondo filosófico conocido desde Platón y san Agustín hasta Ockham. El segundo se refiere al verbum oris o palabra hablada. Habrá que determinar el engarce entre los dos orbes de conocimiento, conceptivo y expresivo. Es la intersección de intenciones antes señalada o valor objetivo de la idea incursa instintivamente en el sonido fónico, el cual experimenta, así lo interpretamos nosotros al menos, una elación significativa, y en ese instante aparece la palabra “significando la cosa, cuando en realidad representa la idea”.31 Esta aparición resulta esencial, pues concibe formalmente el sonido en función de las nociones y conceptos que confluyen en la idea, la cual presenta, a su vez, una cosa y con ello induce una atribución inmediata en los interlocutores. Tal atributo es realmente la palabra, el efecto o acto de la potencia cognoscitiva que hace expresivo el concepto. Y la expresión ya resulta ontológica. Atañe a la facultad natural de conocer y hablar, una misma en dos vertientes, la segunda por efecto expansivo del conocimiento al representar y decir a otro hablante el “valor objetivo” de lo así creado. Se trata de una creación ex aliquo, más bien de una producción creadora: algo que conduce (ducere) algo en razón (pro) del valor adquirido en su proceso: acto creativo. La función elativa actúa la potencia de la facultad confiriendo un valor intencionalmente objetivo a lo representado para conocerlo y, por ello, comunicarlo. La palabra refleja su constitución conservando la capacidad facultativa

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con carácter doblemente plástico según atienda al impulso ideológico o a su expansión fónica. Una vez producida, conserva esta actitud de significación y determinación, cuyo acto es el lenguaje efectivo, formalizado. Amor Ruibal matiza entonces las correspondencias que atañen a cada plano del lenguaje. La idea inviste el sonido con “la significación del objeto que representa”. Y según consideremos la relación del objeto con la idea y la palabra, el diverso modo de conocerlo o de expresarlo, así observamos respectivamente que sus divisiones se reflejan comunes en ambas. En el segundo caso, el del conocimiento, atañen sólo a la idea y en el tercero, el expresivo, a la palabra.32 La consecuencia inmediata de todo esto es que el signo del lenguaje se muestra, por una parte, formal y natural, pero, por otra, una vez creado, su valor es instrumental y convencionalmente arbitrario. La determinación formalmente activa acontece en libre albedrío y según aquella razón del medio o mesología, que alcanza incluso al orden creativo de la expansión etimológica y de la palabra en la oración. De esto resulta que el acto intelectualmente nominal de la palabra se produce ocasionado por un objeto singular. La intención es ya denominativa porque se refiere al objeto y según “una equivalencia semántica abstracta (. . .) que se concreta en cada caso”.33 Ya sabemos que este modo de concreción se produce con el dinamismo del discurso al limitar una palabra el sentido universal y genérico de otra. Amor Ruibal admite además que originariamente los sonidos fónicos contaron con “fundamento real” y una razón no enteramente arbitraria o convencional, pero, una vez formado el lenguaje, el hombre se mantiene en principio indiferente respecto del uso de cualquier idioma y después, ya adquirido uno determinado, se subordina a él convencionalmente.34 Así se explica la diferencia de idiomas y el apego entrañado de las lenguas al medio cultural y etnográfico donde se generan, aunque esto no suprime, como vemos, su carácter independiente. Volviendo entonces al fondo científico y ontológico del lenguaje, a su valor entitativo, la doble relación plástica del verbum entre la mente (mentis) y la oralidad (oris) se manifiesta como causa eficiente (razón de su existencia y de su significación); ejemplar (norma de su significación); y final: la razón del vocablo es la intención significativa. Ahora bien, tanto la ocasión intencionalmente denominativa del lenguaje como la causalidad ideológica del verbum mentis respecto de la fonación tiene consecuencias notables. En primer lugar, al ser la significación una equivalencia abstracta y producida libremente en la naturaleza del concepto con ocasión de algo singularmente objetivo, los nombres son “adjetivos que expresan una cualidad”. No existe palabra propia y, por ello, “todo lenguaje es en orden a las individualidades un conjunto de pseudónimos combinados”.35 El nombre no contiene todo lo que evoca y de algún modo intuye mentalmente. Va más allá de lo designado. Abre espacio múltiple de interpretación radiada en

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el que convoca a otros nombres ya creados o posibles. Amor Ruibal incluye también la Retórica en la Ciencia del Lenguaje siguiendo a K. Brugmann y J. Darmesteter. El signo resulta convencionalmente libre, pero adecuado a la situación en que se produce. El objeto apropiado de la inteligencia es la inmediatez de sus valores universal y singular, no reflejos, sino espontáneos, aunque cada uno produce efectos diferentes cognoscitivos. Amor Ruibal concibe como Kant y Hegel un solo rayo intelectivo bifurcado en dos direcciones de conocimiento, el concepto originado por la sensación singular del objeto y la idea producida al considerar la razón que asiste verdaderamente a esa relación original. Y de aquí procede su teoría relativa del conocimiento y del lenguaje. La propiedad, el carácter de propio, de suyo, como dirá luego X. Zubiri, pertenece a lo producido conociendo. De ahí que la palabra sea a su vez “un universal individualizado”.36 Es el nuevo objeto, la transición elativa y traslativa del singular a la mente como algo propio que significa conociendo en reciprocidad inmediata, alterna, correlacionada. El autor se refiere de continuo a un ejercicio de traducción entre los niveles del conocimiento, indicando con ello que la inteligencia tiene una función traslativa. La traducción pertenece también al complejo hermenéutico del lenguaje. El constitutivo diferenciado del signo es finalmente la inconstante y mutable relación permanente de sus elementos, en correlación con aquella definición ya expuesta de la “razón evolutiva” de la historia: “inconstancia presente de todo lo sucesivamente actuado”. Por eso el signo resulta también símbolo o, más bien, la palabra contiene, en su relación simbólica, al signo como código suyo de actuación cognitiva. El lenguaje significa el tránsito objetivo de la realidad en el conocimiento. Y lo que sigue son sólo detalles derivados como consecuencia del universal concreto. La limitación mutua del significado de las palabras en el orden procesivo, sintagmático, y en virtud del valor objetivo ocasionado por la realidad conocida anticipa el orden compositivo de los conceptos -el juicio- y las palabras en la oración. Las unidades se determinan y limitan mutuamente en función del conjunto que forman y las engloba, es decir, del contexto así creado. Amor Ruibal anticipa de algún modo el referencialismo contextual de R. Carnap y constata el principio de composicionalidad de B. Bolzano y G. Frege.37 La potencia incursa en la Etimología como aptitud significante, en principio indeterminada respecto de la individualidad del referente, favorece la expansión predicativa y luego revierte sobre lo así determinado como contexto suyo interpretativo. El significado general de la palabra se concreta según Carnap en el marco que la circunscribe. Asimismo, el contexto interviene como medio entre la idea, la cosa y la palabra en el referencialismo contextual de Frege, por lo que diferencia entre función y objeto, referencia, significado y sentido. Como

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el conjunto oracional no es suma lógica de los significados de las partes y sus puestos funcionales en el sintagma, el sentido determinado tampoco responde unívocamente a cada una de ellas. Para determinar lo concreto de la referencia hay que situarlo en el contexto así obtenido y expansionado, pero ya nada garantiza que su significado sea la realidad del objeto. La extensión y diástasis predicativa incrementa la perspectiva del objeto en el horizonte que la posibilita. Es otro modo de escepticismo y consecuencia de la ruptura del vínculo que el juicio aún garantiza para Amor Ruibal al comprender en su afirmación y como criterio de verdad el reflujo de las cosas y estados suyos objetivos como predicamento real de la atribución lógica de sentido. La proposición de la lingüística relacional incluye en su proceso el contexto que interpreta sus partes y funciones. Los procesos determinativos evolucionan también en el contexto histórico y contribuyen a establecer la categoría de las palabras y sus funciones posibles. Amor Ruibal acepta la descripción genética de Bréal. El primer elemento compositivo en orden a limitar el valor universal de la palabra es el demostrativo, aún generalizante, pero con índices deícticos al referirse a algo. El pronombre abre campo de designación aludiendo a algo ya previo y el acto mismo de alusión resulta concreto. Vienen luego las denominaciones abstractas de cualidades genéricas, instrumentos comunes de la vida, y en forma de adjetivos. Le siguen los géneros sustancias según se va manifestando el objeto. Más tarde se recurre al compuesto en función del lugar, la filiación o algún acontecimiento notable en el que participó una persona, los apellidos. Incluso una frase completa puede equivaler a una designación particular.38 Lo importante de la génesis designativa es el intermedio pronominal de las unidades lingüísticas, la completud que una palabra determina en otra en virtud del espacio demostrativo, referencial. Por eso “lo individual no tiene nombre propio y singular en ninguna lengua”.39 Amor Ruibal salva el determinismo y escepticismo semántico con la correlación gnoseológica o vínculo espontáneo, nocional, prelógico, del objeto y sujeto, en el que la ciencia descubre principios básicos de funcionamiento como el de identidad, no contradicción, el derivado de tercero excluido entre ser y no-ser y el de causalidad. Son los fundamentos de la lógica, que el lenguaje refleja en el fondo ideal y especulativo de la significación. Tampoco es determinista el lenguaje considerado social y etnográficamente, a pesar de que se constituye y evoluciona según el medio de la realidad que lo motiva. El lenguaje procede como en Bonnot de Condillac, Humboldt y A. Comte social e individualmente. Aunque depende para su existencia y desarrollo del individuo y de la sociedad, en contacto, no obstante, con la naturaleza y el medio humano, no guarda relación necesaria “ni con el individuo ni con la sociedad que le dio ser y forma determinada”, por lo que tampoco ninguna

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lengua caracteriza a un pueblo o su capacidad intelectual. El hombre tiene por naturaleza facultad lingüística, pero su desarrollo no depende de una lengua determinada, sino que lo favorece cualquier idioma. El lenguaje se adquiere y una vez asimilado resulta individualmente propio. Se establece entonces una influencia mutua con el medio social y cultural y entre todos los individuos se genera “un substractum de fuerzas conservadoras y fuerzas modificadoras de las lenguas”, tal como testimonia su estudio comparado.40 Amor Ruibal concreta como Humboldt la sustancia social y diacrónica, democrática, del lenguaje, convertida luego por Saussure y Hjelmslev en fundamento estructural suyo y, con Chomsky, en fondo de competencia y actuación, el lenguaje adquirido y apropiado que posibilita comprender y realizar más lenguaje. El lingüista y filósofo gallego diferencia ya el sustrato socialmente histórico del lenguaje, la “lengua común y social”, y la apropiación que el individuo hace de ella dándole “existencia real” y modificándola poco a poco, nunca del todo ni a su entero capricho, pues su esencia y entidad, el “ser y forma determinada”, le viene del modo social y de la convivencia. He aquí el carácter langue y parole del lenguaje definidos luego por Saussure en el Cours de Linguistique Générale,41 publicado en 1916, once años después de los volúmenes filológicos de Amor Ruibal y dos respecto del primer tomo de Los Principios Fundamentales de la Filosofía y del Dogma, de 1914. Aquí expone el concepto ideal de ciencia y esboza la teoría de la relatividad partiendo de los elementos estático y dinámico, el concepto de valor y la prelación del predicado sobre el sujeto en el orden gnoseológico del conocimiento y del lenguaje. ONTOLINGÜÍSTICA

Nos referíamos antes al doble valor plástico de la palabra en orden a la idea o a su propia expresión, el significado objetivo, valor que procede a su vez de la relación sígnica del objeto con los planos significante expresivo e ideológico. Amor Ruibal sostiene un equilibrio esquemático o correlación entre la constitución de la idea y de la palabra respecto de las cualidades del objeto y sujeto que traslapan a una y otra, respectivamente, pero ambas referidas a su capacidad designativa y significante de sujetos atribuibles o designables con tales esquemas. La aprehensión de cualidades del ser culmina en algo concreto que las unifica en el sujeto y esta unidad, ya objetiva, sirve de esquema para posibles atribuciones a otros sujetos, es decir, a nuevos entes susceptibles de aplicarles las mismas cualidades: “De modo, que el esquema de cualidades del objeto, conviértese en esquema de sujetos de aquellas cualidades, desde el momento en que la aprehensión intelectual se une a la aprehensión sensible, o más bien ésta origina aquélla”.42 En la designación, como en el decir, los objetos resultan predicables: sujetos de predicamento. De ahí que la palabra

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sea también, a su vez, “un esquema de cualidades del sujeto, y un esquema de sujetos de tales cualidades, respondiendo así bajo la forma de unidad fonética, a la dualidad psíquica que la produce”.43 Existe un flujo y reflujo de concreciones sensibles cuya unidad ya categoriza con predicamento y en algún punto del proceso entra o se constituye el nombre, que Amor Ruibal entiende como traducción de uno a otro fenómeno. Ese punto es, a nuestro entender, e infiriendo del mismo sistema ruibaliano, el de relación activa y atómica que correlata al objeto, la idea y su expresión fónica en orden al conocimiento en tanto invariable equilibrio permanente de constante mutación ontolingüística. Son los elementos básicos de rotación continua del pensamiento en unidad relativa de cognición, lo cual no configura un relativismo mecánico ni psicológico, pues el índice de inconstancia relativa es permanente. Tiene entidad propia. Se efectúa en espacio y tiempo o unidad fónica de acción mental concretada históricamente, como demuestra la evolución lingüística de los idiomas y conceptual de las ideas. Cada elemento refluye hacia los otros una vez constituida la conexión de relatividad real o relatividad real entitativa. Los principios de relación son los lógicos básicos y elementales y las categorías descubren el proceso que las forma según el fundamento objetivo que designan y a la vez las predica, es decir, en correlación con el ente por ellas designado. La designación categorial implica nombre, por lo que palabra e idea están imbuidas de la relación prelógica y nocional ser, el punto de inherencia del hombre en la realidad por el simple hecho de existir. La conclusión ontolingüística del proceso ruibaliano permite concibir lo sujeto de las cualidades como la rotación predicativa del esquema nominal sobre el ontológico en orden a la reversión predicamental del ente sobre las categorías que lo definen designándolo. Y entonces el sujeto figura como índice de inherencia y adherencia propositiva. La proposición es el reflejo proyectivo, flujo y reflujo, del nombre sobre el proceso que lo constituye. Tal es el aporte del método sintético-histórico de la lingüística y del correlacionismo ontológico de Amor Ruibal al conocimiento. Universidad Nacional de Educación a Oistancia, Madrid N O TA S 1 Ángel Amor Ruibal, “Introducción” a P. Regnaud, Principios Generales de Lingüística IndoEuropea. Versión española, precedida de un estudio sobre la Ciencia del Lenguaje, Tipografía Galaica, Santiago, 1900. Edic. facsímil del Consello da Cultura Galega, Santiago de Compostela, 2005, p. 35. Citaremos como CL señalando a continuación la página o páginas correspondientes y, en el resto de las obras, según indicamos a continuación de cada una de ellas. Los Problemas Fundamentales de la Filología Comparada. Su Historia, su Naturaleza y sus Diversas Relaciones Científicas. Primera Parte, Tipología Galaica, Santiago (de Compostela), 1904; Ibid.: Segunda Parte, Imprenta y Encuadernación de la Universidad Pontificia, Santiago (de Compostela), 1905.

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Edic. facsímil de idem (PFFC, I, II). Los Problemas Fundamentales de la Filosofía y el Dogma. El conocer Humano. Tomo Octavo, Tipografía del Seminario Conciliar, Santiago (de Compostela), 1934 (PFFD, VIII). Los Problemas Fundamentales de la Filosofía y el Dogma. El Conocer Humano (Función de Deducción). Tomo Noveno, Tipografía del Seminario Conciliar, Santiago, 1934 (PFFD, IX). Estos dos volúmenes están incluidos en uno solo, el V, de la reedición crítica efectuada por C. Moreno Robles (Xunta de Galicia, Santiago de Compostela, 1999, pp. 13–287 el octavo y 289–488 el noveno). Al referirnos a alguno de estos volúmenes de nueva edición, incluimos además las siglas (XG). 2 Ibid., Cuatro Manuscritos Inéditos, Edic. de Saturnino Casas Blanco, Edit. Gredos, Madrid, 1964. 3 PFFD, IX, 56. 4 PFFD, I (XG), 158. 5 CL, 75 nota 1. (Respetamos en todas las citas la acentuación del original). 6 Ibid., 76. 7 PFFD, VIII, 163. 8 PFFC, II, 349–350. 9 Ibid., 352. 10 Ibid., 355–356. 11 Ibid., 356, nota 1. 12 Ibid., 363. 13 Ibid., 367. 14 Ibid., 369. 15 Amor Ruibal evita de este modo el posible reproche de recurrir aún al método escolástico del silogismo, al que Bréal atribuye el retraso científico de la gramática fundada en criterios lógicos desde los griegos. En el caso del autor gallego sería más notorio por cuanto su sistema se opone precisamente a la tradición escolástica, pero parte del fundamento real que la noción de ser implica en todo acto cognitivo. Ahora bien, la perfila desde el aporte filológico de la atribución y recurriendo al semantismo de Bréal, quien reconoce, de acuerdo con la tradición comparatista, que el sustantivo encierra una raíz atributiva. Tal movimiento de relación es para Amor Ruibal el verbo ser. (Cf. Michel Bréal: “La forme et la foction des mots”, conferencia dada en el Collège de France en 1866 y recogida en Mélanges de Mythologie et de Linguistique, Hachette, Paris, 1882 (2a ), p. 245. Esta obra y el Essai de Sémantique. (Science des Significations), publicada en 1890, están muy presentes en la base filológica del autor gallego. 16 Michel Bréal, Mélanges de Mythologie et de Linguistique, op. cit., p. 254. 17 Publicado hoy en dos volúmenes por la Fundación Pedro Barrié de la Maza (A Coruña, 1999, 1998) con edición y estudio de José L. Pensado. 18 PFFC, I, 64. 19 Ibid., 66. El análisis muestra en la raíz “una representación universal” si partimos de un concepto idealizado de lengua perfecta, que era el objetivo de muchos pensadores en la tradición filológica, por ejemplo la determinación de una característica universal del lenguaje por parte de Leibniz. Es una pretensión del ideal científico aún vigente hoy día en el neopositivismo lógico y en el generativismo chomskiano. Amor Ruibal es consciente de que se trata de “una pura abstracción de contenido general é indeterminado, que, como tal, no aparece en ninguna lengua acabada”. La síntesis y la evolución histórica perfila, a su vez, las raíces “como palabras primitivas que existían al formarse los idiomas, y como gérmenes vivientes que en virtud de propia actividad van atrayendo los términos de relación y asimilándolos hasta fundirlos en las palabras actuales” (CL, 76, nota). Este funcionamiento amébico de la raíz deja entrever el evolucionismo histórico y además la potencia inherente de la energía incursa en la palabra, pues ha de entenderse el resto

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del lenguaje a modo del paradigma morfológico, por ejemplo la fase inmediata de transición a la frase y al texto. Son movimientos de atracción, asimilación y fusión, lo cual implica otros que separan y distribuyen -diátaxis- expandiendo. Amor Ruibal resume en la palabra intususcepción, ya presente en Hegel, este doble proceso racional y evolutivo. Se aprecia en ello la concepción biológica y atómica del lenguaje a partir de un núcleo mínimo energético, la vida como principio activo de existencia. Responde así indirectamente a Hegel, Darwin y Einstein, autores también objeto de su reflexión filosófica y lingüística. 20 PFFC, I, 61. 21 Ibid., 60. 22 Ibid. Cf. J. Locke, An essay Concerning Human Understanding, B. II., ch. XXXII, Clarendon Press, Oxford, 1985, p. 386. 23 Ya hemos advertido que la determinación concreta de la significación se obtiene en el proceso del discurso o, como decimos hoy, en el recubrimiento de las relaciones paradigmáticas y sintagmáticas. El principio formal comprende el dinamismo interno y atañe tanto al Lexicón como a la Sintaxis ya prefigurada en la Etimología. Benot alude a este núcleo dinámico señalando el efecto reductivo, de recorte o acotamiento, de epojé lingüística, podríamos decir, que una palabra ejerce respecto de otra en orden a determinar el concepto intuitivo de las cosas concretas: “El arte de hablar consiste indudablemente en limitar lo general por lo general para dar nombre á lo individual” (Eduardo Benot, Arquitectura de las Lenguas. Núñez Samper, Madrid, 1889, p. 40. Cf. además, Arte de Hablar. Gramática Filosófica de la Lengua Castellana, Anthropos, Barcelona, 1991 (1910), pp. 55–59. PFFC, II, 344. 24 I. Kant, Kritik der Urteilskraft. Suhrkamp, Franfurt am Main, 1978, pp. 360–362. 25 El autor recoge aquí otra observación de Bréal en el artículo “La forme et la fonction des mots” (op. cit., p. 265), del que parte asimismo, con otras fuentes, para el resumen de la orientación gramatical de filólogos hindúes y pensadores griegos. 26 Cf. C. K. Ogden e I. A. Richards, The Meaning of Meaning, Routledge & Kegan Paul, London, 1960, (1923), p. 11. Kurt Baldinger, Teoría Semántica. Hacia una Semántica Moderna, Ediciones Alcalá, Madrid, 1970, pp. 24–27, 155–159. Klaus Heger, Teoría Semántica. Hacia una Semántica Moderna, II, Ediciones Alcalá, Madrid, 1974, pp. 31–32, 155–171. 27 PFFD, VIII, 141. Cf. G. W. F. Hegel, Enzyklopädie der philosophischen Wissenschaften im Grundrisse (1830). Dritter Teil. Die Philosophie des Geistes. Mit den mündlichen Zusätzen. Suhrkamp, Frankfurt am Main, 1979, pp. 270–271, 283–284.; Ibid.: Vorlesungen über die Ästhetik, I, Suhrkamp, Frankfurt am Main, 1979, pp. 459–460. En un estudio precedente figuramos la intensidad de la concepción expresiva del signo por la altura de una pirámide trapezoidal. Son modos de aproximación intuitiva a cuanto acontece mientras tratamos de explicarlo y el ejemplo comprende menos que el alcance de la realidad implicada. 28 El poeta y filósofo William Oxley entiende que incluso la verdad del ser es volumétrica y que su medida requiere una base cónica, pues también lo es la perspectiva de conocimiento. (Cf. The Idea and its Imminence –a poet’s philosophy-, Institut für Anglistik und Americanistik, Universität Salzburg, 1982, pp. 64, 67). 29 Humboldt analiza las implicaciones lógicas contenidas en las tres direcciones del diálogo, yo-tú-él (realidad). El yo locutivo de hablante y oyente supone una serie de juicios traslapados que evidencian el fondo prelógico del lenguaje y su prelación crítica. Cf. W. von Humboldt, «Ueber den Dualis», en Schriften zur Sprachphilosophie, W. III. J. G. Cotta’sche Buchhandlung, Stuttgart, 1988 (6a ), p. 139. 30 PFFC, II, 340, 341. 31 Ibid., 340. 32 Ibid., 337.

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Ibid., 343. Ibid., 348. 35 Ibid., 343. 36 Ibid., 344. 37 Observamos ciertas connotaciones de los conceptos de Mathesis universal, Formenlehre y Grössenlehre o teoría de los gradores de Bolzano en otros de Amor Ruibal como el de sintaxis y procesos gradativos aplicados al valor, ahora bien, desde fundamento muy diferente en uno y otro filósofo. Bolzano entrevé el principio de composicionalidad o combinación semántica -en el fondo una variante del arte combinatorio medieval-, por el que a cada representación le corresponde una proposición en la que aparece como constituyente suyo, pero esta propiedad es externa a la representación misma (en sí), mientras que en Amor Ruibal resulta inherente y procesiva. (Cf. Bernhard Bolzano, Wissenschaftslehre, § 52-1, Bd. I, Sulzbach, 1837, p. 228). Estos y otros posibles referentes, como, por ejemplo, la distinción de Rudolf H. Lotze entre juicio de existencia y juicio lógico, aquí también implicada, debemos anotarlos con prudencia, pues Amor Ruibal remite tales connotaciones a precedentes más antiguos y dialoga con sus presupuestos e implicaciones sin citarlas siempre de modo expreso. 38 PFFC, II, 345–346. 39 Ibid., 344. 40 Ibid., 349. 41 F. de Saussure, Cours de Linguistique Générale, Payot, Paris, 1983, pp. 25–26, 30–31, 112. 42 PFFD, VIII, 400. Cf. “El esquema ontolingüístico”, en Antonio Domínguez Rey, Ciencia, Conocimiento y Lenguaje. Ängel Amor Ruibal (1869-1930), Prólogo de José Luis Abellán, UNED- Espiral Maior, A Coruña, 2007, pp. 106-111. (Este libro expone y desarrolla el pensamiento lingüístico de este autor gallego situándolo como uno de los autores pioneros en la fundamentación científica del lenguaje). 43 Ibid., 401. Es oportuno recordar aquí otro concepto de Bolzano, las representaciones mutuas o Wechselvorstellungen inducidas por un mismo objeto y cuyas propiedades se correlacionan en ellas (Wissenschaftslehre, § 64–4, B. I, op. cit., p. 272). La palabra sería entonces una representación más para Amor Ruibal, y lo es de hecho una vez constituida, pero la forma -¿ Formenlehre bolzaniana?- que confiere unidad al conjunto fonético está considerando el esquema ya ontológico de cualidades del sujeto atribuibles o predicables a su vez de nuevos sujetos, desde la palabra misma. Algún punto habrá, pues, de coincidencia relacional en la remisión que ya podemos nombrar ontolíngüística. La correferencia implica un enlace interno correlacionante y categórico en atención a la etimología de este último término, pues enuncia anunciando, es decir, hace público lo acontecido en la fusión y fisión atómica del núcleo nominal, el nombre. 34

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S AU D A D E A N D M E M O RY I N T H E O N T O P O I E S I S OF LIFE

ABSTRACT

The aim of this paper is to confirm how the categories saudade and memory express themselves differently within one’s consciousness through the philosophy of Saudade. The explanation of Saudade as a liberator of memory records is implied in the function of a Poetic Reason and a Poetic Logos achievable through the phenomenal movement of existence in its ontological and ethical sphere. S O M E N OT I O N S O N T H E C O N C E P T S AU DA D E

The expression of the consciousness category we name Saudade has not yet been properly widened within the universe of philosophy. Nevertheless, we are aware that given its ontological importance, in a near future it will be understood with the appropriate value for the knowledge of Man in the world. In fact, the Saudade that has been handled for the past five hundred years by Portuguese theorists and literates has never reached its true philosophical status. Having been understood as an element independent from immediate emotions, it has been able to maintain a certain amount of mystery, deriving not only from its abnormal etymological and philological formation but also from the semiologic contents it closed. Having been discussed since the early 20th century by numerous philologists, there seems to be a consensual majority regarding the fact that Saudade derives from the Latin feminine plural etymon solitates, having developed into soedade – a formula that remained until the 15th century in Galicia, although the form soidade was already contemporaneous to the south in the 12th century Cantigas de Sta. Maria. In A Saudade Portuguesa, it becomes exemplarily evident that in the normal movement, so-e-dade, a primitive form that lasted in Galicia until the 15th century, to so-i-dade, documented in the Cantigas de Amigo by King D. Dinis, to the suydade of the Leal Conselheiro, by the philosopher King D. Duarte, the word Saudade appears independent in the evolutionary causal chain. The phenomenon witnessing this abnormality in the evolution of soedade – soidade – suidade – Saudade – disrespecting the phenomenal causality and not abiding 195 A-T. Tymieniecka (ed.), Analecta Husserliana CII, 195–205. c Springer Science+Business Media B.V. 2009 

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by the laws of phonic evolution is best explained by Carolina de Michäelis Vasconcelos1 : Seja como for, certo é que Saudade de soidade ou suidade não é evolução fónica. O ditongo oi, como equivalente de ou, e representante de au é normal. Coisa, cousa provém de causa; oiro ouro de auro; loiro louro de lauru; etc. Anormal é o oposto: au de oi. De mais a mais, num período onde todos pronunciavam ainda so-i-dade.2

Defying all phonetic laws, this time oddity certainly has its share of responsibility in the previously mentioned riddles of Saudade and its mysterious character. In effect, many studies have already approached the linguistic and chronological and philological history. This was how Carolina de Michäelis de Vasconcelos presented a probable perspective or hypothesis regarding the morphic variation of the word by referring the value of the concept significance as an indication, as Bedeutung as per Freege, Husserl, and Derrida.3 However, this study that achieves one of the highest moments in interpreting the Portuguese Saudade is to be set among the line of a long tradition, which translates the history of research on the issue of the mysteries of Saudade. Also it would seem that Saudade as an emotion was a feature transported and generated within the travels of the Portuguese Descobrimentos.4 This is the reason why in Portugal, following the presence of this semiotic entity, not only was Saudade deeply felt, as a national feeling, but it was also the basis for the creation of the Portuguese saudosismo movement. The first mentor of a philosophy of Saudade who had not yet found logical and ontological support was Teixeira de Pascoaes. In 1912, he created the group of the Renascença Portuguesa5 having been joined by the greatest personalities of Portuguese literature, science and arts. The saudosismo was created in Portugal and in Portuguese, and it had the aim of becoming a broad spiritual regeneration movement. Brazil and other Portuguese language countries also joined the movement, which would soon be surpassed by the Positivism trends of the beginning of the century. L O G O S A N D S AU DA D E

In the construction of the Saudade philosophy, to know is the status of the Being that recognises itself in the participation with the given and original Whole under the principle that “Saber e Ser é o mesmo”,6 i.e. Knowing and Being are the same. This participation of the Knowing in the Being and vice-versa understands Man in his totalizing and integrative dimension. Consequently, at the various levels of existence, the consciousness of the given Being

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(es Gibts) remains through the exclusive feeling of the Saudade of Being, which in its excellence function is still the quest for knowledge. The man who knows his ontological dimension is thus a man prepared for a creative existence (because he encompasses saudade, thus being saudoso), and the creative condition becomes his sole vital constraint.7 Man’s authenticity that recognises himself in his own self – where he will meet the possibility of recognition of being part of a universal entity, as ultimate awareness of his humanity. “O ser é a síntese das coisas, onde elas se convertem em sensações recebidas e estudadas à luz da consciência”, i.e. the being if the synthesis of things, where they become sensations received and studied under the light of awareness.8 This is the reason why the distance between ethics and gnoseology is eradicated in the philosophy of Saudade, and knowledge becomes an essential part of the moral conduct. It is possible to say that the Cartesian emphasis of error conception seems to soar over this matter. Evil results from mistakes, lack of knowledge and philosophical absence; not as much from Aristotle’s agnoein (not-seeing), as this is the starting point for knowledge, but mostly from mistakes as effective detour from the approach to truth. It should thus be noted that understanding this or solving the mistake as “evil” does not rely solely on the orientation of Reason or the rational method; knowledge does not rely exclusively on reason, as the latter will only become operational through the category(ies) of sensitivity, understanding and imagination while considered supra-individual categories, agents of the dynamics moving through the Universal Law of Love. “Ver é ver amorosamente”, i.e. to see is to see amorously, and Reason as the “reason” presenting “irrational” results, as per Pascoaes,9 is to be kept away from this matter: and on the limits of reason: Só tem profundo olhar o nosso sentimento. Para se descobrir a origem de uma flor, Não basta o raciocínio, o humano pensamento, É preciso sentir por ela um grande amor.10

P O E T I C S O F S AU DA D E

Reason in itself is not capable of being understood or considered within a syntactics referring to intuitive levels, nor may it be considered within a random grammar emerging from the deepest level of knowledge makes it possible to acknowledge the principle that “só se conhece o que se ama”, i.e. one only knows that which one loves (ibid). In the philosophy of Saudade, the entire circuit of cognitive elements to apprehend the world of phenomena and of the internal life of the Being depends not only on the generating principle of Love, but also on the principle of its Universal Law (a field of original and combination forces), as well

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as, and mostly, on the use of intuition, which alongside inspiration is capable of interpreting the representation of that same force. One can thus better understand Pascoaes11 when stating: «A Intuição, a inspiração, foi e continua sendo a primeira forma de saber».12 «Entre o real e o poético, o mediato e o imediato, há um traço de separação e união. Separa ou liga separando, um conhecimento racional apoiado em irracionais, um conhecimento teológico supra-racional porque excede o racional em que se afirma, como o telescópio excede o olho».13

The functional character of knowledge, understood as noesis, succeeds in becoming a propeller of real desire and affection through the emotion of love. The role of the emotion expressed in this gnoseological combination can obviously not be detached from the role of the feeling of Saudade as an original feeling capable of creating the sense of the absences(s) in Being, nor does it restrict the understanding of the phenomenon of knowing in the noema-noematic relationship and the fulfilment role. Nevertheless, it is important to recognise that the priority given to the feeling as essential device for knowledge must not be confused with that of the sensation and, in a different way, from the remains of a certain empiricism that the feeling-knowledge thesis may convey. What is hereby stated is that in the thought of Saudade and in the founder of the Portuguese saudosismo, the feeling emerges from the deepest levels of our consciousness, which is why it is closest to the original intuitions. Such a position may authorize the feeling in phenomenological terms, not only through the rule of familiar proximity but also as an understanding device. It is stated in S. Paulo14 that: o pensamento é sentimento definido, e a inteligência a definição do pensamento.15

For these reasons feelings are resistant to rational explanations or logical representations, but it is the poetic metaphor that provides them with better shelter, which is to say through art and poetry. Feelings thus have greater responsibility than thoughts, as they are also considered to be the means through which the phenomenological context of the Being relates to its own solitude and Saudade16 : Sentindo é que nos sentimos como entidade original que principia, em si, mas não acaba, um núcleo incandescente e radiante. Pensando podemos passar por qualquer outro aos nossos próprios olhos.17

Or also: amando a árvore conheço-a, possuindo-a. Surge na minha memória fazendo parte de mim mesmo; e alcança um valor humano.18

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Therefore, the theory of Saudade does not comprise knowledge without affections; and since affections are captive of desire, they represent the link between the element that involves knowledge and the consciousness of Saudade. Consequently, gnoseology gains consistency and is better understood as a kind of meeting point of idealistic and realistic trends. Simultaneously though, the resulting gnoseology is a logical immanentism which is poetic a priori and transcendental, and it represents itself in its state of crystalline purity (Kantian), combining «acaso e natureza ou energia e matéria, alma e corpo», i.e., randomness and nature or energy and matter, soul and body. This immanentism19 was founded based in proximity with Bergson’s intuitionism, which, if necessary, would complete the awareness that all of this takes place in a time defined as the period peripheral to the extension.20 “Entre o intelectual e o emotivo há uma diferença de nitidez”,21 i.e. there is a difference in accuracy between the intellect and the emotional. The Being is then perceived as a traveller of images and at the same time a transcender of the fragmentary and virtual reality. If reality is a reflection of a nexus between the whole and the sole, under the experience of a time with no known direction, the consciousness of Saudade is left with the possibility of understanding it, by its intuition, and that of perceiving it by recreation through its categories: Remembrance, Desire, Evocation. In this seeming paradox, it would be possible for reality to result from potentialities coming closer, and in this context the memories of consciousness are what the future may bring; following this line of thought, the axiology capable of supporting such a concept of reality would necessarily have to be related to the decisive importance of affections and their direction. That which could have been read in Calderon, Shakespeare, Unamuno, Yourcenar, and many others as: “la vida es sueño”, i.e. life is a dream, may be forced to surpass this logic of Saudade, as well as surpassing what Ortega y Gassett state regarding this matter22 : Hagamos una física lo más rigurosa que podamos: experimentemos, midamos, cortemos los tejidos con el microtomo, distendamos los poros de la matéria para ver bien su estructura. Pero no gastemos en eso toda nuestra energía mental; reservemos buena parte de nuestra seriedad para el cultivo del amor, de la amistad, de la metáfora, de todo lo que es virtual.23

Considering the context of knowledge, the role of saudade which is neither reminiscence (of platonic character) nor memory, sets itself within a type of evocative creationist experience, resulting from the active reasoning within consciousness, in its dialectic and intervening dimension for the regions of

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pre-category, ante-predicative consciousness, i.e., as return to the expressive contents, those inhabiting the area where representation is forbidden. In any case, what becomes clear is the autonomy of the Saudade memory regarding the platonic reminiscence or the memory function. As for the world of the platonic eikasia (imagining), the philosophy of Saudade merged it with the understanding that reality results from a complex relationship with consciousness which is not to be subject to any of the terms in the traditional subject-object dichotomy, which is understood as apparent. “A realidade é um transitório aspecto de ilusão”,24 i.e. reality is a transitory feature of illusion, Pascoaes wrote regarding this matter. That is why it is the creating subject’s responsibility to decide on the reality to experience. In this context the memory function as sheer record of consciousness does not grant it this freedom. Reality thus becomes a continuous act of will and desire of consciousness, a participation, but one involving the creationist act; the role of evocation does thus have an essential role regarding the conception of reality or realities to be experienced. Against this background it becomes relevant to present the idea that reality, in the figuration of Saudade, is an evoked event and as evocation it is solely the responsibility of the subject and the transcendental consciousness. However, what is suggested in this perspective of Saudade on the knowledge of reality is not the denial of cardinal points for certain realities, be it social or economical and cultural, as well as ethical or aesthetical consequences; it is instead the attention to be drawn to the fact that consciousness is something to be experienced in various ways, and the possibilities to appeal to the evocation of Saudade touch the core of its dynamics. For the thought of the philosophy of Saudade, reality is thus a set of real potentialities, and if it is possible to experience it in various ways, that is the result of the time inference(s) that in the intentional consciousness evoke and recall what affection is through desire. This is why there is no knowledge without affection. Although some believe the knowledge of reality in the philosophy of Saudade may seem surrounded by a certain amount of relativism or scepticism, it is necessary to verify that the multiplicity of the intentional realities of consciousness is born from the principle of the One. This principle is the basis for pre-matricial categories, under original grounds, a Unform, as per Husserl. The One of the world diversity points the finger at itself over this perception of diversity of the hilectic data, precisely for the capacity of consciousness of Saudade. Therefore, any way of relativism incompatible with the rest of the Gnoseology to be pointed out in the philosophy of Saudade would fail on the first levels of its metaphysics.

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On the whole, what becomes peculiar in this conception of the knowledge of reality is the fact that, above all, it is the fusion of intuition, sensitivity, understanding and reason. As (Kantian) categories, all of these are capable of organising a cognitive construction around affections, or that which is called Poetic Logos, which has been properly explained by Maria Zambrano or António Machado as paradigm for a Hispanic and Iberian expression. The phenomenal experience as reality of the intentional consciousness thus results from the power of evocation. One evokes what one thinks as a wantingthinking-living process. To evoke is then to call upon a certain degree of reality, and to materialise it in experience is to manipulate the sense of memory in its own action, which is why, in the words of Pascoaes “a imaginação prolonganos os sentidos”, i.e. imagination extends our sensesthus becoming a part of the reality as much as it manipulates them.25 When considering the issue of reality in terms of what may and may not be known about it, evocation as action of remembering and desiring takes on a main role and within this dynamics where knowing is also creating, it is not possible to leave out the role of the figuration of love, as an Aristotelian Universal Law, revising and supporting the principle of the philosophy of Saudade according to which it recognised that “apenas se conhece quando se ama”,26 i.e. one only knows when one loves. Knowledge is thus generated by affections, degrees of amiability suppressing and integrating the differences and absences; to know applies to a dynamic character, a sense of knowing, and that is the last touch of truth of its own foundation. M E M O RY A N D S AU DA D E

Considering all elements referred to in the sphere of knowledge, unlike Saudade, memory appears as deposit and device of the activity of times that have been experienced, without depending on or being under the direct proportion of desire. Nevertheless, as primal memory, when placed to the level of original intuitions (Husserl), like Saudade, memory would then receive a supra-individual character. When shown upon the identity of races, peoples and languages, this type of saved memory is better defined in what Jung calls the collective unconscious or as genetic deposit whose symbolic ideal presents itself through archetypes and others as symbols. However, it is important to state that under the light of the philosophy of Saudade, having the responsibility of saving records experienced in the consciousness, memory does so not considering weight and value regarding the ethical or aesthetical axiological scale. Following this line of thought, it is possible to bear bad memories but it is not possible to hold bad Saudades. At first glance, this is exactly where it

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becomes possible to distinguish the function of memory from that of Saudade. In fact, when realising that Saudade is a “sweet remembrance” of something, either experienced or underway, it reflects the involvement with a Poetic Logos, with the poetic order of the world, with the universal law of love. In this context and under the light of the philosophy of Saudade, memory as a concept of records is to be understood as an ulterior result of perception and complementary to the deductive activity of reasoning. This statement makes it clear that through desire and evocation, Saudade creates once more the experience in the consciousness of the time it exchanged with the Beautiful, Good, Truth, thus leading to the idea of Sublime. POETIC LOGOS

As a Universal law responsible for then dynamics of all knowledge, love is what may convey the recurrent idea of the emergence of a new man. However, that which will make it possible for that new man, who will be creator and participant in the work in the universe, to appear or to be developed is the emergence of another logos. The Poetic Logos will be implemented through a poetic reason of the quest for truth and beauty and combines apprehension of a Whole which is harmoniously One and diverse, because “a imensidão é sempre harmoniosa”, i.e. vastness is always harmonious.27 tudo tende a permanecer e a mudar, (. . .) o mundo sonhado é belo; pensado é massa ou energia bastante confundidas ou indistintas ou conversíveis uma na outra, mistura de relações insubstanciais, voos sem pássaros, jogos e jogos sem jogadores, tudo marcado com algarismos árabes e letras gregas.28

The assumption of a cosmic order submerged in all of these issues, makes it clear to see that primal arithmetic of an intelligent universe (Fred Hoyle, 1984). This is how science is solely in the network of a vital formula, which is latent and manifest, for example, “na ciência de uma aranha diante de um insecto”,29 i.e. in the science of a spider before an insect. Furthermore, when speaking of limits of knowledge as representation it is important to think of Poetic Logos by its power to attract borders, places where that universe of the Ineffable remains, and where it is granted contact, some control even over that consciousness volitional formation. It thus brings it closer to the intermingling with speech, to the language Network, through the work of metaphors, which conveys meaning to those forms-unforms, imagining elements that touch unknown roots. In the philosophy of Saudade, the knowledge inherent to the Poetic Logos is the one true religion, because it brings the Being closer to the self, elevating it

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to creating man as the former believes that he can make of man the only being capable of revealing the mystery from himself to himself. Still, knowledge thus understood may not become fulfilled without the reason that understands the source of inspiration and the means of liberation from the condition of existence as ek-sistente, the Spirit which is capable of moving forward over the unknown treads where he will satisfy his thirst from ignorance . . . That which will truly compose the new man is a new reasoning, a new logos that is poetic and that feeds through Strength, Spiritus, Pneuna, Geist. The truth is that the non-represented reality of areas of consciousness where, as per Husserl, words are but an immediate experience, shapeless, bodiless, insignificant, only an imagining mass, Phantasievorstellung with no figuration and no access to the dominium of expression, Kundgabe has been gaining shape30 inhabiting places31 however, it should be stated in and through the poetic word the one that meets the desire to combine the essential Being with its existence as truth based on the most obscure areas of consciousness. The existence of ontological regions escaping the intention of the objective consciousness, regions cohabiting in an area not available for representation as Kundgabe/Kundnahme,32 seems to stand from Kant to Husserl, from Freud to Jung; however, if their absence is felt, one is bound to miss their figurations with Saudade. Poetry is thus the logical order on which the unadvised, understood precisely at its Kantian valoration,33 may come to the representation and so better understand the sphere of essential meaning, in the original event of existence and of the Being towards the reality of the Happening –, just as it was presented by Heidegger: the Ereignis.34 That which flows in the poetics and the language of poetics is then a kind of precedent knowledge whose subjective organisation, the Poetic Logos, made or worked through by the consciousness categories work, must be understood in the phenomenal relationship (as noema-noematic) and in the effort of the organisation of phenomenal data, which determine the reunion between the pre-logic matter, matricial, pre-reflexive, and the data evident in the need for construction and representative edification of the feeling from absences-presences and its improvement. In fact, the access to all of this will be the responsibility of a sole Poetic Logos.

Universidade Aberta, Lisboa

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1

Cf. Carolina Micaelis de Vascocelos. A saudade Portuguesa, 1914, Porto. Regardless of how it happened, the truth is that Saudade developing from soidade or suidade does not mean undergoing the phonic evolution. It is normal for the diphthong oi to act as the equivalent of ou and representative of au. Coisa, cousa (thing) comes from causa (cause); oiro, ouro (gold) from auro (golden); loiro, louro (blonde) from lauru (lovage); etc. Abnormal is the opposite situation: au coming from oi. Especially in a time when so-i-dade was still widely pronounced. 3 Cf.Pascoaes, 1996:29. 4 Translator’s Note: The Descobrimentos were the period of the Portuguese expansion in the 15th century. 5 Translator’s Note: The Renascença Portuguesa, or Portuguese Renaissance, was a cultural movement that took place in the early 20th century, which promoted Saudade as the defining feature of the Portuguese soul. 6 Cf.Pascoaes, 1984:200. 7 Cf.Coimbra, 1915. 8 Cf.Pascoaes, 1993:9. 9 Ibid., 1993:28. 10 Only our feeling possesses a deep look/To discover the origin of a flower/Reasoning and the human thought is not enough/One needs to feel great love for it. 11 Idem. 92. 12 Intuition, inspiration was and still remains the first form of knowledge. 13 Between the real and the poetic, the indirect and the immediate, there is a separating and a uniting line. It separates or unites separating a rational knowledge supported by irrational knowledge, a theological supra-rational knowledge as it exceeds the rational knowledge it states itself in, just as the telescope exceeds the eye. 14 Cf. Pascoaes, 1984:217. 15 Thought is the defined feeling and intelligence the definition of thought. 16 Cf.Pascoaes, 1993:92. 17 It is by feeling that we feel as original entities that begin in themselves but do not end, a luminescent and radiant nucleus. By thinking we can be perceived as any other being before our own eyes. 18 By loving the tree I know it, possessing it. It appears in my memory as a part of myself; thus gaining human value. 19 Cf.Pascoaes, 1993:29. 20 cf. Bergson, 1988. 21 Cf. Pascoaes, 1993:29. 22 Cf. Ortega y Gassett, 1988:65. 23 Let us create a theory as accurate as possible: let us experiment, measure, cut the substance with the microtome, let us expand the pores of matter to properly see its structure. But let us not waste all our mental energy on it; let us save a good part of our seriousness to nurture love, friendship, the metaphor, all things virtual. 24 Cf. Pascoaes, 1984:213. 25 Ibid., p. 24. 26 Cf. Pascoaes, 1993. 27 Ibid., pp. 39, 11–12. 28 All things tend to remain and change (. . .) the dreamed world is beautiful; when thought of it is mass or energy fairly confused or similar or convertible into one another, a mixture of insubstantial 2

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relationships, flights with no birds, games and games with no players, all of which marked with Arabic numbers and Greek letters. 29 Cf. Pascoaes, 1993:12. 30 Cf. Merleau-Ponty, 1996. 31 Cf. Heidegger, 1995. 32 Cf. Derrida, 1995:53. 33 Cf. Enes, 1990:11. 34 Heidegger, 1989.

BIBLIOGRAPHY Coimbra, L. (1915) O Pensamento Criacionista. Porto. Nova Renascença. Derrida, J. (1996) A Voz e o Fenómeno. Lisboa, Edições Setenta. Enes, J. (1990) Á Porta do Ser. Lisboa, INIC. Heidegger, M. (1989) Beitrage zur Philosophie. Von Ereignis.Frankfurt, V. Klostermann. Heidegger, M. (1995) Sobre a Essência da Verdade. Porto, Porto-Editora. Hoyle, F. (1984) O Universo Inteligente. Lisboa, Presença. Merleau-Ponty (1996) Fenomenologia da Percepção. S.Paulo, Martins Fonseca. Gassett y. G. (1988) Para la Cultura del Amor. Madrid. Ediciones El Arquero. Pascoaes, T. (1993) O Homem Universal e outros escritos. Lisboa Assírio & Alvim. Pascoaes, T. (1984) S. Paulo. Lisboa, Assírio Alvim. Vasconcelos C. M. (1912) A Saudade Portuguesa. Porto,Renascença Portuguesa.

D AV I D A . R O S S

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ABSTRACT

Prepared for the phenomenological conference on the ontopoiesis of memory, the paper recalls the difference between freedom and its shadow, namely, promiscuity in order to delineate the logic of Being. Being (ta on) is always at the point of being forgotten, moreover, and to recall its essence means liberating it from its shadow appearances. This inquiry has implications for the dialectical-fractal form developed at greater length in Being in Time for the Music (see Cambridge Scholars Press). Freedom, I argue, is subsumed to the value of Being, freedom being what is needed in order to play the musical composition that is one’s own life. In scaling freedom, the paper renders audible the resonances belonging to its being, freeing freedom from its shadow image. The poetic quality of this ontopoiesis refers to the making out – both music and love – of the on-going wave-like resonances with which the dancer flows – as, indeed, the resonance that is that making’s voice. INTRODUCTION

I am an unknown and I know this here, at the Conference: Memory in the Ontopoiesis of Life. Is memory implied? Have I remembered that I am unknown in order to know this? Ontopoiesis – ta on being, what is, ousia substance, – poiein to make: making being. What is the substance of making being? Life – la vie – la survivance – a plethora of languages (reduced to three) resonates within the text that becomes uttered – outered – made apparent and so visible – being there in the Now that is the Title. What do we know about being (is being an object, subject to a grammatical lexis?) What, then, is the relationship between memory, being, and making? Poetically, Heidegger said, man dwells. ‘Do we have ears to hear?’ asked Nietzsche. That we hear being, that we remember ‘what it is’ reveals a complicity between being and memory. What is the relationship of memory to mind? Memory, the word, derives from the Latin memoria, from memor mindful; akin to Old English gemimor well-known, Greek mermEra care, Sanskrit smarati he remembers. To remember is to be reminded of something, memory being the second mind. In a thing being remembered it comes to mind; it becomes present and so represented. The memory of a thing being what it 207 A-T. Tymieniecka (ed.), Analecta Husserliana CII, 207–225. c Springer Science+Business Media B.V. 2009 

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is – being – becomes remembered through mind – the being mindful of. Does being remind us that we have a mind? Or do we remind ourselves that we have a life when we ‘mind’ being? To mind: to be irritated by and to take care of. We mind that which irritates us, that which troubles us. In being so troubled, we mind and come to have a mind. That is, the mind cannot exist out of the act of minding. Or a mind without minding is mindless, a pale phantom of itself. Would not that be a strange phenomenon? What would that represent? What is the strange phenomenon of representation (at a conference yet) at which, an unknown, would present? In giving mind to the phenomenon of ‘memory in the ontopoiesis of life,’ this unknown presenter would raise the question of the conference’s possibility. How is it possible to even speak of this phenomenon? Is there a noumenal essence in the shadows? What is the mind (nous) of memory? Of what is the mind mindful when it reminds itself of being? Does being come to mind? Or is the very reminding the being? Would ‘being’ then cease to be an object? In that case would there be any point to talking at all? That precisely is what needs to be recalled in the form of my presentation. I begin with a timely reminder from Heidegger, from Being and Time that appears in my own work, Being in Time to the Music: If the question of Being is to have its own history made transparent, then this hardened tradition must be loosened up, and the concealment with it has brought about must be dissolved.1

What is this hardening which this paper aims to recall? The opposite of hard is soft, and to convert the first into the second state requires loosening. Heidegger wants to loosen up the question of Being, most immediately its hardened (Hegelian) dialectical form whose analysis lies outside the scope of this paper. I want to analyse nevertheless the phenomenon of analysis, performing a metaanalysis, if you like, the ‘memory of Being’ being the onto-poetic object at hand for Being is the life. The purpose of its analysis will be to remember what the life of Being is. I begin with the question of an analytic treatment. The word analysis derives from the Greek luein to loosen, and it is a loosening that Heidegger aims to induce in regard to the history of Being. Analysis is a double negation: a negation of ‘alysis,’ which is itself a negation of ‘lysis.’ That has lost its looseness has become hard. Looseness also implies freedom, meaning the absence of limits or barriers. Chains have been left behind. A loose body has been loosened from its former bounds. However, ‘looseness’ could also imply ‘promiscuity.’ Is freedom promiscuity? Promiscuity is a ‘free for all.’ A loose woman is a promiscuous woman, a woman freed, or having made herself free from constraints to which she has been subject. Curiously enough, the woman here is Sophia. Is wisdom promiscuous, that is, free for all? How is freedom free?

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That which is not free for all is restricted. Restriction would exclude some from ‘enjoying’ or ‘having possession’ of ‘something,’ whose name is the ‘forbidden fruit’ associated with the ‘tree of knowledge.’ In the above, Heidegger also makes use of the image of light: ‘history made transparent.’ That which lacks transparency is not light, but heavy or opaque. Opacity is heavy light; transparency is light enlightened of its heaviness. What is this enlightening movement? In the light becoming lighter spacing out of the matter at hand occurs, and in this spacing what is dense becomes less so. If to be dense is to not display intelligence, then the movement of enlightenment, which means the reduction of density, is the movement of intelligence. In this movement, then, Dasein’s being-there is less dense, or there is more space between its parts. Intelligence, the word, to space out the idea here further, derives from the Greek verb legein to pick out, and, secondly, to speak. Heidegger cites zoon logon echon, his translation of ‘that living thing whose Being is’. To draw the second back from the first: the ability to speak relies upon the ability to pick out. What is the picking out action? To pick out is to select one thing from another, selection (and election) stemming from this common root. In this selection the picker orients to something that is there. To be there means to not be somewhere else or to not be something else. The picking out, in other words, points us towards an identity or a means of identifying what is ‘there’ such that what is there is other than what it is not. To illustrate this point, consider more closely the issue of freedom. If to be free is not to be promiscuous, we had established, then, to be free is not to be free for all or to be free for some. Freedom in its ‘freedom-ness,’ because it is for some and not all, requires selection; a free person elects to do some things or be with some people but not to do other things or to be with other people. Being-free, then, is a matter of choice, it would seem, because of the linguistic associations between selection and choice; to select is to choose one thing over another. However, because freedom is an elective action, it cannot be it cannot be for all things, and this must include ‘choice’ if ‘choice’ or ‘choosing’ is something we do. Or, for freedom, however odd this may sound to ‘freedom lovers,’ choice is not all. This implies that choice is limited, and that a free person is choosey. What, however, makes freedom free? Or, language borrowed from the European Enlightenment, what is freedom’s necessity? To paraphrase a famous student of Hegel’s, namely, Karl Marx, men are free to make history, but not under conditions of their choosing.2 If freedom of choice exists then so must the necessity corresponding to it, and which must be other to choice. That difference implies necessity, the explication of which is now useful. I do so in order to make transparent the history of Being recommended by Heidegger.

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I shall dwell with Parmenides, one of the first to systemically raise the question of Being. Heidegger cites echon having from of zoon logon echon. The infinitive form χει means to have, hold, possess, and is also found in Parmenides Way of Truth (line 30): γ ρ ν γκη πε ρατoς ε´ ν δεσμo σιν χει . . . τó μιν.3 Extrapolating and re-stating: necessity ( ν γκη) holds fast ( χει) the One (τó μιν) in chains ( ν δεσμo σιν) at the limits (πε ρατoς ). Freedom is chained by the necessity of not being other than itself, and what is other to freedom is promiscuity, this referring to the logic of the concept. How so? What limits freedom? To be free is to be able to choose. Choice is defined by picking one or the other; to pick all is to choose none. Choice then would have no logic. The logic of choice points us necessarily to limits: the not having all. To choose means to exclude some and exclude others, and that is hard. Necessity is hard, and that is its logic. The logic of hard necessity is what holds fast choice to ‘choiceness.’ It is hard to choose but choice would have no real necessity in absence of that hardness. The hardness of choice is this: some possibilities are better than others. That is the basis of choosing well. To choose well is to choose from possibilities. What, however, is good? That choice cannot tell us because choice is not knowledge. To choose one thing from many does not necessarily mean that we have chosen rightly. Indeed, if we did know what is right, there would be no need to choose. There would only be one which is good and others which are not. Choice is only necessary when one is presented with alternatives that possess some individual validity. Logically, the one which we choose is the best possibility, which implies that the best is not obvious or there is no one which is the One. Or, the One is lost among possibilities with varying degrees of goodness. Or no one or none is the Perfect One which means that the one which we actually choose will be imperfect. Our actual choice will be imperfectly good. The logic of choice, and choosing is the exercise of freedom, is the selection of the imperfectly good. If this was not the case then the One chose would be perfectly good, and this implies that all the other possibilities were not good at all, which means they were not really alternatives. That is absurd. The necessity of choice compels us to realize that what are actually will have, when we choose will be imperfectly good. This result shows us that choice and goodness are inversely related. To the degree that we have choice then to that degree we cannot have what is perfectly good, and to the degree that perfect goodness exists, to that degree choice is unnecessary. Goodness does not exist in varying degrees among all parts. That some parts are better than

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others means that none is perfectly good or bad; inequality then is the necessary condition for choice alongside the imperfect goodness that we necessarily chose if we have to choose at all. Promiscuity violates the condition of equality because it would be open to all because, presumably, all are equally good. But if equally good then equally bad, which means that choice is impossible or absurd. It is impossible to choose one thing whose goodness is perfectly equal to another because that would deny the individuality of a thing, assuming that things are good in different ways because they are different things. If things are different then they are be good in different ways, and this can give rise to inequality. Without difference, inequality cannot exist. Freedom which is truly free must exist among different goods. The individual quality of the differences makes possible inequality in relation to the choicer. Depending upon what he seeks, some differences will be more valued than others. To choose well is to pick an imperfect good if only because individual differences each possess a part of ‘what is good.’ Therefore, to be free is not to be open equally to all but to be open to what is imperfectly present in the form of actual choices, with the belief or hope that the actual choice would be better than the alternatives not selected. The logic of freedom is to choose what is good, and this requires concern about the individual alternatives in terms of their goodness. That is necessary if the actor would choose well. Otherwise, in absence of that necessity the actor is closed to the question of the good or the good is only this ‘passing sensation’ or ‘excitement,’ that being the basis of novelty. Promiscuity, best defined, is the excitement produced by passing sensation, and thus is good only in this passing way. It is open to all because it regards all equally, which means that it is indifferent to the individual goodness of each. Given this indifference, the promiscuous actor is choosing really nothing at all, or nothing which would make any difference to him. Moreover, if promiscuity is essentially indifferent to the individual quality of the alternatives it is equally indifferent to whether any of them, because ‘each any’ is individually distinct, are any good, which further implies an indifference to the question of goodness. That invalidates the reason for choice in the first place or choice logically conceived of, namely, to select what is good among many. Promiscuity, thus, is not actuated by goodness but by other matters, for example, boredom of which the promiscuous actor ‘relieves’ the self by experiencing the momentary ‘excitement’ of ‘something’ or ‘someone’ new. Excitement, then, is the highest good for promiscuity. But if that is promiscuity, then we can observe how the promiscuous actor is not free at all but enslaved to sensation. Starkly revealed, promiscuity is the slavishness to sensation that wears the mask of freedom. The source of the deception was the existence of various ‘others’ which, in the case

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of free have individual significance and in the case of promiscuity, have no significance whatsoever. In summary: freedom is the being open to the quality of goodness present in individuated alternatives while promiscuity is the being closed to the quality of goodness. This means that promiscuity is indifferent to real differences, and this indifference is the basis of its being ‘open to all,’ which means that promiscuity is open to none. Its choices, therefore, will have very little or accidental relationship to the actual and real goodness of any one alternative and be based, rather, on passing sensation and novelty. Freedom qua freedom, to conclude, is not determined by multiplicity but by an appreciation of the individual goodness residing in each, which are unequally distributed in each; that is its logic. Freedom that is not purely itself is determined by the sensation of multiplicity and this impure if not horribly polluted form of freedom is promiscuity. In short, freedom is rooted is selecting out the logic implied by the many and thereby overcoming multiplicity on the basis of gathering the unity of goodness, even if imperfectly realized; promiscuity is rooted in the sensation of multiplicity and the indifference to the whole question of goodness, which is why promiscuity becomes and is the slave to sensation and hence not really free at all. Freedom qua freedom is logical; freedom that is not at all free (and hence self-contradictory) is slavishness to sensation. That is the logic of its ill-logic, the freedom that is not free at all or in a word, promiscuity. The above has implications for the discussion of the ontological and dialectical aspects of the question of Being. To show this, first consider the meaning of the word ontological, that being the logic or giving an account of being (ontos). We have given an account of the Being of freedom. To generalize this, we note that freedom is not itself when lacking the necessity implied by choice, called the ‘unity of goodness.’ Freedom, moreover, realizes an imperfect goodness in the form of an actual choice. Therefore, unity of goodness is an imperfect goodness, if this is the result of freedom’s exercise (choice). In its goodness, nevertheless, freedom aims to pick out what is good, and goodness is dispersed throughout the many choices possible. This ‘picking out’ displays freedom’s logic or necessity. Freedom is necessary in order to choose what is good. This choosing is a picking out or selecting. The other to freedom is, to introduce new terms, non-freedom, which is not by any means slavery. Non-freedom refers to freedom becoming free, meaning the movement of ‘picking out.’ In more traditional metaphysical language, non-being is becoming. Freedom becomes itself by way of non-freedom. This is not slavery because slavery belongs to promiscuity which is not freedom. Non-being is not ‘not-being’; freedom becoming freedom is not promiscuity. This non-being is, in regard to Hegel’s dialectic, the Other.

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I shall now relate this middle term to the two other traditional terms of the triad. In itself freedom is the possibility for choosing what is good lying immanent within the plurality of alternatives which appear more or less good. However, freedom needs to choose itself from out of itself, meaning that part of freedom becoming freedom is freedom separating itself from what it is not. Freedom is not promiscuity. Freedom being for Other is freedom then suffering the process of this ‘election.’ Freedom must elect to be free by forsaking its slavishness to sensation. Freedom becomes choosing what is good then in the same measure that it turns towards its own being or Being, in Heidegger’s terms. The Being of Freedom or freedom qua freedom refers to the quality, that is, the degree of goodness present. Promiscuity is freedom in the least degree, meaning that state which is hardly freedom at all because it denotes enslavement to sensation. The movement from itself to for Other to for itself marks, in the case of freedom, freedom struggling to be free of its enslavement to sensation, meaning to end that ill state in which it finds itself in order for it to recover its health. Its health is its Being and its recovery depends upon its Becoming. Or, more precisely, the recovery is its Becoming. To consider the above more closely, I retrace our steps, beginning with looseness. Looseness is associated with freedom: to be free is loose from restraint. However, freedom is restrained by the Other – its Becoming – which moves it away from what it is not, this being unbecoming or inappropriate. That freedom which is most inappropriate is promiscuity, which is also called ‘looseness.’ Freedom qua freedom is not bound by sensation but by the logic of choice: the quality of its being. Moreover, to the degree that a thing possesses quality, it is good. If good, the thing in question is appropriate and becoming. To the degree that freedom is appropriate, it is becoming to itself, and thus approaches the state of being for itself. However, it undergoes the state of for Other: the motion of non-being which appears to be not being. This is the point of analysis. Freedom appears to be promiscuity to the degree that its proper sphere is Being remains unclear and thus ‘loose.’ This looseness becomes negated in two steps, signified by the for Other and the for Itself. Freedom is loose in the form of non-being; it is not clear what freedom is because it appears to be promiscuity. That state requires negation – alysis – which is the state of nonbeing; however, this, too, requires negation in turn – the an-alysis or analysis. The analysis of freedom brings out the Being of freedom through clarifying the state of non-being in which freedom found out: the state of spontaneous looseness. More clearly now, the looseness associated with freedom is not that associated with promiscuity. Paradoxically, freedom loses its ‘looseness’ or ‘loose character’ by making apparent its limits (πε ρατoι). Freedom loosens itself from its enslavement to sensation by cleaving more tightly to the logic of choice.

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The logic of choice bounds freedom to freedom and hence defines its necessity. Freedom is necessarily freedom only when tightly bound by that logic. When that logic is loose, then freedom becomes loose, that is, veers towards promiscuity. More theoretically, this concerns the clarifying of the state of nonbeing or becoming. Freedom becomes freedom (for Itself) to the degree that it can clarify and so bring into view its necessary limit; to the degree that it cannot or, worse, refuses to do so, then it has in effect turned its back upon itself. Its face remains faceless, that is, devoid of features. This blank face of freedom, the features remaining naught, is promiscuity. Promiscuity is freedom carte blanche, the face of freedom without distinguishable features and hence the mere surface appearance of freedom. Freedom comes into its own through the removing of this blankness, through the action of ‘facing itself.’ In facing itself, freedom loosens the grip of sensation upon itself. Cleaving more clearly to its limit, ‘what it is’ comes more clearly into view. This is the work of analysis. This logical limit I call necessity, the explication of which now follows.

N E C E S S I T Y H O L D S FA S T T H E O N E

Necessity (’Aν γκη) holds fast ( χει) the One (τó μιν). Freedom’s necessity is the limit which binds it fast. However, onto that freedom must cleave if it is to be itself, and freedom is cleaved from that to the degree that it does not. Here I note the double meaning of ‘cleave’: to separate and to join. A meat cleaver separates meat from meat and yet loves cleave onto each other, meaning join in heated and passionate embrace. Cleaving is one yet it appears to two, and the two become more-than-two with the multiplications of instances in which these terms become employed. In clarifying ‘what freedom is,’ it is necessary to separate freedom from promiscuity, and the cleavage defines the space between the two, a space that becomes evident in the course of analysis. Necessity then becomes obvious. That necessity needs to become obvious is other than the necessity, moreover. More precisely, that the necessity of the thing in question needs to become obvious is the work of analysis. Freedom is One but it appears to be Other than itself and thus two. Freedom could be both becoming (non-being) and unbecoming (not being) to Itself. Both the possibility for becoming and unbecoming, are found in the state of being for Other. Apart from an analysis, the two states remain merged with each other, and the role of analysis is to allow the thing being for Itself to emerge. This emergence requires that the thing break the surface and appear and so be seen for what it is. The thing being for itself is thus the thing breaking through to the surface, the restoring of the features of the face otherwise

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lost. This restoring of the face’s features is the facing by the self of itself. Freedom faces freedom through restoring the necessity which limits itself to being itself. This ‘facing’ is the self being for itself from out of its non-self. Non-self and not-self cleave to each other such that the identity of the thing-in-question remains unclear. It is only through analysis – the work of the mind – that clarity becomes achieved and that the proper identity emerges. Indeed, the steps of this dance-like motion resonate with other similar Greek grammatical constructions, for example, anamnesis. That too is a double negation. The triad, brought into prominence by Hegel, was an expansion and exposition of basic Greek grammatical structures, generalized and translated into German. The impulse of dialectical thought is to restore the identity of the phenomenon in question that finds itself lost in the state of non-being. The phenomenon, to clarify is what appears to be. This appearance manifests something being there. However the identity of the something-being-there remains unclear in absence of analysis. Analysis drives out identity through the twosteps of the dance called dialectic: splitting non-being from not-being. Identity, moreover, is ‘what is the same’ from the Latin idem same. That which is the same appears to be other than itself. The identity of freedom, for example, is other than promiscuity, but appears to be the same in absence of analysis which would restore that identity’s proper state. Is identity stored up in the thing? Is freedom the story of freedom? Can freedom be free to be other than itself? Freedom can appear to be other than itself. Its being (ontos) conceals itself in the state of non-being. This concealment is the phenomenon of duality. We have observed this duality in a thing being itself and other to itself. Being itself is itself a duality, however. If a thing could not be itself, it could not appear. Its being is necessarily there in its appearance; a thing cannot appear and be without being. That is its phenomenal reality, what its being-there shows. A phenomenon is a thing being itself, and this is necessarily dual (without being dualistic). This duality, however, can fall into dualism if the lack of clarity is not taken in hand; thus freedom can fall into decadent freedom or promiscuity. The phenomenon of freedom is the showing and thus putting into the light what the freedom is for.4 A thing’s identity is its sameness, which necessarily appears to be other to it in the act of a thing being itself. Being itself, a thing cannot escape duality if it is to have phenomenal reality. If identity refers to the same, and the same thing is being itself when it is itself, and its being is its unity, its unity is other than its identity. Or, conversely, its unity can be its identity only if its being is not its unity. In either case, duality intervenes; or, more precisely, duality is the distance between ‘being’ and ‘itself.’ Moreover, if dialectical thought is primarily concerned with a thing both being and not being itself (the non-identity

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of identity in Hegel’s terms) then any ontological based inquiry, whose rational essence is the ‘giving account of being,’ must be dialectically based. Now, Heidegger says in the above that: ‘This is why the ancient ontology, developed by Plato, turns into “dialectic”.’ The dialectical turn revolves upon the difference/distance between being and itself, the play of its identity or sameness. While the thing is inevitably the thing that it is, for logically it cannot be otherwise, it is never the thing that it is in the same way. It is always at a distance from itself in the very being itself. Dialectical thought points to the distance between ‘being’ and ‘itself.’ The ontological clue is logic of the thing being itself which becomes worked out through analysis, an analysis based upon that difference. All form of inquiry then is implicitly dialectical, meaning all forms of inquiry must avail themselves of the basic insight of dialectical thought: the changing identity of the difference which is the thing ‘being itself.’ In the ‘hermeneutic’ of the logos – it becomes increasingly possible to grasp the problem of Being in a ‘radical fashion.’ Hermeneutic means interpretation, from the Greek God Hermes, the messenger. The messenger-interpreter is the go-between, and what goes between being and itself is the identity enjoining the two-as-one. That which holds a thing to its being is not its identity, which is, logically speaking, an artefact, but the limits of its necessity. Identity is a necessary artefact that spans the gap between ‘being’ and ‘itself,’ and which, because it is a spanning, is difference/distance. Also, it should be clear that identity is neither unity nor difference. Dialectically expressed, identity is the difference of unity. The roots of identity therefore lie in this differentiated unity, whose presence emerges through analysis. We have seen already one example of this: the looseness associated with freedom/promiscuity. Freedom in its necessary is loosened from its enslavement to sensation and thus binds with the logic of choice. Freedom differentiates itself for itself out of itself by breaking with the lack of clarity defined by its merging with not-Freedom. This state of non-being is the site for and of Becoming. A thing becomes for itself through the emergence of its appropriate state by way of its necessity. That is the binding force of its logic. This site is the place where the thing in question comes in the movement of Becoming. For a thing to become itself means that it comes out of the vague state where, loosely speaking, it both is and is not itself. Another name, to draw from Heidegger, would be the pre-ontological state, the Hegelian equivalent being the ‘in itself.’ In itself, the thing in question is the being not yet appropriate for itself; equally, it is readying itself to become itself. Becoming is the thing coming over to itself by way of gaining clarity about the difference/distance between ‘being’ and ‘itself.’ For a thing to be itself is for it to cross that distance, the crossing being its identity. Thereby, the being in question assumes sameness, which is predicated upon

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that differentiation. Becoming, moreover, is the distance the thing travels by way of ‘being itself.’ By way of implies ‘being on the way,’ and possibly coming upon ‘what stands in the way.’ These are obstacles. Dialectical thought would remove standing obstacles by clarifying – rendering transparent – the manner of traveling which has made that way appear. The distance/difference is the non-being/not-being. The non- is merged in the not by way of the common denotation of ‘negation.’ We have observed this in the case of looseness and the implied absence – non-/not- of limits. Freedom, qua freedom, however, is not a slave to sensation because it cleaves onto the logic of choice. The logic of choice cleaves freedom from promiscuity, they cleaving onto each other otherwise in their merged state. The One is the thing-in-question being for Itself: the point at which it has surmounted the difficulties and so overcome the distance signified by Becoming. However, such ‘straight line thinking’ presumes that the distance has not changed. Indeed, dialectically, that is precisely the case or rather what dialectical thought brings out in relation to the ontological demands of inquiry. How so? Exposed systemically by Heidegger, the ontological demand of inquiry is the question of Being (Sein). This question however is merged in the Beingthere (Dasein). Heidegger states, ‘the problematic of Greek ontology, like that of any other, must take its clues from Dasein itself.’ Being is merged with the being-there, and the emergence of the Being question is thus possible only with the ‘there’ becoming articulate, the function of discourse. To articulate, from the Latin ars joint, is to show how things are joined together. In the state of mergence, Being and the being-there are joined in an un-free state. Really, they are one. Their emergence in dual form is the dialectical articulation of the ontological issues at stake. This stake, to sharpen the point, is the character of discourse, the word character deriving from the Greek charassein to scratch out. Charaz is a sharpened stick or stake. Ontology necessarily (must) take its clues from Dasein because the being-there implicitly stakes out the ground of Being. Being becomes there in the form of Dasein. This is Heidegger’s overall point and the basis of the dialectic in which his ontologically primal form of inquiry is grounded. This is also why Heidegger criticizes Hegel: Hegel’s end point of Absolute Knowledge is pointed in the wrong direction: that dialectical form is not dialectical at all because it fails to notice how the being-there (human essence) stakes out the ground of Being (transcendent reality). Thus, the role of inquiry, dialectically grasped, is to uncover that already staked out ground. ‘It becomes increasingly possible to grasp the problem of Being in a radical fashion’ negates one dialectical form (Hegel’s) while preparing the ground for a renewed formulation (Heideggerian) even if this last is not that inquirer’s avowed intention. That is the logical cleaver employed here by the present

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inquirer to both separate and join two dialectical forms while preserving the unity of dialectical thought.

THE GROUND OF THOUGHT

The ground of thought, to be clear, is neither ontological nor dialectical. To cite Parmenides, a line that Heidegger himself cites in Being and Time: ‘τò γ ρ α τò νoε ν ε´ στ ν τε κα ε ναι.’5 It is the same thing to think and to be. But the sameness is not a thing, even if this appears to be the case. Or is not the very thing, the thing ‘being itself,’ two? Here the thing is thinking, and thinking ‘being itself’ has given rise to (at least two things): the ontological and dialectical. However, ontological and/or dialectical are concerns that Dasein brings to bear in facing the question of what ‘it’ is. To think (νoε ν) is not to think, this last referring to the inquiring mind disabusing itself of various language habits (Wittgenstein would say), the first habit of which inquiry needs to divest itself of being that its concerns are thought itself. These concerns become stated in the form of themes. The word concern is from Latin com- + cernere to sift. Thought is a sifting operation, its theme being the statement of the logical possibility permitting the thing in question to appear, that is, assume the form of phenomenological reality. Thought becomes thought only by way of its Other, that non-being, which is language. We think through language, and the thinking-through brings out the logical possibility for the thing beingthere, which is the linguistic place it now occupies in the mind. By way of ontology, mind, however, is really nothing other than language and language is nothing other than the minding of Being. That was and is the primordial concern powerfully expressed by ‘Parmenides’: it is the same thing to think and to be. In the way of minding, words denoting obstacle if not impediment, stands the question of Being. An obstacle, the question stands in front of the inquirer; yet only upon that way can the mind think. An obstacle is, moreover, an object. Being becomes the object of inquiry, this becoming the mind. The object of inquiry, Being becomes the minded for inquiry, Being becomes the material, more precisely, the material theme; that which matters means that which recurs. Here ontology and dialectical thought meet. Dialectical thought points to the recurrence of the same, a recurrence, however, grounded in the thing ‘being itself,’ which, strictly speaking, is an ontological concern. But the differences between them should not conceal from us the unity of the doubling which their phenomenal reality manifests. ‘What thinking is,’ becomes doubled, in the context of Heidegger’s text; thought-substance appears to be ‘ontological’ and ‘dialectical.’ It is true, however, in fidelity to the

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author’s intentions that Heidegger would want to posit an unfolding of a stage that thought proceeds in stages (which is itself a highly dialectical notion): the ancient ontology, for which Parmenides was a prime exponent, as developed by Plato turns into ‘dialectic’ (see above). The ancient ontology is thought in itself and turns into‘dialectic,’ thought becoming for Other. Dialectical form, in a highly ironically reversed way, becomes the icon of the very alienation (but also abstraction) which, in the Hegelian (and Marxian) form, it was designed to eliminate. ‘As the ontological clue gets progressively worked out – namely, in the “hermeneutic” of the logos – it becomes increasingly possible to grasp the problem of Being in a radical fashion’ (see above) This increasingly radical fashion is the negation of the alienated for Other stage of thinking, which Hegel would call for itself. But Heidegger is not Hegel. The difference between the two is this: Heidegger remembers and Hegel forgets, an error which is Absolute Knowledge in Hegel’s own text and historicism, the shadow that will haunt Marxism, that the being-there already has staked out the ground of Being. So it is necessary to ‘turn over’ that ground, that overturning being the basis of the ‘revolution in thought’ by which Heidegger has overcome Hegel. But this overcoming is a destruction not of the thing itself but the form which the thing has taken when in the state of non-being. The non-being of thought is, in a word, language. In the language of thought, ontological inquiry can only in a more rooted fashion draw out the Being of thought through minding, upon a renewed and energetic basis pointed out by Heidegger’s work, the dialectical re-conception of reality which exists alongside of it. ‘The “dialectic,” which has been a genuine philosophical embarrassment, becomes superfluous’ flows once more over the land, watering the new seeds of thought. There spring returns. THE POINTLESS QUESTION

We would spring the question of Being from the Heideggerian text, turning the same into the different. In raising the question of Being, we are marking and re-marking upon the statement, ‘what is,’ stating that it is a question that has been answered. Is there an answer to ‘what is’? Can Being ever Be answered? If there is no answer, what is the point of the question? Why ask? This is what the otherwise unperturbed countenance would answer, would it not? Questions that have no answers are pointless, and being so, they point to nothing. Having no answer, the question of Being is pointless; or it points to nothing. How can a question point to nothing? Another pointless question? One pointless question follows another, and yet are we not pointing to something? What would that be? Because the question of Being is pointless, it points to nothing. What, then, is nothing and what is something?

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That something is refers to some ‘standing in Being.’ An action, standing requires a ground against which standing stands. Without the ground standing is groundless. Ground then stands for solidity, what holds the feet. However, there is a force here, namely, gravity. Preventing us from ‘flying away from the earth,’ gravity holds us to the ground. To stand is to resist gravity, and thus to rise up, in being upon the feet. The word resistance means to stand again, and in resisting gravity, a word akin to grave, we would rise to our feet and stand. Thereupon we would gain our full stature. Stature denotes the standing we have within a community and what by implication we stand for, being members of that community. It is our social position. What, however, is standing for? What is the point of this standing-out or existence? What does existence stand for? That ‘something is’ is means that ‘something exists.’ It is present, that word deriving from the Latin prae- before and esse to be. In standing before the question of Being we take up certain ground, that ground that holds us by the force of its gravity, and is where we face what is gravest, namely, the end of our existence. For there, at the end, we enter the grave. To be present is to be before the question of Being, the question of the grave which awaits us, and the standing ground which is our existence. To stand out, moreover, is to exist. The question of Being stands out for us, for those who would stand upon this ground: the gravest question. It holds us there, and we yet we would resist the gravity of the question in attempting to stand. What, however, is standing? Here, in standing the ground, we would make out what Being is. This is the standing question. The question of Being stands out for us in our being before the grave, holding the end of our existence. It stands out there. The ‘there’ where it stands out, is the ‘something’ which holds us. There something is, and it is the grave. Is this the meaning of something? What of nothing? We stand before something, and this is the grave we are about to enter. At the point of the grave we become nothing. So standing before something is to stand before nothing? What difference is there? Question and answer: the question of Being comes before us and the answer is grave. That is the measure, the graveyard, upon which we stand. But do we stand there? Or is that not precisely the struggle, to stand, to ex-ist? The space between ex- and ist is a gap, lacunae, and it is the distance that stands-between question and answer, ground and standing. A standing question, Being presents us with the gravity of our existence, that it is the grave-yard upon which we stand in walking to our grave. That is the distance. What, however, is that? Is the distance to be measured according to a yardstick? If so, what is that? We say that there is a gap between ex- and ist, and this is the distance between the ground and what would rise out of it. It is none other than ourselves that would stand, if we would walk upon the earth, and exhibit our human status.

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Human beings stand upon the earth. What of that? What is standing such that our status is that? The standing question of Being reveals to us a gap between existence, to be more precise, and ex-istence. In standing before Being, we stand before this open question, for Being does not appear to be anything if Being persists. Being persists; the question has no answer and thus, by the criteria which we would apply to other questions, is pointless. Being is the question that points nowhere, except back to the ground of our existence. There the question is: what are we? For what do we stand? To ask the question of Being is to point to what, for the unperturbed countenance, is pointless and of no account, namely, the ground of existence. To such a face, the question is nothing, and nothing comes out of nothing. Such a face does not countenance the question of Being because for it the question, because it does not point to anything, is pointless. The point, then, is that Being is a thing: that is the question of Being for the one for whom Being is not a question, but merely a statement. Being is this. Caught by the phrase, ‘what is,’ there is no question marking the statement of Being. Because the question of Being does not point to that or this or anything, it is pointless and thus not worth asking. But if Being were a thing, would there be any point to asking the question? A simple formula would do and Being, a problem to be solved, would no longer a question to be posed and would be resolved. One could give the answer and go on one’s way. Resolution means ‘what is solved.’ The question becomes dissolved in the answer, and loses its solid force. That is the fluid solution, which washes away. In hearing Being in this questioning way, no solution exists for it, if Being is a ‘problem.’ Being is irresolvable; the question will not wash away. That is the force of its grounds that it remains ‘what resists’ all solutions. Science, inferior philosophy, can only have problems to solve; philosophy, superior science, has only issues to explore. This resistance movement to converting Being into a problem (called philosophy) gives the question its standing. To resist means to stand again. This standing again is how the question takes the stand, in standing its ground. This taking ‘the stand,’ moreover, is associated with giving testimony in a trial: the witness takes the stand. What is the stand here? In the courtroom, the witness takes the judge and testifies, this attesting to the truth. Testimony, I may add, comes from the Latin testes, the male sex organ, commonly called ‘balls.’ Having balls is the vernacular for having courage, meaning, here, the ability to stand one’s ground. The courageous stand their ground in refusing to have their being dissolve before either pain or pleasure. To attest to the standing power of Being is to pose the question, in risking the ridicule of the unperturbed countenance that would make faces, deriding the very asking of the question. To stand one’s ground is to persist in ‘being-there.’ Opposed to those who would make faces, the courageous one

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would make out his face, to glimpse more clearly the features of his own being. That is the point of asking this most pointless question: that the features of the face belonging to the self do not yet stand out. They lie submerged in the ground and require being raised from out of it. In taking the stand for Being, those would attest to its power, make a stand for ‘having a face.’ They would face the question of ‘what it is they are’ in stating their existence in this questionable way. Existence is the questionable statement for Being. To exist is both to be and not to be, and thus it is a question whether, indeed, ‘what exists’ is at all. Am I? The ground of Being is a question mark, which makes it a statement. Am I what I am? Being the statement of the question, Being cannot have any set formula or solution. To answer Being in this way, which can only disturb the unperturbed countenance, is to pose questions in order to make that ground stand out. That is the point: To ground Being back into the existence that would otherwise take it to be a thing. In other words, the existence of the unperturbed countenance is groundless, precisely because it refuses to ask the question, and would without question state what Being is. What are the grounds here? They are the graveyard upon which we would stand and out of which we are, in this standing out action. There is no ground to our existence except through the struggle to make the question of Being stand out, we who would be other than unperturbed countenances taking Being to be a thing. That Being is a thing grounds the existence of the unperturbed countenance and yet, however, we others would call such an existence groundless. Why? To take Being to be a thing is to take it to be this, say, rather than that. But this is something and that, something else. Both something and something other to that must possess being if it is possible to say that this is and that is not. Within the ‘that is not’ is ‘is.’ It is impossible to say ‘that is not’ without saying ‘is.’ The former phrase lacks standing and so falls to the ground. It cannot support itself, for which falling to the ground is the consequence. Consequently, then, we must say that it is groundless to take Being to be a thing, which is either this or that. So Being is a thing that is neither, because it is present in both. All things attest to the presence of Being without anyone thing being Being. By being attested to by all things, and hence by being not any one of them, Being is nothing, if something is the presence of a thing and nothing the absence of. By contrast, Being is some-thing and no-thing. It is the break between, the gap between ex- and ist. Would this not convert Being into a break? ‘Being is a break’ is the statement. What, however, marks the question of the statement Let us understand this ground more closely.

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GROUND BREAKING

We push our way from out of the ground, the ground that breaks open with the question of Being. Heidegger’s Being and Time is a ground-breaking work in its raising of this question. This pushing our way out is the struggle to stand, if not to understand what is there. Being is there before us, the presence that persists and resists, is present in any and everything, but which itself is none of them. That Being is there, and not there, if what is there is something or nothing, makes the ‘there’ to be neither. That is the ‘being-there,’ which Heidegger will call Dasein. Before coming upon Dasein, for which a transformation is necessary for our purposes, the question of the possible standing that this being has requires addressing. The breaking question of Being opens the ground. How? To break could mean to shatter. If we shatter an object such as a vase we do not open it. We open a thing only by preserving its integrity, for example, a bottle, by removing its cork. To break open the bottle of wine is to present and offer it to the assembled. The ground-breaking question of Being is breaking because it preserves the ground’s integrity, making way for something to emerge through the opening. Out of this opening the question grows. Here I note that the Sanskrit word bhu to grow is the root of the English word, to be. Being is a growing thing, which is no-thing and some-thing. In understanding this question, it is necessary to keep in touch with the growth; the question opens up the ground out of which it grew. The question of Being grows from the inability to state, without question, that Being is a thing. If Being is not a thing, or a thing which is both some-thing and no-thing, then there are no grounds for saying that it is this and not that. Or, in other words, Being both is this and that. But, if Being is not only this and that, then it could be something else. It is everything and not any one of those things. So Being both is and is not this and that. To understand the ground of Being is to state that the question itself is irresolvable if by solution, the one who is there intends the identification of Being with an actual thing, that is, something which exists and becomes, when it ceases to exist, nothing. The question thus grows from out of the distance between ‘things that exist,’ and ‘what ex-ists.’ What ex-ists is Being. Its growth is indicated by the space between ex- and ists; equally, this is the distance separating the two. Distance is marked by ‘and.’ The distance from the ground to where the growing things stands and exists, is its growth. In the context of Being, growth is becoming, equally, be-ing. A growing and hence living thing, Being becomes what it is. In so doing, it puts a distance between itself and its grounds, marked here by the difference between the Sanskrit bhu and the English to be.

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To further elucidate I return to the space between ex- and ist, whose root is the Latin stare. Here I inquire about the crossing of this opening, the distance between different languages. To what does this question of translation, to use this Latin based work or metaphor, its Greek counterpart, point? Both words reference the verbs of carrying (the Latin ferre and the Greek pherein) and across, through (the Latin trans- and Greek meta-). The crossing of the distance between ex- and ist, is a matter of translation, a metaphorical ‘negating’ of the separation. This is the bridge that connects two otherwise wholly different sides. Being, moreover, is the question of ex-istence, namely, the break-up of existence. Existence breaks up into ex-istence at the point where Being cannot be identified only with this or that. Referring to the break-up of existence into ex-istence, difference belongs to the question of Being. It is ground-breaking and so releases Being from the identity given to it by the otherwise unperturbed face. However, this face is faceless, since it is precisely the question of the grounds of its existence it would flee from. To review that strand of the argument in binding more tightly the parts to the whole: those who would stand their ground are courageous, and their ground refers to the identity of their existence, that which they are. However, their identity is not clear, and I employ the metaphor of face to refer to the identity of a person, the entity in question, whose ‘being-there’ is the statement. The face of the person, which I shall use in place of Heidegger’s Dasein, for reasons that will become clearer with the text’s further expansion, is highly individual, bringing out the singular character of the person concerned. The question of Being is highly singular and personal; it refers to the question of a person’s existence. What does a person stand for? What grounds the existence belonging to that individual? On what grounds does a person qua person stand? The answer to that question is the personal response to the question of Being. Because Being has no stated identity, it not being a thing, the person in question is forever struggling with what Being is. In face of the question of Being, a person can only respond in terms of that individual’s character. That is the character of the question of Being, that it forces us to respond personally, in ways that are highly individual and singular, because Being has no stated identity. Being is forever a question that can only invoke a response and so not elicit an answer. This was the implication, touched upon earlier, that the question of Being is incapable of resolution. It is impossible simply, on the grounds that Being is not a thing, to give an answer and walk away. Now we can say more clearly why. The grounds that the person-as-a-person walks upon are the grounds upon which the person stands. They are none other than that individual’s graveyard.

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CONCLUSION

To conclude, in presenting this paper I walk upon my graveyard. This walking upon the grave side in this merry way being the making-being that is my existence: the difference between existence and ex-istence. The active person, grave and merry by turns, seeks out and explores the play between existence and ex-istence, crossing over from one side to another. In this crossing over there is a crossing out; the actor negates the faceless character of existence, thereby bringing out his face. The motion of crossing over and out is the bringing out of the face from its faceless state, the unearthing of the ground of that actor’s character. That is, to return to the beginning, the great Unknown – what one’s proper self is – the Being projected from out of the being-there. There I walk walking, if not dancing upon my grave. Istanbul, Turkey NOTES 1

Heidegger, 1962, p. 44. See www.memorablequotations.com/marx.htm. 3 http://philoctetes.free.fr/parmenidesunicode.htm 4 Organized democracy’s refusal to do this is symtomatic of its decadenct conception of reality, particularized by the freedom which is promiscuity prevalent under such a regime, the basis of Plato’s criticism of organized democracy as the worst form of government in the last section of the Republic. 5 http://philoctetes.free.fr/parmenidesunicode.htm 2

S E C T I O N III M E M O RY ’ S N E T W O R K O F T H E H U M A N H O R I Z O N S

K O N R A D R O K S TA D

M E M O RY A N D T H E H I S T O R I C I T Y O F H U M A N EXISTENCE

ABSTRACT

In this paper we shall first look into the phenomena of memory as they are functioning quite naturally, life-worldly – and then, on that foundation, ask questions into the depth of the phenomena reflecting descriptively on the functions and structures that constitute the phenomena in a phenomenological manner, in its essence. The core of memory thus has to be decided, but then, as this is to be constituted, the context and the inter-related other functions in which the phenomena are interwoven, have to be taken into consideration as well. The whole field of relevant phenomena eventually leads to the question of human existence, now examined as a question of historicity founded in the life-world. Memory thus, closely connecting historicity, yields clues for examining (inner) time-consciousness in its various aspects. The point, then, is to “dismantle” the phenomena of memory so that both its obviousness and its radically transcendental significance can be further examined. Thus the solidity (and existence) of actuality proves interdependent on the functioning subjectivity living in a historical world, always transcending and (re)creating oneself/ourselves – yet keeping the identity of both ourselves and the things of the world relatively constant in the genuine sense of historical human existence. Memory is, of course, a quite common phenomenon in the course of human life. It might function in the manner of consciously and specifically recalling past experiences, but mostly, perhaps, memory functions only “implicitly”, providing continuity in our experiencing both our selves and the surrounding world with happenings, actions, things1 etc. Without the functioning of memory we would not be able to orient ourselves in our lives as individuals – Why is it so – and what is it about memory – being an obvious phenomena in our life that we commonly don’t think much about – that explains this important function? In this paper we shall first look into the phenomena of memory as they are functioning quite naturally, life-worldly – and then, on that foundation, ask questions into the depth of the phenomena reflecting descriptively on the functions and the structures that constitute the phenomena in a phenomenological 231 A-T. Tymieniecka (ed.), Analecta Husserliana CII, 231–250. c Springer Science+Business Media B.V. 2009 

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manner, in its essence. The core of memory thus has to be decided, but then, as this is to be constituted, the context and the inter-related other functions in which the phenomena are interwoven, have to be taken into consideration as well. The whole field of relevant phenomena eventually leads to the question of human existence, now examined as a question of historicity founded in the life-world. And this again might provide clues for examining the total field of issues in a transcendental manner. Let’s start by looking into one pretty obvious aspect of memory. Memory “brings back”, it “re-calls” experiences, happenings etc. What I did and experienced yesterday I can remember, and some times I had better do so as well. Thus yesterday is not plainly passed, a no-thing to day; pretty often what is and happens to day is even directly dependent on what happened yesterday and what I (or others) can remember from it. The meaning of to day’s experiences can often be inconceivable if I don’t remember what happened yesterday, and this might be the case even if I don’t remember exactly what happened and specifically think about it. And perhaps this might be stated even stronger – since identifying and speaking of “the meaning of something” quite generally seems to imply some transcending in regard to the actual now. Maybe even the meaning of “the actual now” presupposes something that has passed and something that is coming, because how could I identify the actual now if I did not identify it within its context, as a moment in a, so to speak, flowing stream? Of course, commonly I don’t think about and reflect on this, but my experiencing actual nows would have been pretty odd if I plainly did not do it. (They would have appeared as “totally” isolated points with no kind of connection – not even some horizontal background – between them, which is impossible and does not make sense.) In my actual experiencing I commonly have expectations related to it, and in the identification there is some living recognition (always some living “pre-”) expanding the actual situation, settling it within the context of both past and future. All this is commonly functioning automatically (or anonymously), but also sometimes calling for an explicit remembering of relevant past experiences. And perhaps this might function the other way around, starting by fairly unmotivatedly remembering something, and then this remembering sheds light into the actual experienced situation, even constituting the decisive moment in the meaning of the whole situation. Memory is thus a special kind of functioning intentionality that is embedded in various contexts, related to different kinds of intentionalities – thus also constituting depth into our whole experiential life. Perception is perhaps the most closely (or frequently) related other kind of intentionality, and it might be instructive to compare the two first. How is memory interrelated with perception and how do they constitute different intentionalities? Perception directly presents objects to us, and one object is always given in a mixture of presences

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and absences: I see the thing, e.g. a cube before me, and it is given as an object presented with its identity. But strictly speaking, what I directly see are some of the cube’s sides; I don’t see all its sides in one view – some of them are concealed, and I don’t either see its inside – even though I reasonably assume there is some inside. However, I can easily turn the cubed around or move myself and see it from another, different angle, and then those sides first being absent present themselves at the expense of those first being present, now only presenting themselves in their absence. This is plain description – and anyone being able to observe how such objects are given to us, would probably at once subscribe to it. Throughout this dynamic blending of presence and absence, this manifold of presentation, one and the same object continues to present itself for us, and its identity is not plainly (some of) its sides, aspects or profiles, but it is given as continuously existing in a dimension different from these. Thus, since this identity is constituted through the above indicated process, this, at the same time, indicates some continuous linking ability in my mind, which is closely related to – if not plainly is – memory.2 The identity provided by perception might further on as well be provided by memory itself, but now it is present as remembered, and belonging to the past. There are different kinds of appearances and manifolds involved in the constitution of its identity, and its presentation involves another kind of absence that is more definite than the one characterizing perception. You cannot actually (– although with the sc. time-machine we imagine we can) move yourself into the “real” past, as you can in regard to the perceived thing, getting a grip on what was first absent. In this regard the past incorporate a more radical absence, which, however, you can bring back by remembering; what you then bring back is not a mental picture of what was once experienced, but the experienced itself as something belonging to the past. In a way we live through experiences we previously have had, reactivating them making them alive once more, as belonging to the past. And in this sense and manner, as the past embodies multitudes of more or less continuous happenings etc., it might be part of our actual life. Thus, the horizon of past and history comes into our lives in a very elementary sense by the ability for memory. This also applies to the other pole-side in the memory-intentionality; you might not only remember what was experienced, but also the how and yourself as the subject and agent of the experience you remember. I, so to speak, place myself in the past situation in which the experience took place. And I might recall other aspects which at first did not cross my mind. Thus there is depth in the subject-pole-side, too – and this again, since it is me, my actual self, remembering having had that experience (in the past), might also call for a question in regard to the identity of my self throughout the span of time covered by the remembering: Is it me, my actual self, now remembering, or is it the

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self of the past having the experience now remembered, that constitute the identity of my “real” authentic self? The most plausible answer seems to be that they both are; the self I remember is not only a mental picture – rather it is a “real” part of my actual self, and therefore it seems more proper to say that the identity of my self is constituted in-between the two: My self is constituted in the interplay between (actual) perceiving and remembering; thus I am not limited to my here and now, but I have a history too, that I by remembering might reactivate and actually attend to. And further on – to make this descriptive reflection more complete – we better also mention imagination and anticipation, which are closely connected with perception and remembering. Actually all those are more or less directly interwoven into each other – with, however, perception as some kind of primary, founding intentionality. As memory interplays with perception, so does imagination. The major difference, then, between memory and imagination lies in the doxic modality proper to each: Whereas memory operates belief – we commonly believe what we remember actually happened, imagination does not do so; it is pervaded by a kind of suspension of belief. What we identify imagining has the modality of “as if” – it is not real and the imagining subject in a manner displaces itself in an imaginary world, even though the real world around it remains as the believed-in, constituting the founding context for it all, also providing material for the imaginary life. And finally we have the anticipating intentionality; how can we describe anticipation and its major features? It is very similar to imagination, but is not quite the same. Anticipation involves some kind of displacement and imagination, but now this has to get realistic – thus moving back into the mode of belief. If we are planning something, then we are imagining ourselves in a future situation, but now we have belief in what we anticipate about the coming situation – we normally want to act in a realistic manner, to have expectations that are realistic. If we are planning, we normally want to reach some goal, and the means we use have to be both realistic and efficient; this involves actual choices and considerations that partly, or perhaps mostly, have to be made at the actual moment – but, then, explicitly in anticipation of the possible future situation. Given our actual situation in which we now act, choose etc., we will, of course, always meet with limitations; we do not have unlimited means, and the choices we make have to be grounded in our perception and understanding of the actual situation. And then again, that ability for anticipating in a sense enables us to look into the future, and to distinguish different possible ways of development, as possible choices are made etc. But, memory might again become highly relevant – what is it that enables us to perceive and regard the situation in a realistic manner, and, not least, what is it that enables prediction

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and makes the probable, realistic anticipation of some future situation possible, if it is not memory: We have previously experienced similar situations (we might, of course, also have read or heard about them in one way or another – and now we remember this), and then, that happened. I remember this and might therefore foresee what’s coming this time too. Thus, we so to speak make “rules” for our expectations – patterns for association are made up in our minds and they are made habitual, and become constitutive both for our personalities and for how we conduct our lives. Even though perception might be considered one primary and founding intentionality, it is probably never functioning “purely” as perception without being blended with and interwoven into these other intentionalities. In natural human life we are, of course, settled in an actual situation, are living here and now, but this is never totally isolated – not in some way or another connected with past and future. The horizons of past and future are, as the horizon of our surrounding world is, always present – ap-presenting, thus providing depth into our lives. And this “depth” is due to the living interplay between perception, memory and imagination that always takes place, these (living) functions presenting them selves by living at one time primarily as perception, another as memory, and the third, as imagination/anticipation. And the subject being, of course, localized in her/his body – might, nevertheless, displace its self – and live in “places” not being the place in which s/he actually lives. There are, however, other dimensions and modes of intentionality that have to be taken into consideration in regard to what provides depth, continuity and firmness into our lives, and those which I will now only mention, are what is called signitive and categorical intentionality. These provide ability for using words and formulating sentences, thoughts etc. – and eventually enable logical thinking and reason. But at the same time they are, of course, the most obvious phenomena in our natural, common human lives. As humans we naturally use words and communicate by using language and this provides quite an enormous expansion of the depth (and breadth) in our lives – and it enables a new kind of firmness. It is not only what we perceive, remember or imagine that enriches our lives, but language certainly also does. And then, interwoven and in interplay we might mention the dimension of tradition, history and sociality. We shall not now, however, expose more details in the same way it has been done in this rather wide picture that is indicated by this – only say that in human life, in our life-world, sociality, for example, embody language, memory, imagining and perception. And likewise, we might perhaps quite generally say that all these capacities and dimensions are embedded in and involve each other: History and tradition do, of course, involve and relate to memory, and memory both to perception, tradition and history etc. And in the continuation of this paper we shall now change our perspective and try to examine what

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might prove to constitute an explicit phenomenological or transcendental perspective on the whole issue, then making history in the sense of “the historicity of human existence” the key-concept of it all. Our analysis and argument will mainly be based on an analysis provided by Ludwig Landgrebe [L. L.], but we will not either forget the results of our own analysis so far. First, then, what has been exposed so far in regard to memory, perception etc. – in what perspective have these analyses been provided? A proper answer might well be – they have been provided in a philosophical perspective. But then, what does this mean? One answer might again be that this implies some conception of a subject involved in the different kinds of (intentional) experiences. But again – is this necessarily philosophical, could not this have been achieved in a natural reflection as well? Perhaps the most proper would be then to describe the whole perspective as some mixture of natural and philosophical reflection, not explicitly distinguishing the one from the other: People might, of course, reflect quite naturally, and thus also experience aspects making up themselves as subjects of their (intentional) experiential lives. Regarding for example the perception of a cube (seeing it as a solid six-sided identical thing), it presents no problem to realize – in natural reflection on what is strictly speaking seen in one view, that it is only some of its sides and, at least implicitly, one also “knows” that this is due to my specific perspective again embedded in my body and in my self as the proper subject of the whole perception. But if you are really to examine and expose all that might be contained in and implied by this fact, you probably have to enter into some philosophical reflection that in its manner transcends the natural. The point I am trying to establish is, however, that in regard to content at least, the two kinds of reflection contain the same material. The philosophical does, of course, operate more in the “depth” and is far more systematic and extensive – and especially maybe has a far more consistent methodical grip on the whole issue. But this might as well be considered as differences in degree more than in principle. It is, however, one difference in principle that is of decisive importance, and it pertains to what could be described as ontological aspects or “undertones” contained in those different attitudes. Commonly the reflection – and the experience quite generally – within the natural attitude, implies (belief in) the existence of what is experienced – and this is, of course, quite “natural”. But the point now is that it might appear a decisive difference in regard to the conception of this “existence”: On the one hand it is viewed as some “in-it-self” being quite independent of any experiencing it by some subject correlated with it; on the other it is – in so far as it can meaningfully be described as something identical, with its identifiable “in-it-self”, necessarily correlated with some subject which essentially constitute the meaning of this existent.3

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These two alternatives roughly describe a major difference between what is called the naturalistic- (realistic- or objectivistic-) and the transcendentalphenomenological attitude, and this is a difference that belongs in philosophy. Thus, neither of them belongs to what is properly called the (“pure”) natural attitude, but of course they might intermingle, something which historically also has happened. And since this is how our situation both as philosophers and humans has become, what is strictly natural, what is naturalistic and what is the “pure” transcendental, are not (therefore) easy to decide – at least not objectively. In phenomenology, however, there is provided a methodological device for distinguishing, not then pretending any metaphysical or ontological foundations for these different kinds of attitude.4 Philosophically it is, thus, strictly methodical – as it essentially also involves the historical embedded in the life-world and the historicity of human existence. And this carries us into what will constitute the next, main and final move in our analysis, namely an examination of the argument Ludwig Landgrebe presents in his article “The Life-world and The Historicity of Human Existence” (hereafter: LHHE).5 Landgrebe starts6 by examining the concepts of “life-world” and “horizon”, and says that the world does not exist as an entity, an object; rather every such presupposes the world-horizon – and “[i]n the determination of the life-world as a horizon, a transcendental point of view guides us”. And this is because “[. . .] the concept of the horizon already originates from a reflection on the correlation between life-world and the experiencing of the life-world.”7 In regard to what we just discussed above concerning the natural vs. the naturalistic/ontological and the transcendental, the concept of the life-world would be an ontological-transcendental concept of hybrid character, and Landgrebe characterizes the conception of the world as a totality of things, as a philosophical abstraction. He would rather then insist on the way in which the world exists for the natural understanding, because it is more appropriate to describe the world as a horizon providing access to a constantly moving openness that also encompasses limitedness, which nevertheless might provide an access to this structure of the horizon on the basis of which our claim about it can be repeated with evidence. This does, however, require the transition to the transcendental-phenomenological reflection which would transform the concept of horizon into a genuine transcendental concept.8 Landgrebe further elaborates his point of view on the issue, and now explicitly means by “horizon” – “the way in which we are already conscious of the world in pre-scientific life” so that the life-world meant would be “concrete universality” (which Husserl also spoke of as a socio-historical-cultural world). And then, this universality of the horizon could not be understood in the sense

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of “a totality of all existing things”, which according to Landgrebe excludes the possibility of ontology of this universality.9 This obviously constitutes an important aspect in his argument, because now he also mentions the regional ontologies in the Ideas II and in a way relativizes them, saying that the outline of them orients itself toward the organization of the larger groupings of science into the physical and biological natural sciences and the human sciences, constituting an organization of fields of scientifically experienceable things which always originates from a unique historical constellation. And it is in this sense that such ontology cannot claim an unconditioned and general validity.10 And thereafter Landgrebe points at what he calls another aporia: [. . .] the theme of the philosophic science of the life-world should be the invariant style of worldlife which govern all worlds, that is, a common basic structure of “all ways of living in the world”, [which should embody] “concrete universality” [interpreted as] “a universeof principal intuitability” as a realm of original evidence where we “have” our world before philosophy or science.11

This generates various challenges and problems in regard to comparability (between cultures) and compatibility in regard to characterizing the life-world in all these ways at the same time. Besides, natural life is a life of interests, interested in its own (particular) goals, how things can help/hinder its aims, others also having (their) goals, situations, possible collisions or unions etc. One may realize one has a limited perspective on the world – others having perspectives “beyond my horizon”, but this – it seems – might be changed and widened through understanding one another and learning from this.12 Further on, there are, of course, many and different environments and differing roles of life. But this fact does not change the fact that the life I am living exactly now takes place on the basis of the world in which I am living at this particular time. And then, what about the “substance” of “concrete universality” interpreted as “the sense of the horizon of a totality in which one lives”? As changes, both in regard to roles and environments, take place, then the world in which one performs these changes of roles (and environments) is connected with one’s own identity. Thus, one “has” the world (as part of one’s identity) as the horizon of totality which encompasses all special horizons determined by one’s specific life-interests, which again may concretize universally the meaning of ‘the way in which everyone has their world’.13 Given this, how then compare life-worlds? – This will be the next question. What is invariant in all worlds and allows comparison is, according to Landgrebe, nothing other than having the world as horizon. In this sense and manner, also people living in (quite) different cultures, may have a common world, and be able to communicate with one another (which historically actually has happened, too). This invariant in all conceivable worlds must therefore

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be present as something shared before all different worlds; it must be that to which the beginning of communication is related. But what can this be, asks Landgrebe. He does not answer directly, but suggests that the basic structure of the world is disclosed in sensuous-bodily-kinaesthetic self-movement as the condition for having perception at all.14 Now, Landgrebe concretizes what all this entails, first saying that “[c]ommunication requires the possibility of exchanging information about one’s impressions” which further on implies that “[t]he ability to think, the ability to speak, and kinaesthetically functioning bodiliness all belong inseparably together”. And on the basis of this, the “universe of intuitability” is what all comparative transition from one world to another rests upon, and this means: [. . .] upon those structures which are common in all these life-worlds and which make reference to their relationship to the sensuously kinaesthetic bodiliness. Intuition must be freely understood in the wider sense as intercourse with that which is given in our world through sensuous-bodily functions. All communication does not only start with “Look there”, but also with “Grasp that”, “Move in this or that way”. In this elementary way, communication is already pre-linguistically rooted. Words with deitic “occasional” meaning, in turn, are the first elements in the transition to the linguistic exchange of information.15

Having concretized in this way, it is in this sense that the compatibility of both determinations of the life-world, respectively, as “concrete universality”, and as “universe of intuitability”, can be made intelligible as well. According to Landgrebe, any life-world is, in itself, concrete universality; but with respect to that which makes it compatible to other life-worlds, it is the universe of intuitability. And it is upon the basis of having a world that all comparison of life-worlds takes place. This applies also to the sciences which make comparative sociological studies – even though they normally do not question this most general condition for their activity but take them as unimportant or obvious. Transcendental phenomenology does, however, effect this questioning.16 After having established this “horizontal” character of the life-world, with its core in the body, centred in (or around) sensous-bodily-kinaestetic selfmovement, new aspects concerning the total project of Landgrebe are coming into play. The life-world still has essential importance, but now the analysis moves more towards what might be characterized as a “vertical” dimension, thus examining another kind of depth. It is the historical and what Landgrebe calls “the a priori of history” that comes into focus, and he will connect the concept of life-world to the problem of history, then, following Husserl’s demand to take account of “the universal historicity of the correlative manners of being of humanity and the cultural world”.17

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The argument starts from what previously has been established, namely a common life-world constituted by something which is invariant in all the differences of individually concrete universality. But this not only applies for people living at the same time – it is also valid for the worlds in the past of which we have gained knowledge. In so far people in the past have left us signs and traces of their lives (buildings, texts etc.), we can place ourselves in their situation, and understand how it has been the result of activities “like ours”, presupposing an active bodiliness guided by purposes and goals. They have had their “life’s fate” between birth and death, and they have been determined by some interests common to ours, within a life-world which is common to all people as a universe of principal intuitability.18 According to Landgrebe, this “[. . .] is the basis to which all individual life-worlds are related and on which they have developed in their respective individual concrete universality.”19 Thus, this universe is the ground of the becoming of the life-world, i.e. the a priory of history. And it is also added that Husserl’s demand that we consider the entire historicity of the life-world is satisfied only when this characterization of the life-world as the universe of principal intuitability is understood, thereby understanding the meaning of the statement that “History is the grand fact of absolute being”, too. To develop and concretize this further, Landgrebe first critically states that the field of observation for science is a well-founded “substruction”, and contrary to this, the life-world is a realm of “original evidence”.20 And he says, it is the task of phenomenology to traverse the path back to this evidence through which the world is constantly pre-given, not, however, in some ontological manner where concepts like “material thing” or “constant nature” will be the primal. It has to be done in another way realizing that perception always is guided by life-worldly interests. Thus, the original sense-qualities are the favourable or unfavourable qualities [embodying also “values”, “secondary qualities” etc.] which encompass all sensual fields. Only in this way we may say that the universe of intuitability is the stratum of sensible presence with original evidence. But in relation to what develops here, as upon a ground, this stratum is not, Landgrebe insists, a fixed stability, but rather an acquisition (Erwerb). And given this, he will fully acknowledge that it is in intuition that the first and original confrontation with what is given occurs, and we thereby become first acquainted with the world.21 The next move is now to concretize the impact of this, and it is interesting to notice that Landgrebe does not try to dig back into some “first” historical (in the factual sense) acquisition. Rather he concretizes by speaking of childhood and says, [. . .] in childhood an acquaintance with the world begins genetically as we learn controlled movements guided by the individual [and that] one’s first acquisitions begins in a reflexive self-relation.

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At the beginning this self-relation is not yet an explicit consciousness of itself as an ego, but is, rather, a pre-reflective self-relation. Even for the smallest child, as a living organism, the world is one.22

The child’s horizon will, of course, then, appear rather limited, and all actions are results of very elementary needs and emotions. Nevertheless, as a horizon, the world is related to the (child’s) body as a “null point” of orientation, and within the borders of this limited horizon the world is also “concrete universality”. From the perspective of the adult, however, this world is a universality in becoming, a promise for the future – and there is actually something shared with both, such as craving, pain, disappointment, satisfaction, joy, fear and hope. And as this makes space for “interaction”, there develops a personal character (firstly the child’s, but probably also the adult’s further develops in her caring for the child), and then the affective character of this sphere of behaviour always forms the horizon to which all “higher actions” stand in a living relationship. It is in relation to this horizon that all higher actions are situated. If this is not a fixed stability, then we can, according to Landgrebe, in principle, only speak of the life-world as a world in becoming, in which even the functioning of the senses is not a fixed dimension.23 Landgrebe continues the development of his argument by further examining what has been laid down as “the a priori of the life-world”, and it is now to be examined as “a universal problem of the history of experiencing consciousness”, which eventually, then, will be grounding a distinction between transcendental and empirical history. The first step is to clarify the double meaning entailed within the talk of the universe of intuitability; this is about: (1) that which is ubiquitously available and immediately accessible, and (2) the a priori whose concept can be arrived at only through universal comparison. And how is, then, this universe given and how is it laid claim to? Evidently, says Landgrebe, only through the performance of kinaesthetic functions – within seeing, hearing, and grasping which are the sources of original evidence. We become acquainted with the world as the world that exists for us, and then, these functions are also guided by interests, and in their performance they are controlled and guided, usually in a pre-reflective way, through a projection of their effects.24 Commonly those performances remain “anonymous”, but they might become thematic even in everyday life, if one says “you could have done it differently, better . . .”.25 This indicates a possibility which is compared with other possibilities, so that they now are taken out of anonymity, and a reflection in which these performances might be recognized as a priori will always be the result of a comparative method – explicitly or implicitly. However, in their anonymity – yet being familiar, they build up the horizon in personal life, providing the “living in the world” which is characteristic of the “natural attitude”.26 But even in everyday

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life we might be thrown into the following reflection – “can you do this too?” This, then, indicates that reflection is never a return to isolated states of consciousness, for states of consciousness as such are the results of performance. Rather reflection is always a reflection upon these performances themselves and their possibilities, on that which one is capable of, and the limits and the obstacles which stand against carrying out tasks.27 And given what is now revealed in Landgrepe’s descriptive reflection moving in the “in-between-the-natural-and-the-transcendental”, a new question arises: what then motivates the universal philosophical reflection upon the life-world as ground? According to Landgrebe, it is a universal comparison that motivates and is presupposed, which at least potentially involves a historical review of all possible ways of having a life-world. He further says that this reflection presupposes everything which has been achieved by the comparative sciences – also informing us that Husserl had undertaken broad ethnological studies so that phenomenology did not “spin” (Habermas) these possibilities out of itself.28 Thus, such scientific knowledge belongs to the “concrete universality” of our modern life-world and has flowed into it and determines its horizon, available to everyone in books etc. And Landgrebe then repeats a statement previously presented, namely that the being of the world is presupposed as a steady becoming, in which nothing is (totally) fixed. But this likewise presupposes a history of this world in which the becoming of humanity is only a short and late moment in a great cosmic becoming. Thus, it presupposes that there is such a history which encompasses this short moment. But where and how “is” there such a larger history, and how can we be justified in speaking of it? This is the next question to be examined. Landgrebe’s answer is, then, that “History” is only there for those who themselves stand within it and who remember what happened earlier in their lives, or who can be taught about still earlier times through some sort of tradition. One can even theoretically reconstruct, as cosmic history, much earlier times before the beginning of mankind and, in view of this, natural understanding will say that this cosmic occurrence of nature is both earlier and older than man. Transcendentally, however, this could not appear in the same way, and now Landgrebe recurs to something Husserl has said: In a meditation on “Temporalization and the Monad”, Husserl asked, “[. . .] whether all of humanity with its cosmos (to which also the worlds of the stars belong) is accidental?” And he answered, “That is a speech dependent on time. We stand within transcendentality. I am – and time is only constituted by me!”29 This has to be further explained because natural understanding makes the obvious presupposition that there simply is this becoming of the world and that there simply is its time into which everything falls. According to Landgrebe, this presupposition

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is precisely the general thesis of the natural attitude, and transcendentalphenomenological reflection begins with the “bracketing” of this standpoint – so that we might “stand” within transcendentality. But who are “we”? It is the reflecting philosophers who can communicate, and still have their place and their time. And can they regard this becoming otherwise than the affirmation of the fact that this reflection, too, takes place on the basis of the world? In accordance with Husserl, Landgrebe suggests a different result: one stands within transcendentality. But what and how is this?30 The well known first step of transcendental reduction results in the apodictic self-certainty of “I am”. This has, however, mostly been misunderstood, saying it lands in subjective idealism. According to Landgrebe, the reduction is rather nothing other than a meditation upon reflection as a recursive relationship, and this cannot be arbitrarily fixed at some point, but the person who is reflecting must also be viewed as belonging to this reflection. And this implies that it is only for oneself that reflection can be carried out, though one may re-perform the reflection of another, if this reflection has been linguistically expressed. Given this, this co-performance and re-performance is my possibility, but with this possibility my singularity and isolation also come into view. Thus, the meditation upon apodictic self-certainty which expresses itself in the “I am”, is a meditation upon an “absolute fact”. And why is that? It is a meditation upon an absolute fact because its “that it is” first gives a point of reference with regard to which the (“my”) world itself is given (“to me”) as horizon.31 The reduction, thus, points out that one can never simply talk about the world in general, but that one always has to keep in mind exactly for whom it is a world. One implication is then, that when we speak today of the one world, we have to remember that, as such, this world was not the horizon for those who lived in the past. If the world as a steadily changing horizon is fundamentally a world in becoming, then when we regard it as one world it is always as a result of this becoming. It is one world for us, for modern society. But that we can speak of a “for us” [within the transcendental standpoint] means that it is [in our actuality] “for everyone”. This common character of a world as horizon does not, however, float above single individuals who have this horizon in common; rather it is the result of a constitutive history of this horizon. And such a constitutive history does again presuppose the many individuals who from the common horizon by means of their being together, being opposed to one another, in their self-movements and in their respective life histories live their lives.32 This explication of the impact of the reduction which Landgrebe now has provided, carry us back into the question regarding the a priori of this constitution being the “universe of intuitability”, which can only be conceptualized by being formed through reflection upon sensuous-kinaesthetic performances.

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And as this can only be self-reflection, what is unveiled cannot be observed anywhere in the world as a visible state of affairs. The visible are common types of behaviour and regularities of behaviour guided by traditions and norms. And since the perspective of comparative sciences is limited to this, i.e. the observable things in the world, they cannot answer the question of the legitimacy of a general comprehensibility which is presupposed in their activity. Nevertheless, the “self” which performs, itself unobservable and invisible [to the sciences], being only for itself in reflection, yet it is this which is the last source of all possible evidence. Thus, and this constitutes the conclusion of Landgrebe so far: “the forgetting of the life-world is simultaneously a forgetting of the self”33 – which, plainly speaking, means that the self, if it is not to be constructed abstractly, has first to occur in its essential correlation with the life-world. This is not, however, the final result of Landgrebe’s argument; on the contrary, it motivates further investigation that will dig deeper into this essential interconnection (between life-world and transcendental self) indicated by the concluding statement so far. The argument continues explicating in this manner: In order to overcome this forgetting of the self, one attempts a reduction to the original fact of the “I am”. But because this “I am” means an “I-amthere”, and being-there means having the world as a horizon, my world is included within the original fact of the “I am”. Thus, we have one of the decisive premises explicitly stated. And, then, one more: Bracketing the thesis of the world means realizing that this original fact is an absolute fact because it is only from the world horizon of this fact that everything is revealed which we can understand as a human life-world. And a third: “I am - and it is by me that time is constituted”. [Quoting Husserl] This means that it is only the self-reflection upon and disclosure of this original fact which legitimates the right to speak of the structuring of a common world and its becoming and history. And finally (so far): It is only this reflection which discloses the formerly anonymous a priori of the functions of this subjectivity.34 What we, then, have got, is an original, but not completed (fixed) fact, saying that these functions of the subjectivity in question are the conditions for the possibility of having a common world as a unity in becoming. And such functions are not fixed stabilities, but are them selves unfolding and developing. And Landgrebe now in a way turns the whole thing around (against both unhistorical understanding of the transcendental and ordinary naturalisticontological thinking), and states: Because they are not themselves facts [fixed stabilities] which can be found in a finished world, such functions are rather conditions for the possibility of being able to find facts and being able to look back on a world which has already become. These functions are transcendental conditions and the review of their becoming is a transcendental history of the experience of consciousness insofar as every experience of things in the world

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gained by consciousness is at the same time an experience of itself. Thus, by reflecting on this transcendental history (historicity) consciousness becomes acquainted with its abilities.35 The argument, having regained the “I am” in its essential inter-relation with the life-world so that the functions of subjectivity are the conditions for the possibility of having a common world as a unity in becoming, thus grounding a concept of transcendental history or historicity, is the result so far. But as this, even though being “pure” and transcendental (in a strictly historical-methodological sense), will appear highly concrete too, then a factual-empirical history has to be distinguished as well. And Landgrebe now says that the transcendental history so to speak “mirrors itself” within the world in a factual, empirical way. It “appears” as that which can be experienced as “it self” in my own self-reflection upon my performances, and it also “manifests” itself within the world of determinable facts of human behaviour that everyone might experience. Our performances are the a priori of the becoming of the life-world and of the histories of life-worlds.36 Given this, questions arise. One first question might be: where and what are such performances before discovery? That they are anonymous is not sufficient. Some pregivenness has to be discovered, and, if discovered, how then is that related to anonymity? Here we must, says Landgrebe, remember how thematic reflection already knows itself: [. . .] it knows itself related to that which just happened in performance and within this performance it knows itself as a “post discovery” in the sense that it, so to speak, rushes after that which already has happened and tries to catch it. In this post-discovering it is treated as an entity: we can say, it “is” or it “was” this or that. It is only in such a reflection upon a performed act that it acquires the character of “pre”. But what we reflect upon is not in this way ordered into a flow of time already present; rather this flowing itself occurs within the lively there of the performance, that is in the living present.37

Pretty similar to how the a priori fact of everyone having her/his – or rather – The life-world (common as horizon in spite of all differences that might occur) in the “horizontal” dimension, the ‘living present’ now gets some kind of a priori functions in the “vertical” dimension, in regard to history and time: it becomes an absolute there to which all determinations of time are related. It even constitutes the “deepest” conceivable level which always is functioning – (naturally) in its anonymity. But within reflection, these functions which can be described as “syntheses of temporalization” and on the basis of which “time” is “given” to us, might be taken out of their anonymous, passive occurrence and even be treated as entities to which we can refer in propositions. We refer to them as retention, protention, etc., and as indicators, they point to what can fulfil the intention, which is perceptive selfgivenness – which again only occurs within another performance. That is Landgrebe’s point, – and he further points to this:

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[. . .] it is only in a relationship between the original “lively” anonymous performance and the reflection which re-grasps it, that the basic temporal relationships first are structured. We cannot say that we are treating an occurrence which falls into a presupposed flowing of time; we must rather say that this flowing forms itself within the there of the original performance and its relationship to the reflective performance.38

Strictly transcendentally there is, thus, no flowing taken as a form to be filled in with changing contents. But yet, in order to say that there “is” such a flowing, and in general, the occurrence which we call history, we still must presuppose that there is one person “there”, surrounded by others, who wants to hold onto his self-present existence in such a way that he can communicate about it – make it into a subject or a predicate by use of words intelligible to others. Thus, the existence of a person who reflects in such a manner is even the final presupposition that there “is” a flowing, and, with this, that there “is” time and history. According to Landgrebe, it is a meaningless question to ask what this steam would be like independent of any relation to this being-there. From the point of view of existence we must say that there is a flowing only as long as it is correlative to those who do not only co-perform this flowing, but, within their co-performance, also have a pre-reflective acquaintance with the performance.39 Thus, a “self” as a performing agent is presupposed, and Landgrebe now quotes Husserl to sustain his point: “The flow has to be temporalized in an a priori way starting from the (final functioning) ego. This temporalization is itself flowing; the flowing is always a before; but the ‘I’ is also a before”. And the point further is that there can be no proper talk of “I” here, because the I-consciousness is also the result of a transcendental-genetic becoming. Before such a result there is a pre-reflective self-relation which is within the control of the performing agent as capable of kinaesthetic movement.40 The major consequence of this is that transcendentally there are not two different things – first the flowing of time and (then) the experience of the flowing. But the whole experience is self-experience (of the historically living subject), since a flowing can only exist by being centred around the existence of the experiencing subject. Thus, [. . .] with regard to the functions and performance of the self of these performances, flowing as the history of the experience of consciousness, is transcendental genesis. This is the case because flowing can only be discovered through transcendental reflection. Consciousness is itself this history, it is not consciousness of history, but the point of the formation of history. This means that history is only there when it is remembered or reconstituted as one’s own prehistory, which implies the history “sedimented” into it, one in which the experience of others has become an aspect of the formation of the horizon of the concrete life-world, where the mediating subject finds itself in its “there”. Transcendental history of consciousness and empirical history are not two different things, but rather the same; it is only that history is examined from different stages of reflection in the two.41

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Even though these two different conceptions of history “is the same” (viewed from different stages of reflection), they appear quite different in regard to consequences: Empirical history accepts the relativity of becoming as final – and leads to scepticism and relativism. Transcendental history, on the other hand, leads to the absolute in all relativities. It leads to the existence of the subject for whom it is history and for whom it forms its historical world. In this way, says Landgrebe, transcendental history understands history as the “grand fact of absolute being”.42 And finally now, some short concluding remarks: We might agree or disagree with Landgrebe, but the a priori interconnection and historically always living correlation between the life-world and the transcendental ego having now obtained its essential transcendental character – as Landgrebe’s argument tries to demonstrate, is inspiring and interesting in more than one way: It is interesting, of course, in regard to the understanding of the phenomenology of Husserl and phenomenology quite generally (M. Heidegger, M. MerleauPonty, A.-T. Tymieniecka etc.); further, it is interesting in regard to the engaged relationship and concern philosophy should have towards the existence of humanity in a historical world, on the one hand, respecting this existence as the ultimate and final foundation for both rational understanding and for living civilized lives; and, on the other, for providing a thoroughly and to “rockbottom” radical reflection on some of the most basic issues that philosophy has engaged in almost since its birth. And in our specific context in this paper, it is also interesting in the way it makes space for incorporating the everyday phenomena of memory – from which we started, into this highly transcendental field of investigation. Memory (and the other modes of intentionality examined in the first part of this paper) is not quite the same as those functions of inner time-consciousness (especially retention) which transcendentally (in the most basic manner) constitute identifiable identities with continuity and firmness into our experiential life. But similar to how the difference between transcendental and empirical history primarily is a matter of different stages of reflection for examining it, so it might also be said in regard to memory and those deepest transcendental functions of temporality. The life-world and the transcendental ego are inseparable in the manner of historicity now examined, and Landgrebe does also bring the whole issue “down to earth” in an ethical sense – ending by saying, “[. . .] the earth (a transcendental determination) is the absolute limit of our world horizon” – reminding us how this fact is founding demands toward which it is our “existential” – and perhaps even transcendental duty to comply.43 University of Bergen, Norway

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1 The phrasing that it is memory that provides continuity etc. – might call for some explanation, because most people will probably say it is things, happenings etc. which in themselves have permanence, stability, existence etc. – thus providing continuity in our experiencing them, not that highly subjective, more or less arbitrary ability called memory. To this I will now only comment that this is not quite as simple as indicated above, and to demonstrate this is a major issue in this paper. 2 At this point it is pertinent to mention what in phenomenology will appear a difference – or maybe rather a distinction between memory and what is called retention. In a way they cover each other and have similar functions. But as the concept of memory is primarily used to cover what happens in the natural attitude, likewise the concept of retention is used within the transcendental phenomenological. Retention is – together with protention and original impression (Uhr-impression), those inescapable functions of internal time-consciousness always spontaneously expanding the original impression making it the living flowing present that always is related with past (history) and future; it is what makes any “pre-” possible, and it is provided out of the present now, and is in a way some “wake” following each actual experience, expanding it and ending it in a non-punctual manner, also describable as “fresh memory”. Memory, then, in the plain ordinary sense of the natural attitude is this ability for bringing back again after this wake or “fresh memory” has fainted away. Then you in one way or another presuppose that there is some objective time and history, and through memory you (dis)place yourself in this context. As we are speaking of retention we operate at a far deeper level constitutively providing the preconditions (only) presupposed in the natural attitude. But memory and retention are very closely inter-related. Husserl has examined especially internal time-consciousness in manuscripts now published as: Husserl, Edmund: Zur Phänomenologie des inneren Zeitbewusstseins (1893–1917). Husserliana X published by Rudolf Boehm. Haag: Martinus Nijhoff 1966. Analysen zur passiven Synthesis. Aus Vorlesungs- und Forschungsmanuskripten 1918–1926. Husserliana XI, published by Margot Fleischer. Den HaagMartinus Nijhoff 1966. Die Bernauer Manuskripte über das Zeitbewusstsein (1917/18). Husserliana XXXIII, published by Rudolf Bernet and Dieter Lohmar. Dordrecht: Kluwer Academic Publisher 2001. 3 In one of the volumes published concerning Husserl’s analyses on intersubjectivity: Edmund Husserl: Zur Phänomenologie der Intersubjectivität, Zweiter Teil: 1921–1928, published by Iso Kern, Den Haag Martinus Nijhoff 1973, p. 248, Husserl states something which is very instructive in regard to this difference. In my translation he says: “[. . .] to hypostasize this idea [of the existent] to something which is separated from and independent of the constituting subjectivity and has an “An-sich”, such as in the purely objective way of looking (which does not reflect on the constituting I, and therefore takes as absolute what can only be constituted in and by the I) as if this was an incidental relation instead of an essential one, is nonsense.” (Now quoted from Konrad Rokstad: “Meditations on Intersubjectivity and Historicity” (p. 510) in Phenomenology World Wide, edited by Anna-Teresa Tymieniecka, Analecta Husserliana vol 80, Kluwer Academic Publisher 2002.) 4 What we are hinting at by these remarks are, of course, the reduction-procedures embedded in the “substance” of transcendental phenomenology itself, which perhaps is most systematically examined and exposed in Husserl’s Ideas I (1913). Edmund Husserl: Ideen zu einer reinen Phänomenologie und phänomenologischen Philosophie, Husserliana Band III, ed. Walter

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Biemel, Martinus Nijhoff, Haag 1950. But there are very many expositions and the reduction is always at work in the analyses of Husserl. The reduction “as such” is, however, not our issue now. 5 We will refer to the version of Landgrebe’s article published in Research in Phenomenology XI 1981. This is an abridged and revised version of (Landgrebe’s) “Lebenswelt und Geschictlickeit des menschlichen Daseins,” published in Phänomenologie und Marxismus, Vol. 2, Praktische Philosophie, ed. By Waldenfels, Brockman and Pazanin, Frankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp, 1977. Landgrebe’s article is based especially on these two works by E. Husserl: Die Krisis der europäischen Wissenschaften und die transzendentale Phänomenologie, ed. By Walter Biemel, Husserliana, Vol. VI (The Haag: Martinus Nijhoff, 1954), and E. Husserl: Zur Phänomenologie der Intersubjektivität: Texte aus dem Nachlass, Part III: 1929–1935, ed. By Iso Kern Husserliana, Vol XV (The Haag: Martinus Nijhoff, 1973). And as I now read Landgrebe, I view the article as rather “programmatic” and slightly critical in regard to both Husserl himself and some mainstream reception of him in the 70s (and before). My main concern in this context is, however, to examine and rethink (reflect on) the argument which is exposed in it. 6 This is on LHHE, p. 120 in the middle of a fairly extensive exposition of Husserl’s Crisis; the total program for his article is by Landgrebe described as follows: “I want to argue for a transcendental theory of the life-world and of historicity, and I want to do so by suggesting that a phenomenological reflection upon the transcendental ego – once correctly understood – is the proper procedure for constructing such a theory.” p. 112 7 LHHE, p. 120 8 Op.cit. Paraphrazing p. 121 9 Op.cit. p. 122 10 Even in regard to Husserl Landgrebe might here seem critical, but this is really not against Husserl, because he never meant Ideas II (Edmund Husserl: Ideen zu einer reinen Phänomenologie und phänomenologischen Philosophie, Husserliana Band IV, ed. Marly Biemel, Martinus Nijhoff, Haag 1952) to be ontological, at least not in any naturalistic sense. Rather, if you read Ideas II in a perspective provided by the Crisis – which is quite possible, then you will land on the position Landgrebe here seems to take underscoring the profound historical character of the whole scientific project. In Analecta Husserliana, Volume XC and in Volume XCIII I have published articles respectively called “The Historicity of Nature” and “The Historicity of Body and Soul” examining how the Crisis and Ideas II might be read comparatively so that the rather concrete analyses of Ideas might be reflecting historicity. 11 LHHE p. 122 12 Op.cit. p. 123 13 Op.cit. p. 124 14 Op.cit. 15 Op.cit. p. 124–125 16 Op.cit. p. 125 17 Op.cit. p. 127; here Landgrebe also quotes Husserl, Crisis. 18 Op.cit. paraphrazing pp. 127–128 19 Op.cit. p. 128 20 Op.cit. p. 129 21 Op.cit. p. 130 22 Op.cit. 23 Op.cit. p. 131 24 Op.cit. 25 Op.cit. p. 132

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26 At this point Landgrebe poses a question that might seem quite natural, namely: why was the life-world as horizon – if it has always been familiar (and the most obvious), discovered so late? – To this I will for my part say the answer is pretty obvious, namely: the obvious is not considered to be of any philosophical interest worthy of serious philosophical interrogation – it is only obvious and that’s it! This is what changes radically with Husserl’s phenomenology, and Landgrebe too is very well aware of it – so his question, I would say, is clearly rhetorical in kind. 27 Op.cit. p. 132 28 Op.cit. p. 133 29 Op.cit. Landgrebe here quotes Husserl from the last supplement in Intersubjektivität III, written in 1934. 30 Op.cit. p. 134 31 In my understanding of Landgrebe here it is important to note now how “the”/“my” world are distinguishable, but strictly transcendentally not separable. In the natural understanding, my world is, of course, not right away identical with the world, but transcendentally in this sense of historicity that Landgrebe’s argument now develops, they are not either separable. 32 Op.cit. p. 134–135 33 Op.cit. p. 135 34 Op.cit. p. 135–136 35 Op.cit. p. 136 36 Op.cit. 37 Op.cit. p. 136–137 38 Op.cit. p. 137 39 Op.cit. 40 Op.cit. p. 137–138. Landgrebe here quotes Husserl from something written in 1931, and this is also quite consistent with what he previously has stated in regard to the child and its development, in the beginning not being explicitly conscious of itself as an ego, only having a pre-reflective self-relation. But it might also be interesting to notice that Husserl provides clues for saying this already in his Ideas II (1912–1913), then specifically in regard to the development of the personal ego, saying it develops primarily by living in interaction with . . . – and on that ground also (in a way secondarily) by reflecting. I have written about this in my article “The Historicity of Body and Soul” (pp. 130–132) published in Analecta Husserliana XCIII. 41 Op.cit p. 138 42 Op.cit. 43 Op.cit. p. 138–139

PIOTR MRÓZ

S T RU C T U R E A S A C O L L E C T I V E M E M O RY O F C U LT U R A L S Y S T E M S

ABSTRACT

The main assumption of the paper centers around the notion of memory as an apriori mechanism of culture formation. According to the founders of the structuralist movement all phenomena are based on differentiation that is, binary structuring. The latter is unconsciously carried on and passed on to following stages of human development of various sections of human culture and civilization. The main goal of this paper is to present a non-psychological, non-egological understanding of the phenomenon of memory. Among many notions, concepts as well as interpretations of memory (treated mainly as an individual faculty of mind) the idea of memory – worked out by the philosophers of the structuralist persuasion – seems to have been an incontrovertible breakthrough in our thinking of it. The widely-known, generally approved of in late 50s and early 60s philosophical model of memory1 – both as a store of vital information and a solid basis of human future projects which must take advantage of that which has previously been experienced in different ways on individual and/or collective level has been overcome by works of such structuralist philosophers as Lévi-Strauss, Foucault, Derrida, Barthes, Deleuze, Kristeva and Todorov to mention but the most prominent members of this very influential French movement. What is proposed in the present paper is an attempt at explaining the concept of memory as a kind of underlying structure, a force of non-personal, non-individual nature which can be discerned and is visible behind almost all of human endeavours constituting the sphere and domain of culture. To our mind it was structuralism (influenced by the Freudian version of psychoanalysis, the Jungian theory of archetypes, the science of geology and Marxism)2 that during the heyday of existentialism and phenomenology (incarnated by Sartre) put forward (in a strong polemic with all idealistic approaches) a new understanding of memory – freed from the shackles of the Husserlian retention, the memoire of Bergson and the notion of memory-traces advanced by experimental psychologists. The prevalent thought idiom of Lévi-Strauss (the philosopher of our main concern here) boiled down to saying that memory is not only an individual affair, being a direct expression of our conscious 251 A-T. Tymieniecka (ed.), Analecta Husserliana CII, 251–261. c Springer Science+Business Media B.V. 2009 

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acceptance of a set of rules, codes making up the only true essence of cultural phenomena marking off human life – as it were – from that of nature. As this concept of memory is part and parcel of the more general views of structuralism one must analyze it within the context of the movement itself. It goes without saying that any precise, adequate definition of structuralism seems simply impossible, in spite of the unquestionable fact that this set of more or less coherent doctrines belongs to the history of 20th century Ideas.3 Among many reasons explaining this uncomfortable (mostly for a historian of philosophical ideas) state of affairs there is one which appears very convincing. Structuralism is a unique, inimitable cluster of doctrines for its area of interest covers such disparate theoretical as well as empirical discourses as ethnography, ethnology, sociology, anthropology, cognitivism, the arts and of course the main branches of philosophical reflection. However the presence or still better co-presence of such a multitude of so many diverse ideas and concepts, proposals and solutions, analyses and descriptions does not preclude a distinct possibility of putting them all under a common denominator. Historically speaking the very movement – to wit – this concrete style of thinking – was initiated by the Swiss linguist de Saussure, author of the decisive works4 (Cours de la linguistique . . .) and Mémoire de le systéme belonging as might have been noticed rather to a non-philosophical domain. As it soon turned out, it was the very field of theoretical linguistics which was to become the main source of inspiration for all subsequent structuralist theories. Ironically enough, de Saussure himself was hardly aware of the role he was to play in the birth of this movement, as well as of the enormous influence exerted by his ideas on human language and its semiologic functions. Due to theoretical activities of such scholars as Jacobson, Trubeckoj and Mukarowski the de Saussurian approach to language revolutionized the way (manner) in which we had hitherto thought of the nature and “construction” of human language. One of the main characteristics of the structuralist approach to the world of human culture is that it applies this newly-acquired structuralist experience (knowledge) of language to investigations into various fields of social (cultural) life. To put it differently: the structuralist thinkers were ready to discern (and describe in their works) an unquestionable similarity, if not analogy, between language as such and the human world. This crucial discovery was formulated by them in the form of the categorical declaration that our world – the world of social behaviour can be reduced and explained away in terms of language. This methodological dictum amounted to saying that human beings use certain items5 exactly in the same way that they use words (signs) in their linguistic exchange. Thus one is fully justified at this moment in raising the vital question concerning the nature of this similarity, as well as the nature of those elements along with the set of rules governing this exchange or communication act. The

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latter aspect leads us straight to a new understanding of memory as propounded by the structuralist. During his instructive lectures in Geneva, de Saussure pointed to the fact that throughout almost twenty centuries – since the teachings of the Sophists, Socrates, Plato, Aristotle, The Bible tradition (teachings of the Prophets) through the Middle Ages (the realist persuasion) the Enlightenment (Renaissance, Valla, Poliziano, Pico de la Mirandola) and the Romantic Period (Humbold) language was regarded in terms of a necessary creation whose nature was aprioristically determined. Moreover, it was the creation of God or of same metaphysical “factor”, hence its nature must have been predestined in such a way that the relation of language (containing signs plus the rules how to use them) with the transcendent reality, was explicable and clear. Signs stood for things, represented them. In other words, there was a logical (did not our forefather Adam create this affinity?) link, tie between this particular item and the corresponding term. This idealistic theory which led to the dissemination of the belief in language, enabling human beings any acts of communication, discrimination, eventually leading to some kind of knowledge, was flatly refused, rejected by the Swiss linguist. The common point shared by all those theories of language and its relation to reality was geared up with the unsubstantiated tenet that due to some mysterious events, circumstances or causes those two entities were tightly interlocked. Contrary to those beliefs, de Saussure proposed to view language in terms of an organized whole by which he meant that this system comprising sign elements is something quantitatively more than and qualitatively different from the mere sum-total of its elements. The crucial thing, of course, was the way the system was organized and poised for functioning. The elements which are “embraced”, incorporated in by such a system as language are signs (strictly speaking their physical, acoustic matter treated by de Saussure as something of much greater importance in comparison with writing).6 De Saussure did not question the fact that the essential role of signs was to refer to something ontologicaly different from themselves by way of naming, describing, defining, denoting and meaning. But what was of the utmost importance – underlined time and again the Swiss linguist – was this disputable link, relation with the transcendent world. On what grounds are we to accept the allegedly necessary relation between a “table”, stół, la table and the wooden handy object found in our study? According to de Saussure this semantic relation was of a purely arbitrary nature. In other words, signs displayed no “natural”, “metaphysical” or “logical” – that is – “rational” link with the multifarious (material or immaterial) entities they referred to. But it was the way the Swiss linguist interpreted – once a unified, compact – as it were – body of a language as such that made him a true revolutionary in the field of the 20th century humanities. The author of Cours introduced the

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concept of a dualistic nature of language, both as the very system containing signs (elements) and the dualistic nature of the latter themselves made up of twofold layer. Let us note that this methodological innovation seems to have resolved age-long, apparently insurmountable aporias concerning the ontology and semiology (functioning) of this communication tool. For one thing, language (as an organized, structured phenomenon) was divided by de Saussure into two planes. The first one was called la langue while the other la parole (In the first plane in question one finds the elements which are of particular interest in so far as the notion, idea of memory is concerned). La langue was interpreted by de Saussure in terms of an abstract, universal and model-like system of signs. The latter was subject to strict rules governing the proper, adequate usage and application of the signs. In specific linguistic terminology the rules constitute the domain of grammar and syntax. The sphere of la langue is not limited to a particular space and time, any more than it is limited to a particular, individualized group of users of language. One might say that la langue functions on an unconscious level – we resort to it, take advantage of its resources collectively without being aware of doing so. As a well-known, prominent structuralist remarked on one occasion, we are rather spoken by it, than actively speaking it.7 Thus la langue displays – under thorough scrutiny – the properties characteristic of an unconscious, deeply rooted in the collective mind regulative mechanism – both a mechanism of control and a basis for all linguistic (language) exchange. The most crucial point here is that this layer of language provides us with ready-made elements accompanied – as it were by strict rules to be followed. It seems that those elements have always been “there” and will probably be in store the moment we turn to them in order to perform varied acts of communication. Now to the second part (layer) of language. De Saussure calls it la parole trying to bring out all the differences between the first and the second plane of the language system. In contradistinction to la langue – la parole is not immaterial, abstract or universal. It is something whose ontological status is somewhat paradoxical: la parole exists only after having been activated by individual speakers, actual users of language. What is meant here by de Sausseure is the fact that abstract elements are revealed in the process of realization of some parts (e.g. signs plus rules) of the system. Briefly speaking, the actual act of linguistic communication, the act of speech (resp. writing) takes place in a given space and time pertaining to a concrete group of users of a human language. There is an abstract model of English or Polish, a model of traffic language, Morse code and a concrete materialized realization of them all – a kind of specific, highly individualized speech. However, it must be kept in mind that those two planes, layers of the language system are closely related with one another for – as the structuralist thinkers are prone to often repeat – language is an organic whole – a whole possessing a highly complex, refined,

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or even sophisticated type of organization. Due to this twofold nature of language, one can employ two methodological approaches of investigation into its nature and functioning. The first, bequeathed by 19th century researchers, mostly German philologists – was concerned with historical changes, transformations of rules and elements hence its name: diachronical, while the second approach is referred to as a synchronic one. The latter proposes to analyze both planes of language system at the stage of its actual existence so to speak. The structuralists of late 50s and early 60s depended heavily on this approach as better equipped to reveal the genuine nature of linguistic communication, regardless of any historical transformations. But it was in the domain of the analysis and description of signs – their ontological and semantic status within and outside of the system that the Swiss linguist showed his incontestable acumen as the initiator of a new way of thinking, not only about language itself but about the latter’s relation to almost all spheres of cultural reality – the genuine phenomenon of the human world (This will be the current motif in the works of Lévi-Strauss, Barthes and Greimes).8 Signs, as will have been remembered, are vital elements of the language. Since they belong to the system their task is to take part in all functions the language is supposed to perform. But for de Saussure those elements (similarly to language itself) were also of a dual nature. Each sign is made up of two layers, two parts: the signifiant (signifying) and the signifié (signified). The first layer – the physical sound, its matter – like quality is the ontological basis of the second one: the notion, idea, concept meant by the sign itself. The Swiss linguist did not intend to enter the slippery ground of semiology – to wit – the branch of the philosophy of language that deals with the difficult, complicated sign-referring-to-the-transcendent-reality (world) problem. In other words the problem of symbols referring (denoting) to real or purely intentional objects (entities). What was so innovative in the de Saussarian solution was the notion of the very difference in so for as the meaning of signs is concerned. Being part and parcel of the linguistic system, signs are grouped in a certain way (within the system itself). It is the very grouping or ordering which counts the most. To put it differently, the meaning (sense) of one sign is necessarily different from that of another sign-sense sequence in the same system. As signs are in certain positions, in certain relations to each other it is the position itself which makes their meaning visible. De Saussure understood this issue in terms of an internal differentiating mechanism. Let us consider the pair closely related to one another: pot – pod – occupying a very close position in the system. Pot, a sequence of certain sound cluster means exactly something opposite to the cluster pod. As might be easily seen the difference is due to a certain quality (appearing on the primordial, fundamental level: voiced versus voiceless consonants). This enabled the Swiss linguist to develop a theory of signs as negatively, oppositionally related to each other

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with language itself being nothing else but the system of differences. As the popular de Saussurian dictum ran there was not a single, positive element in the language. So far we have presented a general outline of structuralist linguistics, its methodology which – in turn – was to exert an enormous influence on the movement itself. Structuralism turned to the de Saussurian theory of language (semiology) intending to base (ground) its analyses of almost all social, cultural phenomena on the view (and that was the current thought idiom in structuralism) that the vital domains (areas) of human life could be treated in terms of language – to wit – in terms of organized system containing elements and governed by certain rules (an inner grammar and syntax). In other words, the structuralist thinker – in his attempt to precisely describe the human world along with its creations, intended to carry out a kind of translation which meant that a part of reality (the human world) was to be rendered, mapped-out or pictured in a system-like model. Both Lévi-Strauss and Foucault wanted to get rid of all those elements which made such an analysis impossible in the past. Thus a strict – as they thought – scientific approach was offered by de Saussurian linguistics: the surrounding world could be treated in terms of language and its elements and – what is more important – rules could be allocated in on the other side: the studied, analyzed and investigated phenomena. What constituted the starting, initial moment in their theoretical (and empirical) endeavours was the most vulnerable, “shaky” aspect of the theory, or rather group of theories of age long standing, propounding the idea that we, human beings were and still are heavily indebted to our allegedly conscious nature. In other words, cultural development, the so-called progress we had made since the mythical epoch of the caves was made possible because human beings refined, improved the mind, the conscious Ego – this unique faculty at their disposal: the free, creative, spontaneous and invaluable faculty. The mind was – at the very most – capable of predicting, projecting transcending the given milieu, the given situation while resorting to its stored knowledge consisting of all facts, all rules and immutable laws the individual did manage to gather.9 The structuralist movement rejected the highly personalized view of the Cartesian model of transparent consciousness. Mind – we find Lévi-Strauss saying – is an element of Nature, displaying certain universal qualities – it is more of a collective character. Although neither Lévi-Strauss nor Barthes or even Foucault devoted separate studies to the problem of memory this phenomenon has been analyzed by them in more a general context, that of consciousness itself. As has already been mentioned the author of The savage mind rejects categorically the classical, subjectivist understanding of the Ego – the human psyche so different from the natural world. Instead of

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consciousness understood in terms of phenomenological retentions and protentions intentional acts constituting the meaning and sense of the transcendent world Lévi-Strauss as a faithful follower of de Saussure is critical even of the indiscriminate usage of the personal pronoun “I” univocally invoking the idea of a personal, individual mind. Structural analyses of social phenomena constituting so-called cultural, civilized life, that is, life sharply opposed to crude Nature point to one fact: such creations of human activities like systems of taboos, totems, taxonomies, myths, regulations governing the system of marriages, kinship come from the deep, unconscious layer of the mind. They have nothing to do with egological consciousness. Although, according to Lévi-Strauss mind being a part of nature must – at one stage of its history – have broken out of this unanimous continuity – to wit – a mass of total Being. Human cognitive apparatus through the sensual activities (knowledge, claims Lévi-Strauss, is based mostly on perceptions) introduced an endless series of discriminations. Nature – due to this human activity – has irretrievably lost its pristine unity. This series of discriminations is nothing else but a set of binary categories. Similarly to the language system human mind employs negative categories, applying them to multifarious parts, domains of Nature. This is done, we find Lévi-Strauss saying, by a kind of collective and unconscious activity. Instead of this once sanctified by the rational tradition usage of “I” – the centre of the human universe – the structuralist thinkers prefer to talk of “us”/“we” – as members of a given ethnic group, the latter associating itself with another group thus forming a still larger social unit.10 Two facts here seem to be of unquestionable significance. The first one concerns a set of traits, features common to all of us. They pertain to some in-born, genetically and culturally transmitted structures of the human mind irrespective of the stage of development or the level of civilization. The famous savage mind – so dramatically described by Lévi-Strauss – does not differ structurally even from the most advanced, refined, sophisticated “apparatus” of a man of 20th century. Both of them – the so-called primitive and the civilized – use a system like a set of binary discriminations, introducing a human type of ordering into the hitherto undifferentiated mass of Nature (Being). Although they may differ in so far as the applied means are concerned (the primitive is fond of “tinkerinig” fr. bricoler with all available “tools” he has at his disposal) they participate – so to speak – in the One, Universal Mind. The second fact is even of greater importance. Contrary to the Cartesian tradition all these activities are mainly unconscious. As Lévi-Strauss wanted to introduce the structuralist methodology into investigations of social, cultural phenomena he automatically – as it were – had to refer to the fundamental concepts of de Saussure, namely that of la langue and la parole. The main tenet here hinged on the assumption that all elements occupying in the domain of culture could be treated as signs in the

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language system. The operational, universal Mind and its activities imposes its order, its structure on continuous domain, sphere of Nature. Thus, cultural phenomena are defined in terms of relations binding (similarly to negative, opposition – like ones in the language system) real or virtual discriminatory categories. One can discern endless series of analogical (either metonymical or metaphorical) series of cultural, social events while such a series would be impossible in continuous Nature, in unindifferantiated mass of Being. Moreover, the series occurs in various societies, in many different epochs of the history of mankind. In his search for the essence of human thinking, human mind, Lévi-Strauss claims he has came upon something constant, universal – a structure or a set of structures constantly appearing behind disparate, diverse cultural phenomena. Time and again Lévi-Strauss underscores the fact that the mind is common to all of us at all historical stages, hence its “products” or creations display similarities. The la langue part of culture is a kind of immutable structure – a set of rules memorized in the collective mind. What is more, this collective memory sets in motion (although we are hardly aware of it) all this differentiating mechanism – a chain of binary oppositions, visible, discernible behind the actual realization of human activities. So, any anthropologist of the structuralist persuasion – while analyzing human creations of such abundance like myths, magic formulas (the mana type of communication), ancient tales, images of animal or human totems may obtain (and on many occasion has obtained) incontrovertible evidence that what he has submitted to scrutiny during a field work or study in his room is nothing else but a series, a sequence of modulations or transformations of identical material. Hence there is a strong, close affinity between apparently distant and inimitable cultures as behind all those myths or fables. One experiences, feels – as it were – the evident presence of an immutable structure in all of them. The unifying structure works in the area of discriminating the chaotic material flowing from Nature – according to Lévi-Strauss, Leach and Greimas, the very structure is grounded in more primordial, fundamental patterns e.g. triangles of oppositions (Analogically to basic traits, qualities of consonants and vowels). Thus the unconscious mind is not an individual, egological affair, its creations and the material or immaterial results of its activities reveal this great impact of strict rules of syntaxt (all phenomena may be treated in language-like terms say the structuralists while inner grammar is being imposed upon all we create, upon all the ways and manners characteristic of our various dealings with Nature. Fascinated by the seminal theories of Jacobson and Trubeckoy (who found out the “atomic” elements constituting the differences in the language system on the phonological level) Lévi-Strauss adopted the view of primary differences and transferred this theoretical stance to all domains of human culture. The surface of it, its

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la parole is not a proper domain of the analysis undertaken by the structuralist thinker aiming at precision and scientific strictness. Therefore the structuralist would like to go deeper: to the very core of human thinking, to the structure stored “in there”, the very syntax and “grammar” present in the algebra of the mind, memorized and repeated, reproduced in endless, continuous acts of human creations throughout space and time, throughout so many epochs and historical formations. Be it a primitive Bora tribe or a refined group of French École Normale youths, the “hot” (advanced, fast developing societies) or “cold” – ahistorical, immutable and stable in all their activities there is a visible, underlying structure: an inborn matrix of the universal grammar and “logic” shared by all of us. In other words, this unique, unconscious store of pristine primordial forms of human conduct renders possible all cultural civilization – like behaviour. As children for no logical reasons whatsoever are able instinctively to distinguish between p and b sounds in order to “expand” on this ability and graft it on all domains of human activities – marked off by disseminations, differentiations and differences (as it happens in a language system) so all humankind know how to reproduce memorized, in-born structures. The binary system of oppositions – inherent in our nature is genetically preserved and passed on to other members of the species. Thus such opposite pairs as: culture – nature, male – female, edible – non-edible, a possible object of sex interest – an impossible one, permissible – nonpermissible, belonging to the totem – not belonging to a totem, living – dead, organic – non-organic will be always appearing and making themselves “felt”, experienced in our allegedly conscious activities. The “memory” of the structure is ever present even without our being conscious of it. The afore – mentioned assumption outlines the main paradigm of the profuse, vast and prolitic work of Lévi-Strauss. Let us conclude by presenting the way the author of Tristes Tropiques has tried to substantiate this tenet. Analyzing such phenomena as systems of kinship marriages, classifications of animals, plants and human beings, myths and fables, Lévi-Strauss disregards the “surface” (apparent contents) and concentrates his efforts on the deep – to wit – universal structure reflected11 in the algebra of the brain – as he puts it himself. Totally dissatisfied with the functionalist analyses of the problem of kinship (the initial stage of the process of building-up human society proper) Lévi-Strauss applies his theory of structure as discriminatory mechanism. Each individual – as will be remembered – is an element of a system, a group (like signs in language system) so he/she must abide by certain rules – that is – a “syntax” and grammar. In order for a human society to perform its functions, a system of binary oppositions must be operational. Thus every individual must function within the sphere of influence of such primary pairs as good – evil, permissible – non-permissible etc. These in turn regulate (inform) individual choices and projects, prompt him/her what should

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be done, and what should be avoided. In the sensitive domain of kinship (the first step leading us to humanity) the exchange of women-partners reminds one of the exchange of signs-symbols. Some may be used in communication act while some must not. In the sphere of kinship certain women “may go” into the hands of chosen partners provided very strict, even repressive conditions will be observed. Lévi-Strauss claims to have found – contrary to the previous proposals – the real reason of the ban on incest. The latter was excluded in the mythical past not on moral, or biological grounds but only on social ones. An individual – belonging to a given group – must secure the right, adequate number of the members of the group otherwise it would dwindle in quantinity thus becoming an easy prey to another group. As might easily be seen incestual practices would have caused this unwanted undesired phenomenon. Thus the imposed (ever remembered, ever recalled) rule being part of a longer structure works as a kind of deterrent, making a given society behave in a predictable way (By the way, Lévi-Strauss was intending to construct the periodic table à la Mendeleyev predicting most of our social and cultural behaviour). A direct or indirect system of kinship is then supposed to secure the largest possible number of individuals belonging to a group (system). It goes without saying that the incest taboo has been memorized, inscribed as it were into the system, placed in the universal Mind, which in turn rules our activities. It is this strictly preserved memory that excludes and accepts at the same time, thus securing general social and cultural interest. This more often that not difficult, cryptic algebra of the brain is apparently illogical but by a thorough analysis of the matrilinear or paternal lines of exchange we get eventually to the very core of our unconscious thinking there discerning the work of ever present syntax of such exchanges. The same holds true for other forms of exchange social, that is cultural – parole. Let us mention such forms of social communication as the way we prepare our meals, tell stories, pass on perennial truths contained in myths, the way we dress and classify objects and animals. As far as many and various cuisines are concerned Lévi-Strauss puts forward the following set of binary oppositions: exogenic – endogenic, interior – exterior, centralised – peripheral, spicy – insipid all these constitute so-called gustem which set in motion all discriminatory processes in this domain. Hence – as any language, the couisine is based on differences and the collective memory of the “hidden structure” makes all ways of culinary communication meaningful. What is of a great importance is the fact that the code-like rules (fry, not boil, simmer but not cook etc.) are placed (stored) in deep layers of the collective mind. In order to get our meals ready (and abide by the local standards at the same time) one must resort to this unconscious know-how, as one must refer to the English or French syntax in order to speak and write in English or French. It should by borne in mind that for the structuralist it is the la langue

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that really counts, while the surface of it is something changeable and open to transformations. Hence, the conscious attitude to which people of different epochs attached such an enormous importance seems of lesser significance. As the algebra of the brain prompts us, all knowledge, technology, know-how and what we understand by culture that humankind has been creating for thousands of years is based on the stored, preserved and memorized structure. The latter is part and parcel of the Collective Mind to which we turn in order that society – the users of certain code – might function. No matter what kind of society it is (hot, cold, developed, underdeveloped, primitive, civilized) the surface differences are indeed trifles. The set of binary structure of oppositions – visible in myths, totems and classifications is ever present and it appears that we are, have always been, and will ever be governed by a structure which one day in the past did lead us out of darkness – giving birth to the state of culture and civilization – so sharply opposed to chaotic and unpredictable Nature. Jagiellonian University, Cracow NOTES 1

See an invaluable presentation of this subject in Structuralism and since. From Lévi Strauss to Derrida, Ed. John Sturrock, Oxford University Press, 1979. 2 See Structural Anthropology and Antropologie structurale deux by Claude Lévi-Strauss in witch the latter recalls all theories that exerted a substantial influence on his works. 3 See Lévi-Strauss, by E. R. Leach, London, 1970. 4 See Conversations with Claude Lévi-Strauss, London and New York, 1969. 5 See La vie familiàle et sociale des Indiens Nambikwara, Paris, 1948. 6 See Writing and Difference, by Jacques Derrida, Chicago, 1978, esp. Introduction. 7 Ibid. 8 See Structuralism and since, op. cit. 9 See L’Homme nu, by Lévi-Strauss, in Mythologiqes IV, Paris, 1971. 10 Ibid. 11 See Écrits, by Jacques Lacan, Paris, 1966.

N OV I KOV D M I T R I Y

A G R I C U LT U R A L L A N D S C A P E AS PHILOSOPHICAL-ECOLOGICAL PHENOMENON

The earth assumes the role of the nurturing soil for our vital existence. We find in it ready-made treasures present for use, the green grass and water, which allow us to cultivate it for our nurturance. These “natural resources” of the soil are infinitely exploited by humanity; there has been a seemingly limitless expansion of the transformatory applications of their virtualities. Thus the soil stands in our mind for infinite life resources. A.-T. Tymieniecka. The Passions of the Earth. Analecta Husserliana LXXI, p. 7. ABSTRACT

Agricultural landscape in the context of interdisciplinary researches might be analyzed not only according to the system of diversified (ecological, social, economic and other) activities, which are traditionally designated for solving problems of rational land use as applied to the levels of administrativeterritorial subdivision, specific conditions of business arrangement of production and use of natural resources, but also as a philosophical-ecological phenomenon. In addition to the necessity of accounting for physical properties and natural peculiarities of landscape, sectorial and species suitability of territories, aimed at satisfaction of key requirements of society, ensuring high efficiency of production and other types of activity, there is an actual demand for protection and reproduction of fertile, cultural-historical, landscape-aesthetic and other useful properties of lands. That is why geosciences, first of all, land use planning and control science, should introduce their own environmental philosophy of land use and consistently saturate (in proactive reaction to changes in natural environment, development of labor forces and industrial relations) theoretical and practical knowledge on Mother Earth with ecological content. Diversity of forms and methods of territorial planning shall correspond to variety of properties of land, agro-ecosystems and agro-landscapes. Land use planning is not only a natural-economic science envisaging sustainable use and protection of land as a natural resource, as the place for life and economic activities of human being, as the major means of production and subject matter of other social-economic and property relations (real estate). It 263 A-T. Tymieniecka (ed.), Analecta Husserliana CII, 263–270. c Springer Science+Business Media B.V. 2009 

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is evident that land use planning and control ensures accounting and reorganization of not only social-economic, but also cultural-ecological properties of territories. That is why in addition to traditionally applied social-economic justification of land use planning solutions it is necessary to ensure their objective and specialized philosophical-environmental analysis based on detailed and reliable ecological information. The above is stemming out of rigorous insights of prominent Russian scientists on the sources and ways of development of national agriculture. More than two centuries ago the talented scientist and practitioner A.T. Bolotov wrote: “. . . as the firsts object or as a part of arable farming, one may honor the analysis of properties and quality of land or research and cognition, for what and which land is more capable of” (Progress M, 1982). The land use planning activities such as “wisest and best division of lands into fields, resettlement of villages, application in field and other works, equalizing between arable farming and stock-breeding” he related to “improvement of the entire underlying foundation”, highlighting the importance of “particular things” such as tillage, fertilizing, grassland improvement, raising of livestock etc. It is pertinent to note that A.T. Bolotov was known as a refined aesthete in the sphere of natural landscape and a gentleman of virtue. In the beginning of last century the classicist of Russian agrarian science A.S. Ermolov reconfirmed economically and ecologically oriented character of land use: “In order to ensure productivity of land it is necessary to deliver to the plants everything required for their successful growth . . . The farmer has to . . . adopt himself in the best way to the conditions in hand and make the best possible use of them” (Zoidze and Ovcharenko, 2000). A.V. Chayanov viewed the land area from an aesthetic standpoint as a “surface exposed to the sunlight; so, this is the area . . . in essence, which serves the basis for agricultural production” (Razumovskiy, 1989). Academicians of land use planning and control – P.N. Pershin and S.A. Oudachin contemplated the role of land use planning in adapting the territories for economically wise use of “natural forces”, in arrangement of efficient functioning of land, labor, material and technical resources. Perhaps, these “forces of nature”, are exactly the Premeval Elements” (Tymieniecka, Vol. XXI) – in Ontopoesis of Life theoretically created and introduced by A.T. Tymeiniecka. Philosophical-ecological directionality of geosciences is quite obvious. At present the priority in the development of land use is given to ecologicallandscaping constituents. Archetypal status of land may be perceived in form of natural substance, while the secondary one – in form of means of production or immovable property. From theoretical point of view the issues of ecological-landscaping substantiation of agricultural production arrangement

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were worked out more thoroughly if compared to practical application of results of scientific researches. Natural origin and status of landscape, quality and diversity, sectorial and species suitability of land, predefine the capacity of territories to perform various economic functions as means of production, territorial basis, subject matter of social-economic and property relations. Thematic prioritization of researches on ecological-landscaping substantiation of geosciences does not mean that applicable hierarchic structure of territories’ arrangement disregards ecological features of land. It has been taking shapes for a long period of time and inevitably had to rely (consciously or spontaneously) upon various properties of landscape, zonal and local conditions and suitability of land. Categories of lands form on the basis of schemes and projects of microeconomic land use planning based on reliable ecological-landscaping substantiation, which denotes sectorial suitability of lands. Macroeconomic land use planning and control widely apply agro-landscaping indicators, which primarily identify composition and correlation of arable lands in agricultural enterprises. When planning the territories of crop rotation, fields and working spaces on the basis of land use planning working projects the priority is given to agro-ecological parameters for assessment of suitability of lands for certain types of agricultural crops. Firstly, ecological quality of lands predefines the structure of their categories, specifically the proportion of agricultural lands, forestry, water and nature protection land funds, and forms up landscaping systems. Agricultural lands should be subdivided into highly valuable, valuable and low value assets, and then introduce the legal mode of their usage: total immunity and prohibition for allotment for other purposes, strict protection, justified transforming and allotment to other category not related to production of agricultural products. Based on landscaping evaluation of territories there is a transition to agro-landscaping subdivision. Secondly, accounting for ecological quality of lands is mandatory for microeconomic division into agricultural and non-agricultural land assets in improvement of agro-landscapes. Thirdly, differences in ecological quality of lands are considered in forming of agro-ecosystems of various purposes. Ecological-landscaping features of territories are of special significance for solving issues of resettlement, deployment of production entities and businesses in large production conglomerations (joint stock companies and associations etc.) and farmsteads. Important is not only accounting of actual and perspective productivity of lands, but also the sanitary status of territories and aesthetic landscape attractiveness. “Clean up the environment” movement is considered to be quite perspective and actual,

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which reconfirms the growing interest to environmental aesthetics. For the purposes of land use planning and control some researchers (M.V. Andriishin and N.M. Koltunov, N.M. Radchevskiy) propose dividing territories by landscapeecological micro-zones: prohibited (national parks, recreational zones, migration corridors etc.), protection (territories adjacent to ecologically hazardous objects, water protection zones etc.), agro-ecological (eroded, contaminated etc.). Terrain elements (cultivated forests, grassing, hydro-technical installations) establish landscape-ecological framework of geosciences, but never define agro-ecological system of use and protection of lands. Production classification of lands extends the sphere of application of materials for natural-agricultural, landscape-ecological and ecological-economic zoning in land use planning, which allows for considering the features of orography, pedogenic and underlying rocks, soils, watering conditions etc. In the process of land use planning and control, agro-ecologically homogeneous territories and land plots are transformed into production-territorial objects: landholdings and land use assets, land plots of separate business entities, crop rotation, fields, working spaces etc. There is an establishment of integral system of scientifically justified territorial arrangement of production, adaptive to ecological-landscaping conditions of local terrain with more thorough and comprehensive accounting for ecological-landscaping, ecological-economic, agro-ecological and ecological-aesthetic conditions of the planned object and features of land, consumer demand for the results of land use, crop and livestock products. Tendencies and achievements of allied sciences at the junction of interdisciplinary researches exert significant influence on defining the directions for improvement of land use planning and control. It is generally admitted that land use planning and control establish organizational-territorial structure for all sectors of arable farming and crop production. The latter are more and more saturated with ecological-landscaping and agro-ecological content. This, alongside with other factors, predefines higher priority of ecological requirements in arrangement of territories, specifically agricultural enterprises and farms. At different historical phases, organizational-territorial structure was formed through land marking, inter-settlement and intra-settlement, microeconomic and macroeconomic land use planning and control. In Soviet era collective farms and state owned farms have been arranging plough lands only. Subsequently, perennial horticultural crops and forage land assets were introduced in the sphere of macroeconomic land use planning and control. Starting from 1960s, agronomists and land surveyors actively developed erosion-preventive organization of lands in agricultural enterprises and farms. On this background

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it was absolutely logical to capitalize on modern microeconomic and macroeconomic land use planning and control on ecological-landscaping basis. Ecological-landscaping land use planning is aimed at mobilization of natural resources and at sustaining higher yields of agricultural crops, at managing economically efficient, socially oriented and ecologically safe production, at preservation of equilibrium of natural environment. Ecological-landscaping approach is objectively justified in territorial arrangement of agricultural production. Its application both in the past and nowadays has been influencing all levels of land use planning and control, its constituent parts and elements. The task is in infusion of ecologicallandscaping content of land use planning with scientific feasibility, and in elaboration of appropriate methods and mechanisms of substantiation. Specific categories of land assets segregated at various levels of land use planning activities (agricultural, development and construction, protected lands etc.) are of well-defined ecological-landscaping purposefulness. Ecological-landscaping content is laid in the notion of “land assets” if we consider them from the point of view of systematic use or suitability for use in specific economic purposes or differences of their natural-historical attributes. Rationalization of agricultural lands’ composition is also a pressing challenge both at economic and zonal-regional level. Stability of agricultural lands’ structure may be achieved only with reliable and in-depth ecological-landscaping substantiation. The organizational-territorial structure of agricultural enterprises is being established immediately in microeconomic and, specifically, in macroeconomic land use planning and control. In this connection, it should mentioned, that for achievement of ecological well-being we are not only utilizing typical features of landscape, but we do introduce substantial changes in landscape planning. The principle of adjustment of production and its territorial planning is applied to peculiarities of landscape, which at the same time is somehow leading to transformation of natural environment. In the opinion of quite competent scientists and specialists (S.N. Volkov, A.N. Kashtanov et al.), land use planning and control is a tool for designing landscape systems. This appears from the definition of landscape as territorial system consisting of mutually applicable physical or natural and anthropogenic components and complexes of much lower taxonomic rank. Macroeconomic land use planning and control exert ultimate reformatory influence on agro-landscapes being arranged for the purpose of and under influence of agricultural production. Deep agro-landscaping transformations determine deployment of production enterprises and centers of economy, arrangement of agricultural lands and crop rotation, planning of territories

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for crop rotation, perennial horticultural crops and forage lands. Accordingly, these constituents of macroeconomic land use planning require detailed ecological-landscaping substantiation. Ecological-landscaping land use planning, which has more benefits if compared with traditional methods of land planning, is characterized by higher complicity due to its omnitude and communion, integrity and comprehensiveness of objectives and measures aimed at arrangement of use and protection of lands, as well as higher costs of implementation. However, it is proactively reacting to any changes in prerequisites of economic development, in the use of natural and land resources, it is accounting for anticipated dynamics of the initial object and conditions of its functioning. Improvement of land use planning and control in ecological-landscaping direction, its adaptation to current and future social-economic situation, are feasible provided that a range of general requirements are duly satisfied. Their consideration is equally important in development of projects of land use planning and control at agricultural enterprises. The requirement of comprehensiveness contemplates detailed analysis of ecological-landscaping and agro-ecological features of territories through special zoning and classification of lands including thorough accounting for various natural, social-economic, technical, technological and cultural-aesthetic factors, which are presently actualized through environmental aesthetics. Equilibrium and coherence of interests express the balanced relations of natural and economic resources such as agricultural lands, employable population, technical means, gross and marketable products, financial flows etc. Landscape conditions and agro-ecological quality of lands define volumes, specialization and intensity of production, parameters of land use, composition of and cost of investments to environmental activities. Ecological-landscaping land use planning and control serves in the best interests of not only a specific agricultural enterprise or farm, but in the interest of managerial activity of municipal and state authorities in development of rural districts, increasing the quality of life of population. The requirement of differentiation and integration reflects the dialectic communion of ecological-landscaping substantiation of separate constituents and elements of land use planning and control for establishment of integral system of scientifically justified arrangement of use and protection of land resources at various levels of economy and management. Ecological-landscaping, agroecological zoning and classification are oriented at differentiation of lands against the predefined indicators of their quality. Any object of land use planning is subdivided into multiple homogeneous territories and land plots in accordance with the principle of sectorial and species suitability, unification

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of ecological situation and environment protective activities. In the process of designing they are integrating into specific production-territorial objects: landholdings (land use plots), production departments of agricultural enterprises, massifs of agricultural lands and crop rotation, fields and working spaces. Moreover, ecological-landscaping division of lands for land use planning and control purposes creates a unified territorial basis for monitoring and cadastral, environment protective and taxation operations etc. The ultimate objective of contemporary land use planning and control is in sustaining the status of land as public ownership. Land and other natural resources are used and protected in many countries as basis of life and activity of their nations. This is feasible only with scientifically justified arrangement of territories, availability of reliable, detailed and regularly updated information on the volumes and quality of lands, on prevailing tendencies and rates of changes. For several thousands of years of society development, there has been an uninterrupted adaptation in primarily biological, and then economic components to natural environment, to the potential of land. In future, accounting for conditions of habitation may become the only possible strategy of survival and prevention of ecological adversities, decreasing the rate of use of nonrenewable lands and other natural resources. “Earth remains our very milieu, realm of existence as we participate in its changes, transformations, palpitating with its convulsions, worrying about its fate. In conclusion, earth is the groundwork, the existential condition, and destiny of life” (Tymieniecka, Vol. XXI) – writes A.-T. Tymieniecka. We need to achieve a compromise between the conation to increased quality of life of present generation with preservation of habitation environment for our succession. It is on record that productivity of agricultural labor is directly connected with rational use of (temporal and spatial) non-uniformity of natural resources, which, as labor, are the underlying basis of consumer values. “Our seemingly most direct ‘contact’ and experience of the earth comes from our experience of living ‘upon’ the earth”. We walk, we build, we establish our dwelling, whether in a cavern or in a building and surround it with a garden; we plant crops, trees, and flowers; we cultivate the surface of the soil; we dig up precious minerals and stones. In one word, “upon” the earth entails a primordial sensing, feeling, conviction of the solidity, the indisputable solidity of the earth upon whish we stand, upon which we may rely in all our ventures. “Upon the earth entails not only a stable and fertile surface but the solidity of our work with the ground. We may assume to find a ground for our enterprises, the very ground for our subsistence“6 . Plants, the growth and reproduction of which are regulated by biological laws are used as objects and products of labor. Our Managing economy “en rapport with nature” contemplates planning and

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deployment of agricultural lands and crops in territories with the best agrolandscaping features. Moreover, the search for such places shall not be cut and try method but on the basis of ecological-landscaping and agro-ecological evaluation of lands. The State University of Land Use Planning and Control, Moscow REFERENCES Protection of Landscapes. Explanatory Dictionary. M: Progress, 1982. page 54. E.K. Zoidze, L.I. Ovcharenko. Comparative evaluation of agricultural potential of climate in the territory of Russian Federation and of the degree of utilization of its agro-climatic resources. St. Petersburg. Gidrometioizdat, 2000, issure 76. page 43. V.M. Razumovskiy. Ecological-economic zoning (theoretical aspects). L: Nauka, 1989. A.-T. Tymieniecka. First Principles of the Metaphysics of Life Charting the Human Condition. Analecta Husserliana, Vol. XXI. A.-T. Tymieniecka. The Passions of the Earth. Analecta Husserliana, Vol. LXXI, page 1.

VA S I L I Y N I L I P O V S K I Y

T E R R A I N A S S U B J E C T M AT T E R O F C U LT U R A L - E C O L O G I C A L VA L U E

. . . passions of the earth are, first of all, profoundly ingrained in the vehicles of our elementary existence, running in a transformatory way through the entire network of its ontopoietic unfolding. A.-T. Tymieniecka ABSTRACT

In cultural-ecological aspect the terrain has special value which is shown through preservation and improvement of separate natural complexes becoming during the certain period of time an example of museification. Ecological museum, first of all, is a museum in the open air, which enframes quite a large territory with a variety of separate landscape loci culturally assimilated by human being. As cultural-social phenomenon such museum is universally versatile, because it integrates an assemblage of diversified objects: cultural-ecological, artistic-aesthetical, moral-ethical, socio-economical and others. The evolvement of interdisciplinary approach here arrives at the utmost Perfection. From our standpoint, it would be interesting to try constructing certain theoretical model of national ecomuseum, which embraces material attributes created by human being and surrounding territory as cultural-natural phenomenon. Undoubtedly, in virtue of many reasons, including both traditionally conservative and complicated socio-economical ones, there might be no solutions, which would pretend to radical conceptualism. Even though democratic elements started penetrating our museum cause, reorienting it to spectators, after all, national museum invokes aid in solving a multitude of urgent issues. Against the background of vulgar bargaining on socio-cultural and moralethical valuables, the downside of museums are, probably, the most painful and tragic, because no museum collection may recur in any new hypostasis. Monuments perish forever, and museum collections vanish into thin air and disappear too. Current unstable situation created an entire class of worm grooves endangering museums (which have already done their part): loss of rare pieces of art, offence of caddish commercial front against museum premises, unenviable fate of the most of provincial museums, growing prices for entrance tickets 271 A-T. Tymieniecka (ed.), Analecta Husserliana CII, 271–274. c Springer Science+Business Media B.V. 2009 

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to museums and exhibitions, blasphemous and splendiferous attitude to illustrious palace and garden museums etc. There is a threat of privatization of state museums with collections of national significance and endowment, which were gathered for many centuries. Today, the issue of indivisibility of museum valuables is one of the most acute problems. Nevertheless, there are certain ecomuseographic methods developed by western specialists-museologists. Fundamental provisions of ecomuseum might be potentially projected on the screen of national cultural reality and, therefore, we may try to save the patrimony that has not been lost yet. There is a certain paradigm of ecological museum as such, that was changing on any cultural-social ground with various degree of probability. Thus, ideational Russian ecomuseum may be created on the basis of famed manors or historical parks. Having this in mind we hear a chord, which thematizes its directivity. However, this is only an initial thematicity that characterizes pre-stageness in making any ecomuseum exposition. For instance, memorial-artistic manors, as a whole, may serve as lucrative and live material stimuli, which may universalize any future ecomuseum. We may dwell upon an experience of Scandinavian ecomuseum in the mountains of Lapland, first created on the basis of national parks and then developed into a museum of mountains and valleys, cultural and social heritage. The same may be focused on our national territorial-landscape culture. Being a kind of foreplay, an introduction to ecomuseum reality, the cultural phenomenon of Russian manor might predefine the genesis of ecomuseum in our current situation. Which way may it happen? Firstly, there would be a subordinating “horizontal” notional strain of sensuously perceived material showpieces, as though keeping on voiceless “conversation” in a global contemporaneous space. Secondly, there would be an opportunity (in associational-imaginative and symbolic plane) to search into spiritual-cultural and socio-economical essence of the past and future ages, mediated by the present. Museified could be not only parks as memoria and historical-artistic relics. The process of museification would embrace an extensive sweep of social, political, economical, national and other realias, universalized in racial memory and deeds of the nation. The most essential precondition for functioning of ecomuseum would be a direct participation of locals in its work. Let us trace this dynamics. Being created of the basis of historical manors, let’s say, in the suburbs of Moscow, Russian ecomuseum as cultural institution would provide the visitors with integral knowledge on natural environment in Moscow region, on its history, artistic culture, economy etc. Separate showpieces, such as remaining natural, architectural and sculptural monuments would be echoing

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with still-life – exhibited performances, generalized by memory and collective creativeness. All this, in essence, has found expression in the history of development of Moscow suburban manor culture. The spectator would receive a concentrated imaginative and conceptual apprehension of places near to his heart. Specially organized meetings of museum workers and visitors would contribute to such comprehension. Thematically, ecomuseum could be subdivided into several sections. Household-economic display area, for instance, connected with arrangement of botanic gardens and menageries in Izmailovo, undoubtedly, would give a broad insight to regional economy in its historical development. Furthermore, if they could imitate functioning of at least one or several similar botanic gardens or menageries, then the spectators’ activeness, the role of resident population in museification of collective economic memory would become obvious and apparent. Let us recall an experiment of Portugal ecomuseum in Mertula, which organized in its park an open air training workshop that revived ancient techniques of manufacturing and trade of wool blankets. Such experimental character could be applied to Russian ecomuseum too. Further sections, which could become constituent parts of Moscow suburban ecomuseum exposition, might include: “Moscow suburban manor and artisticpoetical palette of Russia”; “Theater and Russian park”; “Park as entertaining facility”; “Manor and oeuvres of bonded craftsmen”; “Art Patronage and Russian manor culture”. I believe that within the exposition zone of “Theater and Russian park” (let’s take as an example such “theatric” manors as Kouskovo, Archangelskoye, Sheremetyevo or Abramtsevo) the performances based on Old Russian traditions on the spatial background of beautified nature could become quite pertinent. The visitors there could play a dual role: as theatregoers and amateur-elucidators of histrionics, as practitioners introspecting the history of Russian theater and, at the same time, its worshipers protecting it in the frameworks of ecomuseum against the intrusion of time, and, therefore, extending the lifespan of the scenic image of the past. We may also assume some other thematic zones, which could be incorporated into ideational composition of Russian ecomuseum. Each of them could present quite a voluminous package of information on the dear homeland. The major distinction of ecomuseum from traditional regional museums is in proposed practical and functional participation of spectators-visitors aimed at implementation of environment protective activities in various spheres of cultural and social life as indispensable part of museum activities. And, perhaps, this symptom affords ground for perceiving the ecomuseum as one of the most appropriate modern mechanisms, which ensures relative equilibrium of spiritual and historical strata, because the very stylistics of it allows people drawing as close as possible to space and time, to the origins of their own existence.

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In this context one should draw attention to certain ideological aspects in the development of ecomuseum. From our point of view, they are as follows: ecomuseum is trying to startle the human being from the status of egocentric, “ensemble” consciousness, which for a long time has been encroaching sociocultural and natural environment. Conceptual ensemble dictating obsessional intents for improvement and adjustment, has been always trying to rearrange the historically formed “natural” living space and, in the long run, has driven social culture to unnatural, “rootless” existence, thus loosing perceptual unity of history and memory. Prescribing of eviscerated notions, confined in any particular hackneyed phrases, to a greater degree promoted “intervention” to surrounding environment, thus introducing a tone of discord between human being and society in their historical and contemporaneous interaction. In this respect the ecomuseum is capable of drawing the subjective factor under the assemblage phenomenological perception and comprehension of all vital structures, rather than under conceptual, providential notional ensemble. Strive for natural pluralistic augmentation of the new to already existing things is thus establishing spatial-temporal, visional essence of contemporary ecomuseum-assemblage, which encompasses not only cultural attributes created by human being, but the terrain too. It is curious enough that in ancient Russia people used to use two definitions of ekisticians – “town builders” and “town restorers”. The latter never built towns from scratch. They just restored the things that already existed. The same way ecomuseum “is capable” of stringing, layering, in-building novelty in antiquity by small doses and with separate fragments. Socio-cultural environment is being explored gradually, thus drawing our minds closer to comprehension of organic perceptual unity. In this regard the environmental cultural setting should be formed on the basis of adaptation to natural self-producing structures of specific locality, territorial locus, or natural fragment. From our point of view, an assemblage ecomuseum can maximally satisfy the human nostalgia for naturalness, eradicate abstractive conceptualism, reproduce visional and associational-ideational broaching of history and memory, allow us feeling the architectonics of time. Only with such concentration of preconditions, there will be possible further advance of human consciousness towards macro-society, “small native land” and thereafter to mosaic, multilingual and contextual Motherland. This is the essence of intercultural dialogue, which is supported in situation of mass communications by actualized “cultural-alternative”, expressed in saved heritage. The State University of Land Use Planning and Control, Moscow

A.L. SAMIAN

N E W T O N ’ S T H E O L O G Y O F M AT H E M AT I C A L P RO B L E M S

ABSTRACT

Isaac Newton’s contribution to the quantitative aspects of science is wellknown. His Philosophiae Naturalis Principia Mathematica has provided the paradigm for physics and astronomy for more than a century. However, not much has been written about the qualitative aspects of his creative endeavor. In this article, the author attempts to examine the relationship between his theology and mathematical problems that are embedded in his philosophy of mathematics, particularly in his overall program of mathematizing the phenomena. INTRODUCTION

Isaac Newton (1642–1727) had a multitude of interests as reflected in the variety of his works. His Philosophiae Naturalis Principia Mathematica (The Mathematical Principles of Natural Philosophy), customarily referred to as the Principia, was received by the Royal Society in April 1686 and consequently published in 5th July 1687.1 Another well known work of his, Opticks: or a Treatise on Reflexions, Refractions, Inflexions, and Colours of Light was printed in 1704.2 His works continued to be published even after his death. Notable among his “unpublished” works are Historical Account of Two Notable Corruptions of the Scriptures, The Chronology of the Ancient Kingdoms Amended, Observations on the Prophecies of Daniel and The Apocalypse of St. John.3 In what follows, we will examine his concept of nature and God, his view of mathematical problems and the manner they are related to his theology in his philosophy of mathematics. N AT U R E A N D G O D

Newton believed that nature is created by God. Newton did not believe that God creates nature continuously. There is an important “mechanical aspect” of nature. He furnishes several arguments to show the impossibility of nature to exist on its own despite its mechanical manifestation. Basically we can classify 277 A-T. Tymieniecka (ed.), Analecta Husserliana CII, 277–298. c Springer Science+Business Media B.V. 2009 

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these arguments into those that do not employ verses from the Scriptures4 and those that do. We will first examine his non-scriptural arguments. In one of his arguments, he appeals to the “beauty” of the cosmos. He maintains that the intricacies of nature necessarily point to the existence of the Creator. In describing the cosmos, he states: The six primary planets are revolved about the sun in circles concentric with the sun, and with motions directed toward the same parts and almost in the same plane. Ten moons are revolved about the earth, Jupiter, and Saturn, in circles concentric with them, with the same direction of motion, and nearly in the planes of the orbits of those planets; but it is not to be conceived that mere mechanical causes could give birth to so many regular motions, since the comets range over all parts of the heavens in very eccentric orbits; for by that kind of motion they pass easily through the orbs of the planets, and with great rapidity; and in their aphelions, where they move the slowest and are detained the longest, they recede to the greatest distance from each other, and hence suffer the least disturbance from their mutual attractions. This most beautiful system of the sun, planets, and comets could only proceed from the counsel and dominion of an intelligent and powerful being.5

We can derive several things that characterize Newton’s idea of “beauty” from the above passage. “Beauty” is synonymous with “order”, “system” and “regularity” and these words do not refer exactly to the rigidity of a purely mechanical world which is filled with mechanical causes alone. In addition to appealing to the “beauty” of nature, Newton argues that if nature was not created by God, the random behavior of the constituents of nature would result in their own destruction. “And if the fixed stars are the centers of other like system”, says Newton, “these being formed by the like wise counsel, must be all subject to the dominion of one”, because he maintains, “the light of the fixed stars is of the same nature with the light of the sun and from every system light passes into all the other systems”. He adds, “lest the systems of the fixed stars should, by their gravity, fall on each other, he hath placed those systems at immense distance from one another”.6 In another argument, Newton appeals to the idea of complexity of the organization of matter which in his opinion, could not be attributed to natural causes alone. He writes: But how the matter should divide itself into two sorts, and that part of it which is fit to compose a shining body should fall down into one mass and make a sun and the rest which is fit to compose an opaque body should coalesce, not into one great body, like the shining matter, but into many little ones; or if the sun at first were an opaque body like the planets or the planet lucid bodies like the sun, how he alone should be changed into a shining body whilst all they continue opaque, or all they be changed into opaque ones whilst he remains unchanged, I do not think explicable by mere natural causes, but am forced to ascribe it to the counsel and contrivance of a voluntary Agent.7

We can see from the above passage that Newton views natural causes as something different from voluntary causes; at least not all voluntary causes

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are natural causes. There is a sharp distinction between the “natural” and “supernatural”. Newton maintains that if nature in the beginning had no Creator, there would be chaos. There is no order in nature and consequently anarchy will prevail. There would be no harmony in nature. An example which Newton uses to demonstrate the existence of harmony in God’s creations is the particular orbits of the planets Jupiter and Saturn. . . . considering that the planets of Jupiter and Saturn, as they are rarer than the rest, so they are vastly greater and contain a far greater quantity of matter, and have many satellites about them; which qualifications surely arose, not from their being placed at so great a distance from the sun, but were rather the cause why the Creator placed them at great distance. For, by their gravitating powers, they disturb one another’s motions very sensibly, as I find by some late observations of Mr. Flamsteed; and had they been placed much nearer to the sun and to one another, they would, by the same powers, have caused a considerable disturbance in the whole system.8

Newton argues that the orderliness and harmony which result from the particular places in the universe occupied by Jupiter and Saturn shows that nature is created by God. That nature did not exist out of chance without having a Creator can be ascertained if we examine the case of the earth and the sun. According to Newton, the inclination of the earth’s axis is extraordinary because the inclination results in “a contrivance for winter and summer, and for making the earth habitable toward the poles”. Also “the diurnal rotations of the sun and planets . . . could hardly arise from any cause purely mechanical”, that all of these “was the effect of choice rather than chance”.9 In response to those who claim that nature is created out of chance, he asks: Whence is it that all the eyes of all sorts of living creatures are transparent to the very bottom and the only transparent members of the body, having on the outside a hard transparent skin and within transparent layers with a crystalline lens in the middle and a pupil before the lens; all of them so truly shaped and fitted for vision that no Artist can mend them? Did blind chance know that there was light and what was its refraction, and fit the eyes of all creatures after the most curious manner to make use of it? These and such like considerations, always have, and ever will prevail with mankind, to believe that there is a being who made all things in his power, and who is therefore to be feared.10

Newton likewise argues that the particular pattern of distribution of matter will not be possible if God did not create them. Only God can make matter such that it is distributed homogenously throughout space and that “there should be a central particle so accurately placed in the middle to be equally attracted on all sides”. He continues: And much harder it is to suppose all the particles in an infinite space should be so accurately poised one among another as to stand still in perfect equilibrium. For I reckon this as hard as to make, not one needle only, but an infinite number of them (so many as there are particles in an infinite

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space) stand accurately poised upon their points. Yet I grant it possible, at least by a divine power; and if they were one to be placed, I agree with you (Bentley, that is) that they would continue in that posture without motion forever, unless out into new motion by the same power.11

One cannot say from the above passage that Newton is referring to an active God who is creating continuously. The transition from the view of God as creating and destroying continuously to that of a clock-maker can be seen in Newton’s argument concerning gravity whereby he believes that gravity also has some kind of natural power. It is not the case that all natural power rests upon God alone. “Gravity”, say Newton, “may put the planets into motion, but without the divine power it could never put them into such a circulating motion as they have about the sun”. “Therefore”, Newton concludes, “I am compelled to ascribe the frame of this system to an Intelligent Agent”.12 One can say from this passage that Newton indeed paved the way for a mechanical world view which later dominates the Newtonians. In his scriptural arguments, which are not well elaborated, Newton quotes the Ten Commandments, Genesis 7 and 8, Proverbs 8:25 and Psalm 90:2.13 It is only when he attempts to construct the early act of God creating the earth whereby God creates nature out of chaos that he refers to Moses’ knowledge. States Newton: “A sea I believe was then formed, as Moses expresses, but not like the sea, but with an even bottom without any precipices or steep descents”.14 The foregoing discussions shows that Newton believes in the divine creation of nature. God creates nature in the beginning. As to whether nature is created ex nihilo or not, Newton asserts: “Creation in scripture signifies formation but of something: as where God created man out of dust or the earth. Gen. 2.7”.15 In Newton’s cosmology, nature as a work of God has several characteristics besides “harmony” and “beauty” that I have mentioned earlier. One of those is uniformity; that there are standard features for each species of God’s creation which differentiate them from others. Newton cites the case of bird, beast and men to support his claim: Can it be by accident that all birds, beasts and men have their right side and left side alike shaped (except in their bowels); and just two eyes and no more, on either side of the face; and just two ears on either side (of) the head; and a nose with two holes; and either two forelegs or two wings or two arms on the shoulders, and two legs on the hips, and no more? Whence arise this uniformity in all their outward shapes but from the counsel and contrivance of an Author?16

In addition to the uniformity of nature, Newton believes that there is nothing in nature that is an “excess”. It is in this sense that nature is simple, that “Nature does nothing in vain”, and that “Nature is pleased with simplicity and affects not the pomp of superfluous causes”.17 It is due to simplicity of nature that according to Newton, “we are to admit no more causes of natural things than such as are true and sufficient to explain their appearances”.18 An example that

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he gives is the sun. In response to the question of “Why there is one body in our system qualified to give light and heat to all the rest”, he says: “I know no reason but because one was sufficient to warm and enlighten all the rest”.19 In order to elaborate his concept of simplicity further, he says that since nature is simple, “we are certainly not to relinquish the evidence of experiments for the sake of dreams and vain fictions of our own devising”.20 Therefore Newton’s concept of simplicity does not mean that the structure of the universe is not complex because a conglomerate of simples is certainly a complicated object. What he means is that we should not make our examination of nature unnecessarily difficult by employing extra-sensible stories of our own.21 Newton maintains that the understanding of simplicity and the unveiling of truth about nature are deeply connected. There is an organic synthesis between truth and simplicity. “Truth”, he declares, “is ever to be found in simplicity, and not in the multiplicity and confusion of things”.22 The content of a simple, harmonious, orderly, and beautiful nature is far from homogenous. In fact, Newton’s nature is definitely not a material plenum. There are levels of beings, spiritual and material, each having particular responsibilities given by God. Says Newton: As all regions below are replenished with living creatures (not only the Earth with Beasts, and Sea with Fishes and the Air with Fowls and Insects, but also standing waters, vinegar, the bodies and blood of Animals and other juices with innumerable living creatures to small to be seen without the help of magnifying Glasses) so may the heavens above be replenished with beings whose nature we do not understand. He that shall well consider the strange and wonderful nature of life and frame of Animals, will think nothing beyond the possibility of nature, nothing too hard for the omnipotent power of God. And as the planets remain in their orbs, so may any other bodies subsist at any distance from the earth, and much more may beings, who have a sufficient power of self motion, move whether they will, place themselves where they will and continue in any regions of the heavens whatever, there to enjoy the society of one another, and by their messenger or Angels to rule the earth and converse with the remotest regions. Thus may the whole heavens or any part thereof whatever be the habitation of the Blessed, and at the same time the earth be subject to their dominion.23

According to Newton, one of the responsibilities given by God to some of these invisible and intelligent beings is to manage the motions of heavenly bodies. Conduit reported that in one of his conversations with Newton, the latter “seemed to doubt whether there were not intelligent beings superior to us who superintend these revolutions of heavenly bodies by the direction of the supreme being”.24 Elsewhere, Newton writes: God made and governs the world invisibly . . . . For in God’s house (which is the universe) are many mansions, and he governs them by agents which can pass through the heavens from one mansion to another. For if all places to which we have access are filled with living creatures, why should all these immense spaces of the heavens above the clouds be incapable of inhabitants?25

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Apart from the fact that Newton believes in the existence of angles and other invisible beings, interestingly Newton did not embrace the view that Nature is governed by God through a process which he called “emanation”. Thus: From this opinion came the metaphysical philosophy of the heathens about the origin of the world, the generation and nature of the Gods & the transmigration of Souls. And this doctrine of Daemons was as old as the Idolatory of the heathens. For their Idolatory was grounded upon it. And therefore Moses to prevent the spreading of this sort of Philosophy among the Israelites wrote the history of the creation of the world in a very different manner from the Cosmogenies of the heathens, attributing the production of all things to the immediate will of the supreme God. Yet the Israelites by conversing with the heathens frequently lapsed into the worship of their Gods & by consequence received their theology, until there were captivated for these transgressions. And afterwards by conversing with the Chaldeans, Egyptians and Greeks they imbibed their Metaphysical Theology as is manifest by the Cabala of the Jews which consists chiefly in describing how the first Being, whom they called Aen-Soph the infinite emitted ten gradual subordinate emanations which they called Sephiroths or Splendours, the first immediately from himself, the second from the first, the third from the first or second & so on. And these ten emanations they name after God’s attributes and powers, calling the first Kether the Crown, the second Cochmah Wisdom, the third Binah Prudence, the fourth Gedulah magnificence, the fifth Geburah strength, the sixth Tipherah Beauty . . ..26

In this discussion on the theory of emanation related to the creation of Nature, he also claims that the theory is very closely allied to the view that the cosmos is divided into three worlds; the world of separate intelligence, the world of Angels and the corporeal world. And after these ten which they call ‘mundus azaluthicus’ the emanative world, they make three lower worlds which they call Briah the throne or glory, & the world of separate intelligences, Jezirah the world of Angles, & Asiah the corporeal world, that is the world in which we live. And they say that the influence and power of the first cause which they call Aen-Soph & the Aensophic world reaches through all things below them & that by means of the superior powers the Azaluthic kingdom formed the world Jezirah & the Jezirathic kingdom formed the lowest world Asiah: & that the souls of men from above revolve & pass into several bodies & after death return to the internal light of the Shekinah.27

Newton rejects the theory of emanation and the theory of the three worlds in the creation of nature because he maintains that both theories are products of heathens worshipping their Kings, idolizing them after death. Newton explains in detail, canvassing the history of creation adopted by various nations and races.28 This opinion seems to have had its rise from the worshipping and deifying of dead kings & exalting them in the opinion of the people till they made them the highest celestial Gods & took the oldest for the supreme God or for a God descended immediately from him & his successors for a series of Gods descended successively from the oldest, & making this race of Gods as ancient as the world. For the Chaldeans placed a race of ten successive Gods reigning from the beginning of the world to the time of the flood, as is recited in the fragment of Berosus preserved by Eusebius. The Egyptians represented God’s creation of the world by a spider’s weaving a web out of

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her own bowels & began their history with a race of Gods & heroes the last of which was Orus. The Phoenicians began their history with the creation of the world & a race of above ten successive pairs of Gods as is recited by Sanchoniatho. And from Egypt & Phoenicia came the like Theology into Greece as you may see in Hesiod’s Theogony. And the Jews by conversing with the heathens fell into Idolatory before the captivity, so conversing with the Chaldeans in the time of the Babylonian Captivity they seem to have learnt the theology of those nations & refined it. For they derived mystical Cabbala by tradition from the days of Ezra & supposed that it came to Ezra from Moses & this Kabbala consists chiefly in describing how the first cause whom they call Aen-Soph the infinite emitted gradually ten subordinate emanations which they call Sephiroths; formed the lowest world Asiah. Each of the ten Sephiroths they called Adam a man & the first of them they called Adam Kadmon the first man & make him the son of God as Adam is called in Scripture. Which confirms the opinion that the ten Sephiroths were originally ten men deified, namely the antediluvian patriarchs mentioned by Manetho the first of which was called Alorus by the Chaldeans & Adam by the Jews.29

From the above passage we can also derive that Newton’s cosmological view is certainly influenced by this belief that truth lies in Christianity since he rejects their explanations about the creation of nature chiefly because the theories originate from the heathens. Embracing their theories of emanation is synonymous with deifying their dead Kings and will results in “worshipping the creation instead of the creator”.30 God creates the world and governs it in his own way. “God made the world and governs it invisibly, and hath commanded us to love, honor and worship him and no other God but him, and to do it without making any image of him”,31 says Newton, and that “We can know him only by his most wise and excellent contrivances and final causes”.32 So far we have elaborated Newton’s perspective concerning the link between nature and God. Since God plays such a dominant and pervasive role in his conception of nature, Newton’s conception of God certainly warrants further examination. Does his God have particular Names and Attributes? Is his God transcendent? Is his God “God-of-the-Gaps,” so to speak? Concerning Newton’s theology, he has been described as “a Judaic monotheist of the school of Maimonides”,33 an Arian who “sometimes expressed himself like a Socinian”,34 a Unitarian, anti-trinitarian,35 and that his religion was “historical and scriptural”.36 What is common under these themes is that his belief was considered heretical in his time and certainly in so far as theology (as opposed to religion) is concerned, Newton’s belief did not conform to the Christian tenets of his days.37 If his peculiar belief were to be made public during his lifetime, it would at least have cost him his career.38 By and large, Newton’s concept of the Names and Attributes of God is summarized in the General Scholium.39 According to him, God “governs all things, not as the soul of the world, but as Lord over all”.40 He is “eternal, infinite, absolutely perfect”,41 and that He is “omnipotent and omniscient”.42 Newton

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believes that not only God governs all things but He also “knows all things that are or can be done”. Newton adds further that God “is not eternity and infinity, but eternal and infinite; He is not duration of space, but He endures and is present”.43 Furthermore, Newton claims that there are Aspects of God which are absolutely unknowable. Says Newton: Whence also he is all similar, all eye, all ear, all brain, all arm, all power to perceive, to understand and to act; but in a manner not at all human, in a manner not at all corporeal, in a manner utterly unknown to us. As a blind man has no idea of colors, so we have no idea of the manner by which the all wise God perceives and understands all things.44

With regard to the Essence of God, Newton states that “He is utterly void of all body and bodily figure, and can therefore neither be seen nor touched”. Consequently God should never “be worshipped under the representation of any corporeal thing”, because “we have ideas of his attributes, but what the real substance of anything is we know not”.45 Elaborating further on our knowledge on the Essence of God, he draws an analogy with the manner of our perception. In bodies we see only their fingers and colors, we hear only the sounds, we touch only their outward surfaces, we smell only the smells and taste the savors, but their inward substances are not to be known either by our senses or by any reflex act of our minds; much less, then, have we any idea of the substance of God.46

If the Essence of God is unknowable, how then do we as human beings know and consequently worship God? In response to this question, Newton states: We know him only by his most wise and excellent contrivances of things and final causes; we admire him for his perfections, but we revere and adore him on account of his dominion, for we adore him as his servant.47

Newton is clear that “anthromorphic phrases” about God are nothing more than metaphor. He understands that the total dependence of the world on God is beyond literal description although perceiving the dependence lies within the realm of human knowledge. The activity of the omnipotent Creator has no human counterpart. Therefore “anthromorphic phrases” about God should not be taken literally in the sense used to describe human behavior. But, by way of allegory, God is said to see, to speak, to laugh, to love, to hate, to desire, to give, to receive, to rejoice, to be angry, to fight, to frame, to work, to build; for all our notions of God are taken from the ways of mankind by a certain similitude, which, though not perfect, has some likeness, however.48

In addition to his comments above, he emphasizes that God “is omnipresent not virtually only but also substantially; for virtue cannot subsist without

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substance”, and that “the Supreme God exists necessarily, and by the same necessity he exists always and everywhere”.49 Thus we say that Newton’s God is not “distant” but transcendent and immanent. In Newton’s cosmology, God creates the universe but He does not manage it continuously; he only intervenes occasionally. There is the “mechanical aspect” of nature. Thus Newton uses phrases such as “Nature does nothing in vain”,50 “Nature is very consonant and conformable to herself”,51 nature “performing all the great motions of the heavenly bodies by the attraction of gravity”,52 that is, nature has the disposition to act independently. For example his discussion on ether leads him to write: Perhaps the whole frame of nature may be nothing but various contextures of some certain etherial spirits or vapors, condensed as it were by precipitation, much after the manner that vapors are condensed into water or exhalations into grosser substances, though not so easily condensable; and after condensation wrought into various forms, at first by the immediate hand of the Creator, and ever since by the power of nature, which, by virtue of the command “increase and multiply”, became a complete imitator of the copy set her by the protoplast.53

In a similar vein, Newton uses phrases like “the power of gravity” or the “power of magnetism”.54 In presenting a partly mechanical world’, Newton is following the foot steps of Galileo55 in paving the way for a purely mechanical world which later dominates the West. M AT H E M AT I C A L P R O B L E M S

In this section, we will discuss the orientation of mathematical problems and Newton’s approach in solving them with respect to his theology. Through out Newton’s mathematical endeavor, it appears that these mathematical problems56 share some common and interesting traits. The most important of them all is that Newton’s mathematical problems are problems which are shadowed by arguments about God. In more specific terms, mathematical problems according to Newton are problems concerning nature belonging to that part of theology which is demonstrable. His fervent belief in the connection between God and problems can be seen in his view about problems and their solutions. God is simple for He is the One. Accordingly, problems and the manner of solving them should portray simplicity. Says Newton: As the world, which to the naked eye exhibits the greatest variety of objects, appears very simple in its internal constitution when surveyed by a philosophic understanding, and so much the simpler by how much the better it is understood, so it is in these visions. It is the perfection of God’s works that they are all done with the greatest simplicity. He is the God of order and not of confusion. And therefore as they that would understand the frame of the world must endeavor to reduce their knowledge to all possible simplicity, so it must be in seeking to understand these visions.57

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The above passage is taken from his inquiry into prophetic visions. What we want to emphasize from the passage is the similarity of finding the solutions to problems. Solution to problems should be based on the mathematician’s belief in the attributes of God (God of order and not of confusion). The mathematician should assume that the problem has to be tackled in an orderly fashion in order to arrive at the simplest solution. In view of these passages, we claim that Newton construes mathematical problems as problems that have solutions which enhance the mathematician’s knowledge of the Deity. Another aspect of Newton’s mathematical problems is that they are natural demonstrable. That they are so is because Newton’s mathematical problem involves “phenomena”. In order to give an example of what is meant by the phrase “naturally demonstrable” and “phenomena”, we will present his discussion on gravity which occurs in the Principia, and which leads to his wellknown slogan, “Hypothesis non-fingo”. Newton writes that he has explicated “the phenomena of the heavens and of our sea by the power of gravity”, but he admits that he has not yet “assigned the cause of this power”. Newton argues that gravity: must proceed from a cause that penetrates to the very centers of the sun and planets, without suffering the least dimunition of its force; that operates not according to the quantity of surfaces of the particles upon which it acts (as mechanical causes do), but according to the quantity of the solid matter which they contain, and propagates its virtue on all sides to immense distances, decreasing always in the duplicate proportion of the distances.

He goes on to concede that he could not thus far “deduce the cause of those properties of gravity from phenomena”. This phrase occurs immediately preceding his famous remarks, “Hypothesis non fingo”. Newton continues: “Whatever is not deduced from phenomena is to be called an hypothesis”, and these hypothesis, “whether metaphysical or physical, whether of occult qualities or mechanical, have no place in experimental philosophy”.58 Just exactly what are “phenomena” to Newton and how are “phenomena” related to the thesis that his mathematical problems are naturally demonstrable? According to Newton, phenomena are not made up from the world of brute facts. It is not merely data resulting from sense observations such as the rising and setting of the sun. Rather “phenomena” to Newton results from observing the sensibles while analysing and thinking about nature and God (The existence of God is deduced from phenomena as Newton has shown and thus this hypothesis, if we want to call it a hypothesis, certainly belongs to his experimental philosophy). As a matter of fact, the various planets and the Sun which Newton mentions in order to support his arguments about the Deity59 constitutes the materials for Phenomena I to IV of his Principia.60

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We can likewise find the word “phenomena” in his “Rules of reasoning in Philosophy”. Newton states: In experimental philosophy we are to look upon propositions inferred by general induction from phenomena as accurately or very nearly true, not with standing any contrary hypothesis that may be imagined, till such time as other phenomena occur, by which they may either be made more accurate, or liable to exceptions.61

That the above passage is to underscore the importance of problems based on phenomena can be discerned from its draft which is one of Newton’s unpublished statement. In experimental philosophy one is not to argue from hypothesis against propositions drawn by induction from phenomena. For if arguments from hypothesis are admitted against inductions, the arguments of inductions on which all experimental philosophy is founded could always be overthrown by contrary hypothesis. If a certain proposition drawn by induction is not yet sufficiently precise, it must be corrected not by hypothesis but by the phenomena of nature more fully and more accurately observed.62

Since phenomena involves that part of nature which is demonstrable63 meaning that they must be supported by empirical evidence (thus the term “experimental philosophy“), mathematical problems which are founded on phenomena must likewise be demonstrable too. Specifically, they should have empirical import. Mathematical problems are problems solved “not by deducing it [in arriving at the answer] only from a confutation of contrary suppositions, but by deriving it from experiments concluding positively and directly”.64 Thus Newton argues: For the best and safest method of philosophizing seems to be, first to inquire diligently into the properties of things, and establishing those properties by experiments and then to proceed more slowly to hypothesis for the explanation of them. For hypothesis should be subservient only in explaining the properties of things, but not assumed in determining them; unless so far as they may furnish experiments.65

Newton’s belief that mathematical problems qua mathematical problems must involve experiments has made him to remark that “the Greeks, a people more addicted to the study of philology than to Nature, derived their first, as well as soundest, notions of philosophy (by observing the heaven)”.66 Surely Newton knew about the Greek contributions to the development of mathematics. What I want is to direct the readers’ attention to the significance of experiments to Newton. According to Newton, in spite of the Greek well known involvement in the development of mathematical sciences, their awareness of the importance of experiments is still insufficient. Now that we have established his conception of mathematical problems particularly on the manner which they are related to arguments about God and the

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characteristic that they must be naturally demonstrable, we will delve deeper into his creativity in solving them. M E T H O D O L O G Y O F P R O B L E M S O LV I N G

That he had a methodology we are certain. Some of the words he used such as “induction” and “inferred” point to a methodology. For examples, he states: “. . . we are to look upon propositions inferred by general induction from phenomena”,67 and “In this philosophy particular propositions are inferred from the phenomena, and afterwards rendered general by induction”,68 And elsewhere Newton again expounds on this theme: This Analysis consists in making Experiments and Observations, and in drawing general Conclusions from them by Induction, and admitting of no objections against the conclusions . . . And although the arguing from Experiments and Observations by Induction be no Demonstration of general Conclusions; yet it is the best way of arguing which the Nature of Things admits of, and may be looked upon as so much the stronger, by how much the Induction is more general.69

Although Newton uses the word “induction” quite conspicuously, it is incorrect for us to classify Newton’s methodology as basically that of induction70 because he also uses the word “deduction”. To cite some examples, in the concluding General Scholium of his Principia, Newton writes: “whatever is not deduced from the phenomena is to be called an hypothesis”,71 and elsewhere in his other work: “. . . the main Business of natural Philosophy is to argue from Phenomena without feigning Hypotheses, and to deduce causes from Effects . . .”.72 In fact, in his letter to Oldenberg of 6th July 1672, he claims that “the proper Method for inquiring after the properties of thing is, to deduce them from Experiments”.73 Therefore it is clear that in his methodology of mathematical research, he uses both induction and deduction extensively. What is the strongest connection between his methodology of solving problems and his philosophy of mathematics? We will argue that the connection is the particular role of hypotheses as envisaged by him. Just like Galileo and Descartes who used hypotheses in their mathematical inquiries, so did Newton. By and large, the latter used the word “hypotheses” in order to “signify only such a Proposition as is not a phenomenon nor deduced from any Phenomena but assumed or supposed without any experimental proof.“74 The following quotation is an example: HYPOTHESIS I That the centre of the system of the world is immovable. This is acknowledged by all, while some contend that the earth, other that the sun, is fixed in that centre. Let us see what may from hence follow.75

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The great difference between Newton and other mathematicians in using hypotheses is that the former used the word “hypotheses” pejoratively. Hypotheses to Newton “should be subservient only in explaining the properties of things, but not assumed in determining them; unless so far as they may furnish experiments”.76 And elsewhere he boldly states: “Hypotheses, whether metaphysical or physical, whether of occult qualities or mechanical, have no place in experimental philosophy”.77 As a matter of fact, in the first part of his Opticks he clearly shows his peculiar attitude to hypotheses. “My Design in this Book is not to explain the Properties of Light by Hypotheses, but to propose and probe them by Reasons and Experiments”,78 says Newton. We submit that the main reason he exhibits such a cautious approach to hypotheses is because of his historical finding on the “abuse” of hypotheses, so to speak. This so-called “abuse” of hypotheses is diametrically opposed to his intense belief in the dominant role of God. Newton’s conception of the historical development of hypotheses can be ascertained from a draft of his works which in the polished form, is presented as Query 28 in his Opticks. Thus: Later Philosophers banish the Consideration of such a Cause out of natural Philosophy, feigning Hypotheses for explaining all things mechanically, and referring other Causes to Metaphysics: Whereas the main Business of natural Philosophy is to argue from Phenomena without feigning Hypotheses, and to deduce Causes from Effects, till we come to the very first Cause’.79

And in the draft for the above passage, Newton unequivocally qualifies what he means by “a Cause” and what the usage of hypotheses has done to it: Later Philosophers banish the consideration of the supreme cause out of natural Philosophy framing Hypotheses for explaining all things without it & referring it to Metaphysicks (that is to abstract reasoning without the help of Phaenomena or reasoning in the dark): Whereas the main business of natural Philosophy is to argue from effects to causes ‘till we come to ye very first cause’.80

Here we have a natural philosopher who believes that it’s not possible to do natural philosophy without God, who spent more time in studying the scriptures than in writing the Principia,81 who was an active participant in ensuring the success of Boyle’s lecture,82 who was prepared not to take orders from the Catholic church83 and who wrote passionately about Him, and yet, the usage of hypotheses will do nothing save banishing Him from natural philosophy. Certainly he would take proper measures to avoid this intellectual idolatory from happening. Thus his unique attitude to hypotheses.84 So far we have sketched some aspects of Newton’s methodology of solving mathematical problems. It consists basically of experiments and observation, hypotheses, induction and deduction85 of phenomena. In solving problems, Newton always mentions observations and experiments together. That relationship does not always hold with induction or deduction.

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In addition to the above passage quoted, the affinity between observations and experiments is also stated in the following passage: Natural philosophy consists in discovering the frame and operations of nature, and reducing them, as far as may be, to general rules or laws; establishing these rules by observations and experiments . . .86

and likewise in Cote’s preface to the second edition of the Principia: Without all doubt this world . . . could arise from nothing but the perfectly free will of God . . . From this fountain . . . the laws of nature have flowed, in which there appear many traces indeed of the most wise contrivance, but not the least shadow of necessity. These therefore we must not seek from uncertain conjectures, but learn them from observations and experiments.87

Since the crucial link between the mathematician and his experiment in Newton’s philosophy of mathematics is observation, we will examine Newton’s position on observation. In particular, we want to know whether he believes that observation is objective or subjective, in order for us to have a clearer insight into his conception of mathematical problems. Observations involve vision and Newton makes several statements pertinent to this issue in his Opticks. He believes that “seeing”, is a complicated process. According to him: . . . . When a man views any object . . . the light which comes from the several points of the object is refracted by the transparent skins and humors of the eye (that is, by the outward coat . . . called the tunica cornea, and by the crystalline humor . . . which is beyond the pupil . . .) as to converge and meet again in so many points in the bottom of the eye, and there to paint the picture of the object upon the skin (called the tunica retina) with which the bottom of the eye is covered . . . and these pictures, propagated by motion along the fibers of the optic nerves in the brain, are the cause of vision. For accordingly, as these pictures are perfect or imperfect, the object is seen perfectly or imperfectly . . .88

The interesting thing is that Newton believes what is seen is what is. In other words, the observation of the mathematician is objective. Says Newton: If when we look but with one eye is be asked why objects appear thus and thus situated one to another, the answer would be because they are really so situated among themselves and make their colored pictures in the retina so situated one to another as they are.89

Although the brain plays an integral part in the process, but it is not the brain that sees; rather it is the soul. Thus: In like manner when we look with two eyes distorted so as to see the same object double, if it be asked why whose objects appear in this or that situation and distance one from another, the answer should be because through the two eyes are transmitted into the sensorium two motional pictures by whose situation and distance then from one another the soul judges she sees two things so situate and distant.90

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Newton’s acknowledgment of the significance of the soul with regard to observation (in the process of problem solving) points to the importance of the spiritual aspect in his conception of mathematical problems. Thus any analysis on his mathematical enterprise should not only deal with the material world. In more specific terms, to analyse his concept of understanding mathematical problems merely on the basis of the function of the brain and consequently neglecting the function of the soul is certainly not conforming to his mathematical credo. There is more to observation than meets the eye; what is copied by way of observation to the memory is more than a picture of the event, but the meaning of it, which make creativity possible. Paraphrasing Tymieniecka, “It is the soul that gathers all the life-processing functions and through them articulates the constructive progress of life”.91 Since the soul can attain objectivity in the process of observation, the knowledge thus acquired can be actual knowledge about the properties of things. But the problem to Newton is that we do not know when we arrive at true knowledge because there is always the possibility of not being able to prove it with an experiment yet.92 Interestingly this aspect points also to his inclination of the mechanical view of the world in evaluating truths. Although experiments are indeed crucial in his methodology, Newton believes that conclusions drawn from them are not infallible. In writing the Principia, Newton’s awareness of the limitation of his methodology leads him to say that “I hope the principles here laid down will afford some light either to this or some truer method of philosophy”.93 As a matter of fact, Newton shows the manner wherein his discoveries can be shown to be incorrect: . . . showing the insufficiency of experiments to determine these queries, or prove any other parts of my theory, by assigning the flaws and defects in my conclusions drawn from them; or of producing other experiments which directly contradict me, if any such may seem to occur. For it the experiments which I urge be defective, it cannot be difficult to show the defects.94

In addition to the above passage, Newton also states that “if at any time afterward (after the discovery) any exception shall occur from experiments, it may begin to be pronounced with such exceptions as occur”.95 Therefore Newton concedes that there is always the possibility that knowledge derived from his methodology can turn out to be inaccurate or incorrect. Although the possibility is so remote as to seem practically impossible at the time of discovery, there is still the possibility nevertheless. Cognizant of the uncertainty of mathematical knowledge at the level of experimentation, he adopts a cautious attitude with regard to using the Scripture in mathematical research, paving the way for a secularized view. Newton declares:

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That religion and Philosophy are to be preserved distinct. We are not to introduce divine revelations into Philosophy nor philosophical opinions (not truth derived from philosophy!) into religion.96

Furthermore, Newton employs the modus tollen form of arguments in his approach of problem solving. His discussion on infinities leads him to say: The falseness of the conclusion shows an error in the premises, and the error lies in the position that all infinities are equal . . .97

Supposing that Newton is using a divine revelation as a premise for a mathematical problem which he is tackling and his conclusion is somehow shown to be false, accordingly the premise, which is the divine revelation, is false too! There is, however, a caveat. Although Newton unequivocally states that divine revelation should not be incorporated into mathematical works, it does not imply that mathematics should be totally void of the Transcendent. His works that we have examined thus far certainly include some discussions about God. What Newton is against is not some discourses on God’s Names and Attributes in the practice of mathematics; it is the application of verses from the Scriptures given by mathematicians to support their answers to mathematical problems.98 Newton believes that Moses possessed the answers to some of the mathematical problems and the Scripture provides “notional explanations” about these problems. Newton’s position on the synthesis between scriptural explanation and mathematical problems leads him to adopt the opinion that “the Bible is written in the language of everyman” and thus found justifications in the Scriptural explanation concerning the creation of the world (not to mention other problems), that the world is created in six days, without the scripture giving in depth elaboration concerning the nature of the six days. In Newton’s opinion: To describe them distinctly as they were in themselves would have made narration tedious and confused, amused the vulgar, and become a philosopher more than a prophet. He [Moses] mentions them, therefore, only so far as the vulgar had a notion of them, that is, as they were phenomena in the firmament, and describes their making only so far and at such a time as they were made such phenomena.99

Newton draws a distinction between the audience of the mathematician and that of the prophet. The reason that Moses did not relate the answer more rigorously as derived from the quotation above, is because Moses was a prophet rather than a mathematician. Therefore Moses had “to adapt a description of the creation as handsomely as he could to the sense and the capacity of the vulgar”.100 A prophet faces a larger and more heterogeneous social group and intellectual community than a mathematician.

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Thus when he [Moses] speaks of two great lights, I suppose he means their apparent, not real, greatness. So when he tells us God placed these lights in the firmament, he speaks I suppose of their apparent, not real, place, his business being, not to correct the vulgar notions in matters philosophical . . . If it be said that the expression of making and setting two great lights in the firmament is more poetical then natural, so also are some other expressions of Moses, as when he tells the windows or floodgates of heavens were opened (Gen. Vii.,) and afterward stopped again (Gen. Viii,) and yet the things signified by such figurative expressions are not ideal or moral, but true. For Moses, accommodating his words to the gross conceptions of the vulgar, describes things much after the manner as one of the vulgar would have been inclined to do had he lived and seen the whole series of what Moses describes.101

CONCLUSION

According to Newton, the study of nature, religion and mathematics are interconnected. All of them are grounded upon the belief in the existence of God. There is also a notable distinction between the natural and the supernatural in Newton’s philosophy of mathematics. Natural causes such as gravity has natural power which is independent from the supernatural. Religion and mathematics, however, have some similarities. What mainly differentiates religion and mathematics, or a prophet and a mathematician, if we must make the distinction, is partly the manner in explaining problems as explicated in the foregoing discussions. In Newton’s mathematical enterprise, he believes that harmony is found not only in nature but also in the relation between nature, religion and mathematics. In as much as he tries to harmonize between all of them, one can feel the tension in Newton’s position. It is not surprising that in his assiduous effort to integrate them in his philosophy of mathematics, he ends up with a suggestion of differentiating between religion and natural philosophy. National University of Malaysia, Malaysia NOTES 1 See D. Gjertsen. The Classics of Science (New York, 1984), p. 211. I.B. Cohen discusses the history of the Principia in all of its editions in his Introduction to Newton’s “Principia”. 2 See Dictionary of Scientific Biography, p. 56. The first edition of Opticks included sixteen queries and two mathematical treatises. The second edition which was printed in 1706 in Latin excluded the mathematical treatises and added seven new queries. The third and the fourth editions, published in 1717 and 1730 respectively, were in English and included all of the thirty one queries. 3 Some of his works on religion are reproduced in F.E. Manuel. The Religion of Isaac Newton (Oxford, 1974), hereafter cited as Religion; H. Mc Lachlan. Sir Isaac Newton Theological Manuscripts op. cit., and D. Castillejo. The Expanding Force in Newton’s Cosmos (Madrid, 1981), hereafter cited as Expanding Force . . .

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In so far as Newton is concerned, by the word “Scriptures” I mean the Torah and the Bible. See Principia, Motte-Cajori, pp. 543–544. Any quotation underline in this paper is by the author unless other wise stated. 6 Ibid., p. 544. 7 See Newton’s first letter to Bentley in Isaac Newton, Opera quae exstant Omnia. Commentariis illustrabut Samuel Horsley, 5 vols. (London, 1779–1985), IV, pp. 429–430. Hereafter referred to as Opera Omnia. See also Ra. Bentley, Sermons Preached at Boyle’s Lecture: Remarks upon A Discourse of Free Thinking; Proposals for an Edition of the Greek Testament; etc., edited with notes by Alexander Dyce (London, 1838). Hereafter cited as Sermons. See p. 204. 8 See Newton’s first letter to Bentley in Opera Omnia, IV, pp. 429–432. cf., Sermons, p. 206. 9 See Newton’s first letter to Bentley in Opera Omnia IV, pp. 429–431. See also Sermons, p. 207. 10 See his unpublished work, “A Short Scheme of the True Religion”, in Theological Manuscripts, pp. 48–49. Also reproduced in Brewster, Memoirs, Vol. II, pp. 347–348. 11 See Newton’s second letter to Bentley. In similar vein he writes: “The hypotheses of matters being at first evenly spread through the heavens is, in my opinion, inconsistent with the hypothesis of innate gravity, without supernatural power to reconcile them,; and therefore it infers a Deity”. See his fourth letter in Sermons, p. 215. 12 See Newton’s second letter to Bentley. In his fourth reply to the latter, he says: “The diurnal rotations of the planets could not be derived from gravity, but required a divine arm to impress them”. See his Opera Omnia, IV, pp. 432–442; Sermons, p. 215. 13 See his letter to Thomas Burnet reproduced in Brewster, Memoirs, Vol. II, pp. 99–100, 447–454. 14 See ibid., p. 448. 15 See Newton’s statement reproduced in D. Castillejo, Expanding Force, op. cit., p. 59. 16 See Newton, “A short Scheme pf the True Religion,” reproduced in Brewster, Memoirs . . ., Vol. II, pp. 347–348. 17 See Principia, Motte-Cajori, p. 398. 18 See his “Rule I” in ibid., p. 398. 19 See his first letter to Richard Bentley in Sermons, p. 204. 20 Ibid. 21 It is important to distinguish between stories from the scripture and stories of our own in analysing Newton’s concept of simplicity because it is very clear that Newton employed the former in his scientific explanation as we have demonstrated earlier. Therefore what he was referring to when he used the phrase “dreams and vain fictions” in my opinion, was man made and not “revealed” (from his perspective, that is) extra-sensible explanation. 22 See Yahuda MS. 1.1 Manuel, Religion, op. cit. (Appendix A), p. 120. 23 See Yahuda MS. 9.2, fol. 140r. cf. Manuel, Religion . . ., p. 102. 24 See Conduitt letter reproduced in Castillejo, Expanding Force, p. 96. 25 See the manuscript reproduced in Brewster, Memoirs, Vol. II, p. 354. 26 See Yahuda MS. 15, p. 137. cf., Castillejo, Expanding Force, p. 66. 27 Ibid. 28 In the time of Newton, there was the zeal to proselytize the heathens by the “Christian Virtuoso”. For an example, Robert Boyle who was a close friend of Newton left this will upon his death: “To settle an annual salary for some divine or preaching minister who shall be enjoined to perform the offices following: 1. To preach eight Sermons in a year, for proving the Christian religion against notorious infidels, viz., Atheists, Deists, Pagans, Jews, and Mahometans”. See Sermons, pp. xv–xvi. 5

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See Yahuda, MS 15, p. 137. cf. Castillejo, Expanding Force, p. 67. See Theological Manuscripts, p. 50. 31 See ibid., p. 54. 32 See Principia, Motte Cajori, pp. 545–556 and Principia, Koyré & Cohen, pp. 762–763. 33 See Theological Manuscripts, p. 13. 34 See ibid., p. 14. 35 See his “A short Scheme of the True Religion” in Theological Manuscripts, pp. 49–51. According to one biographer, Newton’s letter “exposing as false the Trinitarian proof-texts in John and Timothy had been transmitted through Locke to Le Clerc for anonymous publication in Holland, but then had been withdrawn in panic”. See Manuel, Religion, p. 12. See also G.S. Brett, “Newton’s Place in the History of Religion, p. 12. See also G.S. Brett, “Newton’s Place in the History of Religios Thought”, in Sir Isaac Newton: A Bicentennary Evaluation of His Work (Baltimore, 1928), pp. 260–268 and Newton’s “Paradoxical Questions Concerning the Morals and Actions of Athanius and his Followers,” in Theological Manuscripts, pp. 61–118. 36 See Manuel, Religion, p. 3. 37 I have in mind the tenets advocated by the Council of Nice whereby the Trinity was made the foundation of Christianity. 38 William Whiston’s career was a case in point. Although appointed by Newton as his successor to the Lucasian chair, Whiston was expelled from the post in 1711, a consequence of the Toleration Act of 1688, because his Arian belief was made public. See The History of Science Society, Sir Isaac Newton: A Bicentenary Evalution of His Works, op. cit., pp. 260–261. 39 See Principia, Motte-Cajori, pp. 544–546. See also his “A Short Scheme of the True Religion”, in Brewster, Memoirs . . ., Vol. II, pp. 347–348. 40 See Principia, Motte Cajori, p. 544. 41 Ibid. 42 Ibid., p. 545. 43 Ibid. 44 Ibid. 45 Ibid., pp. 545–546. 46 See ibid., p. 546. 47 Ibid. 48 Ibid. 49 Ibid., p. 545. 50 See ibid., p. 398. cf. Opticks, p. 369. 51 Opticks, p. 376, 397. 52 Ibid., p. 397. 53 See Newton’s “An Hypothesis Explaining the Properties of Light Discoursed of in My Several Papers”, in a letter to Oldenberg, January 25, 1675/6. Communicated to the Royal Society, 9th December 1675. Quoted in Brewster, Memoirs . . ., Vol. I, p. 392. 54 See Corollary V to Proposition VI in Principia, Motte-Cajori, Bk. III. 55 Say Galileo, “The Holy Ghost teaches how to go to heaven, not how the heavens go. “See his ‘Letter to the Grand Duchess Christina’ in Stillman Drake, Discoveries and Opinions (New York, 1957), p. 186. 56 We have in mind problems treated in the Principia, Opticks and in his practice of alchemy. For a sample of Newton’s work on alchemy, see Castillejo, Expanding Force, pp. 17–29. 57 See Yahuda MS. 1.1. See also Appendix A in Manuel, Religion . . ., p. 120. 58 Principia, Motte-Cajri, p. 547; Principia, Koyré-Cohen, p. 764. The nature of Newton’s hypothesis are the subject of several studies. See for examples Alexander Koyré articles; 30

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“Concept and Experience in Newton’s Scientific Thought” whereby he argues that what is meant by “Hypothesis non-fingo” is “I feign no hypothesis” and his other article, “Newton’s ‘Regulae Philosophandi”’. Both articles appear in Newtonian Studies (Cambridge, Mass., 1965) pp. 25–52 and pp. 261–272 respectively. See also I.B. Cohen’s “Preface” in Isaac Newton, Opticks, op. cit., pp. ix–lviii; “Hypothesis in Newton’s Philosophy,” Physis, 8(1966), pp. 163–184. 59 See for example, Newton’s first letter to Bentley dated 10th December 1692 in Isaac Newton Papers & Letters on Natural Philosophy, edited by I.B. Cohen, op. cit., pp. 286–287. Cf. Sermons, pp. 203–207. 60 See Principia, Motte-Cajori, pp. 401–406. 61 See Newton’s Rules IV in Principia, Koyré-Cohen, p. 555 and Principia, Motte Cajori, p. 400. 62 This statement is translated by Alexandre Koyré in his “Newton’s ‘Regulae Philosophandi”’, Newtonian Studies, p. 269. The Latin text is given on the same page. 63 There are six phenomena stated in Newton’s Book III: The System of the World. For the purpose of illustration, three of them are as follows: Phenomenon I. That the circumjovial planets, by radii drawn to Jupiter’s centre, describe areas proportional to the times of descriptions; and that their periodic times, the fixed stars being at rest, are as the 3/2th power of their distances from its centre. Phenomenon III. That the five primary planers, Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter, and Saturn, with their several orbits, encompass the sun. Phenomenon IV. That the moon, by a radius drawn to the earth’s centre, describes an area proportional to the time of description. See Principia, Motte-Cajori, pp. 401–405. 64 See Newton’s letter to Oldenberg, July 1672 in Opera Omnia IV, pp. 320–321. 65 See his letter to Thomas Burnet, quoted by Brewster in his Memoirs . . ., Vol. II, pp. 450, 453. 66 See his letter to Thomas Burnet, quoted by Brewster in his Memoirs . . ., Vol. II, pp. 450, 453. 67 See Principia, Motte-Cajori, p. 400. 68 Ibid., p. 547. 69 See Opticks, pp. 404–405. 70 See R. Palter. “Newton and the Inductive Method,” Texas Quarterly, Vol. 10 (1967) pp. 161–73. 71 See Principia, Motte-Cajori, p. 547. 72 See Opticks, Query 28 (which is Query 20 in the Latin edition of 1706.) 73 See Opera Omnia, Vol. IV, pp. 320–321. 74 See Newton’s letter to Roger Cotes, 28th March 1713 in Correspondence, Vol. V. p. 397. 75 See Principia, Motte-Cajori, p. 419, Koyré-Cohen, p. 586. 76 See Papers and Letters. Cf. Correspondence, Vol. I, p. 164. 77 See Principia, Motte-Cajori, p. 547. 78 See Opticks, Part I. 79 Ibid., p. 369. 80 University Library, Cambridge; MS Add. 3970. 81 D. Gjertsen. The Classics of Science (New York, 1984), wherein the author argues that Newton was more interested in religion and history than in science. See pp. 191–192. 82 For example, Newton gave as much help as possible to Bentley who was chosen as the first lecturer. 83 See Manuel, A Portrait . . ., pp. 100–103, about Newton’s refusal to be ordained. See also Theological Manuscripts, p. 13 about Archbishop Tenison’s offer that Newton rejected. 84 That Laplace relegates the active role of God to that of a hypotheses (which he does not need: “Je n’avais pas besoin de cette hypothe’se-la“) is an example of the “abuse” of hypotheses from Newton’s point of view.

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85 They are not necessarily in this order because it has been shown that he did use hypotheses not conforming to the spirit of “Hypotheses non-fingo.“ 86 See Newton’s “Scheme for Establishing the Royal Society,” quoted in Brewster, Memoirs . . ., vol. I. p. 102. 87 See Principia, Motte-Cajori, p. xxxii. 88 See Opticks, p. 12. 89 See his letter to William Briggs, quoted in Edleston, Correspondence of Sir Isaac Newton and Professor Cotes (London, 1850), p. 269. 90 Ibid. 91 See Anna-Teresa Tymieniecka “Life’s Primogenital Timing, Time Projected by the Dynamic Articulation of the Onto-genesis of Life, A Fragment” in Tymieniecka, A.T. (ed.) Phenomenological Inquiry: The Tree of Life-Aesthetic Expression of the Moral Sentiment, vol. XXIX, Oct. 2005, pp. 5–14. 92 Instruments are indispensable in devising experiments. That Newton knew experiments are dependent upon the availability of instruments is clear from his effort in inventing the refracting telescope. About this “philosophical discovery”, to use his phrase, he writes: “Thus Sir, I have given you a short account of this small instrument, which though in itself contemptible, may yet be looked upon as an epitome of what may be done according to this way”, See Newton’s letter reproduced in L.T. More, Isaac Newton: A Biography. op. cit., p. 68. 93 Ibid., p. xviii. 94 See his letter to Oldenburg, July 1672. Opera Omnia V, pp. 320–321. 95 See Opticks, p. 404. 96 See Theological Manuscripts, p. 58. Therefore Newton’s statement should not be interpreted either as a consequence of a “positivist” position. Rather, it is because of his intense passion for safeguarding his scriptural belief. 97 See his second letter to Bentley in Sermons, p. 209. 98 It has been suggested that there are two basic reactions concerning the relationship between mathematics and religion. The first is to keep them apart and the second is to conjoin them, yielding an organic synthesis whereby religion and mathematics are amalgamated into a single worldview. See Manuel, Religion . . ., pp. 27–28. In my opinion (contra Manuel), Newton never belongs to the first. His natural philosophy is always bounded by his “scriptural religion”. His natural philosophy is a consequence of his religious belief and not an opposition to it. 99 See Newton’s letter to Thomas Burnet, quoted in Brewster, Memoirs, Vol. II, pp. 452–453. 100 See Brewster, Memoirs . . ., p. 450. Newton gives another example of an explanation for the common people. Says Newton: “And if at any time I speak of light and rays as colored or endued with colors, I would be understood to speak, not philosophically and properly, but grossly and according to such conceptions as vulgar people in seeing all these experiments would be apt to frame”. See Opticks, pp. 108–109. 101 See his letter to Thomas Burnet, quoted by Brewster in his Memoirs . . ., Vol. II, pp. 450, 453.

BIBLIOGRAPHY Brewster, David. Memoirs of the Life, Writings, and Discoveries of Sir Isaac Newton, 2 vols. Edinburgh: Thomas Constable & Co., 1855. Cohen, I. Bernard. Introduction to Newton’s “Principia”. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1971. Cotes, Roger. “Preface to the Second Edition”, in Isaac Newton, Principia, Motte-Cajori, p. xx, First published in 1713.

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Manuel, Frank. E. A Portrait of Isaac Newton. Cambridge: Belknap Press, 1968. Newton, Isaac. “On the Day of Judgement and World to come”, in Frank E. Manuel’s The Religion of Isaac Newton, Oxford, 1974. Newton, Isaac. The Correspondence of Isaac Newton, ed. H.W. Turnbull, J.F. Scott, A.R. Hall and Laura Tilling (eds.), 5 vols., Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1959–1975. Newton, Isaac. “Four letters from Sir Isaac Newton to Doctor Bentley: containing some arguments in proof of a deity”, in The Works of Richard Bentley, Rev. Alexander Dyce (ed.), London, 1838. Newton, Isaac. Sir Isaac Newton’s Mathematical Principles of Natural Philosophy and His System of the World. Translated into English by Andrew Motte in 1729. The translations revised, and supplied with an historical appendix, by Florian Cajori, Berkeley, University of California Press, 1934. Newton, Isaac. Sir Isaac Newton Theological Manuscripts. Selected and Edited with Introduction by H. McLachlan. Liverpool: Liverpool university Press, 1950. Newton, Isaac. Opticks, or a Treatise of the Reflections, Inflections & Colours of Light. Albert Einstein (Foreword), Sir Edmund Whittaker (Introduction), I. Bernard Cohen (Preface), Duane H.D. Roller (Analytical Table). New York: Dover Publications, 1952. Newton, Isaac. Unpublished Scientific Papers of Isaac Newton, ed. A.R. Hall & M.B. Hall (eds.), Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1962. Newton, Isaac. Correspondence of Isaac Newton and Professor Cotes with an appendix containing other unpublished letters and papers by Newton, L.L. Laudan and J. Edleston (eds.), London: Frank Cass Co. Ltd., 1969. Newton, Isaac. Isaac Newton’s Papers & Letters on Natural Philosophy and Related Documents, I. Bernard Cohen and Robert E. Schofield (eds.), Mass: Harvard University Press, 1958. Newton, Isaac. Newton’s Philosophy of Nature: Selection from His Writings, H.S. Thayer (ed.), John Herman Randall (intr.). New York, 1951. Newton, Isaac. Isaac Newton Opera quae Exstant Omnia, Samuel Horsley (ed.), 5 vols. London, 1979–85.

S E C T I O N IV M E M O RY I N T H E C O M M U N A L C I P H E R I N G O F L I F E

I LV I T S K AYA S V E T L A N A VA L E R Y E V N A

O RT H O D O X M O N A S T E R I A L C O M P L E X I N C O N T E M P O R A RY S O C I O C U LT U R A L E N V I RO N M E N T

ABSTRACT

Actuality of studying the monasterial culture has been predetermined by the revival of Orthodox culture and spiritual consciousness of compatriots on the background of essentially complete loss of experience in monasterial development in Russia in 20th century. The revival of spirituality in our society and impetuous booming of hieratic construction are justified by insufficient knowledge on monasterial ensembles and temples, which simultaneously are the guardians of spiritual and creative memory in artistic and cultural heritage of the country in a uniform Ontopoesis of Life, as well as the places of pilgrimage and informative tourism. The methods of interdisciplinary exploration of orthodox monasteries in contemporary cultural situation are connected with deep and extensive working out of a considerable volume of factual material, part of which for the first time in history is being introduced to scientific turnover. Over a period of 1000-year history of Orthodoxy, the monasteries performed a mission of social self-actualization and development, keeping a dialogue between the past and the future. They have been centers and disseminators of cultural values, moral and ethical norms of people, faith and education, which exerted influence on the level of intellectual and artistic life of the society; they have been the custodians of unique architectural-artistic monuments. At present, the monasterial complexes are regaining their strength as carriers and disseminators of orthodox religion, as well as sociocultural and educational centers. Their major religious role in mentoring spirituality and morality of contemporary society is supplemented by secular functions: cultural-educational (tourism and museums), social-philanthropic and economic activities. The issues of studying monasteries in the Balkans (Bulgaria, Greece, Serbia and Rumania), the activities of which were never interrupted in 20th century, and which successfully adapted to modern environment (for instance, broadening of pilgrimage and development of tourism), as well as the issue of defining the practicability of their positive experience for restoration of monasteries in Russia – are of great significance for our country. 301 A-T. Tymieniecka (ed.), Analecta Husserliana CII, 301–306. c Springer Science+Business Media B.V. 2009 

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It is necessary to highlight the positive side of interdisciplinary studying of orthodox monasterial complexes: application of historical-architectural, culturological and other methods of developing modern approaches to organizing tours on monasterial ensembles taking into consideration their adaptation and expansion of monasterial functions, as well as inclusion of monasteries into new traveling routes. As a result of exploring the contemporary cultural situation in Bulgaria, Greece, Serbia, Rumania and Russia, the researchers have identified tree major trends in development of monasterial architectonics, which were laid in the foundation of creative concept of architectural activities in the field of reconstruction and monasterial development: 1. Emergence and development of secular directions: in monasterial activities and their adaptation to modern environment based on a new functionaltypological foundation and architectural-spatial structure (creation of architectural spaces related to the functions of tourism and museums), taking into consideration modern architectural-constructional requirements (new technologies in construction and development along with innovative materials); 2. Restoration of ensemble structure of functioning monasterial complexes, based on safeguarding of architectural heritage: creation of an expressive aesthetic-phenomenological image of a monastery taking into consideration new stylistic impacts and its harmonious amalgamation with terrestrial environment; 3. When constructing a new monastery: creation of an open system of its activities with high level of accessibility and comfort, including unrestricted space for low-mobile groups of population, as well as organization of social and engineering infrastructure of services, taking into consideration local occupational levels and development of profitable economy, crafts and workmanships. Integrated and comprehensive approach to studying issues related to monasterial ensembles is presently based on the concept of a monastery as a uniform sociocultural, territorial-landscape and architectural-compositional complex, spiritual core of which is identified by religious, moral-ethical and philosophic-aesthetic priorities in the whole ontopoetic continuum of Life. As we analyze the major trends for development of monasterial construction, the present way of running orthodox monasteries in the Balkans and Russia presumes certain adaptation and transformation of general monasterial architecture to the requirements of modern life. Positive experience of monasterial construction in the Balkans, which never experienced any sustained interruption in functioning of monasteries (both in their main sacred and other activities), the process of Russian monasteries’

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revival should be started from rehabilitation of primary monasterial mission, from functional zoning of their territory, from appropriating the “silent” zone for secluded monastic life alongside with separate functional secular spaces or courtyards for monastery pilgrims and other guests. The first tendency shows that major, original functions of monasteries were currently amended by new ones and expanded by traditional types of activities, which facilitate the creation of diversified typological composition of structures and buildings and enhance expressiveness of architectural image of a monasterial ensemble. Special momentum was applied to the development of secular functions – museum, publishing, traveling and commercial activities. The spiritual pilgrimage as most venerable form of visiting monasteries is also developing. Today, the issues of welcoming and supporting the pilgrims and tourists, which have traditionally been monasterial missions, are not solved yet. There is an explicit example of aligning traditional and contemporary functions at Solovetskiy and Preobrazhenskiy Valaamskiy monasteries. Both monasteries have already designated museum zones, furbished hotels, established infrastructure and organized waterway access to priories. Local population is engaged in servicing monasteries and their guests. The rebirth of sociocultural role of monasteries in modern society as spiritual-ethical and economic centers with high rates of productivity allows solving the employment problems for local population, which facilitates the recovery of Russian province. Thus, the experience of Russian monasteries shows that already in XVIII century St. Cyril-Belozerskiy monastery established profitable enterprise with mechanized farming, icon painting, fishing fleet and smokehouses; the monks built water pipe-lines and a railway connection to the harbor. Today we hear news about the resurrected farming and villages on the lands of Savvino-Storozhevskiy, Pskovo-Pecherskiy and Moscow Sretenskiy monasteries, which promotes wellbeing and engrains healthy lifestyle among rural population. In modern environment reactivation of production function in a monastery gains a new implication: organization of construction teams, monastery based “small ventures” specializing on servicing tourists etc. Artistic and trade activities of the monastery is being reactivated on the floors of icon painting studios and ornamental arts workshops. Restoration of monasterial farming is being deployed on no-men lands of former soviet collective farms and abandoned villages. There are new approaches to organization of sociocultural functions of monastery – holding of religious holidays, opening of ornamental art studios, Sabbath schools, amateur choirs and publishing houses. Sponsors resumed charitable, therapeutic and commercial activities of abodes.

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Modern experience of Balkan monasteries, which undergone functional adaptations and transformation of buildings, may allow us forecasting the architectural development of national monasteries trough more compact exploration of spaces (integration of various functional zones in one courtyard, increasing of housing density, re-orientation of old buildings functionality etc.) and through expanding their sociocultural functions. However, when selecting modern functions of a monastery, the templar zone must not be exposed to functional re-orientation, but for ceremonial fraters, which may be used as concert halls, exhibition spaces or a historic museums. The buildings and structures of commercial and dwelling zones might be suitable for some new functions, excluding churches (such as Church Over-the-gates, fraters, hospital churches or priories). It should be noted that land planning is an important factor that forms architectural-spatial environment of any monastery. The author has explored on rational functional zoning of orthodox monastery and buildings’ typology, and determined interrelationship between zoning and yard structure of monastery complex. Based on the analysis and generalization of experience in orthodox monasteries construction, we identified that the creation of scenic panorama, spatially saturated silhouette and polycentric image of monasteries (emergence of several planning and silhouette centers of the complex in a process of its expansion) demonstrate a positive tendency in the development of architecture and are considered topical in contemporary Russian environment. At the same time it is important to ensure consistent pattern of monastery zoning and its three-dimensional organization, which are based on the principles of concentricity, compositional hierarchy and scale comparability of main and background developments. Expansion of monastery’s hieratic and socio-cultural functions leads to a phenomenon of adaptation and transformation of architectural objects, which in its turn, predetermines the necessity of their designing and development on the foundation of forecasts for evolution of functional and typological processes (infrastructure, new types and modern stylistics). Therefore, when adapting a monastery to ever-changing modern conditions, one needs to consider the following: zoning, broadening of space in front of the monastery entrance and overall growth of the complex area through reserving territory; partial modernization of monastery image and architecture of its buildings; application of new materials and technologies; establishment of infrastructure, engineering utilities, sanitary and hygienic facilities both in dwelling and public places as well as general land improvement. The second tendency relates to the monasteries’ regaining their spiritualethical and sociocultural context in view of the growth of their significance for

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the society in general and the necessity of solving the problem of preserving architectural monuments and urban planning in monasteries in particular. At present the Orthodox Church reestablished its possession of great number of monasteries for the purpose of resuming their spiritual activities. However, most of the monasteries experience shortages in funds both in the process of restoration and in adaptation of monasterial buildings to modern requirements, organization of public services and amenities and in the entire existence of monasteries. In addition to that, the spiritual and sociocultural significance of monasteries in modern society as well as interaction of monastic life with carnal world, which changed considerably for the last 70–80 years, require new solutions. From the standpoint of secular community the role of monasteries is in safeguarding of spiritual traditions, restoration of architectural monuments and, in many instances, in organization of living of local population, which remains in critical situation. Currently there are quite a few unresolved problems: – Restoration of monasteries is hindered by the presence of dwellings, warehouses, garages and farms on the territory of modern complexes; – Strained relations between monasteries and museums, which have arisen after the monasteries regained their possession over land plots and buildings occupied by cultural and public facilities (there is a number of conflicting situations related to withdrawal of museums from St. Cyril-Belozerskiy Monastery, or closing of travel centers in Suzdal Monastery etc.); – Feasibility of new construction and development on the territory of monasteries, which have the status of protected architectural monuments; – Applicable legislation and protection of historical-cultural heritage. The existing laws were adopted in circumstances, when monasteries were not used for their intended purpose; most of them were given the status of protected state property only after their complete ruining. Most of the architectural ensembles of monasteries suffered irreparable damage. Contemporary cultural situation requires changes both in protective legislation and public consciousness; it challenges professionalism of design engineers and wisdom of church officers in understanding the inevitable development of conventional spaces and the desired skills in construction of high quality buildings in such historical environment. At the same time, the monasterial life must go on and exercise a salutary spiritual and ethical influence over secular community; it shall ensure protection and development of architectural and landscape environment in parallel. With this aim in view we need a consistent regulatory control from the part of professionals and state authorities supervising protection and use of historical-architectural monuments of monasteries.

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The third modern tendency in the development of monasterial architecture relates to increasing the comfort of staying in a monastery. Ensuring higher level of comfort for people and accessibility of monasteries is imposed by introduction of renewed sociocultural functions of monasteries and upgrading of their contemporary social and engineering infrastructure. In this context the territory of monasterial yard should foresee a placid “silent” zone for abidance of monk fraternity, with restricted access for the guests of the monastery. At present the monasteries undergo the process of modernization of utilities, improvement of their territory and sanitary-hygienic conditions both in dwelling and public places. In Russia some monasteries such as Holy Trinity-St. Sergius Laura, Solovetskiy and Valaam Monasteries are again included in popular traveling routes. This is a determinant factor for monasterial construction in modern environment, which increases the interest in perceiving orthodox monasterial culture for advanced pilgrimage and cognitive tourism that proved to be a steady source of profits. The creation of new religious-public complexes on the basis of functioning monasteries is topical for Russia. That is why the concept of revival of monasteries as spiritual centers with traditional and new sociocultural functions is based on the principle of open-ended system of their evolvement. This allows perfecting the monasterial architecture through reconstruction of existing and construction of new orthodox complexes in compliance with up-to-date requirements, as well as design engineering and construction of new types of buildings (administrative offices, museums, schools, hotels, motels, camping facilities, cafes, production floors, garages etc.), which ensure monastery functioning in synergy. The issues of preserving the memory of places in monasteries, improving accessibility to and comfort in Russian monasteries still remain at the stage of becoming and represent the sphere of theoretical, methodical and practical solutions for modern architects, the clergy, art historians, philosophers and other professionals. Doctor of Architecture, State University on Land Use Planning and Control, Moscow BIBLIOGRAPHY S.V. Ilvitskaya “Orthodox Holy Mansions in the Balkans and Russia” – Architectural News. Russian Association of Architects. No. 1, 2004, pp. 49–54. S.V. Ilvitskaya “Architectural peculiarities of monasteries in the Balkans”, Monasteries – cultural and spiritual centers of Russia and Europe. History and Modernity. International collective monograph. M., 2003, pp. 155–162. S.V. Ilvitskaya “Architecture of monasteries in the Balkans and traditions of Byzantine architectonics”. Monograph. K., 2000, pp. 330.

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T H E A RT O F M E M O RY I N A P L U R A L I S T I C U N I V E R S E : W I L L I A M JA M E S ’ S “ R E P U B L I C A N BA N QU E T ”

ABSTRACT

The aim of this paper is to conduct an inquiry that would illuminate how a phenomenological account of memory may govern some basic issues of our lives: the meaning of our collectivity and spirituality, the cultural embodiment of our experiences and memories, and their collective status, the question of intimacy and unity in the universe of our experiences. I shall consider this account of memory by focusing on William James’s radically empiricist, pluralist, and pragmatic philosophy. In reading James, my aim is to propose a notion of collective memory as the cash-value of James’s spiritualism. This proposal will inevitably lead us to James’s confrontation with Hegelian Spirit, or Absolute, as an alternative hypothesis in understanding the intimacy, the unity, and the spirituality of the universe. I shall seek to derive some implications from their profound articulations in order to suggest a more pragmatic and releasing conception of collective memory as freeing us from the burden of the past by socially transforming it into prospects for action, and by aesthetically deploying it to symbolic expressions embodied in art and cultural works. The approach that I propose aims to relocate the philosophical concept of memory in a perspective that acknowledges life or becoming in terms of its excessive dynamism. What is the task which philosophers set themselves to perform; and why do they philosophize at all? Almost everyone will immediately reply: They desire to attain a conception of the frame of things which shall on the whole be more rational than that somewhat chaotic view which everyone by nature carries about with him under his hat.1

What is this philosophical desire to attain a conception of the frame of things? From where does it arise, or what is its source? A reference to William James’s words might be useful: “It is only when the distress is upon us that we said to strive, to crave or to aspire.”2 We also know this distress as the awe and wonder we feel in the face of existence, and as the initial impulse of thinking being qua being. Yet, what we learn from James is that this distress does not take place 307 A-T. Tymieniecka (ed.), Analecta Husserliana CII, 307–334. c Springer Science+Business Media B.V. 2009 

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in the face of a deeper reality residing over and beyond what is given, but in the face of our experience of the “dramatic richness,” plurality, and thickness of the concrete world. Our cravings and strivings arise out of the fact that we are experiencing, sentient beings, and that there are experiences which are in superabundant continuous flow. In this regard, the task of philosophy is to inquire into the possibility of making ourselves at home in the face of this superabundant continuous flow of experiences without falling into a reductive intellectualist unity. The goal of philosophy is then to seek out and to give an account of “the-unity-of-everything-there-is” in terms of a lived intimacy with a pluralistic, growing, dynamic, continuously becoming universe. Its prospect is not merely to render the universe in which we live more comprehensible, but also to transform it practically so as to yield more and more intimacy where possible by knowing that this possibility is always an experiential matter, and not something that can be realized only by logical means. For William James, the lived or experienced world is the ground out of which our philosophical wonder flourishes, and the term “intimacy” here provides the criterion demanding satisfaction and preference as “one’s best working attitude” in philosophy.3 Philosophies as the expressions of our differing and pluralistic visions of the world, or ways of life, arise out of our temperaments, that is, from our deliberately adopted reactions of our total character upon the course of reality as it is experienced or lived.4 In this regard, James, with his humanistic and pragmatic temperament, conceives the difference between living against a background of foreignness and of intimacy as a social difference, that is, as a habit of wariness and one of trust.5 His commitment to intimacy as our “best working attitude” leads us to envision the world after a social analogy in which we are not only interactive partners in and members of an incurably pluralistic, temporal universe of experiences by sharing “the same one deep concern in its destinies,” but also contributors in its destinies which have no pre-given, singular, pre-established destination.6 James indicates the line of philosophical inquiry with his intimacy criterion by focusing on the question of where to seek the possibility of holding together concrete experiences varying differentially across time and space. This question is a matter of thinking the relation between the one and the many, and for James, this issue can be resolved on experiential basis, that is, by taking his radically empiricist theses as forming the background of the matter questioned. James’s later philosophy can be conceived as an attempt to give an answer to this central question by refining his radically empiricist philosophy through a spiritualistic and pluralistic outlook satisfying his intimacy criterion without recourse to any monistic, idealistic, or rationalistic discourse.

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Given this brief outline, how can we consider the topic of memory? The aim of this paper is not to investigate the nature of memory and to find a simple answer to the complex question of what memory is, but rather to conduct an inquiry that could illuminate how a phenomenological and a metaphysical conception of memory may govern some basic issues of our lives: the meaning of our collectivity and spirituality, the status of the products or works of our being-together, the cultural embodiment of our experiences and memories, and their collective status, the question of intimacy and unity in the universe of our experiences. I consider the significance of the concept of memory by focusing on William James’s radically empiricist, pluralist, and pragmatic philosophy. In reading James, I focus on his intimacy criterion, his radically empiricist account of the relations and the continuity of experiences, and his spiritualistic approach to a pluralistic universe. By interpreting these themes under the light of the concept of memory, which is only implicit in James’s later works, my aim is to propose a notion of collective memory (collectivity of memory experiences) as the cash-value of James’s spiritualism. This proposal will inevitably lead to James’s confrontation with Hegelian Spirit, or Absolute – “a metaphysical monster” – as an alternative hypothesis in understanding the intimacy, the unity, and the spirituality of the universe. In order to come to terms with James’s position against Hegel’s absolute spirit, I shall articulate the way they envision the spirituality of universe from different perspectives, which assume, and at the same time, develop different meanings for collectivity and memory. I consider these different perspectives according to their pragmatic consequences, and in this regard, seek to derive some implications from their profound articulations in order to suggest a more pragmatic and releasing conception of collective memory as freeing us from the burden of the past by socially transforming it into prospects not only for action, but also for recognition, and by aesthetically deploying it to symbolic expressions embodied in art and cultural works assuming practices and their appropriated pre-theoretical “know-how” at the background. I entitle this liberating function as one of the most significant functions of memory, and more specifically, as a melioristic work of mourning, which is neither obsessed with the irrevocable loss and dispersal brought by time and displacement, nor powerful enough to turn absence into full presence. Rather, the art of memory consists in acknowledging, and qualifying the continuity of absence (as what is other from, or not in, the instant field of the present) and presence (as provisional meanings, goals, values, and works as in view of our selective attending and comportment). First, in order to render my proposal more comprehensible, I shall engage with James’s radical empiricism, that is, the metaphysical and phenomenological aspects of what he entitles as “pure experience” which is characterized

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as the undifferentiated unity of the act of experiencing and the content experienced, and as the immediate flux of life, or the continuous stream of pure experiences. Reading Essays in Radical Empiricism opens up the significance of delineating a concept of memory in line with James’s understanding of the collectivity, continuity, and the relations of experiences. This reading will lead us to James’s vision of a pluralistic universe, in which James first sets the intimacy criterion as a task to be satisfied by a philosophical vision, and then, claims that his philosophy is satisfying this criterion by its “sympathetic” temper, and by its spiritual outlook, which considers the possibility of a wider interpersonal, or superhuman field rendering the universe we live intimate. At this stage, the question will turn out as whether we need to invoke a Jamesian panpsychic tendency in order to assert the collectivity and intimacy in a world of pure experiences, i.e., a possible wider soul, but not an all-embracing soul. Reading A Pluralistic Universe will suggest the possibility of conceiving collective memory as the “cash-value” of James’s account of spiritualism and intimacy of a pluralistic universe. RADICAL EMPIRICISM

James, all through his philosophical works, attaches to the metaphors of “stream,” or “field.” In his early works, these metaphors characterize thought or consciousness, and in his late works, they qualify the undifferentiated unity and dynamic flow of experiences or “life.” By keeping in mind that these metaphors are mostly spatial and powerful enough to exhibit the temporal flow, we can say that the “stream” is neither a completely unified and coherent field, nor a totally disjointed, fragmentary, granular aggregation. The metaphor suggests the fluidity, continuity, transitions, variations among the surface and depth, currents and undercurrents differing and coalescing, that is, the life of becoming. Jason Throop redefines it as “a stream that ebbs and flows continually forward while retaining the undercurrents and residues of past experience.”7 Moreover, Bruce W. Wilshire expresses the continuous flow of the stream in phenomenological terms as follows: Just as there is no thought or experience which is of a single thing and nothing else (there must always be relations and a background), so there is no experience which is locked into a discrete moment of time, a “now,” and experience only it. What is given is a “specious present,” a field of duration or continuity, in which the just past is present as the just past, and the anticipation of the future is present as the anticipation.8

Therefore the present moment, as indicating the center of selective comportment and attention, always refers to its beyond, but does so in a continuous way. James claims that “our fields of experience have no more definite boundaries than our fields of vision”, since they “both are fringed forever by a

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more that continuously develops, and that continuously supersedes them as life proceeds.”9 Here, the “fringe-like,” or marginal aspects of the field are particularly important not only because these aspects refer to the residual or anticipatory dimensions of experience, but also because they designate the irreducibility of objective context of experience to the actual contents of a personal stream of thought, i.e., to the subjective context. David C. Lamberth claims that “there is a wider, ejective realm of contents beyond any particular field,” and he continues as follows: Given the change of the center of field, whether it be from the intrusion of contents from margins or a subjective change in the center itself, any field as such must be assumed to point to “an ‘eject,’ a not yet realized, (which) is continuously connected with the realized.” . . . In addition to objective changes of the subjective field, then, subjective changes can produce objective effects in the field. Therefore, insofar as there is a change in fields – a stream of fields at all – there is, on James’s view, both potential objectivity and an actual, ejective “more” beyond any present field.10

In using the metaphor of stream, James intends to oppose and differentiate himself both from the atomistic presuppositions of traditional empiricism, and from transcendental idealism’s view of transcendental synthetic unity. He intends to propose a different approach accounting the continuity of experiences and the experience of continuity. This is an account that traditional empiricism could not provide given its recourse to atomistic stance. Moreover, transcendental idealism could not also provide such an account without the help of categories, logic, transcendental apperception, or the Absolute, which are meant to formalize experience as a meaningful coherent unity by structuring and ordering it with what is other than experience. James summarizes his stance against these approaches by his radical empiricism doctrine which opens itself up to a phenomenological and metaphysical account of “pure experience.” James states his radical empiricism as follows: To be radical, an empiricism must neither admit into its constructions any element that is not directly experienced, nor exclude from them any element that is directly experienced. For such a philosophy, the relations that connect experiences must themselves be experienced relations, and any kind of relation experienced must be accounted as ‘real’ as anything else in the system.11

His radical empiricism doctrine consists of a postulate, of a statement of fact, and of a generalized conclusion: The postulate is that the only things that shall be debatable among philosophers shall be things definable in terms drawn from experience . . . The statement of fact is that the relations between things, conjunctive as well as disjunctive, are just as much matters of direct particular experience, neither more so nor less so, than the things themselves. The generalized conclusion is that therefore the parts of experience hold together from next to next by relations that are themselves parts of experience. The directly apprehended universe needs, in short, no extraneous trans-empirical connective support, but possesses in its own right a concatenated or continuous structure.12

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James, by means of his radical empiricism, proposes a way to construe a notion of “pure experience” that is self-supportive. In this regard, he introduces his postulate of “pure experience” as indicating an undifferentiated field equated with reality, which is neither mental nor physical, but which is the pre-reflective ground for differing contexts of experiences as “thoughts” and “things,” or as subjects and objects. James acknowledges that experience is a double-barreled term, and the distinction between the act (and the agent) of experience and the content of experience is an affair of relations falling within the particular experience considered.13 Organization of experience into distinctive contexts, as subjective and objective, are required for the purposes of reflection, appropriation, or knowing. Thus in “Does Consciousness Exist?” James claims that consciousness is not an entity, but “a function in experience which thoughts perform,” indicating the fact that “things not only are, but get reported, are known,” and therefore, knowing is nothing but “a particular sort of relation towards one another into which portions of pure experience may enter.”14 This radically different notion of experience is clarified by James as follows: Experience, I believe, has no such inner dublicity; and the separation of it into consciousness and content comes, not by way of subtraction, but by way of addition – the addition, to a concrete piece of it, of other sets of experiences . . . Just so, I maintain, does a given undivided portion of experience, taken in context of associates, play the part of a knower, of a state of mind, of ‘consciousness’; while in a different context the same undivided bit of experience plays the part of a thing known, of an ‘objective content’. In a word, in one group it figures as a thought, in another group as a thing. And since it can figure in both groups simultaneously we have every right to speak of it as subjective and objective both at once.15

James says that the same bit of pure experience is, in one context, my field of consciousness, that is, my personal biography, where in another context it is the thing which is the last term of a history of previous physical operations. Particulars are experienced not just as themselves, but just there as part of a field. This field, if undifferentiated, is the “pure experience” which is only virtually a subjective or an objective field.16 Yet, the differentiation has always a practical purpose and value in the sense that we need to draw distinctions in order to transform experience for practical purposes. Hence, James denies that what is differentiated, as mental or physical, has a substantial ontological status. Rather, they fall within experience since their status is only functional, that is, they function as systems of different associates and arrangements in and of experiences. As Bruce Wilshire says; “Human mind is minding (let us not hypostatize the noun ‘mind’).”17 Given this characterization, we can say that human mind is nothing but a collective name for specific functions in and of pure experience, such as remembering, attending, thinking, reflecting, striving, desiring, etc. Therefore, the self is nothing, but the experienced continuity of

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these experiences. All this ends up well if we can say that the self is a history, or in other terms, “memory” in this specific sense. After this brief statement of radical empiricism, I shall raise the following interrelated and guiding questions that may expose the status of memory in this picture: 1. Should we interpret “pure experience” as a postulate that refers to an individual level phenomenon, or a collective level? Should we take it as a phenomenological or as a metaphysical postulate? 2. In what way could we entitle James’s notion of experience: a “coherent” or a “granular” collectivity? How can we understand experience both as a flow or a stream, and as involving discrete parts in transition? How can James move beyond the dichotomous thinking which qualifies collectivity exclusively either as integral cohesive unity or as successive discrete disjoint parts? 3. Can re-collected experiences collect themselves into a kind of unity? How should we qualify the collective unity of selves? What does collectivity and collective memory mean if we try to explain it from a Jamesian perspective? P H E N O M E N O L O G I C A L A N D M E TA P H Y S I C A L I N T E R P R E TAT I O N S

Referring to David C. Lamberth’s interpretation, we can read James’s postulate of “pure experience” as signifying both an individual and a collective phenomenon, and it has both phenomenological and metaphysical aspects.18 James defends his world-view “radical empiricism” by means of his metaphysics of “pure experience”, which is also known as neutral monism. Thus, in its phenomenological interpretation, the world of pure experience is the world that we are always already in, that is, “the experiencing-experienced-experienceable world,” and metaphysically, it is “the world, the context of contexts.”19 Above all, interpreted as a metaphysical thesis, the purity of experience designates the ontologically primary unity and immediacy of experiencing. As Lamberth claims, at this pure level, or in the first intention, “the modality of being is one of activity and flux.”20 If we read the purity of experience metaphysically, we can say that James equates reality with the purity, or undifferentiated unity of experience. Moreover Lamberth argues that we can understand the modifier “pure” both collectively and discretely at this metaphysical level: When used as a metaphysical placeholder . . . “pure” indicates as a collective term, as general and basic term for use in philosophical constructions. As such pure experience partakes of certain fundamental characteristics of particular experiences, without ever being as specific or concrete as any actual experience. In this context James is apt to treat pure experience as an unquantified, indeterminate noun – much as we speak collectively of land . . . James also writes metaphysically of pure experience in a second way, speaking discretely of bits of pure experience. Qua pure

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experience, a bit or piece of pure experience is still rather indeterminate, though it is by definition discrete in contrast to pure experience taken collectively.21

Lamberth’s reference to this distinction is significant in order to give an account for the functions in experience, and here the function we are interested is memory. Just like the function of knowing, the function of memory is an affair of experienced relations, that is, it is itself “a relation that holds within pure experience taken collectively, and between bits of pure experience taken discretely.”22 Phenomenological interpretation of pure experience consists in James’s assertion that although pure experience is the basic metaphysical unit, there is no specific nature or stuff of pure experience itself, but there are as many sensible natures as there are many different experiences. Thus “pure experience” is always in the plural, and therefore, “a collective name for all these sensible natures, and save for time and space (and, if you like, for ‘being’) there appears no universal element of which all things are made.”23 This is how James’s “neutral monism”, as a metaphysical and general claim, opens to a pluralism of concrete pure experiences, that is, to a phenomenological account. Charles A. Hobbs qualifies the phenomenological account of James as concerned with “the so-called existential variety” instead of transcendental variety, and therefore, as providing an account of the lived-experience of the world at its face value.24 Moreover, the phenomenological interpretation of James’s pluralism can be supported by his principle: “Nothing shall be admitted as fact . . . except what can be experienced at some definite time by some experient; and for every feature of fact ever so experienced, a definite place must be found somewhere in the final system of reality.”25 Obviously, this phenomenological aspect in James’s philosophy, given that it involves first-person perspective, opens up the questions concerning reality, truth, and the challenge of solipsism. I will take these issues in the following section. Nevertheless, we can still clarify the matter at this stage. The above principle indicates the personally experienced and experienceable character of reality. Moreover, what James means by “the final system of reality” is just the provisional collection of experiences which is additive in constitution. The system of reality is, in line with empiricist premises, regarded as an additive collectivity. However, given that James’s empiricism is radical, the relative coherence and the unity of reality are accounted by means of the conjunctive and disjunctive relations experienced and experienceable. By means of his radical account of the relations of experience, James proposes the continuity of experience, and so the experienced continuity of the self and the world. James explicates this additive constitution of reality by using the metaphor of “mosaic philosophy”, “a philosophy of plural facts”26 :

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In actual mosaics the pieces are held together by their bedding, for which bedding the Substances, transcendental Egos, or Absolutes of other philosophies may be taken to stand. In radical Empiricism there is no bedding; it is as if the pieces clung together by their edges, the transitions experienced between them forming their cement . . . the metaphor serves to symbolize the fact that Experience itself, taken at large, can grow by its edges . . . one moment of it proliferates into the next by transitions which, whether conjunctive or disjunctive, continue the experiential tissue . . . In this line we live prospectively as well as retrospectively. It is ‘of’ the past, inasmuch as it comes expressly as the past’s continuation; it is ‘of’ the future in so far as the future, when it comes, will have continued it.27

Above all, for James, the existential variety and coherency of experiences (so personal biographies, and the history of physical operations) do not belong to different orders, such as empirical disjunctive order and rational cohesive or unified order. Rather, variety and coherency belong to the world of experiences. Here the world, or the experiential world as the context of contexts, sustains not only the unity of James’s philosophical discourse, but also the ontological unit encompassing all the phenomena as the way they are experienced and experienceable. It is in this context that we cannot qualify James’s philosophy of pure experience as depending solely on a granular or a coherent model, and as referring exclusively to an individual level phenomenon or a collective one. The world of pure experiences is both a granular and a coherent collectivity, and its philosophy endorses both a kind of metaphysics and a phenomenology of pure experience. Hence, James claims that radical empiricism is “fair to both the unity and the disconnection” and treats neither as illusory.28 Moreover, he asserts that the question of how much union or collection the world of experiences involves is a matter that can only be solved on experiential and pragmatic grounds. For instance, in his Pragmatism, he claims as follows: The result is innumerable little hangings-together of the world’s part within the larger hangingstogether, little worlds . . . within the wider universe. Each system exemplifies one type or grade of union, its parts being strung on that peculiar kind of relation, and the same part may figure in many different systems, as a man may hold several offices and belong to various clubs. From this ‘systematic’ point of view, therefore, the pragmatic value of the world’s unity is that all these definite networks actually and practically exist. Some are more enveloping and extensive, some less so; they are superposed upon each other . . .29

James usually conceives the networks that are more enveloping as “the continua of memory or personal consciousness, of time and space”.30 For instance, he treats the question whether “the parts of the universe hang together, instead of being like detached grains of sand” as follows: “Even grains of sand hang together through the space in which they are embedded . . . Space and time are thus vehicles of continuity by which the world’s parts hang together.”31 However, he adds that our belief in one time and in one space is meant for practical purposes. They are abstractions required for us to organize our lives,

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to make social arrangements as to meet in the same place, at the right time, and also for scientific knowledge and measurement. From a phenomenological perspective, given the continuum of memory or personal consciousness, they have qualifications other than these purposes. James claims as follows: Everything that happens to us brings its own duration and extension, and both are vaguely surrounded by a marginal ‘more’ that runs into the duration and extension of the next thing that comes . . . Cosmic space and cosmic time . . . are constructions. The great majority of the human race never use these notions, but live in plural times and spaces, interpenetrant and durcheinander.32

Here, our question is whether these different durations pass into each other, or how we should think the collectivity of plural times and plural spaces. In James’s terms, our question is how, at the phenomenological and epistemological level, the “conterminousness of different minds”, and at the metaphysical level, “the compounding of consciousness” could be explained.33 I will refer these issues in the following sections. Let me first give an account of personal consciousness in James’s philosophy of pure experience. In coming to terms with James’s notion of pure experience in its phenomenological aspect, we must also keep in mind that any function in experience, perceptual or non-perceptual – such as feeling, perceiving, thinking, remembering, reading, talking, walking, etc. – is, in its first intention, or immediacy, counted as a bit of pure experience, which we can never objectify in the sense of making it an object of our experience. We are here particularly dealing with remembering or recollecting, which is also one of the many experienced relations. “Remembering” is a function in experience which, in its undifferentiated unity, as in its first intention, a mere bit of pure experience. As James asserts, If we take conceptual manifolds, or memories, or fancies, they also are in their first intention mere bits of pure experience, and, as such, are single that’s which act in one context as objects, and in another context as mental states. By taking them in their first intention, I mean ignoring their relation to possible perceptual experiences with which they may be connected, which they may lead to and terminate in, and which then they may be supposed to ‘represent.’34

Therefore, for James, there is no self-splitting of a pure bit of recollective experience into what is recollected and what recollects. The differentiation of this bit of pure experience into a subjective context – as the way the recollective experience belongs to my personal stream of consciousness, that is, the way it enters into relation with my other experiences – and an objective context – as the way what is recollected belongs to its history and environment – is a doubling-up of experience into distinct groups of associates, that is, it is taken by a retrospective experience “as a member of diverse processes.”35 James exemplifies the issue in other terms as follows:

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The room thought-of, namely, has many thought-of couplings with many thought-of things. Some of these couplings are inconstant, others are stable. In the reader’s personal history the room occupies a single date – he saw it only once perhaps, a year ago. Of the house’s history, on the other hand, it forms a permanent ingredient. Some couplings have the curious stubbornness . . . of fact; others show the fluidity of fancy – we let them come and go as we please. Grouped with the rest of its house, with the name of its town, of its builder, value, decorative plan, the room maintains a definite foothold, to which, if we try to loosen it, it tends to return, and to reassert itself with force. With these associates, in a word, it coheres, while to other houses, other towns, etc., it shows no tendency to cohere at all. The two collections, first of its cohesive, and, second, of its loose associates, inevitably come to be contrasted. We call the first collection the system of external realities, in the midst of which the room, as ‘real,’ exists; the other we call the stream of our thinking, in which, as a ‘mental image,’ it for a moment floats. The room again gets counted twice over. It plays two different roles, being Gedanke and Gedachtes, the thought-of-an-object, and the objectthought-of, both in one; and all this without paradox and mystery, just as the same material thing may be both low and high, or small and great, or bad and good, because of its relations to opposite parts of an environing world.36

Thus, the same act of recollective experience, has so many relations to the rest of experience that it may be taken, on the one hand, as regards to its relations to other experiences in my mental history, and on the other hand, as regards to its relations to other experiences in its environing objective and intersubjective world. For instance, the act of remembering dives into different relations continuous with other experiences in a personal stream of consciousness. Then, “what remembers”, i.e., the self, is nothing but the experience of this continuity along with the consciousness of this continuity, that is, a coconscious continuous transition. However, the content of the same act is also a member of a diverse process of other relations in differing fields of experiences, which renders “what is remembered” a fact, and mostly a narrated fact. This may also indicate the qualitative difference between the lived, immediate state of a pure act of remembering – its felt quality undifferentiated – and its narrated, or mediated, state – its cognitive quality. The former indicates that the self is memory (an experienced continuity of relations internal to the collectives of pure experience), where the latter indicates that the self has memory that is correctable (an experienced continuity of relations external to the discrete experiences related). Thus I argue that to be a self consists in having memory insofar as it is memory and consists in being memory insofar as it has memory. The immediate and mediate states require and imply each other. In its narrative state, we find a kind of reflection and abstraction from the stream of experience, which is also a differentiation or a particular mediation of different pieces of experiences already retained. Hence, recollective experience, in reflection, relates itself externally to what is already retained, and as such, runs into both conjunctive and disjunctive relations with retained members. However, this recollective experience is still additive to the process itself, and it is in this way that remembering, just like knowing, is a transformative act. Yet,

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this transformative activity assumes retention of previous experienced relations and their lived quality: it is both a re-membering and a dis-membering of these retained members or associates in experience by creating a difference or a mediation regarding their lived quality. The complex nature of remembering arises from the fact that remembering always takes place here and now, in the instant field of the present. Yet, what is remembered is a thing of the past, or something remote, that is an associate of experiences absent, and moreover, felt as absent though still kept in the mind, or in the margins of the field of pure experiences virtually. What I claim is that, in its immediate aspect, the experience of remembering is a flux, an undifferentiated continuity of the modalities of time. Yet, in its mediated aspect, the remembered contents and relations can be variously discriminated and re-collected, and therefore, set into a different system or collection of associates. Above all, what we remember belongs to a that which retains itself in the subliminal fringes or margins of the field of experience, and the doubling of that in retrospection into an act of remembering (a state of mind) and a content of remembering (reality as remembered) is a transformative act effacing the purity of the act of remembering. I would not consider this transformation in terms of a mournful impossibility of recovering and reliving our past experiences as just the way they were. Memory, I believe, is most valuable not as a record of experience, but as a mode of encountering and shaping it. Given this character, James’s humanism could be interpreted as expressing our transformative contribution to reality. However, we must first come to terms with the possibility of ‘we’ in radical empiricism.

JA M E S ’ S H U M A N I S M A S D I S C L O S I N G T H E M E A N I N G O F “ W E ”

The above exposition leads us to consider the question of the collectivity of experiences as yielding knowledge and truth, and in particular, to our question of historical knowledge and truth. Can we draw from James’s account of truth and objective reference implications for the truth of narrated and remembered events? In both cases, the matter is empirical, and truth consists in pragmatic verification. James Conant states that against Josiah Royce’s challenge that “the only way to avoid solipsism is to postulate an ‘absolute knower’”,37 James’s response would consist in the following: “pragmatism, as much as absolutism, requires a ‘wide knower’ – but not too wide.”38 Moreover, Conant claims as follows: James . . . wishes to conceive of pragmatic verification in both holistic and intersubjective terms. His frequent appeals to experience are now to be interpreted as appeals to the totality of human experience, including both (diachronic) appeals to the past and future of mankind as well as (synchronic) appeals to the collectivity of human experience.39

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As such, James’s account of truth is a humanistic conception coupled with radical empiricism refusing an absolute standard for truth, and yet recognizing that truth must remain in some way external to the individual experiencing subject. As Conant argues, James tries to eschew appeal to an absolute standpoint “beyond the experience of all possible thinkers,” by “locating the source of truth in the collective experience of finite judging subjects.”40 Given all these, I claim that from a Jamesian perspective we can interpret our humanistic contribution to reality by carving its That into a What, as the art of memory, i.e., the re-collection of the “collective experience of ‘mankind as a whole over the historical long run.’”41 For James, there is only one edition of the universe, “unfinished, growing in all sorts of places, especially in the places where thinking beings at work”, but not two as one from the standpoint of finite human experiences and one from the absolute standpoint.42 In order to expose my statement that this one edition of the universe is the work of memory understood as the collective experiences of the mankind, I shall first deal with the charge of solipsism. How could we think James’s approach to the problem of solipsism in relation to his humanism? Although, James does not directly address the problem of solipsism, or the question of the existence of other minds, he addresses the charge claiming that radical empiricism “cannot explain how the notion of a physical order, as distinguished from a subjectively biographical order, of experiences, ever arose.”43 This charge proceeds to show the problem of objective reference in James’s radical empiricism given that he refuses to accept a static, transcendent realm of truth or objects being wholly independent from our experiential operations. He gives his response to this charge in an indirect manner, by referring to his “doctrine of the reality of conjunctive relations.”44 Do our minds have no object in common, which are nothing but contexts, or collections of certain conjunctive relations given through the flow of experiences? This is the question of objective reference. As James claims, “personal consciousness is the name for a series of experiences run together by certain definite transitions, and an objective reality is a series of similar experiences knit by different transitions.”45 The object is nothing but a series of experiences taken in its multiple conjunctive relations, an object at which we arrive from different paths. James claims that “practically . . . our minds meeting in a world of objects which they share in common”46 is not a problem “offering logical and epistemological difficulties; it stands or falls with the general possibility of things being in conjunctive relation with other things at all.”47 Therefore, if our multiple experiences terminate in the same object by transforming a that of our immediate experience into a what of mediate knowledge, it is possible to say that we know the same object, and have an object in common. The problem concerning solipsism dissolves here at this point.

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There is one more point to be made, which may turn out to be significant for the following arguments of my paper. James, in his doctrine of the reality of conjunctive relations, claims that “relations are of different degrees of intimacy.”48 Among the most intimate of all conjunctive relations is the one which is “to experience one’s personal continuum” in a living way, i.e., the continuity of self in the absence of the feeling of break and in a sense of continuity as “passing of one experience into another.”49 In other words, James states as follows: “The organization of the Self as a system of memories, purposes, strivings, fulfillments or disappointments, is incidental to this most intimate of all relations, the terms of which seem in many cases actually to compenetrate and suffuse each other’s being.”50 There, in the self, the transition from a particular content to another is experienced as continuous. However, James claims that “when I seek to make the transition from an experience of my own to one of yours” we cannot avoid the break and the “discontinuity-experience.”51 Above all, we must still show how we arrive at the same object. This is the problem how truth happens to an idea. However, this pragmatic conception of truth could dissolve the problem only in an empirical way. It is empirical in the sense that only by “meeting in the same,” which happens by pointing, bodily gestures, leading, guiding, that is, in all these spatial operations, and in multiple expressive ways, we are authorized to assume other minds knowing the same object, or an objective reference for multiple streams of consciousnesses.52 What is more interesting in James’s response to the challenge of solipsism is that he insists that the object of knowledge does not stand independently as a thing against multiple subjects. The objective referential framework is a product of the relations of experiences. This objective framework is immanent to experience, but not immanent to our personal consciousnesses. Now, with his conception of truth, James insists on the difference between subjective and objective referential frameworks, but it is a difference drawn within experience. Even if our objects that our minds terminate at are numerically identical, our lived-experiences could not be numerically identical. The whole issue is to understand this qualitative difference between our lived-experiences as always assuming our personal histories. The object of my immediate experience is not only an object for my consciousness, but also belongs to the conjunctive relations in experience, which I take hold of in a particular series and appropriate as mine. I take it as withholding a certain dynamic significance by relating it to other appropriated experiences of mine. This feeling of significance, which I can only share with others by using language and bodily expressions, could not itself be experienced directly by others. This feeling of significance is irrecoverable in its immediacy. It is a particular significance standing in an external relation to the thing, but also internal to my experience of the thing. The source of this significance resides in the plural experiences

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that I experience as continuous, and accommodate as indicating the “drama of my mental series.” What is the relation between the significance of the thing from my personal perspective, that is, in relation to my personal subjective referential framework, and the thing serving as an objective reference of our knowledge, or the thing we share in remembering or knowing it? In both cases, James would argue that the thing occupies a place, or a time, that is, it stands in an external relation to the significance that I give to it. However, given that it stands in an external relation to the significance I give to it, this does not necessarily indicate that it is something substantial over and above our experience or that it was there long before we arrive at it. What seems to be decisive in James’s approach to the problem is that although we may not experience the same thing in its qualitative immediacy – there is always a subjective context or a perspective taking – our knowledge has an objective reference, and also our recollective experiences, at least, must have an intersubjective reference. James has a deep confidence in the possibility that we can point to the same object and we can meet in the same place. Does this mean that even if only I have a privileged access (immediate access) to the contents of my mind, these contents do also have an objective and/or intersubjective reference? James tries to solve the riddle by claiming that both the personal subjective, private context and the common, objective, public context are the contexts of experience taken as a whole and, therefore, they are both empirically real. The reality of the former can only be detected in an indirect fashion, or in different words, others cannot share directly my memories or experiences. Only by means of an inference from their own cases, they can understand what and how I feel. This requires sharing, that is, intimacy with the other as sharing time and place, expressive communication, and interpretation. Moreover, place is introduced as having this privileged status in dissolving the problem of solipsism, since the act of pointing assumes pointing to a position, pointing to “here” or “there”, and “now” and “then”. Does this amount to say that what is “there” is known as a fact by just being there? If “being there” indicates the place taken as an objective reference in which the conjunctive relations in experience terminate, then James would answer positively to this question. It is impossible to have knowledge and memory without an experiential context that involves concrete durations and concrete extensions. Experience, taken as a whole, forms the ultimate referential framework though it is never given as such. Can we say that truth, the knowledge of truth, and the truth of memory happen when we meet in the same place at the right time? At least, James introduces this “meeting” as the only motive and ground for assuming the collectivity of consciousnesses and for their sharing ability. This will open the discussion in the concluding section of my paper: “the place of memory.” Let us refer to James’s words once more:

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In general terms, then, whatever differing contents of our minds may eventually fill a place with, the place itself is a numerically identical content of two minds a piece of common property in which, through which and over which they join. The receptacle of certain of our experiences being thus common, the experiences themselves might some day become common also.53

In one of his earlier works, James uses the metaphor “republican banquet” in order to signify the intimacy enjoyed in our world given “the continua of memory or personal consciousness,” of which we are, and “of time and of space” in which we partake and are at home.54 Moreover, he claims as follows: Whoso partakes of a thing enjoys his share, and comes into contact with the thing and its other partakers. His share in no wise negates the thing or their share . . . Why may not the world be a sort of republican banquet of this sort, where all the qualities of being respect one another’s personal sacredness, yet sit at the common table of space and time?55

The answer is as follows: it may be and it may not be. James recognizes this contingency in terms of his moral view, i.e., being open to the contingencies of the world as irreducible. Besides he argues that conflicts among the elements mutually contingent and separate arise only when “as mutually exclusive possibilities, they strive to possess themselves of the same parts of time, space, and ego.”56 Finally James asserts that “That there are such real conflicts, irreducible to any intelligence, and giving rise to an excess of possibility over actuality, is a hypothesis, but a credible one.”57 I find it remarkable how Henry James, the younger brother of William James, in his short novel, The Beast in the Jungle, provides a narrative, which may in a metaphorical way clarify our point.58 In this short novel, Henry James perfectly portrays how a possible love affair could not take place because of the egotism, and probably, the solipsism of the main character, John Marcher, who could not recognize and share May Bertram’s affections for him. The characters, John Marcher and May Bertram, could not meet in the same place at the right time, though from the beginning of the novel through the end they were next to each other. When they seemed to be together, John Marcher was stuck by his own personal thoughts about his expectation of an extraordinary event that will inevitably happen to him in a very unique way. He was obsessed with the thought that this anticipated unique event will distinguish him in a perfect and unique manner. In other words, he was awaiting “the beast in the jungle,” or a unique event that will mark his whole life, and qualify it in a very specific sense. May Bertram was waiting as well without putting her “personal sacredness” on their common table, that is, without confessing her affections and love to Marcher, though she was ready to do if she had seen a sign from Marcher that he is with her “here and now.” In the passing years, at some point, May Bertram gave Marcher the impression that she had known what this unique extraordinary event awaiting him was. She continued to keep it as a secret till

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she died and asked him not to ask. What she knew is never explicitly expressed in the novel, and yet long after her death, with Marcher’s illuminative experience in a day at the cemetery, we learn whatever might have happened or not happened in a very vague way. He confronted with it in the cemetery just after he meets “the face of a fellow-mortal . . . with an expression like the cut of a blade,” which left him in wonder: “What had the man had to make him, by loss of it, so bleed and yet alive?” Marcher, in a sudden illumination, finds out that the man has something that he himself had not: a life, a sharing in life and sharing of life. The event that might have happened or not happened could be their love affair, but since the May had already passed away without recognition, the unique extraordinary event that would mark his life actually turned out to be the futile character of his own personal history, i.e. the recognized terminus of all his past was, in fact, a bare nothing. The truth of the event – the beast – becomes his shallow personality and a life that is not thoroughly lived, i.e., a shallow life to which “nothing on earth was to have happened.”59 The novel ends by declaring that this is, in fact, “the horror of waking – the knowledge,” i.e., the terrible awakening from an egotism. The truth that was confessed to him, “full in the face, was she was what he had missed”, the awful truth “the answer to all the past”, and finally, “he saw the Jungle of his life.”60 He meets the event of his existence, the truth, and yet, he “had seen outside of his life, not learned within, the way a woman was mourned when she had been loved for herself.”61 The truth of the event as learned within and through life, could be interpreted as the truth of memory, and of mourning, which could only take place if we, each, are a particular life, have a life, and share a life that we can remember and mourn for each other. As such, this life requires a strenuous and melioristic effort to render the world of ours a “republican banquet”. This, I believe, is the germ of William James’s humanistic conception of truth. For James, truth happens to an idea and his humanistic conception of truth consists in carving the material of experience (the simple that affecting us immediately) and producing its referential objective framework (by transforming that into a what) according to our purposes, needs, interests, desires, expectations and previous knowledge. In verification, we return what we take from experience. Our taking is always private, but our returning must be corrigible and public. This returning back – verification – is not an act of mere justification of what was already true. Rather, the whole continuous deal is the happening of truth. Our ideas lead or guide us to truth not in the sense of transcending to what stands over and beyond us in an indifferent and independent fashion, but in the sense of producing the result that they aim at. This is the reason why James compares knowing with other practical activities. This carving of experience excludes some elements and includes others, but it is a continuous dynamic activity. James believes that this carving aims at what is good,

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that is, satisfying a demand, and it is always provisional. This is how we build up world-views, schemes of reference, norms and values in which we operate and live. This is the human addition signifying the humanism of James. It is an addition to what we can have no control given its affection. Recall James’s metaphor: “we receive in short the block of marble, but we carve the statue ourselves.”62 Moreover, he says, What we say about reality thus depends on the perspective into which we throw it. The that of it is its own; but the what depends on the which; and the which depends on us. Both the sensational and relational parts of reality are dumb: they say absolutely nothing about themselves. We it is who have to speak for them.63

The critical question here is who we are: a position, a collection enjoying coherency in relative degrees, collective memories, or a “wider self” serving as a measure for our public meeting in the same place, without which we would be lost in the idiosyncrasies of our solipsistic takings or culturally solipsistic world-views? William James introduces his “radical empiricism” as his Weltanschauung. It is a humanistic world-view that should be measured according to its own standards, that is, according to its claims and the practical consequences of these claims. It takes for granted the self-supporting and self-containing character of “experience as a whole.” Does James invoke a form of holism? Is “experience as a whole” a common medium opening up to pluralism: not only to a common medium to which “we” each belong, but also a medium through which we are distinguished from each other as this-particular-person-havingthese-particular-experiences? What does James mean by humanism? What could his humanism say about who “we” are? James takes for granted that “we” each, in our distinct ways, run through a particular course of experiences, appropriate them as “mine”, reflect back on the relations given through our particular streams of experiences, and abstract from them in order to communicate, classify, narrate, and know. If we want to call ourselves as consciousnesses, we are nothing but a certain function. Moreover, the cognitive functions that “we” perform are all seated in the same place that accommodate different processes that “we” are running, and this points to the possibility of true, fallible, shared, common, communicable world of plural experiences. “Experience as a whole” is as such a unique unit that embodies multiple units and layers, which we each experience as our personal streams of consciousnesses. Is it nothing but the collection or the network of multiple schemes of reference opening to a plurality of temporal processes, which are nothing but “us”? “Experience as a whole” is our ultimate reference which requires a constant framing and re-framing, and also collecting and re-collecting, that is, our

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human addition. By following the path of experience, we all work through our way by laying the mosaics on which we stand. This is the sole meaning of humanism for James, which seems to be at odds with solipsism even though James wants to reserve a private immediate sphere of affection. As James says, For pluralistic pragmatism, truth grows up inside of all the finite experiences. They lean on each other, but the whole of them, if such a whole there be, leans on nothing. All ‘homes’ are in finite experience; finite experience as such is homeless. Nothing outside the flux secures the issue of it. It can hope salvation only from its own intrinsic promises and potencies.64

All our conceptual, mental, linguistic, epistemological operations, and also our cultural practices and traditions are these “homes” in experience. For James, philosophy, which tries to settle or searches for ultimate grounds over and beyond finite experiences, is homesick, far and away from home, that is, in estrangement. Does not philosophy, however, consist in the interrogation of what seems to be “homely” or “familiar”, and in acknowledging the unacknowledged presumptions of these finite “homes”? The response to this question assumes James’s confrontation with Hegelian Absolute. The background of this philosophical confrontation is James’s intimacy criterion. JA M E S ’ S S P I R I T UA L I S M : I N T I M AC Y I N A P L U R A L I S T I C UNIVERSE

James, at different times, undertakes the problem of the one and the many. His approach to the problem eventually leads to his sympathetic consideration of Gustav Fechner’s panpsychic philosophy, a pluralistic pantheism, and Henri Bergson’s critique of intellectualism. Under the light of this consideration, in A Pluralistic Universe, James inquires the way to satisfy his intimacy criterion – a philosophy satisfying the existential demand of intimacy – by raising the question of the possibility of compounding of consciousness, collectivity of experiences, or compounding of experiences in a wider scope without recourse to any intellectualist trick. His engagement with this question is also motivated by the fact that religious experiences can be accounted as the outcome of a need for an ideal order, or hope for a better universe, which is thought to be guaranteed by a wider world-soul with which we are continuous, and from which saving experiences, consolation, or transformations in well-being may come. Indeed, all these concerns and inquiries about the coherency of plural experiences and their collectivity in a wider scope must be undertaken in experiential terms. This means that the consciousnesses that may compound themselves would also remain parts, or do not necessarily loose their identity, or personal qualitative differences, while compounding. Thus James considers collective consciousness (human or nonhuman) as a live hypothesis only in so far as the

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world is a world of many and one, and the relations of experiences are conjunctive and disjunctive, or internal and external relations. In other words, James opens up the possibility of spirituality as rendering the universe more intimate only if the world is not the world of Spirit but a pluralistic universe with a spirit wider – yet still finite, immanent, and temporal – than each of our own personal stream of experiences. Here, James’s pluralism and empiricism suggests that in addition to a background of intimacy, we also live against the background of an unaccomplished, imperfect, and an irreducibly temporal universe in which we struggle. James claims as follows: The pluralistic universe is thus more like a federal republic than like an empire or a kingdom. However much may be collected, however much may report itself as present at any effective centre of consciousness or action, something else is self-governed and absent and unreduced to unity.65

James’s use of the metaphor “federal republic” is quite significant for the purposes of our inquiry since it characterizes the way in which there will always and everywhere be “some residual resistance to verbalization, formulation, and discursification, some genius of reality that escapes from the pressure of the logical finger, that says ‘hands off,’ and claims its privacy, and means to be left to its own life.”66 This is how James stresses on the irreducible otherness, and the role of “many” in experience resulting from the plurality of perspectives we take for our particular purposes, and out of our selective comportment to reality. There is an indeterminacy enjoyed, but also suffered within this universe owing to the element of chance and novelty in the continuous flow of the field of experiences given that the centre and the margins of this field run into each other dynamically. It is, in this way, the whole field of experience retains and anticipates the unactualized possibilities which are, as in recollection and expectation, continuous with the actual. In the Jamesian pluralistic world of experience, there is an inexhaustible haunting sense of futurity and past, which is responsible for the fact that the world is a world of both many and one. There is no ultimate interpretation or an exhaustive framework that could logically envelope, and finally account for the experience of possible existential occurrences and relations. As a conclusion, we may refer to James’s words against the ultimate and rational unity of the universe in “The Sentiment of Rationality”: . . . when all things have been unified to the supreme degree, the notion of a possible other than the actual may still haunt our imagination and prey upon our system. The bottom of being is left logically opaque to us, as something which we simply come upon and find, and about which (if we wish to act) we should pause and wonder as little as possible.67

For James, reality gives itself, and its datum is a gift for which are thankful. There is no inherent intelligibility in its giving. This gift, its being given,

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exceeds an economy that an absolute intelligence may formulate, and since its bottom is opaque, we cannot trace its origins. Its gift is the trace that we can only find. Collection of these traces into networks or systems in different conjunctive relations is the ground of our cognitive, cultural, and spiritual life in the widest possible sense. This is the way James finds himself encountering the “metaphysical monster”, i.e., the Absolute, in Hegelian jungle.

C O N F R O N T I N G T H E “ M E TA P H Y S I C A L M O N S T E R ” : THE ABSOLUTE

If James and Hegel were contemporaries, how would they encounter each other? How would Hegel respond to James’s interpretation in “Hegel and his Method?”68 James, in this essay, does not argue for or against Hegel. He also drops any claim to understand the Hegelian procedure. As he says, he treats it “impressionistically,” which may amount to say that he portrays it in a spontaneous manner by taking the object, its shadow and background as fused together, or as blending into one another.69 In other words, what James aims is “to paint what he sees” by capturing his impression of light in a scene (the Hegelian one). The light of Hegelian scene is claimed to be non-empirical, or it is the light of reason under which the Hegelian scene flourishes.70 James’s impression of this light of reason enlightening the plurality of experiences in a uniform and all-inclusive way leads the main structure of his essay. To further the metaphorical language here, we could perhaps say that James envisions the vision of Hegel. How do these visions and their portraying of reality stand to each other? Could we describe the relation between them as inclusive or as exclusive? If it were possible to describe it as inclusive, Hegel’s vision would be the champion since it is claimed to be not a personal vision of a particular philosopher, but the speculative vision of philosophical thinking (sophia), which in order to prove its wisdom, must also embrace the claims of partial and provisional perspectives, that is, it must acknowledge the plural perspectives at the heart of its philosophical vision. This is what Hegel’s Phenomenology of Spirit (or The Science of the Experience of Consciousness) tries to accomplish.71 The philosopher becomes the witness in the whole survey of the shapes or forms of experience that lean on each other by revealing themselves to the observer as interdependent, supportive, collective, and corrective only in an all-inclusive unity. Hegel claims to inspect their togetherness in the way they exhibit an internal relation that takes place within the self-movement of experience. This is what James finds at worst as superficial, and at best, as hypothetical. The whole success of Hegelian vision would depend on showing how what is the

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case is envisioned as what must be the case, that is, it will succeed if experience has an intelligible structure of its own. In Phenomenology, the plurality captured in its unity, or “identity-indifference” (the essential characterization of Absolute in Hegel) is portrayed in terms of “a gallery of images” in which all actualized forms of “seeing” are brought together to exhibit their internal relations as constituting the selfrecollection of Spirit.72 For James, these shapes, or images could be in an exhaustively internal relation to each other only under a specific light assuming a power, an ability, which we could never take hold of: the light of Platonic Sun, the Idea or the Absolute. Hegel would name this power as speculative thinking. This light under which Hegel catches and portrays the whole scene of his vision aims to disclose what proves itself to be rational in the whole form of existence. This is the meaning of actuality (Wirklichkeit) in Hegel. An existence, or being, gains a degree of actuality, and so intelligibility, only in so far as it fully acknowledges its limits by testing and risking itself. This is to gain further determination in its course of existence. While speculative vision tries to dig deeper by means of re-visioning, recollecting and gradually interiorizing the modes of its knowing, pluralistic vision expects to make more contribution to its vision by adding new experiences to the older stock of them. As James claims, for the speculative vision The true must be essentially the self-reflecting self-contained recurrent, that which secures itself by including its own other and negating it; that makes a spherical system with no loose ends hanging out for foreignness to get a hold upon; that is forever rounded in and closed, not strung along rectilinearly and open at its ends like that universe of simply collective or additive form which Hegel calls the world of the bad infinite, and which is all that empiricism, starting with simply posited single parts and elements, is ever able to attain to.73

What James rejects in Hegel’s philosophy is the devotion attached to the activity of recollecting the actualized intelligible forms of experience in a perfectly accomplished fashion. Hegel’s philosophy takes an all-inclusive narrative form, and James would inevitably be one of the characters in the drama, but only in its finite edition. Nevertheless James would feel himself at home since, for him, this is the only edition of the drama. However Hegel would find him estranged if he viewed James’s partial perspective from the second edition of the drama, i.e., the Absolute edition, just as he finds the natural consciousness of Phenomenology who “suffers violence at its own hands” estranged by refusing to move beyond itself.74 Against Hegel’s absolute spirit and intellectualist philosophical discourse, James defends a philosophical vision friendly to the flux of life, from which all we can demand is a view of a world of experiences, which is still in the

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making, and open to more intimacy by providing a relative collectivity without a final achievement, or perfection. It is judged to be more intimate because there is no difference between the standpoints of the finite and the infinite. James’s interpretation of universe from a social analogy, and of intimacy as a task to make the world better and more familiar, invokes a practical agenda for feeling ourselves more at home in a pluralistic universe. However, this practical agenda could only be undertaken and accomplished in an imperfect and finite manner, given that there is always more to come in a world of experiences. Recall what James claims in Pragmatism: “All ‘homes’ are in finite experience; finite experience as such is homeless. Nothing outside the flux secures the issue of it. It can hope salvation only from its own intrinsic promises and potencies.”75 For James, this intimacy requires a philosophical account of co-conscious experiences and compounding of consciousnesses. I argue that James’s notion of intimacy suggests a possible collectivity of memories as a shared and continuous transition of experiences in the sense of forming a “republican banquet.” “We”, each of us, may partake of this banquet and enjoy our share by sitting at “the common table of space and time.” However, this is a loose ensemble which can be qualified as open to novelty, that is, as retaining and anticipating the disruptive power of undetermined, or not-yet determined, fringe-like relations of both past and future experiences that lay at the margins, or the undercurrents of the flow of differing fields of experience, which are related both disjunctively and conjunctively. This means that there is no logical or intelligible security that can protect the coherency of experiences. In contrast, the Hegelian Spirit, which through the end of Phenomenology “gives its existential shape over to recollection”, absolves from the experiences that it suffers in and through time, by interiorizing and recovering the truth of its journey – “the gallery of images” (different forms of experiences it undergoes as forming an intelligible coherency) – as the self-knowledge of its own communal, absolute spirituality.76 Hence, this absolute self-knowledge of the spirit is nothing but an accomplishment of the work of recollection in a perfected manner, i.e., a perfectly accomplished mourning. Given their different accounts, the comparison I draw between James’s and Hegel’s visions of collectivity – respectively, as a republican banquet, and as a total spiritual and speculative act of recollection absolving itself from the table in order to digest the remains of the banquet (the intelligibility of its perfected life) – reflects the tension between living forwards and understanding backwards. In this regard, we can refer to two different modes of re-membering: a recuperative and pragmatic mode full of Jamesian insights, and a sacrificial and speculative mode full of Hegelian insights. The former is oriented to action and to future novelty in a melioristic manner by re-membering experiences through different transitions and contextualization made in and through

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experiences so as to make finite “homes” within and through the flux of life. The latter is oriented to the past and to the acknowledgement of the intelligibility always already immanent and operative in the past forms of experience in a speculative manner by acknowledging the unacknowledged presumptions and the partiality of the “homes” in finite experiences. What we may draw from their different visions in the name of a collective memory would indicate a real, and therefore, a practical difference. T H E A RT O F C O L L E C T I V E M E M O RY

Finally, I shall end my paper by raising an account of memory (continuity and collectivity of past experiences) as kept alive, pragmatic, collective, and dynamic in the direction of the flux of our differing fields of experiences. Collective memories we share with each other as co-experiences are always in the plural, and related to the context of retention, retrieval and re-membering of not-yet determined relations within experience. Therefore, the continuity of past with the present and the future is open to revision and change. Remembering is always transformative.77 Moreover, I regard the work of memory not only as taking place of the past, but also as an opening to the non-actualized, nonthought possibilities which enjoy a certain reality in the fringe-like relations of past and future experiences. I claim that these possibilities have disruptive and transformative power in producing novelty. The approach that I propose aims to relocate the philosophical concept of memory in a perspective that acknowledges life, or becoming, in terms of its excessive dynamism. In doing this, I regard the question of collectivity of our experiences and their recollection in pragmatic and empirical terms without loosing a sense of our being together, i.e., the ground of our sharing this life. I also argued that “meeting in the same place” is the way truth happens, and this event is the work of collective memory through which we find ourselves at home. The work of collective memory is individualized and embodied in the artworks, in institutions and their practices, or even in a simple banquet gathering friends with whom we eat well, and remember well. It is immanent in the dwellings we inhabit, and therefore, it signifies our world, and in an empirical manner, qualifies our “being-there” and “being-together.” We could finally incorporate Edward Casey’s proposal in “Keeping the Past in Mind,” which turns out to be very significant for the prospects of this inquiry.78 His proposal is against the approaches which consider memory from an exclusively mental or naturalistic perspective. Casey shows us a way of leading memory – understood as “remaining with” or “abiding by” what we come to be mindful of – out of mind into the lived world, where the things come to us bearing the past manifestly. He claims as follows:

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They come to us bearing the past manifestly in monuments, relics, and mementoes, less obviously but just as forcefully in the dwellings we inhabit (buildings bear memories as much as our bodies do), and still less obviously but crucially in the collective memories we share with each other as co-experiences of certain situations.79

In addition, Casey provides an account of how the past is kept in place as follows: How then is this possible? Primarily by place’s “active power” of holding memories for us. The hold is held in place. This is not mysterious; it does not require invoking a World Soul. It is a given particular place that holds significant memories of ours, acting as a veritable gathering place for them . . . Place furnishes a matrix for mergings of many kinds – most obviously of past with present . . . (Indeed the remembered past does not merely terminate in the present of remembering but can be said to begin there, and to do so every time we recall it. Keeping in memory is a continual re-keeping: hence the many variant versions of the “same” past with which we regale ourselves in remembering and which lead us naturally to assimilate remembering to story-telling.80

Given Casey’s proposal that the past is kept in “place”, we may consider the fundamental experience of remembering not as exclusively temporal, oriented to past, and dedicated to personal consciousness or identity, but also as related to future, to place, and more significantly, dedicated to our meeting and sharing a place with others, human or non-human, i.e., with other humans, co-experiencing the thing that bears the past manifestly in an active and transformative way. I believe Casey here thinks in line with James: Place, then, plain old place, proves to be a liberating factor in matters of memory and mind. An appreciation of the place of place in our experience helps to free us from the naturalistic and mentalistic straitjackets within which both mind and memory have for too long been confined. Memory of place offers a way out of this confinement and back into the lived world, while encouraging us to rethink mind itself as continuous with this world, coterminous with it, and actively passive (or passively active) there.81

I believe that this approach to one of our modes of experience – remembering – that lies at the source of almost all of our capabilities could give a phenomenological and pragmatic cash-value of the meaning of our spirituality without a Spirit.82 We would not be in need of invoking James’s panpsychic attitude, nor a world-soul, if we give an account of memory in its collective form. In this regard, this notion of collective memory could also realize an understanding of social and cultural forms, our practices, and products as expressions and embodiments of a collectively shared memories and experiences. As James says, to be remembered is to be felt as familiar, and therefore, as intimate, as sharing time and place. The act of remembering, then, is a strenuous art and cultivation which operates in and through the “republican banquet” that happens around the table of time and place. Middle East Technical University, Ankara, Turkey

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William James, “The Sentiment of Rationality,” The Will to Believe and Other Essays in Philosophy, (New York: Dover Publications, 1956), p. 63. 2 Ibid. p. 64. 3 William James, A Pluralistic Universe, (Lincoln and London: University of Nebraska Press, 1996), p. 21. Hereafter, I refer to this work with the abbreviation APU. 4 APU, p. 20. 5 Ibid., p. 31. 6 Ibid., p. 12. 7 C. Jason Throop, “Articulating Experience,” in Anthropological Theory, vol. 3(2), 2003, pp. 219–241. See p. 228. 8 Bruce W. Wilshire, “Introduction,” William James: The Essential Writings, (Albany: State University of New York Press, 1984), p. xxiv. 9 ERE, p. 71. 10 David C. Lamberth, William James and the Metaphysics of Experience, (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1999), pp. 94–95. 11 William James, Essays in Radical Empiricism, (Lincoln and London: University of Nebraska Press, 1996), p. 42. Hereafter, I refer to this work with the abbreviation ERE. 12 William James, “Preface,” Pragmatism and the Meaning of Truth, (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1981), p. 173. 13 ERE, p. 10. 14 Ibid., pp. 3–4. 15 Ibid., pp. 9–10. 16 Ibid., p. 23. 17 Bruce.W. Wilshire, “The Breathtaking Intimacy of the Material World: William James’s Last Thoughts,” in The Cambridge Companion to William James, Ruth Anna Putnam (ed.), (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1997), p. 109. 18 David C. Lamberth, William James and the Metaphysics of Experience, (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1999). 19 Bruce.W. Wilshire, “The Breathtaking Intimacy of the Material World: William James’s Last Thoughts” in The Cambridge Companion to William James, p. 109. 20 David C. Lamberth, William James and the Metaphysics of Experience, p. 193. 21 Ibid., p. 29. 22 Ibid., p. 30. Lamberth uses this characterization for the function of knowing, but I claim that we can treat the function of memory in the same way. 23 ERE, p. 27. 24 Charles A Hobbs, “Was James a Phenomenologist?,” in Streams of William James, vol.5 issue 3, Fall 2003, p. 13. 25 ERE, p. 160. 26 Ibid., p. 42. 27 Ibid., pp. 86–87. 28 Ibid., p. 47. 29 William James, Pragmatism and The Meaning of Truth, p. 67. 30 William James, “On Some Hegelisms,” The Will to Believe and Other Essays in Philosophy, p. 264. 31 William James, Pragmatism and The Meaning of Truth, p. 66. 32 Ibid., p. 87. 33 See for the first ERE, pp. 76–91, and for the latter APU, pp. 181–221.

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ERE, p. 15. Ibid., p. 12. 36 Ibid., pp. 21–23. 37 James Conant, “The James/Royce Dispute and the Development of James’s ‘Solution”’, The Cambridge Companion to William James, Ruth Anna Putnam (ed.), (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1997), p. 194. 38 Ibid., p. 195. 39 Ibid., p. 194. 40 Ibid., p. 196. 41 See Ibid., p. 196. He claims for this collective experience of mankind as the largest possible community through which James tries to show how the standard of truth precipitates. 42 William James, Pragmatism and The Meaning of Truth, p. 124. 43 ERE, p. 235. 44 Ibid., p. 236. 45 Ibid., p. 80. 46 Ibid., p. 79. 47 Ibid., pp. 81–82. 48 Ibid., p. 44. 49 Ibid., p. 50. 50 Ibid., p. 45. 51 Ibid., p. 49. 52 Ibid., p. 77. 53 Ibid., pp. 85–86. 54 William James, “On Some Hegelisms,” The Will to Believe and Other Essays in Philosophy, p. 264. 55 Ibid., p. 270. 56 Ibid., p. 294. 57 Ibid., p. 294. 58 Henry James, “The Beast in the Jungle,” Great Short Works of HenryJames (New York: Harper and Row Publishers, 1966), pp. 447–490. 59 Ibid. p. 489. 60 Ibid. pp. 488–489. 61 Ibid. p. 488. 62 William James, Pragmatism and The Meaning of Truth, p. 119. 63 Ibid., p. 118. 64 Ibid., p. 125. 65 APU, pp. 321–322. 66 William James, “A Pluralistic Mystic,” Essays in Philosophy, (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1978), pp. 189, 190. 67 William James, “The Sentiment of Rationality,” The Will to Believe and Other Essays in Philosophy, p. 73. 68 APU, pp. 85–129. 69 Ibid., p. 92. 70 Ibid., p. 91. 71 G.F.W. Hegel, Phenomenology of Spirit, A.V. Miller (trans.) (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1977) . 72 Ibid., p. 492. 73 APU, pp. 103–104. 35

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G.F.W. Hegel, Phenomenology of Spirit, p. 51. William James, Pragmatism and The Meaning of Truth, p. 125. 76 G.F.W. Hegel, Phenomenology of Spirit, p. 492. 77 See John McCumber, “Introduction: Transforming Thought,” Endings: Questions Of Memory in Hegel and Heidegger, Rebecca Comay and John McCumber (eds.), (Illinois: Northwestern University Press, 1999), pp. 1–25. 78 Edward S. Casey, “Keeping the Past in Mind,” American Continental Philosophy: A Reader, Walter Brogan and James Risser (eds.), (Bloomington and Indianapolis: Indiana University Pres, 2000), pp. 241–257. 79 Ibid. p. 248. 80 Ibid. p. 251. 81 Ibid. p. 252. 82 John J. Stuhr raises the possibility of re-location of spiritualism, and the pragmatic meaning of spirituality in James. He finds “meliorism”, that is, hope and hard-work in the service of genuine pluralism and ordinary life as the only “valuable contribution that any philosophy might maket to the ongoing renewal of thought and life” (p. 200). See John J. Stuhr, Chapter 10: “No Consolation: Life without Spirituality, Philosophy without Transcendence,” Pragmatism, Postmodernism and the Future of Philosophy, (New York: Routledge, 2003), pp. 189–205. 75

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In this paper I will attempt to show that modern individual as a knowing subject has been constructed as such that (s)he is incapable of forming a private life. Since Kant’s “Copernican revolution” in philosophy, the regulative capacity of human reason, among other things, is accepted as the primary judge to know the nature in general and to understand the human beings within their social context. Though the decisive successes of reason on the side of nature, and its holy victories over the humanity, it is still far away from generating a private life for each individual. Modern individuals are not free and/or autonomous persons, they have to be, more or less, one of the parts of a whole. The more we become an individual, the less we experience the life as private. Despite its complicated nature which is under continuous effects of the social phenomena, human reason always is accepted as the primary representative for ourselves. “We all aspire to be true to ourselves, to be today what we were yesterday, to fulfill our promises.” says Michael Kochin (Kochin 2002, p. 691). Since the history of our bodily existence and our personal past are essentially two different things, the will to have integrity with our body and our personality produces an inevitable tension. For instance, we may remember that we run fast while we were young, but now we know that we cannot run fast like in those years. Our memories create a picture of personality which exists no longer. Our experiences about life in general is, in my opinion, not only determined by the physical phenomena but also is shaped by the socio-cultural factors. In this paper, leaving aside the physical phenomena, I would rather focus on the socio-cultural factors shaping our individualities. Each one of us ought to regard his or her life as supremely important and appreciate, through this, that this is equally true of everyone else. What the classical-individualist position comes to, then, is a view that guides one to be virtuous in the sense that will enhance one’s life as a human being. Since what it is to be human is to have the basic capacity to think and act rationally, doing so will be the broadest imperative of this ethical position. 335 A-T. Tymieniecka (ed.), Analecta Husserliana CII, 335–340. c Springer Science+Business Media B.V. 2009 

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On the other hand, to deny that society is a substance and a value by itself is not necessarily to hold that the human group is a logical fiction or to imply that social harmony is not a good. Individualism is not pluralism, but, if so, how is the difference to be formulated? We may enlarge Hobbes’ phrase so as to say that both extremes of pluralism and organism are states of nature. I do not doubt that the condition of war by each against all can exist (Hobbes 1994, p. 88). Human beings are free agents who carve out their own destinies and who may decide to be unsocial. We may define this aspect of the state of nature as barbarism. Now; barbarism may not only be primitive but civilized as well, manifesting itself in refined and subtle guises, instances of which are the social isolationism of the misanthrope, and the aloofness and indifferentism of the pseudo-philosophic attitude with its utter detachment from human concerns. For if it be a virtue in the Aristotelian God to contemplate himself alone, absence of goodwill to men is a vice in man. On the other hand, social organism is also state of nature, to which it is possible for man to return: for, being free, he can choose to surrender his freedom and thus fall back into the condition of, the parts of the human body which he contains, so that individuals become like fingers or lungs, without autonomy or intrinsic value. This is the condition of slavery, more abhorrent than barbarism. With the latter, there still exists individuality of a sort, brutish and predatory, whereas with the former, individuality has been destroyed. What is the way out, or rather the way between the two extremes? There is a half-way house of a solution according to which society has an instrumental value for the realization of the potencies of individuals. By entering into a society, the individuals are enabled better to provide for their physical needs such as food, shelter, and protection; even more, they are enabled to provide for their spiritual wants, society being a teacher who trains the intellect and the will of men. This is undoubtedly true, but it is not the whole truth about society. Society is more than a tool, no matter how noble the purposes of the tool. Standing firmly on the double-peaked doctrine that only individuals think and act, and that society as such neither thinks nor acts; and that individuals are the basic values, and that society as something apart from individuals has no value, how can we dig deeper to reach the conception of a social harmony which is a good, and of a society which is somehow real? Individualism is a doctrine with two aspects: the one axiological, the other ontological. The first asserts that individuals are the supreme (if not the only) good, the second that individuals are rational and free. The two aspects are not unconnected, for the worth of the individual is derived from the fact that he is intelligent and autonomous. Our problem is to show not merely that society is compatible with these two propositions, but that it is entailed by them.

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The Kantian propositions I have in mind concerning the individualism, are two: (a) that human persons have intrinsic worth. (b) that goodwill toward human persons has intrinsic worth (or that human persons ought to be treated as ends, and not as means only) (Kant 1997, p. 28). I will say that the first asserts a simple value, and the second a complex value (or a second-order value). I call the latter a complex value because it contains a simpler value, as a part. But the contrast between simple and complex values must on no account be confused with that between intrinsic and instrumental values. Goodwill is a complex value, it is true, but its worth is intrinsic and exists quite apart from its results. Doubtless, goodwill has instrumental value as well, for by exercising goodwill towards you, I promote your happiness. Moreover, a man with goodwill toward others enhances his own personality, for in some sense he multiplies his own being by including that of the others in his own. Any kind of human association, like a business corporation, a club, a college, or a state, is a union of individuals in which individuals are in pursuit of a common aim. When there is no aim, the association is “natural”, not rational, as when animals are held together by the herd instinct. While human associations often have a basis in natural instinctive bonds, they are never merely natural. The instinctive drive does not operate in an uncontrolled way but is subject to conscious direction. What is natural—impulse, herd-instinct and environment as well—is material worked over by deliberation. The fact that individuals have an identical aim is not by itself sufficient to establish a society. You and I may both be engaged in the observation of the constellation Andromeda, you in the West and I in the East; our aim is the same; nevertheless, we do not form an association, because we are not cooperating in our pursuit. It is essential that the identical aim be pursued jointly: and this means that the individuals concerned are joint causes of the resulting action, namely the pursuing of the plan. Furthermore, the individuals should be consciously and intentionally joint causes. No association is established by the mere fact that the results of your investigation have, by accident, furthered my own activities in the same direction. Each member must direct his actions with deliberate envisagement of those of all the others. Thus, membership is a symmetrical relation. It is not of course essential that members be equal in rank; there are the officers and there is the rank and file. Yet all alike share the reciprocal relation of envisagement, the officer determining his line of action in view of what the private is to do, just as surely as the private in view of the officer. In this specific sense, all members of an association are equal, the weak equal to the strong; in that all are acknowledged as efficient causes, and in that the decisions of each are arrived at by the equal taking into account of the expected decisions of all. Let us now proceed to the derivation of society from the postulates of individualism. The latter provides that all human beings should respect the dignity

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of individuals; and so far forth generates the association we have designated as a society. Human beings form an association because they pursue a common aim, namely the good of human personality; and they are a society because their aim embraces the whole of man. Unlike all other associations, we do not in this case need a special proviso as to cooperation in addition to that as to identity of aims; for in so far as individuals are said to have goodwill, they are said to cooperate also. This is possible because goodwill is at once the relation of pursuer to pursued and the relation of member to member; and because the aim is also an agent, for individuals are at once pursued and pursuers. You, who are concerned with my good, are a person and therefore an object for my goodwill; reciprocity obtains and society is generated. In society thus constituted, society is no more an agent than it is an objective; only individuals are agents; indeed individuals are both the efficient and the final causes of society. Thus, the premises of individualism remain intact. What is obtained is not a new substance, but a new structure, an interlocking pattern of relations, with human persons as, the terms and with goodwill as the relation. It does not follow, however, that society is merely an aggregate from the fact that it is not a monad; society is a real fact consisting of individuals bound by the real relation of goodwill. Society may be called a common order, although not a common good. And since the aim is the good of individuals, society is achieved incidentally as it were. Perhaps the best way to think of society is not as a substance, nor as a class, but in analogy with the universe. Society is a world, rather than an individual—a world of interacting individuals as the universe is a realm of interacting things. Society is a microcosm; and as the cosmos has laws so society has codes, manners, and laws. Essentially, society must be thought of neither in terms of organism nor of mechanism; society embodies a new category of relationship. Pluralism and organism are patterns of nature, the one in the inanimate field, the other in the field of animate things. But human beings are rational as well as natural. Among human patterns, the family relationship supplies the closest analogue to the organic type, in that the children are dependent on the parents and so are not autonomous individuals. Hence it is misleading to conceive of society as one big family with the state playing a parental role. The members of society are mature and rational individuals. Equally is it misleading to think of society as a group of particles repelling and attracting each other? A difficult task for the individualist is the method of computing and measuring the interests of the members of society. Should I aim to serve the interests of each individual without limitation, one after the other? That would be impossible, since the interests of individuals are bound to be in conflict. It may be that

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the interests of angels harmonize spontaneously, but human beings are a different matter, on account of their material constitution and location. To will that all wills be fulfilled unrestrictedly is to will that these wills be destroyed, and therefore to will a contradiction. Individualism is the doctrine of the reciprocal limitation of interests. Thus, in order to arrive at an estimate, I must consider all interests together in their mutual relevance. But can this be done? It is hard enough to solve the problem of three bodies, let alone when the bodies are numerous, and intelligent to boot. For instance, to compute the interests of A properly, I must take into account the modification of A’s interests by those by B; and in computing B’s interests I must modify them by reference to those of A. But then I must go back to revise my estimates of A whose interests are to be modified by those of B, only as modified in turn by those of A. And so with B; and so to a further revision. Consider that in this instance we have been dealing with a society consisting only of two members. There is the further complication that the members are rational beings making their own computation. B estimates his own interests in terms of his envisagement of the interests of A. Thus, A must estimate the situation in terms not only of B’s actual interests but of B’s interests as modified by B’s reflection. An easy way out of the dilemma is the theory of organism which answers the problem by declaring it to be unreal. There are not several interests to be adjusted; there is only one interest, that of the social organism. But we have already ruled this theory out. Another solution is that goodwill is best exercised not by a regard by each for the interests of all, but by a deliberate selfishness on the part of each. Let each pursue his own interests to the utmost of his ability, and in the end the best interests of each and all will be served. This amounts to the paradoxical doctrine that, the jungle spontaneously generates a society, or rather is a society. In reply, let us grant the point that ruthless competition would produce the best kind of economic goods and the best type of individuals. Make note of the words “kind” and “type”. It would promote individuality rather than the interests of actual particular individuals, serving the species and not the particular. Goodwill is utterly comprehensive, however, and is directed equally to the weak and to the strong, to the just and the unjust. This doctrine has no place for minorities (or for majorities either), any more than nature has, when these are weak or just unfortunate. The solution to our problem lies in the concept of general rules. We do not arrive at our estimates by assessing the interests of particular individuals, but by constructing the hypothesis of a general rule which is then verified by reference to the interests of individuals. The approach is not enumerative but constructive, as in all induction. But induction is an insight into a principle which is not derived from, or built out of, particular insights. The validity of the rule is intrinsic and not based on the further fact that it promotes satisfactions.

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If the rule is that X is bad, then X must be avoided in all cases, without regard to its impact on this or that particular instance. Conversely, it is not true that life anyhow and without limitations is good. The general rule states the necessary, conditions to which life must conform in order that it is good. Thus, goodwill is the will to serve interest under the limitation of the general rule. Of course, it is Kant who, above all other philosophers brought the conception of general rules to the forefront of ethical theory. As is well known, Kant’s principle is that a particular maxim of action is valid if it does not contradict itself when generalized. Clearly this is a theory of rules as cognized a priori and analytically. But in what sense general rules would be self-contradictory or not, is not altogether clear. My own interpretation is that the contradiction arises whenever the private maxim would assert as valid the fulfillment of selfinterest at the cost of the interests of others. Obviously, when such a maxim is universalized, self-interest itself is denied because the other individuals in their turn are granted the right to violate my interest. Thus, should I desire to steal in order to increase my possessions, and then the general rule would read, “All individuals are justified in stealing in order to increase their possessions”. Yet universal stealing (deprivation of property) means no possessions, either for me or for anybody else; conversely universal possession means no stealing. Hence the form of the contradiction is that of all propositions which affirm the promotion of self-interest at the cost of self-interest. Evil is such that to wish it is to wish a contradiction. Finally, it is true that all existing societies are societies imperfectly; society is a movement toward a goal. Progress consists in the enlargement of the area of rational personality so that it will comprise all colors, religions, economic classes, and so on. This is progress in knowledge. But even when I know that X is a person, I may withhold respect from him because I am inhibited by passion. Most people are subject to occasional attacks of uncontrolled passion; passion, then, is a perpetual threat to the goodwill which binds individuals into a society. And that is precisely the point at which the individual loses his autonomy on behalf of the continuance of the society. Uludag University, Bursa

REFERENCES Hobbes, Thomas (1994). Leviathan, Ed. Richard Tuck, New York: Cambridge University Press. Kant, Immanuel (1997). Critique of Practical Reason, Trans. Mary Gregor, Cambridge (UK): Cambridge University Press. Kochin, Michael S. (2002). “Individual Narrative and Political Character,” The Review of Metaphysics, 55:691–709.

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Happiness is like time; it doesn’t move. And people come and go, come and go, come and go . . . —Vasconcelos ABSTRACT

This paper tries to formulate a link between a phenomenological description of certain experiences of the co-presence of the past, present and future with the scientific theory of the block model of the universe that is based on the Einstein-Minkovski conception of spacetime. The argument that is constructed to this end utilizes Whitehead’s process metaphysics. Using Whitehead’s attack on the bifurcation of nature problem as my springboard, I argue that even though the passage of time as described in the block model of the universe transcends our perception of nature (i.e., the 4-dimensional space-time transcends passage of time as we perceive it), this transcendence need not introduce an unbridgeable gap between appearance and reality. I then make use of Reiser’s application of Whitehead’s metaphysics to Gestalt psychology to provide an explanation of our perception of time from a scientific point of view that does not conceptualize mental spacetime as bifurcated from physical spacetime. Finally, I argue, using Whiteheadian concepts, that it is possible to apprehend the block universe through sensuous experience. I am standing outside my door at night, taking a break from writing, smoking in front of a tree. I hear the whistle of a train going by in the distance. The sound of the whistle brings back memories from my childhood while the thought of the train’s motion takes me forward in time. At this moment, I experience a blissful feeling of completeness, where not only my past and my future are brought together in one stretching instant, but also the distance between my country—which is across the ocean—and this tree in this foreign land is covered in that one swift motion of the train. I remember myself as a child, sitting inside and looking out of the window of a train at night, as the train was passing by villages in the dark. I remember seeing strange people sitting around by a river in moonlight, smoking something, and feeling intrigued by this mysterious “picnic” in the middle of the night in the middle of nowhere. I had wanted to be there with those people, but 341 A-T. Tymieniecka (ed.), Analecta Husserliana CII, 341–353. c Springer Science+Business Media B.V. 2009 

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had refrained from thinking up stories in my mind about why they were there and what they were doing. I had not wanted to ruin the inexplicableness of that picture in its complete mystery by filling in all the unexplained details in my imagination. Now is a time when the details have been filled in. Now I am standing there, on the outside, while the child is looking at me from the inside of the train. It is not another child but I who is there and here at the same time, and she is looking at me not only from the past but also from the future where the train has taken her. And looking at now from the future, I know that everyone I have loved and lost will be with me in the future. Nothing is lost, all is complete in this moment. Even though the train keeps moving, this eternal moment moves with it. A face in the window catches a glimpse of someone outside looking up and tries to keep looking back while the figure recedes out of sight in no time; someone outside looks after a waving hand in the train’s window and feels left behind . . . But in fact, the pictures remain. And the rhythm of the train assures me that as surely as I was waiting for that child here, all my past, and all my friends with it, are there, waiting for me, in the future. It is a past and a future filled with joy. We are all completely happy. In this paper, I will try to make sense of this experience of a completeness and bliss that somehow “keeps up” with the passage of time, by using the Einstein-Minkovski conception of spacetime which states that “the relativity of simultaneity implies a [four-dimensional] block universe.” (Kennedy 59)

THE BLOCK UNIVERSE

According to a crude, common-sense understanding of space and time, there is a significant difference between the existence of space and the existence of time: while we are ready to grant that different parts of space exist all at once as a unified whole, we are likely to deny that different slices of time exist all at once. We think that the past has ceased to exist and the future does not exist yet and thus “that only the present exists” (Kennedy 53). For example, I believe that my friend in the U.S. exists at the moment even though we are separated by thousands of miles. However, I do not believe that a friend who died 25 years ago exists in this same robust sense. If there is any sense in which we take my friend to continue to exist, it is through the memory and imagination of those of us who knew her when she was alive. But is our belief in the coexistence of different parts of space not also based on extrapolation by memory and imagination? And could it not be the case that there is something more to my intuitive feeling, when I go down to the Basilica Cistern for example, of

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certain people who have been there and the events that brought them there, centuries ago, than my imagination running wild? In contrast to the crude common-sense understanding of space and time, according to many interpretations of Einstein’s theory of relativity, “the past and the future . . . are just as real as the present” (Kennedy 53). As is well-known, according to Einstein’s theory of relativity, we live, not in a three-dimensional universe, but in a four-dimensional spacetime (Kennedy 50). Further, according to this theory, simultaneity is relative. In other words, to say that “event A and event B are simultaneous” is, in a certain sense, arbitrary, because the perception of what counts as past and what counts as the future depends on the observer’s frame of motion. If somebody were to move past me at the speed of light, what is future for me would already be past for her. Consequently, what counts as the present is also relative to the frame of reference of the observer; there is no slice of time that can be objectively, universally identified as “the present” and used to identify and synchronize all events occurring at that moment. There is no such moment. The apparatus we use to measure time and synchronize events is merely conventional. According to different measurement apparatus; I could be simultaneous with an event in the past or in the future (Kennedy 60). Therefore, “distances and durations are not invariant and therefore are not real properties of anything.” (Kennedy 56) Einstein’s theory is mainly about relations between different measurements, but as John Kennedy explains in his book Space, Time, and Einstein, according to a certain interpretation of Einstein’s theory, a block universe view can be deduced from it, which would show that the past, present and future co-exist. This interpretation, advanced by Hermann Minkovski, adds to Einstein’s theory a premise about what it means to call something “real”: if something is invariant, then it is absolute, real (Kennedy 57). Even though Einstein’s theory shows that distance and duration are not absolute, the spacetime interval (which is calculated by treating distance and duration as if they are two sides of a right triangle and treating the spacetime interval as if it is the third side) is invariant, and therefore, according to Minkovski’s argument, real (Kennedy 58). I shall not here present a detailed analysis of the Einstein-Minkovski view of the 4-dimensional spacetime. In what follows, I will simply assume the correctness of the block model of the universe without a discussion of the controversy developed around it, and directly address the question of whether and how it is possible for me to apprehend that 4-dimensional spacetime, as I boldly claim that I, on a couple of occasions, have.

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A fundamental difficulty immediately confronts me: while there is a significant number of scientists who believe that the block model of the universe is correct, in scientific thought, the reality of this “block universe” is presented to us as something that we can comprehend only with the aid of highly abstract concepts. I, on the other hand, am trying to describe an intuitive experience where the completeness of my past and my future is momentarily seized by me, not through a bloodless abstraction but in immediate and concrete albeit fleeting certainty. Can I be justified in resorting to a scientific theory to shed light on the intuitive experiences of the sort that I am describing? Or should that blissful feeling of completeness be dismissed as merely an emotional reaction to a sensory stimulant that got my memory and imagination working? This fundamental difficulty is in fact what I want to challenge in this paper: is there indeed an unbridgeable gap between the world as it really is (say, a 4-dimensional block) and the way it appears to us (time flowing through a three-dimensional space)? Are apparent nature and causal nature totally divorced from each other? These questions can be posed with adjuvant emphasis in light of Alfred North Whitehead’s formulation of what he called the “bifurcation of nature” problem (Tiebout 43). The bifurcation of nature problem arises because scientists make use of concepts that do not seem to directly apply to immediate experience. The abstract objects of scientific or philosophic thought are often taken to be of a radically different sort than the medley of psychic and sensory elements that constitute immediate experience. Therefore the data of immediate experience are taken to be “in the mind.” The basic intuition which motivates this paper—that I believe that I have had moments when I experienced the co-existence of past present and future— requires me to overcome the bifurcation of nature problem as it manifests itself on this specific subject. I would like to redeem that conviction that my past and my future are fully real and fully there without any loss, that when I remember the past or anticipate the future, my mind does not reach out to a non-existent referent, and disappointed, turn back on itself to rummage through its own dusty and faded layers. I feel that I am firmly though dynamically rooted in that reality that was, is and will be, no matter how many its number of pages and how practically impossible it is for me to apprehend all of it at once. I do not believe that it is metaphysically impossible. It is this presentiment that provides me with the justification for wishing to formulate a link between phenomenology and science. Samuel Alexander addresses this very same issue in his “Preface to 1927 Impression” of Space, Time and Deity, and betakes himself to metaphysics as the branch yielding

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this link between phenomenology and science. Alexander argues that science may not feel the need to reveal how the concepts it utilizes are more than mere postulates of the mind (or a scientist may simply believe that they are in fact no more than mere postulates of the mind), but that “the metaphysician feels an horror of notions which the mind takes for ultimate and indefinable. For,” argues Alexander, “every notion is a notion about something.” (xxiv, emphasis added) Metaphysics says to the special sciences: by all means use notions, like relation, or identity, or what not, and call them indefinables; that is perfectly right for you, but not for me; and even I must admit that they are indefinable; but they are not indescribable nor incapable of identification in concrete experience. (xxiv, emphasis added)

W H I T E H E A D ’ S M E TA P H Y S I C S

In trying to apply this approach to my specific question—how to bring together my concrete experience of this feeling of completeness with the scientific theory of the block universe model—I will depart from the event ontology, utilized by Kennedy to explain the block universe, and instead resort to Whitehead’s process ontology. According to event ontology, the world is made, not of persistent objects, but of a sequence of events, with each event conceived of as analogous to a still photograph in a motion picture. According to Whitehead’s ontology, on the other hand, the world is composed of processes of concrescence (actual entities). These primary building blocks of Whitehead’s ontology constitute themselves through their dynamic connection to other such entities in their environment, from which they selectively leave out or appropriate various elements. The term “concrescence” refers to the emergence of a unified actual entity out of a diversity of elements in its environment. The relation through which a concrescence incorporates an element from another entity is called a “prehension.” The inclusion of an element in the concrescence of a becoming entity is called a “positive prehesion”; its exclusion is called a “negative prehension”. The main challenge to constructing an ontology around processes is the imputation of definiteness to processes, the framing and putting in order of recognizable patterns within change. In addition to actual entities, a second important conceptual tool that Whitehead develops in order to meet this challenge, is the eternal object. Eternal objects are universals that are realized in actual entities, enabling the actual entity to attain and exhibit determinacy, which also makes it possible for other actual entities to prehend it. Whitehead also refers to eternal objects as “potentialities” that the actual entities realize. However, the extensive use that Whitehead makes of the notion of potentiality as a synonym for “eternal object” portends to an additional difficulty

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that will confront me if I try to understand the block model of the universe in light of Whitehead’s ontology: while the block model of the universe states that the future already exists and should thus be conceived of as already fixed, in Whitehead’s ontology, the future seems to be nascent and inchoate. Whitehead speaks of the future as merely a potential, to be realized by the choices that concrescing actual entities make. I believe that this difficulty can also be surmounted, but that would be the topic of another paper. Here, I would like to briefly suggest the ways in which we could embark on tackling this difficulty. First, Whitehead also speaks of God as a very special kind of actual entity whose concrescence takes place from the beginning to the end of time. One could here object that Whitehead makes a distinction between God’s primordial nature and God’s consequent nature. The response to this objection brings me to my second point: one could arguably support both the block model of the universe and the existence of possible worlds. In other words, the existence of a block universe is not necessarily incompatible with the existence of alternative block universes. In Whiteheadian terms, this would mean that if one very complex eternal object has been realized in God’s consequent nature, this does not mean that other complex eternal objects (residing in God’s primordial nature) were not possibilities that could have been realized. Armed with Whiteheadian concepts and the block model of the universe, in the remainder of this paper, I will proceed as follows. (1) First, I will argue that, even though the passage of time as described in the block model of the universe transcends our perception of nature (i.e., the 4-dimensional spacetime transcends passage of time as we perceive it), this transcendence need not introduce an unbridgeable gap between appearance and reality. (2) To elaborate the relation between the personal experience of time and the 4-dimensional spacetime framework, I will make use of Oliver Reiser’s application of Whitehead’s theory to the problems of time in science, philosophy and Gestalt psychology in his two articles “Time, Space and Gestalt” and “Problems of Time in Science and Philosophy”. I shall also continue to refer to Alexander’s ideas, as Reiser himself also states that he is for the most part in agreement with Alexander, “following the doctrine of emergent evolution” (1 Reiser 249). (3) Finally, I will use Whitehead to speculate on how it is metaphysically possible to have an apprehension of 4-dimensional spacetime. To this end, the first step that needs to be taken is (1) to bridge the gap between the spacetime of scientific theory and spacetime as experienced by us. After doing so, we can (2) provide an explanation of our perception of time from a scientific point of view that does not conceptualize mental spacetime as bifurcated from physical spacetime.

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T H E P R O B L E M O F T H E B I F U R C AT I O N O F N AT U R E

(1) Holding psychic time as experienced by us and time as a dimension of the block universe to be of radically different sorts, requiring us to appeal to different faculties of our minds, would in spirit and temperament be no different than retaining the Cartesian idea of an indivisible mental substance which maintains its unity over against the extension of space. Whether it be in the form of Zeno’s paradoxes, Cartesian dualism or conceptualism, the creation of a gap between phenomenological experience and scientific reality can almost always be traced back to a supposed distinction between appearance and reality. To make this point explicit, let us go back to the bifurcation of nature problem expounded by Whitehead and how he professes to solve it. In his article “Appearance and Causality in Whitehead’s early writings,” Harry M. Tiebout explains what Whitehead calls the “bifurcation of nature problem” in three steps. The seeds of the bifurcation of nature lie in the Greek assumption that there is a permanent reality (substratum) underlying appearances. But the bifurcation does not become fully manifest until the 17th century, because until then both primary and secondary qualities are held to inhere in the objects “outside” the mind. In the 17th century, “with the elaboration of the transmission theory of light” and the Cartesian description of res extensa in purely mathematical terms, secondary qualities are no longer perceived as inhering in the physical world. They thus have to be relegated to a mental realm. “This [is] the first bifurcation theory.” (Tiebout 49) Berkeley’s attack on Locke’s distinction between primary and secondary qualities introduces the second, more radical bifurcation theory. Berkeley argues that primary qualities cannot be separated from secondary qualities even in thought, as even the perception of space relies on the perception of secondary qualities (Berkeley 37). Berkeley’s conclusion is that the entire perceived world is “in the mind.” By relegating even the appearance of spatial relations to the mental realm, Berkeley paves the way for Kant’s transcendental idealism. As the apparent world is pushed into the mental realm, it becomes impossible to directly experience or speak of the “real” world which is the cause of the apparent world. It is thus argued that the real world can only be understood through abstract scientific concepts. Hence, we arrive at the third bifurcation theory: conceptualism (Tiebout, 50). Whitehead attempts to solve the bifurcation of nature problem by returning to the first bifurcation theory. In the 17th century, the bifurcation problem first became apparent when the physical theories of the time could not accommodate qualia and qualia thus had to be pushed into the mental realm. Thus, Whitehead’s solution to the bifurcation problem goes through denying the view

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that qualia are in the mind. According to Whitehead, qualia are events. For example, the experience of seeing red is an event involving the interaction of lightwaves, the eye, the brain, and so on. Whitehead uses the technical term “subjective form” to refer to qualia— “how” an entity prehends another. In other words, the “subjective form”— qualia—is the particular manner in which a quality, which, is an eternal object is realized in a specific entity. The difference between “eternal object” and “subjective form” is similar to the traditional distinction between “quality” and qualia. Even though eternal objects are in some ways like Platonic forms and are transcendent in so far as they are possibilities, their realization in a particular occurrence is unlike the exemplification of Platonic forms. When an eternal object is realized in a particular entity, resulting in the subjective form of that entity, it is immanent. The process through which an eternal object enters an actual entity is called ingression. Releasing qualia from their consignment to the mental realm by 17th century philosophy, Whitehead shows that “the data of immediate experience are not ‘in the mind’ nor physically external, but relational.” (Tiebout 51) As Tiebout explains in his article, in his early writings Whitehead develops a theory of knowledge that is based on sense-awareness. According to this view, even highly abstract concepts like space and time are grounded on sense awareness, derived from interactions with nature, which is experienced as “passage, occurrence.” The concepts of space and time are derived from two “fundamental relations” that the actual entities which partake of the network of events are in: “cogredience or simultaneity, and extension.” (Tiebout 44) The notion of space is derived from the ingression of an eternal object in an actual entity. In other words, we learn about space through the forms and patterns we recognize in actual entities, because forms and patterns themselves exhibit spatial properties. The idea of time is based on a certain ordering of a succession of events. For events to be ordered into a succession, they would first have to be cut—sliced out—from “the whole duration” and fixed as snapshots, as in event ontology. But event ontology takes these snapshots to be the basic constituents of the universe, thus betraying its unwillingness to abandon traditional metaphysics’ fixation on static entities. Whitehead, who takes processes of concrescence as the basic constituents of the universe, points out that these “snapshots” are abstractions from an ongoing process. Thus, these snapshots have “a certain temporal thickness,” and as I will re-emphasize later, the “thickness” of the slice cut out of the whole process is relative to the observer doing the cut. Recall that Einstein’s theory of relativity implies that the present (simultaneity) is ambiguous and depends on the observer’s frame of reference, unless the

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observers are in absolute contact. Whitehead uses the term “cogredience” in place of “simultaneity”. The term “cogredience” seems intended to highlight and thus resolve the ambiguity of the term “simultaneity,” as the term “cogredience” seems to suggest the co-ingression of an eternal object in two actual entities—i.e., it seems intended to emphasize the contact of two actual entities which are prehending each other through a form of definiteness. In short, we can say that, in countering the bifurcation of nature, Whitehead does a reversal of Kant. Kant reifies the supposed dualisms existing between phenomena and noumena, subject and object, and so on, by stating that we project space and time onto sensory perceptions. Whitehead, on the other hand, says that we learn about space and time from sensory experience and thus reestablishes a connection between sensory experience and the objective world. S U B J E C T I V E S E N S E O F T H E T E M P O R A L PA S S A G E O F T I M E

(2) I will now try to provide (a) an explanation of our perception of time from a scientific point of view (b) that does not conceptualize mental spacetime as bifurcated from physical spacetime. In explaining this position, I will borrow heavily from a 1934 paper by Oliver Reiser, “Time, Space, and Gestalt.” (a) I will first briefly explain how the subjective sense of the temporal passage of time arises from certain events that occupy a location in the objective spacetime framework. The events that give rise to a subjective sense of the passage of time are basically certain physicochemical reactions in our brains, which occupy certain point-instants in the order of nature. As Reiser explains in his article, for there to be a sense of time, these events (physicochemical reactions) must take place within an organism. Reiser employs the term “organism” in the Whiteheadian sense: a whole composed of interacting patterns (2 Reiser 200). Reiser refers to those patterns as Gestalten and he defines Gestalt as “a spatio-temporal organization, or pattern, of matter in which the relations are internal to each other, i.e., there is an interaction between the parts and the whole” (2 Reiser 200). It is important to note here that such an organism is characterized by “wholeness.” In other words, there is a certain organization that the whole seeks to attain and maintain. This endeavor of the organism to attain and maintain its own organization affects the subordinate patterns within it. Thus, in Whitehead’s words, “an electron within the living body is different from an electron outside it” (Quoted in Reiser 201). It is this characteristic of the organism that creates the appearance of a bifurcation between the subjective experiences of an organism and its external environment. In addition to this first condition for the sense of time to exist (that the events must take place within an organism that is characterized by wholeness), Reiser

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adds that this organism (as defined above) must be in an environment that is “in relative motion with respect to the organism” (201). An organism that has a subjective unity within itself has certain internal rhythms. The passage of time is felt when the rhythms internal to and integrated by the organism are related to the external rhythms of its environment (Reiser 201). What constitutes time is an internal sensation that results from observing a certain change in an environment. “That which is externally observed as a movement [is or] can be internally observed as a passage of time.” (2 Reiser 202) Note that Reiser qualifies the motion that gives rise to the sense of time as “relative” motion, because we do not experience motion or change if we are in the same frame of reference with the other objects in our environment. That is to say, physical time is a measure of the change of a system as observed from an external point of view, and varies from one frame of reference to another . . . In certain systems which undergo change, this change is experienced subjectively as temporal passage. This experience constitutes physical time. (2 Reiser 200)

(b) Having situated the subjective sense of the passage of time in the objective spacetime framework, we next need to show that the sensory cogredience of that situated event with what is happening in its environment and the spacetime that is thus perceived is not bifurcated from the totality of space-time that the block model of the universe posits. For this, we must first note that while the observer must needs be an organism and thus have a subjective unity, this unity is not “mental” in the traditional sense of the term. In other words, while the subjective sensation of the passage of time requires an organism in relation to an environment, the organism’s relation to its environment is not like that of a Cartesian mind looking over external space. The organism experiencing the passage of time is a percipient with a distinct perspective embedded in the spacetime network. While I speak of the events (physicochemical reactions) “internal” to the observer as occupying a point-instant in the continuum of spacetime, we should not forget, as Whitehead emphasizes, that the notion of an instant (or a point) is an abstraction. It is an abstraction in two senses: (i)The notion of an instant can only be formed via isolating the dimension of time from spacetime. Just as there is no instant in time without a point in space, there is also “no point in space without an instant in time . . . There are no such things as points or instants by themselves. There are only point-instants or pure events” (Alexander 48). Therefore, the fundamental unit of the 4-dimensional world is an event. Spacetime is a continuum of events or what Whitehead calls “actual entities.” (ii) The abstract notion of “nature at an instant” is derived from the concrete relation of cogredience (or simultaneity) between the percipient event and the

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totality of spacetime. As mentioned above, what we call an “instant” is, strictly speaking, a segment of duration with a certain temporal thickness. The organism experiencing the passage of time forms a “boundary or section or cut between earlier and later” (Alexander 44) and thus forms the notion of the present. Hence, while time as a dimension of the block universe is a continuous duration, it is empirically experienced as successive by the organism who cuts and fixes its attention upon a slice of that moment as the present, thus also defining the past and the future in relation to this moment. The abstraction of time and the ordering into succession of events is made possible by the unity of the organism and the relation of its internal organization and internal rhythms to what is outside. The observer who frames what he/she calls “an instant” also determines which events are simultaneous in that instant. Since simultaneity is relative and ambiguous, we should replace the term “simultaneous” with the term “cogredience.” Again, since simultaneity is ambiguous, among the events that an organism identifies as simultaneous/cogredient with the instant it has framed, there can be others that have different frames of reference and thus different “now(s)” Through sensory cogredience, a percipient entity is connected not only to what it identifies as “here and now” but also to the other events that the events it is cogredient with are cogredient with. “Thus, according to Whitehead, our immediate, momentary experience discloses a uniform relatedness or significance that includes not only the specifically discriminated happenings but also the whole undiscriminated remainder” (Tiebout 44). We thus see that cogredience is cogredience with the totality of spacetime. Since cogredience is cogredience with the totality, we need to say that any instant is simultaneous with the whole. The ambiguity of simultaneity functions as the gradual adding of layers to an instant formed by an organism, thus increasing the temporal thickness of the “now” and revealing what was initially framed as a point-instant to be simultaneous with the whole duration. But what does it mean to say that a point-instant is simultaneous with the duration of the whole process of nature? It means just what I have been trying to argue for: that in fact we perceive “the block.” Even though we cannot take in all of it, what we perceive at the present is a slice of it and not something else. The four-dimensional block is concrete and real, not abstract.

APPREHENDING THE BLOCK

(3) Finally, I want to question whether it is metaphysically possible to intuit the whole spacetime framework through sensory perception.

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The notion of an instant is ambiguous and relative not only because of the ambiguity of simultaneity but also because of the ambiguity and relativity of the temporal thickness of a moment. Exactly what fraction of a second is a moment? The framing of a moment by a percipient entity requires the recognition by that entity of some of the sensory ingredients of its surroundings. Therefore I suggest that the temporal thickness of a moment is associated with the attention span required for a percipient entity to recognize distinctive patterns in its environment. The conventional standards we use to measure time (such as clocks designed to measure hours, minutes and seconds) are based on our adapted ability to recognize the patterns of objects we are accustomed to dealing with in our daily macroscopic lives (as well as the relation between our internal rhythms and the rhythms of the objects in our environment [such as the rhythms of the planets and stars, sunrise and sunset, the turning of seasons, and so on]). These patterns we recognize are, in Whiteheadian terms, eternal objects. Whitehead makes a distinction between simple and complex eternal objects. Simple eternal objects are what we call “qualities.” Complex eternal objects are patterns that structure the interrelations between simple eternal objects. I will suggest that the temporal thickness of the duration identified in/as a moment may be determined by the degree of complexity of the eternal object prehended. To clarify this, we need to understand what Whitehead means by a “conceptual prehension”. Whitehead characterizes an actual entity as essentially bipolar: it has a mental pole and a physical pole. Both physical prehensions and conceptuals prehension are made possible through eternal objects. Like Plato and Hegel, Whitehead also believes that even the simplest form of perception requires the mediation of universals. But in a physical perception, the eternal object that mediates the prehension is immanent: it is a “realized determinant” of an actual entity in the percipient entity’s immediate surroundings (Leclerc 177). The conceptual prehension is the prehension of an eternal object in abstraction from and independently of its particular instance of realization. In more detailed analyses of processes of concrescence, Whitehead describes the actual entity as forming relations and contrasts between eternal objects, trying to synthesize them. The forming of contrasts, “with the addition of diverse eternal objects” yield increasingly more complex structures (Whitehead 250). According to Whitehead, the subject of a process by nature feels an urge towards the realization of a maximum number of eternal objects. The more highly developed the organism, the further-reaching its ability to form higher contrasts and thus prehend more distant potentialities (more complex eternal objects).

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My suggestion is that the temporal thickness of the cut a percipient makes may be determined by the complexity of the eternal object prehended. Therefore, with the aid of the extensive abstraction facilitated by the cogredience of entities with different frames of reference (different “now(s)” ), it is metaphysically possible for a percipient entity to form an instant that grasps elements from the distant past and future, thus seizing a moment that spans the past and the future. Middle East Technical University, Ankara REFERENCES Samuel Alexander, Space, Time, and Deity, 2 vols. (NY: Dover Publications, 1966). Vol. 1. George Berkeley, Three Dialogues Between Hylas and Philonous, ed. Robert Merrihew. Adams (Hackett Publishing Company, 1979). John B. Kennedy, Space, Time and Einstein: An Introduction (Montreal: McGill-Queen’s University Press, 2003). Leclerc, Ivor. Whitehead’s Metaphysics (London: George Allen & Unwin Ltd., 1958). Oliver L. Reiser, “The Problem of Time in Science and Philosophy,” The Philosophical Review 35:3 (May, 1926) pp. 236–252. Oliver L. Reiser, “Time, Space and Gestalt,” Philosophy of Science 1:2 (Apr., 1934) pp. 197–223. Harry M. Tiebout, “Appearance and Causality in Whitehead’s Early Writings,” Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 19:1 (Sep., 1958), pp. 43–52. Alfred N. Whitehead, Process and Reality (New York: MacMillan Company, 1929).

INDEX

Akinci, S., 143–147 Alaku¸s, A. O., 91 Alexander, S., 344, 345, 346, 351 Amabile, T. M., 59 Andrè, L. -G., 37 n.30, 38 n.41 Andriishin, M.V., 266 Aquinas, T., 113 Barbaras, R., 62 Barthes, 136, 137, 138, 251, 255, 256 Baumgarten, H., 151, 162 n.4 Bello, A. A., 63, 64, 124 n.6, 124 n.7 Bennetts, C., 54 Berkeley, G., 347 Berne, E., 82 Bertram, M., 322 Bolotov, A. T., 264 Bréal, M., 165, 191 Brophy, J. E., 58 Bushmen, K., 28 Campbell Neil, A., 36 n.4 Camus, A., 74 Carroll, L., 85 Casey, E. S., 334 n.78 Casey, E., 330 Cassirer, E., 125, 131, 132, 133, 134, 135, 136, 137, 138, 139, 140, 141 n.3 Cecilia, M. A., 52 Chayanov, A.V., 264 Çirakman, E., 307–334 Cohen, I. B., 293 n.1, 296 n.58, 296 n.59 Coimbra, L., 204 n.7

Collins, M. A., 59 Conant, J., 318, 319, 333 n.37 Cotes, R., 297 n.89 Couceiro-Bueno, J. C., 149–163 Damasio, A., 80 De Noronha, M. T., 195–205 de Saussure, F., 166, 175, 193 n.41, 253, 254, 255, 257 Deleuze, 251 Ha´nderek, J., 125–141 Derrida, J., 196, 251, 261 n.6 Descartes, 80, 288 Dewey, J., 110, 124 n.16 Dilthey, W., 132, 133 Dinis, D., 195 Dmitriy, N., 263–270 Donald, M., 37 n.21 Doran, R. M., 47, 50 n.7 Duarte, D., 195 Eli, Z., 38 n.40 Ermolov, A.S., 264 Ernst, P., 125, 131 Eugenio, L., 38 n.49 Ewing, A. C., 147 n.7 Fechner, G., 325 Feldman, D. H., 59 Field, J., 54, 64 Fischer, E., 92 Flanagan, J., 50 n.5

355

356 Foucault, 251, 256 Freud, S., 34, 82, 203 Gadamer, H. G., 153, 162 n.6, 162 n.11, 163 n.14 Galileo, 288 Genovese, L., 124 n.15 Gianni, P., 38 n.44 Goethe, 140 Good, T. L. 58 Gruca, G., 67–76 Hançerlio˘glu, O., 91 Harlacher, E. R., 54 Harris, M., 26, 37 n.27 Haselbach, B., 96 Hegel, G.F.W., 334 n.74 Heidegger, M., 113, 132, 162 n.7, 247 Hergenhahn, B. R., 52 Hervás y Panduro, L., 165 Hobbs, C. A., 314 Hogan, K., 82 Hölderlin, 152, 153 Hoyle, F., 202 Husserl, E., 45, 106, 124 n.20, 162 n.2 Husserliana, A., 38 n.48, 43–50, 248, n.22, n.25, n.26, n 35, n.39, 250, n.25 Hwee, L. S., 52 Ibsen, H., 141 Ilvitskaya, S.V., 306 Immanuel, K., 147 n.5 Ingarden, R., 151, 162 n.3 Jacobson, 252, 258 Jacques, R., 38 n.42 Jaeger, W., 155, 162 n.8 James, H., 322 James, W., 307, 323, 332 n.1, 332 n.3 Jared, D., 38 n.43 Jarvis, 61 Jason Throop, C., 332 n.7 Jean, D., 38 n.34 Josef, K., 70 Kafka, F., 67 Kandinsky, W., 89

INDEX

Kant, I., 147 n.5 Kashtanov, A.N., 267 Kennedy, J. B., 342–343, 345 Kierkegard, S., 127 Kochin, M. S., 335 Kochin, M., 335 Koltunov, N.M., 266 Koren, H. J., 80, 81 Kristeva, 251 Kronegger, M., 44 Kurenkova, R. A., 55 Lamberth, D. C., 311, 313, 332 n.10 Landgrebe, L., 236 Latecka, E., 79–85 Leclerc, I., 352 Lee, R., 28 Lehar, S., 84 Lengrand, P. 55 Levinas, E., 45, 50 n.2 Lévi-Strauss, 251, 255, 256–260, 261 n.2, n.3, n.4, n.9 Lipps, T., 106 Lonergan, B., 46, 50 n.4 Luijpen, 80, 81 Luijpen, W. A., 80, 81 Machado, A., 201 McLuhan, M., 49 Manfred, E., 36 n.14 Manuel, F. E., 293 n.3 Marcher, J., 322 Marcuse, H., 128 Martin, P. R. 61, 62 Martindale, C., 59 Martino, R., 36 n.5 Marvin, H., 26, 37 n.27 Marx, K., 209 Merleau-Ponty, M., 84, 247 Miller, S. L., 23 Minkovski, H., 343 Mukarowski, 252 Narcissus, 129 Newton, I., 277 Nietzsche, 156

INDEX Oizerman, T. I., 143, 147 n.3 Orpheus, 129 Oudachin, S.A., 264 Ovcharenko, L. I., 264 Öztürk, A., 87–98 Parkan, B., 341–352 Paul, E., 37 n.28, n.31 Pershin, P.N., 264 Philip, L., 37 n.18 Pineau, G., 52, 64 Radchevskiy, N.M., 266 Razumovskiy, V. M., 264 Reich, W., 32, 38 n.39 Reiser, O. L., 341, 346, 349, 350 Rey, A. D., 165–190 Richard, D. E., 35 n.2 Richard, L. E. F., 38 n.45 Ricoeur, P., 125, 128, 141 n.2 Roberto, V., 15–38 Roger, L., 38 n.45 Rolla A., 37 n.35, 38 n.37 Roller, H. D., 298 Ross, D. A., 207–225 Royce, J., 318 Ruibal, Á. A., 165, 190 n.1 Runco, M. A., 59 Ryba, T., 43–50 Sakamoto, S. O., 59 Saltz, G., 56 San, I., 92 Scheler, M., 104 Schelling, 152 Schopf William J., 36 n.16 Selvi, K., 51–64 Seng, L. W., 52 Serin, I., 335–340 Shaper, E., 147 n.4

357

Shelling, 152 Spiegelberg, H., 50 n.3 Stein, E., 45, 103, 124 n.6, 124 n.23 Stephen, G. J., 38 n.53 Steve, O., 36 n.7 Stone, H., 56, 57 Stone, S., 56–57 Strózewski, W., 141 n.1 Stuhr, J. J., 333 n.82 Telmo, P., 35 n.1 Teloni, M. -C., 103–123 Terrence, D. W., 37 n.19 Thompson, E., 79 Tiebout, H. M., 347 Todorov, 251 Trubeckoj, 252 Tymieniecka, A.T., 47, 50 n.14, 64, 124 n.21, 247, 264, 269 Valeryevna, I. S., 301–306 Varela, F. J., 79 Vasconcelos, C. M., 196 Verducci, D., 104, 124 n.5 Volkov, S.N., 267 Wait, E. C., 80 Watkins, 82 Watkins, H. H., 82, 83 Watkins, H., 82 Watkins, J. G., 82, 83 Whiston, W., 295 n.38 Whitehead, A. N., 345–352 Wilhelm, R., 32, 38 n.38 Wilshire, B. W., 310, 332 n.8 Wittgenstein, 160 Wojnar, I., 53 Zambrano, M., 201 Zoidze, E. K., 264