This chapter contains sections titled: References.

Regarding the relation of Plato’s early and middle period dialogues, scholars have been divided to two opposing groups: unitarists and developmentalists. While developmentalists try to prove that there are some noticeable and even fundamental differences between Plato’s early and middle period dialogues, the unitarists assert that there is no essential difference in there. The main goal of this article is to suggest that some of Plato’s ontological as well as epistemological principles change, both radically and fundamentally, between the early and (...) middle period dialogues. Though this is a kind of strengthening the developmentalistic approach corresponding the relation of the early and middle period dialogues, based on the fact that what is to be proved here is a essential development in Plato’ ontology and his epistemology, by expanding the grounds of development to the ontological and epistemological principles, it hints to a more profound development. The fact that the bipolar and split knowledge and being of the early period dialogues give way to the tripartite and bound knowledge and benig of the middle period dialogues indicates the development of the notions of being and knowledge in Plato’s philosophy before the dialogues of the middle period. -/- Keywords Plato; early dialogues; middle dialogues; being; knowledge; development -/- Introduction The differences between two groups of the early and middle period dialogues have always been a matter of dispute. Whereas the developmentalists like Vlastos, Silverman (2002), Teloh (1981), Dancy (2004) and Rickless (2007) think that from the early to the middle dialogues Plato’s philosophy changes, at least in some essential points, the unitarists like Kahn, Cherniss and Shorey believe that there happens no development and the differences must be taken as natural, ignorable and even pedagogic. In his well-known article, Socrates contra Socrates in PLATO, Vlastos lists ten theses of difference between two groups of dialogues. The first group which includes Plato’s early dialogues he divides to 'elenctic' (Apology, Charmides, Crito, Euthyphro, Gorgias, Hippias Minor, Ion, Laches, Protagoras and Republic I) and 'transitional' (Euthydemus, Hippias Major, Lysis, Menexenus and Meno) dialogues. These transitional come after all the elenctic dialogues and before all the dialogues of the second group which compose Plato’s middle period dialogues, including (with Vlastos' chronological order) Cratylus, Phaedo, Symposium, Republic II-X, Phaedrus, Parmenides and Theaetetus (1991, 46-49). Vlastos asserts strictly that his list of differences are 'so diverse in content and method that they contrast as sharply with one another as with any third philosophy you care to mention, beginning with Aristotole’s' (ibid, 46). Vlastos’ list of differences between two Socrateses is considered a view breaking sharply between the early and the middle dialogues. Besides all ten differences between the two Socrateses in Vlastos’ list that can be supportive for our doctrine here, we intend to focus on some ontological as well as epistemological distinctions that have not completely been discussed hitherto. Contrary to the developmentalist theory of Vlastos, unitarian theory of Charles Kahn wishes to eliminate any substantial difference between the early and the middle dialogues. He distinguishes seven 'pre-middle' or 'threshold' dialogues including Laches, Charmides, Euthyphro, Protagoras, Meno, Lysis and Euthydemus from the other Socratic dialogues which he calls 'earliest group' (1996, 41). The threshold dialogues, Kahn thinks, 'embarke upon a sustained project' that is to reach to its climax in the middle period dialogues, namely Phaedo, Symposium and Republic. Believing in that there is no 'fundamental shift'between the early and middle dialogues (ibid, 40), Kahn thinks the Socratic dialogues are just the 'first stage' with a 'deliberate silence' towards the theories of later periods (ibid, 339). One of the reasons of the surprising fact that Plato gives no hint of the metaphysics and epistemology of the Forms in the early dialogues, he thinks, is the pedagogical advantages of aporia. He thinks that Plato 'obscurely', and mostly because of education, hinted to some doctrines and conceptions in his early dialogues and with the aim of clarifying them only in the later ones (ibid, 66). The seven threshold dialogues, Kahn asserts, 'had been designed from the first' to prepare the pupils and readers for the views expounded in the middle period dialogues (ibid, 59-60). To show that the differences of the two Socrateses of the early and middle period dialogue are in their onto-epistemological grounds and thence cannot be explained by a unitaristic view, we try to draw the ontological and epistemological principles of the early dialogues in the first part below in order to show, in the second part, that those principles have been developed in the middle period dialogues. -/- A. The Onto-Epistemologic Principles of the Early Dialogues Socratic dialogues are paradoxical about knowledge because while being knowledge-oriented always searching for knowledge, they deny it and even never discuss it directly. Three elements of Socrates’ way of searching Knowledge throughout the early dialogues, i.e. Socratic 'what is X?' question, his disavowal of knowledge and his elenctic method combined together produce something like a circle which works, more or less, in the same way in these dialogues. Though this circle is an embaressing inquiry always resulting in ignorance instead of knowledge, its motivation is surprisingly Socrates’ passionate enthusiasm for knowledge, an intensive love of wisdom. The starting point of this circle is Socrates’ confession of having no knowledge which might be explicitly asserted or presupposed, maybe because it was one of the famous characteristics of Socrates; a confession always paradoxically accompanied with his intense longing for knowledge (e.g., Gorgias 505e4-5). Every time Socrates encounters with someone who thinks he knows something (οἴεταί τι εἰδέναι) (Apology 21d5) and tries to examine him. This examination seems to be the simplest one asking just what it is that he knows. Socrates’ elenchus, therefore, is always connected with 'what is X?' (τίς ποτέ ἐστιν) question, a question that most of the early dialogues of Plato are concerned with; 'what is courage?' in the Laches, 'what is piety?' in Euthydemus, 'what is temperance?' in Charmides and 'what is beauty?' in Hippias Major. This question we call here 'Socratic question' and probably is the very question the historical Socrates used to employ, is tightly interrelated with both his disavowal and his elenchus. He disclaims knowledge because he cannot find the answer to the question himself and he rejects others’ since they cannot offer the correct answer too. Every interlocutor can claim he knows X, if and only if he can answer the Socratic question. Otherwise, he is more of an ignorant than of a knower of τί ποτέ ἐστι X. Knowing the answer to this question is, thus, knowledge’s criterion for Socrates. Having found out that he cannot answer what it is which he would claim to know, the interlocutor comes to the point Socrates was there at the beginning. The least advantage of this circle is that he becomes as wise as Socrates does about the subject, becoming aware that he does not know it. At the end of the circle they are both still at the beginning, not knowing what X is. So let us first take a glance at these three elements. Socratic disavowal of knowledge is strictly asserted in some passages. At Apology 21b4-5, Socrates says: -/- I do not know of myself being wise at all (οὔτε μέγα οὔτε σμικρὸν σύνοιδα ἐμαυτῷ σοφὸς ὤν) -/- Moreover, at 21d4-6: -/- None of us knows anything worthwhile (καλὸν κἀγαθὸν εἰδέναι) …. I do not know (οἶδα) neither do I think I know. -/- In Charmides Socrates speaks about a fear about his probable mistake of thinking that he knows (εἰδέναι) something when he does not (166d1-2). The somehow generalization of this disavowal can be seen in Gorgias. After calling his disavowal 'an account that is always the same' (509a4-5), Socrates continues (a5-7): -/- I say that I do not know (οἶδα) how these things are, but no one I have ever met, like now, who can say anything else without being absurd. -/- At the end of Hippias Major (304d7-8), Socrates affirms his disavowal of knowledge of 'what is X?' this time about the fine: -/- I do not know (οἶδα) what that is itself (αὐτὸ τοῦτο ὅτι ποτέ ἐστιν). Some other passages, however, made a number of scholars dubious about Socrates’ disavowal. Vlastos mentions Apology 29b6-7 as an evidence : 'that to do wrong and to disobey one’s master, both god and men, I know (οἶδα) to be evil and shameful'. He thinks that if we give this single text 'its full weight' it can suffice to show that Socrates does claim knowledge of a moral truth (1985, 7). Vlastos’ claim is not admittable since it would be too strange, I think, for a man like Socrates to violate his disavowal claim just after emphasizing it. We can see his claim just before the already mentioned passage: -/- And surely it is the most blameworthy ignorance to believe that one knows what one does not know. It is perhaps on this point and in this respect, gentlemen, that I differ from the majority of men and if I were to claim that I am wiser than anyone in anything it world be in this, that, as I have no adequate knowledge (οὐκ εἰδὼς ἱκανῶς) of things in the underworld, so I do not think I have (οὐκ εἰδέναι) (Apology 29b1-6) Vlastos tries to solve what he calls the 'paradox' of Socrates’ disavowal of knowledge distinguishing the 'certain' knowledge from 'elenctic' knowledge (1985, 11) and thinking that when Socrates avows knowledge, we must perceive it as an elenctic knowledge, a knowledge its content 'must be propositions he thinks elenctically justifiable' (ibid, 18). Irwin’s solution is the distinction of knowledge and belief. He approves that Socrates does not 'explicitly' make such a distinction, but still thinks that Socrates’ 'test for knowledge would make it reasonable for him to recognize true belief without knowledge, and his own claims are easily understood if they are claims to true belief alone' (1977, 40). While I agree with Vlastos up to a point, I strongly disagree with Irwin about the early dialogues. As I will try to show below, we are not permitted to consider any kind of distinction within knowledge in Socratic dialogues because only one category of knowledge is alluded to there and the distinction of knowledge and belief thoroughly belongs to the second Sorcates. Although no kind of distinction can be admittable here, I think Vlastos’ distinction can be accepted only if we regard it as a distinction between knowledge, which is unique and without any, even incomparable, rival, and a semi-idiomatic and ordinary one that is a necessary requirement for any argument, and thus, unavoidable even for someone who does not claim any kind of knowledge. An apparent evidence of this is Gorgias 505e6-506a4: -/- I go through the discussion as I think it is (ὡς ἄν μοι δοκῇ ἔχειν), if any of you do not agree with admissions I am making to myself, you must object and refute me. For I do not say what I say as I know (οὐδὲ γάρ τοι ἔγωγε εἰδὼς λέγω ἃ λέγω) but as searching jointly with you (ζητῶ κοινῇ μεθ᾽ ὑμῶν). -/- The minimal degree of knowledge everyone must have to take part in an argument, conduct it and use the phrase "I know" when it is necessary is what Socrates cannot deny. We can call it elenctic knowledge only if we agree that it is not the kind of knowledge that Socrates has always been searching, the one that can be accepted as the answer of Socratic 'what is X?' question. His disavowal of knowledge is applied only to the knowledge which can truly be the answer of Socratic question and pass the elenctic exam; a knowledge that, I believe, is never claimed by first Socrates. Socrates conducts his method of examining his interlocutors’ knowledge, our second element here, by almost the same method repeated in Socratic dialogues. That whether we are allowed to regard all the examinations of Socrates in the early dialogues as based on the same or not has been a matter of dispute. Vlastos himself (1994, 31) distinguished Euthydemas, Lysis, Menexenns and Hippias Major from the other Socratic dialogues because he thinks Socrates has lost his faith to elenchus in there. Irwin (1977, 38) distinguishes Apology and Crito where Socrates’ own convictions is present. Contrary to some scholars like Benson (2002, 107) who take elenchus in all the Socratic dialogues as a unique method, Michelle Carpenter and Ronald M. Polansky (2002, 89-100) argue pro the variety of methods of elenchus. Thomas C. Brickhouse and Nicholas D. Smith (2002, 145-160) even reject such a thing as Socratic elenchus which can gather all of the Socrates’ various arguments under such a heading. There can be no solution for the problem of elenchus, they think, is due to 'the simple reason that there is no such thing as 'the Socratic elenchos"'(p.147). Though we consider elenchus a somehow determined process and a part of Socratic circle in the early dialogues, all we assume is that whatever differences it might have in different dialogues, it has the same onto-epistemological principles and, thus, we are not going to take it necessarily as a unique method. This method sets out to prove that the interlocutors are as ignorant as Socrates himself is. That whether elenchus is constructive, capable of establishing doctrines as Vlastos (1994) or Brickhouse and Smith (1994, 20-21) believe or not is another issue to which this paper is not to claim anything. What is crucial for our discussion here is that elenchus does not reach to the very knowledge Socrates is looking for. This is strictly against Irwin who thinks that not only elenchus leads to positive results, 'it should even yield knowledge to match Socrates’ conditions'(1977, 68, cf. 48). He does not explain where and how they really yield to that kind of knowledge. He explains his elenctic method in his apology in the court (Apology 21-22), that how he used to examine wise men, politicians, poets and all those who had the highest reputation for their knowledge and every time found that they have no knowledge. If we accept, as I strongly do, that Socrates’ disavowal of his knowledge is not irony, it might seem more reasonable to agree that the process that has that disavowal as its first step cannot be irony as well. The key of the circle which can explain why Socrates disclaims knowledge and how he can reject others’ claim of having any kind of knowledge lies in the third element, Socratic question. In Hippias Major (287c1-2), Socrates asks: 'Is it not by Justice that just people are Just? (ἆρ᾽ οὐ δικαιοσύνῃ δίκαιοί εἰσιν οἱ δίκαιοι). He insists at 294b1 that they were searching for that by which (ᾧ) all beautiful things are beautiful (cf. b4-5, 8). At Euthyphro 6d10-11 it is said that the Socratic question is waiting for 'the form itself (αὐτὸ τὸ εἶδος) by which (ᾧ) all the pious actions are pious; and at 6d11-e1: -/- Through one form (που μιᾷ ἰδέᾳ) impious actions are impious and pious actions pious. -/- Since the X itself is that by which X is X, knowing 'X itself' is the only way of knowing X. It is probably because of this that Socrates makes the distinction between the ousia as a right answer to the question and effect as a wrong one: -/- I am afraid, Euthyphro, that when you were asked what piety is (τὸ ὅσιον ὅτι ποτ᾽ ἐστίν) you did not wish to make clear its nature itself (οὐσίαν … αὐτοῦ) to me, but you said some effect (πάθος) about it. (Euthp. 11a6-9) -/- 1. Knowledge of what X is Now it is time to look for the onto-epistemological principles of Socratic circle and its three elements. It cannot reasonably be expected from the first Socrates to present us explicitly and clearly formulated principles of his onto-epistemology when such explications cannot be found even in the second Socrates who has some obviously positive theoris. Since there must be some principles underlying this first systematic inqury of knowledge, we must seek to them and be satisfied with elicitation of the first Socratas’ principle. What will be drawn out as his principles cannot and must not, thus, be taken as very fix and dogmatic principles. Some very slightest principles and grounds suffice for our purposes here. The first principle that is the prima facie significance of the Socratic question and his implementation of all those elenctic arguments I call the principle of 'Knowledge of What X is' (KWX): -/- KWX To know X, it is required to know what X is. -/- Aristotle (Metaphysics 1078b23-25, 27-29, 987b4-8) takes Plato’s τί ἐστι question as seeking the definition of a thing that is the same as historical Socrates’ search but applying to a different field. That Plato’s 'what is X?' question was a search for definition became the prevailed understanding of this question up to now. I am going neither to discuss the answer of Socratic question nor to challenge taking it as definition. What I am to insist is that knowledge is attached firmly to the answer of the question: Knowledge of X is not anything but the knowledge of what X is. It entails, certainly, the priority of this knowledge to any other kind of knowledge about X but it also has something more fundamental about the relation of knowledge and Socratic question. Socrates’ exclusive focus on the answer of his question can authorize the consideration of such an essential role for KWX in his epistemolgoy. The total rejection of his interlocutors’ knowledge when they are unable to answer the question can be regarded as a strong evidence for it. Socrates’ elenctic method and his rejection of others’ knowledge in the early dialogues, which all end aporetically with no one accepted as knower and nothing as knowledge, prevent us from finding any positive evidence for this. We have to be content, therefore, of negative evidences which, I think, can be found wherever Socrates rejects his interlocutors’ knowledge when they are not able to give an acceptable answer to his 'what is X?' question. 2. Bipolar Epistemology Socrates’ rejection of his interlocutors’ knowledge has another epistemological principle as its basis. Let me call this principle Bipolar Epistemology' (BE): BE There is no third way besides knowledge and Ignorance. -/- BE says that about every object of knowledge there are only two subjective statuses: knowledge and Ignorance. Socrates’ disavowal, however, says nothing but that he is ignorant of knowledge of X because he does not know what X is. This means that BE is presupposed here. Socrates’ elenchus and his rejection of interlocutors’ having any kind of knowledge are the necessary results of the fact that he does not let any third way besides knowledge and ignorance. The first Socrates never let anyone partly know X or have a true opinion about it, as he would not let anyone know anything about X when he did not know what X is. -/- 3. Bipolar Ontology The principle of BE in first Socrates’ epistemology is parallel to another principle in his ontology. Plato’s bipolar distinction between being and not being is as strict and perfect as his distinction between knowledge and ignorance. This principle I shall call the principle of 'Bipolar Ontology' (BO): BO Being is and not being is not. BO is apparently the same with the well-known Parmenidean Principle of being and not being (cf. Diels-Kranz (DK) Fr. 2.2-5). Euthydemus’ statement against the possibility of false knowledge can be good evidence for this principle: -/- The things which are not surely do not exist (τὰ δὲ μὴ ὄντα … ἄλλο τι ἢ οὐκ ἔστιν). (Euthydemus 284b3-4) -/- He continues (b4-5): -/- There is nowhere for not being to be there (οὖν οὐδαμοῦ τά γε μὴ ὄντα ὄντα ἐστίν). -/- That BE does not let true opinion as a third option besides knowledge and ignorance seems to be related to BO’s rejecting a third option besides being and not being, which is itself the basis of the impossibility of false belief. Socrates’ elaborate discussion of the problem of false belief in Theatetus that leads to a more decisive discussion and finally to some solutions in Sophist can make our consideration of BO for the first group of dialogues authentive. -/- 4. &5. Split Knowledge and Split Being The fourth principle I shall call the principle of 'Split Knowledge' (SK): -/- SK Knowledge of X is separated from any other knowledge (of anything else) as if the whole knowledge is split to various parts. -/- This Principle is hinted and criticized as Socrates’ way of treating with knowledge in Hippias Major: -/- But Socrates, you do not contemplate the entireties of things, nor do people you have used to talk with (τὰ μὲν ὅλα τῶν πραγμάτων οὐ σκοπεῖς, οὐδ᾽ ἐκεῖνοι οἷς σὺ εἴωθας διαλέγεσθαι). (301b2-4) -/- Contrary to Rankin who regards the passage as 'antilogical, almost eristic in tone rather than presenting a serious philosophy of being' (1983, 54), I think it can be taken as serious. Hippias criticizes Sorcates that he does not contemplate (σκοπεῖς) the entireties of things (ὅλα τῶν πραγμάτων), a critique which Socrates is not its only subject but all those whom Socrates accustomed to talk with (ἐκεῖνοι οἷς σὺ εἴωθας διαλέγεσθαι). This last phrase, I think, extends this critic beyond this dialogue to other Socratic dialogues. Hippias’ use of the perfect tense of the verb ἔθω (to be accustomed) is a good evidence of this extension. We can get, thus, these ἐκεῖνοι as Socrates’ interlocutors in his other dialogues that hints that this criticism has the epistemological groundings of the previous dialogues as its subject. What ἐκεῖνοι οἷς σὺ εἴωθας διαλέγεσθαι points to is that Hippias does not have in mind Socrates’ way of treating things only in this dialogue, but he is also criticizing Socrates’ way throughout his dialogues. At 301b4-5, Socrates and his interlocutors’ way of beholding things is described as such: -/- You people knock (κρούετε) at the fine and each of the beings (ἕκαστον τῶν ὄντων) by taking each being cut up in pieces (κατατέμνοντες) in words (ἐν τοῖς λόγοις). This leads us to our next principle that is parallel to, and the ontological side of, SK, the principle of 'Split Being'(SB): -/- SB Everything (being) is separated from any other thing as if the whole being is split to many beings. -/- Socrates and his interlocutors and thus, as we saw, the Socratic dialogues are accused to regard everything as it is separated from all other things. This separation is en tois logois that, I think, can reasonably be taken as saying that Socratic dialogues (it refers of course to the dialogues before Hippias Major) cut up all things which have the same name/definition from all other things and try to understand them separately, without considering other things that are not in their logos. They, for example in Hippias Major, are cutting up to kalon and try to understand what it and all others inside this logos are by separating it from all other things. This is directed straightly against Socratic question and the way Socratic dialogues follow to find its answer, every time separating one logos. As Meyer (1995, 85) points out, every question 'presupposes that the X in question in a logos is something' and 'every answer to every question aims at unity' (84). The critique of Hippias Major is, therefore, at the same time a critique of SK and SB. It is also a critique of KWX because it is only based on KWX that Socratic dialogues could search for the answer of 'what is X' question supposing that knowing what X is is enough for the knowledge of X. SK and KWX are absolutely interdependent. What Socrates and all his previous interlocutors have neglected in Socratic dialogues, Hippias says, was 'continuous bodies of being' (διανεκῆ σώματα τῆς οὐσίας) (301b6). Either this theory actually belongs to the historical Hippias as it is being said or not, it is strictly criticizing SB. We have the same phrase with changing sūma to logos some lines later at 301e3-4: διανεκεῖ λόγῳ τῆς οὐσίας. Although this theory that can be observed as both an ontological and an epistemological theory is rejected by Socrates (301cff.), it is still against first Socrates’ onto-epistemological principles and might let us look at what is rejected as Socratic prineple. -/- 6. Knowledge is of Being The sixth principle that I think is presupposed by the first Socrates, is the 'Knowledge of Being' Principle (KB): -/- KB Knowledge is of Being. -/- This principle is obviously the source of the problem of false knowledge, a very important problem throughout Plato’s philosophy. We face this problem maybe for the first time in Euthydemus. In less than 20 Stephanus’ pages, 276-295, we are encountered with different interwoven problems about knowledge , all grounded in the problem of false opinion. Having challenged the obvious possibility of telling lies at 283e, at 284 Euthydemus discusses it saying that the man who speaks is speaking about 'one of those things that are (ἓν μὴν κἀκεῖνό γ᾽ ἐστὶν τῶν ὄντων)' (284a3) and thus speaks what is (λέγων τὸ ὄν) (a5). He must necessarily be saying truth when he is speaking what is because he who speaks what is (τὸ ὄν) and the things that are (τὰ ὄντα) speaks truth (τἀληθῆ λέγει) (a5-6). This is based on Parmenidean principle of the impossibility of being of not being which Euthydemus restates (284b3-4) and we mentioned discussing BO principle above. The things that are not are nowhere (οὐδαμοῦ) and there is no possibility for anyone to do (πράξειεν) anything with them because they must be made as being before anything else can be done, which is impossible (b5-7). The words, then, are of things that exist (εἰσὶν ἑκάστῳ τῶν ὄντων λόγοι) (285e9) and as they are (ὡς ἔστιν) (e10). The result is that no one can speak of things as they are not. It is this impossibility of false speach that is extended to thinking (δοξάζειν) at 286d1 and leads to the impossibility of false opinion (ψευδής … δόξα) (286d4). The general conclusion is asserted at 287a extending this impossibility to actions and making any kind of mistake. Not only knowledge is of being but speech, thought and action are of being simply because of the fact that nothing can be of not being. -/- B. First Socrates’ Principles in the Middle Period Dialogues Out of what were presupposed or criticized mostly in five dialogues, Euthyphro, Euthydemus, Hippias Major, Laches and Charmides, we tried to draw the first Socrates’ principles. Our inquiry here is directed to find out the fate of these principles in the three dialogues of the middle period, Meno, Phaedo and Republic. To do this, first we ought to check the situation of Socratic circle in these dialogues. The Socratic circle that was predominant in the early dialogues, does not look like a circle here anymore though they certainly have some features in common. Meno, Phaedo and Republic II-X are not committed to the principles of the circle and the whole circle in disrupted in them. The difference of the two Socrateses towards acquiring knowledge is obvious. The Socrates of Meno, Phaedo and Republic is evidently more self-confident that he can get to some truths during his arguments as he does. They are in their first appearance, as almost all other dialogues, committed to Socrates’ disavowal. All of them try to keep the shape of the Socratikoi Logoi genre, which is committed to the historical Socrates’ way of discussion; a dramatic personage who is to challenge his interlocutors, ask them and refuse the answers. Nevertheless, the fact is that what we have in common between two groups of dialogues is mostly a dramatic structure. Whereas the first group’s arguments are based on Socrates’ disavowal and lead to no positive results, the second group is decisively going to achieve some positive results. The aim of the first Socrates was to show others that they are ignorant of what they thought they knew. The new Socrates of Meno, on the opposite, makes so much efforts to show that the slave boy has within himself true opinions (ἀληθεῖς δόξαι) about the things that he does not know (οἶδε) (85c6-7). Despite his lack of knowledge, he has true opinions nevertheless. The way from these true opinions to knowledge, as Socrates states, is not so long. These true opinions are now like a dream but 'can become knowledge of the same things not less accurate than anyone’s' (οὐδενὸς ἧττον ἀκριβῶς ἐπιστήσεται περὶ τούτων) (c11-d1), if they be repeated by asking the same questions. The most outstanding text regarding Socrates’ disavowal is Meno 98b where he explicitly claims knowledge: -/- And indeed I also speak as (ὡς) one who does not know (εἰδὼς) but is guessing (εἰκάζων). However, [about the fact] that true opinion and knowledge are different, I do not altogether expect (δοκῶ) myself to be guessing (εἰκάζειν), but if I say about anything that I know (εἰδέναι) -which about few things I say- this is one of the things that I know (οἶδα). (98b1-5) This passage is very significant about Plato’s disavowal of knowledge. There can hardly be found, I think, anywhere else in Plato’s corpus where Socrates speaks about his knowledge of something as such. He says first that he speaks as someone who does not know. This ὡς οὐκ εἰδὼς λέγω comparing with what he used to say in the first group, οὐκ οἶδα, has this added ὡς. Socrates does not claim strongly anymore that he does not know anything but speaks only as someone who does not know. He needs this ὡς not only because he is going to accept that he does know some, though few, things immediately after this sentence, but also because he needs his previous disavowal to be loosened from Meno on. He does not merely say here that he knows something. It is then different from the examples mentioned before which could be taken as idiomatic or at least not emphatic. Socrates’ remarkable emphasis on distinguishing εἰδέναι from εἰκάζειν departs it from all other passages where he says only he knows something. Moreover, he claims definitely that he has knowledge about few (ὀλίγα) things. From the early to the middle dialogues, Socrates’ attitude to knowledge has totally renewed its face. He brings forth a new concept, true opinion, and he does not speak of knowledge as he used to before; the rough, perfect and unachievable knowledge of the first group has turned to something more smooth, realistic and achievable. Comparing with the early dialogues that did not set out from the first to reach positive results, the middle ones are extraordinarily and surprisingly positive and hence destroy the basis of the Socratic circle. The questions and answers are purposely directed to some specific new theories; most of them are not directly related to the topics or the main questions of the dialogues. They are suggested when Socrates draws the attention of the interlocutor away from the main question because of the necessity of another discussion. Even if the main question remains unanswered, we have still many positive theories, prominently of metaphysical type. These theories are so abundant and dominant in these dialogues, especially Phaedo and Republic, that one might think that they may appear to be arbitrarily sandwiched in there. This helps dialogues to keep their original Socratic structure while they are suggesting new theories. Hence, the Socratic question of 'what is X?', though is still used to launch the discussion, is loosened and is forgotten for most part of the dialogues. Meno that has first a differently formulated question, 'can virtue be taught?', leads finally to the Socratic question of 'What is virtue?'. Phaedo is dedicated to the demonstration of the immortality of soul and the life after death without having a central Socratic question. The case of Republic is more complicated. The first book, on the one hand, has all the criteria of a Socratic circle: its 'what is justice?' question, Socrates’ strong disavowal (e.g. 337d-e), his rejection of all answers and coming back to the first point without finding out any answer. This Book, considered alone, is a perfect Socratic dialogue, as many scholars regard it as early and separated from other books. The books II-X are, on the other hand, far from implementing a Socratic circle. They have still the 'what is justice?' question as their incentive leading question, but they are, in most of the positive doctrines and methods that encompass the main parts, ignoring the question. Even these books that, I believe, are the farthest discussions from the Socratic circle are so cautious not to break the Socratic structure of the dialogue as long as it is possible. What is changed is not the structure of the dialogue but the ontological and epistemological grounds based on which new theories are suggested. -/- 1. Knowledge of the Good We can clearly see in the second group of dialogues that the KWX principle loses the place it had before in our first group. It is not, of course, rejected, but still we cannot say that it has the same situation. KWX that was based on Socratic question, as we discussed before, was the leading principle of the first Socrates’ epistemology and of the highest position. Other epistemological principles, SK directly and BE indirectly, were relying on Socratic question and therefore on KWX. Such a position does not belong to KWX from Meno on. What makes it different in the second Socrates is another principle that is needed it not only as its complementary principle but also as what is more fundamental. Plato, then, does not reject KWX in this period, but, it seems, he transcends to another more basic principle; a principle we shall call the principle of 'Knowledge of the Good' (KG): -/- KG Knowledge of X requires knowledge of the Good. -/- Whereas all the dialogues of our first group are free from any discuscon about KG, it bears a very important role in the second group so as becomes the superior principle of knowledge in Republic. Trying to solve the problem of teachability of virtue, Socrates says that it can be teachable only if it is a kind of knowledge because nothing can be taught to human beings but knowledge (ἐπιστήμην) (Meno 87c2). The dilemma will be, then, whether virtue is knowledge or not (c11-12) and since virtue is good, we can change the question to: whether is there anything good separate from knowledge (εἰ μέν τί ἐστιν ἀγαθὸν καὶ ἄλλο χωριζόμενον ἐπιστήμης) (d4-5). Therefore, the conclusion will be that if there is nothing good which knowledge does not encompass, virtue can be nothing but knowledge (d6-8). What let us discuss KG as an epistemological principle for the second Secrates is the relation he tries to establish between knowledge and the Good which, though is alongside with the mentioned thesis and the idea of virtue as knowledge, goes much deeper inside epistemology asking to regard the Good as the basis of knowledge. The effort of Phaedo cannot succeed in establishing the Good as the criterion of explanation and knowledge since, I think, it needs a far more complicated ontology of Republic where Socrates can finally announce KG. What is said in Republic is totally compatible with Phaedo 99d–e and the metaphor of watching an eclipse of the sun. In spite of the fact that we do not have adequate knowledge of the Idea of the Good, it is necessary for every kind of knowledge: 'If we do not know it, even if we know all other things, it is of no benefit to us without it' (505a6-7). The problem of our not having sufficient knowledge of the Idea of Good is tried to be solved by the same method of Phaedo 99d-e, that is to say, by looking at what is like instead of looking at thing itself (506d8-e4). It is this solution that leads to the comparison of the Good with sun in the allegory of Sun (508b12-13). What the Good is in the intelligible realm corresponds to what the sun is in the visible realm; as sun is not sight, but is its cause and is seen by it (b9-10), the Good is so regarding knowledge. It has, then, the same role for knowledge that the sun has for sight. Socrates draws our attention to the function of sun in our seeing. The eyes can see everything only in the light of the day being unable to see the same things in the gloom of night (508c4-6). Without the sun, our eyes are dimmed and blind as if they do not have clear vision any longer (c6-7). That the Good must have the same role about knowledge based on the analogy means that it must be considered as a required condition of any kind of knowledge: -/- The soul, then, thinks (νόει) in the same way: whenever it focuses on what is shined upon by truth and being, understands (ἐνόησέν), knows (ἔγνω) and apparently possesses understanding (νοῦν ἔχειν). (508d4-6) -/- Socrates does not use agathon in this paragraph and substitutes it with both aletheia and to on. He links them with the Idea of the Good when he is to assert the conclusion of the analogy: -/- That which gives truth to the objects of knowledge and the power of knowing to the knower, you must say, is the Idea of the Good: being the cause of knowledge and truth (αἰτίαν δ᾽ ἐπιστήμης οὖσαν καὶ ἀληθείας) so far as it is known (ὡς γιγνωσκομένης μὲν διανοοῦ). (508e1-4) Knowledge and truth are called goodlike (ἀγαθοειδῆ) since they are not the same as the Good but more honoured (508e6-509a5). KG, which had been implicitly contemplated and searched in Phaedo, is now explicitly being asserted in Republic. As what was quoted clearly proves, this principle is the very one which we can observe as the most fundamental principle of the second Socrates in Republic, corresponding to the role KWX had in the first Socrates. The Form of the Good in Republic, of which Santas speaks as 'the centerpiece of the canonical Platonism of the middle dialogues, the centerpiece of Plato’s metaphysics, epistemology, ethics and …' (1983, 256) much more can be said. Plato’s Cave allegory in Book VIII dedicates a similar role to the Idea of the Good. The Idea of the Good is there as the last thing to be seen in the knowable realm, something so important that its seeing equals to understanding the fact that it is the cause of all that is correct and beautiful (517b). Producing both light and its source in visible realm, it controls and provides truth and understanding in the intelligible realm (517c). -/- 2. Tripartite Epistemology BE is thoroughy rejected in the second Socrates and substituted by its opposite, the principle of 'Tripartite Epistemolgy' (TE): -/- TE Opinion is an epistemological status between knowledge and ignorance. BE of the first Socrates was denying any third way besides knowledge and ignorance which was the foundation of Socratic circle without which Socrates could not reject his interlocutors’ possessing any kind of knowledge. We cannot say, however, that the first Socrates had a third epistemological status in mind but rejected it. Such a status was unacceptable for him so that one can say that he would reject any kind of such status if suggested. There were only two possibilities about knowledge: either one knows something or he does not know it. TE, thus, was not the first Socrates’ discovery and, I think it is not the second Socrates’discovery. All we can see in our second group of dialouges is that he uses this principle as an already demonstrated one. Having examined the slave boy in Meno for the prupose of showing the working of recollection, it truns out that he has some opinions in him while he still does not know. Without trying to prove it, Socrates takes this as the distinction between knowledge and opinion: -/- So, he who does not know (οὐκ εἰδότι) about what he does not know (περὶ ὧν ἂν μὴ εἰδῇ) has within himself true opinions (ἀληθεῖς δόξαι) about the same things he did not know (περὶ τούτων ὧν οὐκ οἶδε) (85c6-7). -/- The same distinction is set between ὀρθὴν δόξαν and ἐπιστήμην at 97b5-6 ff. (also cf. 97b1-2: ὀρθῶς μὲν δοξάζων … ἐπιστάμενος). He connects then their difference to the myth of Daedalus, the statue that would run away and escape. So are true opinions, not willing to remain long in mind and thus not worthy until one ties them down by αἰτίας λογισμῷ (98a3-4). Socrates says that this tying down is anamnesis. We face, in Phaedo, the same relation is settled between knowledge as the process of being tied down and getting the capability to give an account, on the one hand, and anamnesis, on the other hand. When a man knows, he must be able to give an account of what he knows (Phaedo 76b5-6) and since not all people are able to give such an account, those who recollect, recollect what once they learned (76c4). Although the distinction between knowledge and opinion is not explicitly used in Phaedo, referring to the parallel link between knowledge plus account and anamnesis in Phaedo and Meno, one can say that those who cannot recollect are not able to give account and, thus, are in a state of opinion. What is said at Phaedo 84a, though not yet a definite distinction between knowledge and opinion, makes a distinction between their objects so as we can agree that it is presupposed. The soul of the philosopher, Socrates says, follows reason, stays with it forever and contemplates the divine, which is not the object of opinoin (ἀδόξαστον) (84a8, cf. Meno 98b2-5). The distinction of knowledge and belief in Republic has a significant difference with what we discussed in Meno and Phaedo since the distinction of Meno was based on anamnesis and thus more an epistemological distinction. Even in Phaedo that we do not have any elaborate discussion about the distinction, the only hint to the matter at 76 is bound to the theory of anamnesis. In addition to the relation of the distinction with this theory, there is another evidence that does not permit us to consider the distinction as an ontological distinction. Let’s see Meno 85c6-7: -/- So, he who does not know about what he does not know has within himself true opinions about the same things he did not know (τῷ οὐκ εἰδότι ἄρα περὶ ὧν ἂν μὴ εἰδῇ ἔνεισιν ἀληθεῖς δόξαι περὶ τούτων ὧν οὐκ οἶδε). (85c6-7) -/- This last sentence persists that the objects of knowledge and true opinion are the same. What Socrates is to say here is that whereas he does not know X he has true opinion about the same X. I think Socrates’ sentence that the slave boy οὐκ εἰδότι ἄρα περὶ ὧν ἂν μὴ εἰδῇ and his restatement of it by saying περὶ τούτων ὧν οὐκ οἶδε is because he wants to emphasize that the slave boy who does not know, has true opinion about the same thing. Socrates could say this just with using τούτων and there would be no necessity to bring περὶ ὧν ἂν μὴ εἰδῇ for οὐκ εἰδότι if he did not want to emphasize. -/- 3. Tripartite Ontology The distinction between knowledge and true opinion in Republic, on other side, has nothing to do with recollection, but is based on an ontological principle, 'Tripartite Ontology' (TO): -/- TO There are things that both are and are not. -/- This principle I confine, among our three dialogues of the second group, to Republic not extended to Meno and Phaedo, is obviously the opposite of BO. Speaking about the lovers of sights and sounds in the fifth book, Socrates distinguishes them from philosophers because their thought is unable to understand the nature of beautiful itself besides beautiful things (476a6-8) and hence they can only have opinions. The philosopher who, on the contrary, believes in beautiful itself and can distinguish it from beautiful things (476c9-d3), has knowledge because he knows, contrasting others who have opinion because they only opine (d5-6). Since those whose knowledge were degraded as opinion will complain about Socrates’ such calling their thought, he provides them the following argument (476e7-477b1): -/- - Does the person who knows, knows (γιγνώσκει) something (τὶ) or nothing (οὐδέν)? - He knows something (τί). - Something that is (ὂν) or is not (οὐκ ὄν)? - Something that is (ὂν) for how could something that is not be known (πῶς γὰρ ἂν μὴ ὄν γέ τι γνωσθείη)? - Then we have an adequate grasp of this: No matter how many ways we examine it, what completely is (παντελῶς ὂν) is completely knowable (παντελῶς γνωστόν) and what is in no way (μὴ ὂν δὲ μηδαμῇ) is in every way unknowable (πάντῃ ἄγνωστον). - A most adequate one. - Good. Now, if anything is such as to be and also not to be (ὡς εἶναί τε καὶ μὴ εἶναι), won’t it be intermediate (μεταξὺ) between what purely is (εἰλικρινῶς ὄντος) and what in no way is (μηδαμῇ ὄντος)? - Yes, it’s intermediate. - Then as knowledge (γνῶσις) is set over what is (τῷ ὄντι), while ignorance (ἀγνωσία) is of necessity set over what is not (μὴ ὄντι) mustn’t we find an intermediate between ignorance (ἀγνοίας) and knowledge (ἐπιστήμης) to be set over the intermediate, if there is such a thing? -/- From the third status of being we must reach to the third status of knowledge. The simple reading of this text can be an existential reading, taking the "is" of the mentioned sentences as existence. The problem is that when it is said that there is something that both is and is not reading "is" existentially, it sounds too bizarre to be acceptable. It cannot easily be understandable to have something as both existent and non-existent at the same time. This problem arose so many debates and led many scholars to reject the existential reading of "is" and suggest some other readings like predicative or veridical readings. I think though Plato’s complicated ontology of Republic cannot be correctly understood by a simple existential reading, this "is" cannot be free from existential sense of being and, thus, cannot be reduced to just a predicative or veridical sense of being. -/- 4. Bound Knowledges In addition to KG, the Good is also the basis of another principle in the second Socrates, namely the principle of 'Bound Knowledge' (BK): -/- BK Knowledge of everything is bound to the knowledge of the Good. -/- We distinguished BK from KG because we want to insist, in BK, on what had not been insisted upon in KG, that is, the binding role that the Good plays in the second Socrates, contrasting the absence of such a role in the first Socrates. Socrates remembers, in Phaedo, his wonderful keen on natural philosophers' wisdom when he was young. The origin of this enthusiasm was Socrates’ hope to know the cause of everything as they used to claim. When he was searching the matters of his interest on their basis, Socrates says, he became convinced he can get no acceptable answer from them and found himself blind even to the things he thought he knew before. One day he hears Anaxagoras’ theory that 'it is Mind that arranges and is the cause of everything (ὡς ἄρα νοῦς ἐστιν ὁ διακοσμῶν τε καὶ πάντων αἴτιος)' (Phd. 97c1-2 cf. DK, Fr.15.8-9, 11-12, 12-14) and thinks that he can finally find what he has always expected, i.e. something which can explain all things. What I intend to show here is that what makes Socrates hopeful is that Anaxagoras’ theory tries 1) to explain all things by one thing and 2) this explanation is understood by Socrates as if it is based on the concept of the Good. That Socrates was searching for one explanation for all things can be proved even from what he has been expecting from natural philosophers. The case is, nonetheless, more clearly asserted when he speaks about Anaxagoras’ theory. In addition to διακοσμῶν τε καὶ πάντων αἴτιος of 97c2 mentioned above, we have τὸ τὸν νοῦν εἶναι πάντων αἴτιον (c3-4) and τόν γε νοῦν κοσμοῦντα πάντα κοσμεῖν (c4-5) all emphasizing on the cause of all things (πάντα) which can clearly prove that one of the reasons which caused Socrates to embrace it delightfully was its claim to provide the cause of all things by one thing. Another reason was that Anaxagoras’ Mind, at least in Socrates’ view, was attempting to explain everything by the concept of the Good. This connection between Mind and Good belongs more to the essential relation they have in Socrates’ thinking than Anaxagoras’ theory because there are almost nothing about such a relation in Anaxagoras. The reason for Socrates’ reading can be that Mind is substantially compatible with Socrates’ idea of the relation between good and knowledge. Both the thesis 'no one does wrong willingly' and the theory of virtue as knowledge we pointed to above are evidences of this essential relation. Nobody who knows that something is bad can choose or do it as bad. The reason, when it is reason, that means when it is as it should be, when it is wise or when it knows, works only based on good-choosing. In this context, when Socrates hears that Mind is considered as the cause of everything, it sounds to him like this: good should be regarded as the basis of the explanation of all things. We see him, thus, passing from the former to the latter without any proof. This is done in the second sentence after introducing Mind: -/- I thought that if this were so, the arranging Mind would arrange all things and put each thing in the way that was Best (ὅπῃ ἂν βέλτιστα ἔχῃ). If one then wished to find the cause of each thing by which it either perishes or exists, one needs to find what is the best way (βέλτιστον αὐτῷ ἐστιν) for it to be, or to be acted upon, or to act. On these premises then it befitted a man to investigate only, about this and other things, what is the most excellent (ἄριστον) and best (βέλτιστον). The same man must inevitably also know what is worse (χεῖρον), for that is part of the same knowledge. (97c4-d5) This passage is a good evidence of Socrates’ leap from Anaxagoras’ Mind to his own concept of the Good that can explain why Socrates found Anaxagoras theory after his own heart (97d7). Mind is welcomed because of its capability for explanation on the basis of good to 'explain why it is so of necessity, saying which is better (ἄμεινον), and that it was better (ἄμεινον) to be so' (97e1-3). What Socrates thought he had found in Anaxagoras can indicate what he had been expecting from natural scientists before. Socrates could not be satisfied with their explanations because they were unable to explain how it is the best for everything to be as it is. It can probably be said, then, that it was the lack of the unifying Good in their explanation that had disappointed him. We must insist that we are discussing what Socrates thought that Anaxagoras’ theory of Mind should have been, not about Anaxagoras’ actual way of using Mind. Phaedo 97c-98b, is not about what Socrates found in Anaxagoras but what he thought he could find in it. On the contrary, it should also be noted that it was not this that was dashed at 98b, but Anaxagoras’ actual way of using Mind. It was Anaxagoras’ fault not to find out how to use such an excellent thesis (98b8-c2, cf. 98e-99b). Socrates gives an example to show how not believing in 'good' as the basis of explanation makes people be wanderers between different unreal explanations of a thing. His words δέον συνδεῖν (binding that binds together) as a description for the Good we chose as the name of BK principle: They do not believe that the truly good and binding binds and holds them together (ὡς ἀληθῶς τὸ ἀγαθὸν καὶ δέον συνδεῖν καὶ συνέχειν οὐδὲν οἴονται). (99c5-6) -/- Having in mind Plato’s well-known analogy of the sun and the Good at Republic 508-509, we can dare to say that his warning of the danger of seeing the truth directly like one watching an eclipse of the sun in Phaedo (99d-e) is more about the difficulty of so-called good-based explanation than its insufficiency, a difficulty which is precisely confirmed in Republic (504e-505a, 506d-e). Moreover, BK is asserted in a more explicit way in the Republic, where the Good is considered not only as a condition for the knowledge of X, as was noted above discussing KG, but also as what binds all the objects of knowledge and also the soul in its knowing them. At Republic VI, 508e1-3, when Socrates says that the Form of the Good 'gives truth to the things known and the power to know to the knower (τοῦτο τοίνυν τὸ τὴν ἀλήθειαν παρέχον τοῖς γιγνωσκομένοις καὶ τῷ γιγνώσκοντι τὴν δύναμιν ἀποδιδὸν)', he wants to set the Good at the highest point of his epistemological structure by which all the elements of this structure are bound. This binding aspect of the Good is by no means a simple binding of all knowledges or all the objects of knowledge, but the most complicated kind of binding as it is expected from the author of the Republic. The kind of unity the Good gives to the different knowledges of different things is comparable with the unity which each Form gives to its participants in Republic: as all the participants of a Form are united by referring to the ideas, all different kinds of knowledge are united by referring to the Good. If we observe Aristotle's assertion that for Plato and the believers of Forms, the causative relation of the One with the Forms is the same as that of the Forms with particulars (e.g. Metaphysics 988a10-11, 988b4), that is to say the One is the essence (e.g., ibid, 988a10-11: τοῦ τί ἐστὶν, 988b4-6: τὸ τί ἢν εἶναί) of the Forms besides his statement that for them One is the Good (e.g., ibid, 988b11-13) the relation between the Good and unity may become more understandable. Since the quiddity of the Good (τί ποτ᾽ ἐστὶ τἀγαθὸν) is more than discussion (506d8-e2), we cannot await Socrates to tell us how this binding role is played. All we can expect is to hear from him an analogy by which this unifying role is envisaged, the sun. The kind of unity that the Good gives to the knowledge and its objects in the intelligible realm is comparable to the unity that the sun gives to the sight and its objects in the visible realm (508b-c). The allegory of Line (Republic VI, 509d-511), like that of the Sun, tries to bind all various kinds of knowledges. The hierarchical model of the Line which encompasses all kinds of knowledge from imagination to understanding can clearly be considered as Plato’s effort to bind all kinds of knowledges by a certain unhypothetical principle. The method of hypothesis starts, in the first subsection of the intelligible realm, with a hypothesis that is not directed firstly to a principle but a conclusion (510b4-6). It proceeds, in the other subsection, to a 'principle which is not a hypothesis' (b7) and is called the 'unhypothetical principle of all things' (ἀνυποθέτου ἐπὶ τὴν τοῦ παντὸς ἀρχὴν) (511b6-7). This παντὸς must refer not only to the objects of the intelligible realm but to the sensible objects as well. Plato does posit, therefore, an epistemological principle for all things, a principle that all things are, epistemologically, bound and, thus, unified by. -/- 5. Bound Beings The ontological aspect of BK we shall call the principle of 'Bound Beings' (BB): -/- BB Being of all things are bound by the Good. -/- We saw in our principle of Split Being (SB) how the first Socrates was criticized because of his approach to split being and separate each thing from other things. The principle of Bound Beings intends to make the things more related, a duty which is done again by the Good. In the allegory of Sun, there are two paragraphs that evidently and deliberately extend the binding role of the Good to the ontological scene: -/- You will say that the sun not only makes the visible things have the ability of being seen but also coming to be, growth and nourishment. (509b2-4) -/- This clearly intends to remind the ontological role the sun plays in bringing to being all the sensible things in order to display how its counterpart has the same role in the intelligible realm (b6-10): -/- Not only the objects of knowledge (γιγνωσκομένοις) owe their being known (γιγνώσκεσθαι) to the Good, but also their existence (τὸ εἶναί) and their being (οὐσίαν) are due to it, though the Good is not being but superior to it in rank and power. That the Good is here represented as responsible for being of things in addition to their being known means, in my opinion, that Plato wants to posit BB in addition to BK. The allegory of Cave at the very beginning of the seventh Book (514aff.) can be taken as another evidence. The role of the Good, one might say, is confined to the intelligible realm because it is asserted that the role the Good plays in this realm is corresponding to that of the sun in the visible realm. The fact that Plato wants to observe the Good also as the ontological cause of the sensible things is obvious from his saying, in the allegory of Cave, that the Form of the Good 'produces light and its source (τὸν τούτου κύριον) [i.e. the sun] in the visible realm' (517c3). We can conclude, then, that the ontological function of the Good is not confined to the intelligible realm in which it is the lord and provides truth and understanding (c3-4) because it is also responsible to produce τὸν κύριον of light. 6. Proportionality of Being and Knowledge Insofaras BE and BO principles of the first Socrates gave way to TE and TO principles of the second Socrates, we cannot expect him to preserve KB in the same way as it was in the first Socrates. The new tripartite ontology and epistemology necessitates some modifications in KB which results in the principle of 'Proportionality of Being and Knowledge' (PBK): -/- PBK To every class of being there is a proportionate category of knowledge. -/- This principle, of course, does not entail the refutation of KB and thus is not kind of rejecting PBK but only a more complicated version of it. Based on PBK, we can still agree that knowledge is of being (KB) but the issue is that since none of the concepts of knowledge and being in the second Socrates are as simple as they were for the first Socrates, we need a more complicated principle for their relation here. Although from Meno 97a where the distinction of knowledge and true opinion is drawn out in the second group of the dialogues, we can expect a new relation, it is articulated in its most complete way in Republic and specifically in the allegory of Line. All the beings are divided there hierarchically to four classes, to each of them belongs a class of knowledge: imagination to images, belief to the sensible things (more correctly: the things of which they[in previous class] were images (ᾧ τοῦτο ἔοικεν)), thought to mathematical objects (?) and understanding to the Forms and the first principle. The degree of clarity that each of the classes of knowledge shares in (σαφηνείας ἡγησάμενος μετέχειν) is proportionate to the degree that its object shares in truth (ἀληθείας μετέχει). (511e2-4) -/- Conclusion From the six onto-epistemilogical principles of the first Socrates, four principles turn to their opposite in the middle period dialogues. While bipolar epistemology and ontology of the early dialogues give place to tripartite epistemology in the middle period dialogues and tripartite ontology in Republic, the split knowledge and being of the first Socrates are inclined to be substituted by bound knowledges and bound beings in the second Socrates and specifically in Republic. Not all our system of principles in this article is necessarily determinative. Either they are rightly formulated or not, our result would not be vulnerable if we accept that 1) making the distinction of knowledge and belief, 2) accepting the being of not being and 3) trying to bind both being and knowledge by the concept of the Good happens only in middle period dialogues, having been absent in the early ones. These are the favourite results all those somehow arbitrary and even oversimplified principles were to illustrate; that there is kind of a development in the epistemological as well as the ontological grounds of Plato’s philosophy. -/- Notes . (shrink)

This paper formulates Schopenhauer’s account of the development of the individual, with emphasis on the drive towards discerning truth about the essence of the world, be it through philosophy, religion, or the natural sciences, and the concomitant search for consolation in the face of the pessimistic truths about human existence.In this regard, the paper analyses the often largely ignored passages‘On Man’s Need for Metaphysics’ and ‘On the Different Periods of Life’,in order to reflect upon how he views the cognitive and (...) therapeutic needs that all individuals feel throughout their lives, and how these can evolve through the different stages of life, from childhood, through maturity, to old age.Such an account can help fill out our understanding not only of various parts of Schopenhauer’s system, but also of the wider therapeutic aims of his philosophy. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:"The Veil of Maya": Schopenhauer's System and Early Indian ThoughtStephan Atzert"The Veil of Maya": Schopenhauer's System and Early Indian Thought. By Douglas Berger. Binghamton: Global Academic Publishing, 2004. Pp. 319.Arthur Schopenhauer's (1788-1860) philosophy combines a number of inquiries into epistemology, metaphysics, ethics, aesthetics, and psychology. Schopenhauer read widely in several languages and incorporated many influences, including his reading of Anquetil Dupperon's Latin translation (...) of selected Upanishads. From a contemporary perspective it is fair to say that Schopenhauer does not offer a systematic philosophy, internally consistent in all its parts, but rather a philosophical approach that is descriptive and sensitive to a wide range of issues. Despite definite exceptions, the strength of Schopenhauer's writing lies in his attempt to be descriptive about the human experience, in combination with a willingness to incorporate its possibilities, and therefore his writings provided, and still do provide, points of departure for a wide variety of investigations.Schopenhauer became especially popular with artists, due to the fact that he proposed a metaphysical theory of art that offered artists possibilities for self-flattering. Aside from the role he played for Nietzsche, this is perhaps the only area in which Schopenhauer's impact is well understood. By contrast, Schopenhauer's decisive role in the development of Freud's psychoanalytic theory has only begun to be appreciated in the past few years. And although there exists a significant tradition of relating Advaita Vedānta and Buddhism to Schopenhauer's philosophy-the approaches of Paul Deussen, Helmuth von Glasenapp, and Wilhelm Halbfass marking conceptual shifts in this tradition-truly comprehensive perspectives are emerging only now. The fascinating exploration of Schopenhauer's exposure to relevant indological texts, commentaries, and scholars is still far from complete, as only a comparatively small selection of Schopenhauer's manuscript remains has been published, by Arthur Hübscher in 1966. As recently as 1998 Urs App was able to conclude, from his study of Schopenhauer's unpublished annotations to the Asiatick Researches, that it has been a misconception-although one carefully nourished by Schopenhauer himself-to assume that Indian concepts only confirmed what Schopenhauer had conceptualized intuitively of his own accord. Douglas Berger's timely study, "The Veil of Maya": Schopenhauer's System and Early Indian Thought, shows that this case can be made by way of a careful analysis of the development of Schopenhauer's philosophy without recourse to unpublished manuscript remains. In this respect Berger states:After reading Schopenhauer for some years, I became convinced that some crucial aspects of his system, specifically how he made argumentative transitions from epistemology to metaphysics to ethics, transitions about which much dispute still rages in the secondary literature, could not be well assessed without taking into consideration how Scho-penhauer understood the Upanishadic and Vedantic notion of maya.(p. xii) [End Page 675]On the basis of the published manuscript remains Berger traces how the early system developed. Here Berger shows very convincingly that the formation of Schopenhauer's system was strongly influenced by his appropriation of one particular element of Hinduism-or better, of Brahmanic world views-namely the idea of maya. Maya in the Upanishads is "most often identified to be the magical power of God employed to create the world and then to hide behind the matter out of which it was made" (p. 62). As Berger has traced in the manuscript remains,Schopenhauer develops an understanding of maya over time which makes it at once an epistemological category of falsification and an existential fetter that causes human beings to comport themselves... in an ethically pernicious way. More specifically Scho-penhauer believes maya to be a way the world appears to us as something it is not.... Epistemologically, maya entails an erroneous perception of things and a fallacious assessment of their nature; axiologically, it is the inauthentic valuation of world and other; metaphysically, it is the mere phenomenal appearance of a noumenal reality; and ethically, it leads to an unjustifiable alienation of other from self.(p. 63)In Schopenhauer's own words from a manuscript dating to 1814:In so far as he is alive... a human being... is doomed not merely to... (shrink)

Proposal Information: In this paper it is argued that although Spinoza, unlike other great philosophers of the Enlightenment era, never actually wrote a philosophy of education as such, he did – in his Ethics – write a philosophy of self-improvement that is deeply educational at heart. When looked at against the background of his overall metaphysical system, the educational account that emerges is one that is highly curious and may even, to some extent at least, come across as (...) counter-intuitive in a contemporary setting. This is so because it grounds the greater social and political endeavors of humanity in the individual’s striving for an ever-increasing power of acting. Hence, education, for Spinoza, is a decidedly individualistic affair, but then again, so is the making of society. Since, for Spinoza, every instance of knowledge bears the unique mark of the individual body that expresses it, one might conclude that at the foundation of every social structure is an encounter between concrete bodies; each expressing a particular perspective from where to grasp the world. I would argue, based on this, that one of Spinoza’s main contributions to educational theory is his grounding of larger social endeavors in the striving of the individual. Hinged on the striving to be more rational, as dictated by the doctrine of the conatus, education appears to offer a way of grounding the structure of the human social world in the same principles as those guiding the individual. Spinoza’s doctrine of the imitation of affects thereby offers a way of linking the egoistic striving for power on behalf of the individual with the educational goal of building a sustainable society. It does so as it conditions self-improvement by the human characteristic to imitate what others desire. By being surrounded with people who desire to be more rational, one can utilize this desire for the good and become strengthened in one’s own striving for increasing one’s degree of existence. Consequently, the teaching situation is geared for guiding students towards a more rational life, at the same time as it is geared for the self-improvement of the teacher. This aspect of self-improvement is, ultimately, what will motivate the teacher in striving to enhance the lives of his or her students in the first place. Being unable to self-improve in isolation, the doctrine of the imitation of affects dictates that the rational person will be moved toward a life of generosity, not primarily for altruistic reasons, but out of a desire to become more rational and thus to gain in his or her own power of acting. The question that follows from this, of course, is how does one go about when inculcating a desire to be more rational in one’s students?Education, from a Spinozistic point of view, is ultimately about the cultivation of the potential that lies dormant in each individual, so that a person may live a happier life as a result of understanding, more adequately, their place in the natural world. The challenge, then, becomes one of overcoming the many obstacles that prevent a person from developing their potential. Pedagogy, from this point of view, may be understood in terms of the art of offering the right amount of resistance. This notion is based on the assumption that if a student encounters no resistance – or too much resistance – his or her potential remains just that – a potential. In order to develop this potential the student needs to overcome certain barriers. With regards to this, the role of the teacher may be conceived in terms of the one balancing the amount of resistance so that the student is properly challenged but at the same time not overwhelmed. Methodology or Methods/ Research Instruments or Sources Used: The paper makes for an attempt to outline a Spinozistic philosophy of education based on readings of Spinoza’s texts – primarily the Ethics – and some of the relevant secondary literature such as Della Rocca’s influential reading of Spinoza. As such it is a philosophical inquiry seeking to interconnect some key aspects of Spinoza’s philosophy with some of the major issues of education. Methodologically, this paper argues, in line with Melamed, that rather than turning to the history of philosophy in order to identify ‘precursors to [our] own views’, so as to validate what we already believe we know, it is more fruitful to turn to past philosophers in order to ‘challenge our most basic beliefs and intuitions by studying texts that are both well-argued and strongly opposed to our commonsense’. Accordingly, turning to Spinoza marks an attempt to revisit and reconceptualize some key aspects of educational thought. Conclusions, Expected Outcomes or Findings: A conclusion of this paper is that a Spinozistic philosophy of education would need to focus on resolving the tension between Spinoza’s egoism and education as a social project. To this end it identifies Spinoza’s doctrine of the imitation of affects as a possible link between the individual’s striving for power and the collective agenda of improving human well-being at large. It is also suggested that, in aspiring to inculcate a desire to be more rational in his or her students, the challenge for the Spinozistic teacher is to prompt the students to aspire to reach beyond the temporary satisfactions of the passions so as to acquire a more enduring sense of satisfaction and so that their well-being is more fully under their own command rather than under the command of various external influences. This, in turn, is connected with the notion of resistance in the sense that in experiencing the volatility of fortune – and thereby understanding the instability of relying on one’s passions – a person would appear to be more inclined to strive for a more enduring sense of happiness, even if this would mean giving up on some of the temporary pleasures that one has grown accustomed to. The resistance, then, may be conceived in terms of the overcoming of temporary pleasures that stand in the way of the developing of one’s potential. In this scenario the role of the teacher may be understood in terms of someone offering a well-balanced amount of resistance. This means that to accommodate one’s students – in the sense that one approaches them in terms of prospective customers, aspiring to satisfy their demands – is inimical to education insofar as the wants and desires of students are, generally speaking, caused by passive affects rather than their rational wills. References: Aloni, N.. Spinoza as Educator: From Eudaimonistic Ethics to an Empowering and Liberating Pedagogy. Educational Philosophy and Theory 40, pp. 531–544.Della Rocca, M.. Spinoza. New York: Routledge.Della Rocca, M.. Rationalism, Idealism, Monism, and Beyond. In: E. Förster & Y. Y. Melamed Spinoza and German Idealism. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, pp. 7–26.Derry, J.. The Unity of Intellect and Will: Vygotsky and Spinoza. Educational Review, 56, pp. 113–120.Lloyd, G.. Spinoza and Educating the Imagination. In: A. O. Rorty Philosophers on Education: Historical Perspectives. London: Routledge, pp. 157–172.Melamed, Y. Y.. Spinoza’s Metaphysics: Substance and Thought. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Nadler, S.. Eternity and Immortality in Spinoza’s Ethics. Midwest Studies in Philosophy 26, pp. 224–244.Poulimatka, T.. Spinoza’s Theory of Teaching and Indoctrination. Educational Philosophy and Theory 33, pp. 397–410.Spinoza, B.. The Ethics. In: E. Curley A Spinoza Reader: The Ethics and Other Works. Princeton: Princeton Unive. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Journal of the History of Philosophy 39.1 (2001) 158-159 [Access article in PDF] Christopher Janaway, editor. The Cambridge Companion to Schopenhauer. New York: Cambridge University Press, 1999. Pp. 592. Cloth, $59.95. Schopenhauer's import as a original thinker has often been downplayed or underestimated by contemporary commentators and his philosophy is often examined only in light of his influence upon Nietzsche. This collection of thirteen essays assembled by Christopher (...) Janaway does much to overcome scholarly neglect of Schopenhauer by illustrating the original aspects of his thought as well as the widespread influence his philosophy has had. One gains from this book not only a solid introduction to Schopenhauer's major ideas but an appreciation of the significant contributions he made to the philosophical milieu of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries.In the first essay, Gunter Zöller examines how Schopenhauer's unique notion of selfhood fits into his overall "dual aspect" theory of the world as both will and representation. He also discusses Schopenhauer's conception of the self within the context of his claims regarding the negation of the will. The following article, by David Hamlyn, is also broad in scope and provides a comprehensive examination of Schopenhauer's epistemology in The World as Will and Representation. He looks at the various notions of knowledge that are employed in Schopenhauer's system and how they are determined by the different classes of objects of knowledge that Schopenhauer distinguishes. In the third essay F. C. White turns to Schopenhauer's earlier work, On the Fourfold Root of the Principle ofSufficient Reason. White runs through Schopenhauer's arguments regarding each of the four classes of objects which comprise the world as representation in the Fourfold Root. He reinforces the point made by Schopenhauer himself, that this is a text that can not be overlooked if one is to gain a sufficient understanding of his primary work. The Fourfold Root, like the rest of Schopenhauer's philosophy, is deeply engaged with the philosophy of Kant. This is the topic of the next article by Paul Guyer. Guyer gives a detailed summary and evaluation of Schopenhauer's appropriation and critique of Kant's theoretical philosophy. According to Guyer, Schopenhauer and Kant employ quite different methodologies, Kant's being thoroughly transcendental and Schopenhauer's more phenomenological. Also, Schopenhauer's phenomenological approach to epistemological questions often skews his interpretation and evaluation of Kant's transcendental arguments. [End Page 158]Christopher Janaway, in the first of his two contributions, turns the focus to Schopenhauer's famous metaphysical doctrine of the will. He provides a particularly illuminating discussion of Schopenhauer's conception of will as the "thing-in-itself." The thing-in-itself is also the subject of the next article by Noira Nichols. Despite his reputation for not significantly altering his major positions, Nichols argues that there is a distinct difference between Schopenhauer's earlier, more Kantian, conception of the thing-in-itself with his later, more mystical, conception. She attributes these conceptual shifts to the increasing influence of Eastern philosophy upon Schopenhauer's thinking. Schopenhauer's broad analysis of the concept of will includes complex aesthetic and moral theories which are addressed in the contributions by Cheryl Foster and David Cartwright. In her contribution, Cheryl Foster examines Schopenhauer's aesthetics by focusing on his views regarding the relationship of art and science, art and the limitations of the intellect, and the nature of artistic genius. Turning to Schopenhauer's moral theory, David Cartwright explicates Schopenhauer's "narrower" sense of morality as discussed in his often overlooked On the Basis of Morality, rather than focusing on the "higher metaphysical-ethical standpoint" exemplifed in the World as Will and Representation. Cartwright also attempts to demonstrate "... how Schopenhauer has contributed and could contribute to contemporary moral thought" (253).The next group of articles address the issue of Schopenhauer's pessimism. Dale Jacquette looks at Schopenhauer's understanding of the meaning of death in light of his pessimistic metaphysic. Included in Jacquette's study is an explanation of Schopenhauer's views on suicide and asceticism. Covering similar territory, Christopher Janaway... (shrink)

This article interprets Hegel's hierarchical theory of race as an application of his general views about the metaphysics of classification and explanation. We begin by offering a reconstruction of Hegel's hierarchical theory of race based on the critical edition of relevant lecture transcripts: we argue that Hegel's position on race is appropriately classified as racist, that it postulates innate mental deficits of some races, and that it turns racism from an anthropological into a metaphysical doctrine by claiming that the (...) division of humankind into races (at least in the Old World) is not a brute fact, but follows a ‘higher necessity’. We then summarize our interpretation of the relevant metaphysical background to this theory. On our reading, Hegel postulates an essentialist form of explanation that explains given kinds as stages in a teleological, non-temporal process through which the nature of a superordinate kind is realized. We argue that Hegel's views about a hierarchical and necessary division of humankind into races are an application of this model to the case of human diversity, motivated by explanatory considerations and subject to confirmation bias. By way of conclusion, we address two possible attempts to ‘save’ Hegelian philosophy from its racist baggage. (shrink)

This essay focuses on Schopenhauer’s aesthetics and philosophy of art, areas of his philosophy which have attracted the most philosophical attention in recent years. After discussing the subjective and objective aspects of aesthetic experience on his account, I shall offer interpretations of Schopenhauer’s theory of the sublime and solution to the problem of tragedy. In addition, I shall touch upon the liveliest interpretive debates concerning his aesthetic theory: the intelligibility of the “Platonic Ideas” as the objects of aesthetic experience (...) and the very possibility of aesthetic experience within Schopenhauer’s system. Another aim of this essay is to suggest how some of Schopenhauer’s aesthetic doctrines may be interpreted in a less metaphysically extravagant way. When understood in this manner, contemporary aestheticians might be inclined to take a closer look at Schopenhauer’s aesthetic theory and philosophy of art, for it is distinctive in the tradition of Western philosophical aesthetics in its attempt to highlight and balance the hedonic and cognitive importance of aesthetic experiences; in its sensitivity both to the aesthetic experience of nature as well as of art; in the high value placed on the experience of music ; and in the innovative solution to the problem of tragedy it offers. (shrink)

The article addresses some aspects of Gava’s book, highlighting two main points: (1) the notion of philosophy in a cosmic sense; (2) its connection with the meaning of the concept of method. Regarding (1) I show how Gava’s interpretation of the systematic concept of philosophy does not account adequately for the scholastic concept. This has consequences for the notion of philosophy in a cosmic sense itself; its nature as an objective archetype and its personification in the ideal of a (...) master of wisdom are not properly emphasized. These features are closely related to Kant’s claim that philosophy cannot be learned, which is connected with Kant’s peculiar idea of method. Regarding (2), I argue that ‘method’ for Kant does not concern only the construction of scientific systems, but also the establishment of a way of thinking, a stance embracing thought and action. The meaning of the postulates and the notion of ‘faith’ thus acquire a ‘weaker’ connotation, as an attitude, habitus, aimed at the establishment and promotion of a ‘life-structuring’ rationality, and not as an alternative route to a theoretical ‘commitment’. (shrink)

This work explores Schopenhauer's ethics and central aspects of his philosophy of value, discussing his conception of the individual character, determinism, depiction of the states of virtue and salvation, and the value that life has when understood in Schopenhauer's terms. This book also investigates the nature and depth of Schopenhauer's pessimism, and the extent to which it is rooted in his metaphysics.

The aim of this article is to examine some of the anatomical implications of Campanella's theory of magic, focusing in particular on his crìtique of Aristotle's and Galen's anatomical views. By magic Campanella meant first and foremost communication of energy and knowledge. It is no accident that he viewed both medicine and rhetoric as constitutive disciplines of magic. In doing so, he appealed to the time-honoured notion of the magic of the word theorised in ancient times by the sophist Gorgias. (...) The distinctive feature in Campanella's system of magic is that the word is both a symbolic and a physical entity. Meaning flows from nature to the mind and from the mind to nature. Words are both carriers of meanings and physical agents of psychosomatic transformation. As can be demonstrated by pointing to such paradigmatic cases as natural divination and prophecy, the force of the imagination, the patient's trust in the power of the physician or the healer, and the many influences that air exercises on the body, Campanella's theory of magic rests on a definite anatomo-physiological basis. The most original aspect, though, is the way in which Campanella reinterpreted Arìstotle's and Galen's prìnciples of anatomy so that he could adapt his medical views to the broader framework of his theory of magic (practice), on the one hand, and metaphysics (theory), on the other. In addition, Campanella's onginal account of emotions and passions supported a comprehensive system of magical practice that dispensed with the basic principles of both Aristotle's and Galen's physiology. Campanella was convinced that the vital operations of the body could not be explained by simply relying on the unsentient functions of the vegetative soul (Aristotle) or on the natural faculties of the body (Galen), nor could they be accounted for by assuming the existence of incorporeal souls (Aristotle) or bodily temperaments (Galen). By circumventing both Aristotle's hylomorphism and Galen's vital matenalism of the temperaments, and by appropriating the Stoic view of rational pneuma, he managed to produce a physiological model that was more flexible in dealing with the complex interplay of knowledge, action and appetite, and above all, better suited to account for a universe in which the flow of life and meaning encompassed varìous levels of communication. (shrink)

This analysis of Austin Farrer's philosophical theology joins the distinguished work by contemporary personalists, Embers and the Stars by Erazim Kohak and Being and Value by Frederick Ferré. Conti's work is more than an analysis of Farrer's understanding of the relation of faith and reason, the nature of God, and God's relation to other persons. Through a detailed, rigorous investigation of the changes in Farrer's thought from Finite and Infinite through Freedom of the Will to Faith and Speculation, Conti provides (...) us not only a clear, well-argued defense of personalist metaphysics but also insight into central currents in mid-century thinking in philosophical theology. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:Ästhetische Autonomie als Abnormität: Kritische Analysen zu Schopenhauers Ästhetik im Horizont seiner Willensmetaphysik by Barbara NeymeyrGünter ZöllerBarbara Neymeyr. Ästhetische Autonomie als Abnormität: Kritische Analysen zu Schopenhauers Ästhetik im Horizont seiner Willensmetaphysik. Berlin: Walter de Gruyter, 1996. Pp. x + 430. Cloth, DM 250.00.Like a latter-day Janus, Schopenhauer faces the history of philosophy in two directions. As a self-proclaimed follower of Kant and one-time student of Fichte, he partakes (...) in the development of transcendental-idealist philosophy at the beginning of the nineteenth-century. When published in 1818, Schopenhauer’s four-part system of philosophy in The World as Will and Representation, consisting of an epistemology, a philosophy of nature, an aesthetics, and an ethics, was the first philosophical system of German idealism executed in detail. Yet with his orientation toward the natural sciences, from which he sought confirmation of his metaphysics, and through the delayed reception of his work, which began only in the 1850s, Schopenhauer seems to belong to the later nineteenth century, as an immediate precursor of Nietzsche. At the systematic level, the double orientation of [End Page 475] Schopenhauer’s philosophy finds expression in the concurrence of two types of philosophical theory in his work: a transcendental philosophy based on the correlation between a nonworldly subject of cognition and its world of objects, structured according to the basic forms of the principle of sufficient reason, and a metaphysics of the will based on the ultimate reality of everything and everyone as will.The systematic instability that threatens Schopenhauer’s double philosophy of transcendental idealism and voluntaristic metaphysics has prevented his work from being included in the canonical tradition of classical German philosophy and has resulted in a reductive and selective appropriation of parts and aspects of his work, especially focussing on his philosophy of music and his ethics of pity. But recently a number of authors have begun to explore and explain the overall, systematic dimension and potential of Schopenhauer’s philosophy. Rudolf Malter has argued forcefully and in great detail for the significance of Schopenhauer as a key figure in the transcendental tradition from Kant to Heidegger, and John Atwell has laid open the systematic ambition and scope of Schopenhauer’s philosophical project of an anthropomorphic cosmology.1Barbara Neymeyr’s thorough and well-informed reading of Schopenhauer’s aesthetics continues this trend toward a systematic Schopenhauer interpretation. The specific focus of her work, a revised doctoral dissertation that had been directed by Gerold Prauss (Freiburg i. Br.), is the systematic integrity, or lack thereof, of Schopenhauer’s metaphysics of the beautiful. The study soon widens to consider the background of Schopenhauer’s aesthetics in his overall metaphysics of the will. Neymeyr argues that the aesthetic in Schopenhauer occupies a decidedly abnormal systematic position. The norm from which the aesthetic seems to deviate in a radical way is the heteronomy of the intellect in the service of the all-powerful will. Normally, in the nonaesthetic attitude, the intellect is only a tool of the will, providing cognitive illumination to the latter’s originally blind striving. Abnormally though, in the aesthetic attitude, the intellect is supposed to achieve temporary freedom from the will. (Lasting emancipation is afforded only by the ethical, understood as ascetic denial of all willing.) Yet, as Neymeyr argues, in the absence of the will’s driving force, there is no positive basis for any self-determination and intentional activity on the part of the emancipated as well as emaciated aesthetic intellect. Moreover, the role of the will as ultimate reality in Schopenhauer suggests to Neymeyr that the apparent aesthetic emancipation of the intellect from the will is still a case of the will’s ultimate, although clandestine mastery over the intellect. The liberation of the aesthetic intellect from the will is at bottom, so Neymeyr, the cosmic will’s self-liberation from its manifestation as individual will. Thus for Neymeyr, aesthetic autonomy constitutes an inadmissable abnormality in Schopenhauer’s systematic philosophy.Exhibiting great ingenuity and extensive familiarity with the entire corpus of Schopenhauer’s writings, Neymeyr tracks the various levels and forms of inconsistency that [End Page 476] plague Schopenhauer’s aesthetic... (shrink)

In this thesis, I examine the perceptibility of the Platonic Ideas in the thought of Arthur Schopenhauer. The work is divided into four chapters, each focusing and building upon a specific aspect related to this question. The first chapter (“"Plato and the Primacy of Intellect"”) deals with Schopenhauer’s interpretation specific to Platonic thought. I there address the question of why it is that Schopenhauer should consider Plato to have interpreted the Ideas as 'perceptible', particularly in view of evidence which seems (...) to testify to the contrary. Does Schopenhauer misinterpret Plato, or are there sufficient grounds for considering his interpretation consistent? This is important in light of Schopenhauer’s reinterpretation of the Platonic Idea on the basis of the primacy of the will in contradistinction to Plato’'s own emphasis upon the intelligible. In effect, for Schopenhauer, Plato confuses the nature of imperceptible concepts with the more perceptually grounded Ideas. In the second chapter (“"On the Direct Path to Knowledge"”), I explore Schopenhauer’'s methodological approach on the basis of the will. I there discuss the difference between Schopenhauer and Kant with respect to Transcendental Idealism, particularly in terms of their separate analysis and derivation of the thing-in-itself. From there, I turn to a consideration of Schopenhauer'’s discussion of the nature of formal and empirical intuitions, of abstraction and the nature of universal concepts, and finally of the intuitively grounded nature of mathematical demonstration which serves as an analogy for the manner in which Schopenhauer deals with knowledge of the Ideas. In the third chapter ("“The Perceptibility of the Ideas”"), I discuss the manner in which the Ideas become accessible as the manifestation of the Will, arising through the representation of perception. There a number of distinctions are made between Ideas and concepts, as well as the nature of contemplation through Genius. The Ideas are found to be perceptible as aesthetic intuitions which relate not only to the in-itself nature inherent to phenomena, but serve also as the essential basis and foundation for all genuine forms of art. In the fourth and final chapter (“"Critical Discussion of Schopenhauer’s Ideas"”), I consider and outline a number of potential problems with respect to Schopenhauer’s analysis. In particular, Schopenhauer encounters difficulties on the basis of the simultaneous immanence and transcendence of the Ideas; of the knowledge of the Ideas characterized as intuitive while yet having a strangely abstract basis; of the unity of the will in face of the plurality of Ideas and phenomena; and finally of the annihilation of the will which creates essential problems in terms of the desideratum of knowledge itself. I here also attempt to offer various solutions to these problems where relevant. The conclusion which I arrive at in this work is that any radical reorientation of ontology must bear an essential effect upon the character and methodology of knowledge itself. In other words, Schopenhauer’s interpretation of the perceptibility of the Ideas is a direct consequence of hi s analysis of the will as the metaphysical thing-in-itself. In fact, this essential change colors his entire epistemological approach, from science and mathematics, to logic and the Ideas—from the ground the up. (shrink)

IN DEBATES CONCERNING the relationship between basic principles of Whiteheadian process philosophy and the classical doctrine of substance, one can distinguish at least three types of essentially different approaches to the discussed issue: Process metaphysics implies definitive rejection of substantialist categories of traditional philosophy, and introduces a radically new perspective in which notions of flux and change replace the former categories of enduring substances and relative immutability of individual subjects. Whitehead's approach to the traditional doctrine of substance results in a (...) strong critique of it but not in total rejection. Certain elements of the Aristotelian and Cartesian legacy must be critically revised, but they cannot be eliminated from a rational interpretation of nature. Their implicit presence in Whiteheadian interpretative schemes substantiates the opinion that process metaphysics introduces a reformed version of the doctrine of substance. In spite of explicit critique of the concept of substance found in Whitehead's texts, the same texts implicitly presuppose the necessity of reference to certain substantialist categories. Whitehead himself did not always formally recognize such a necessity; his metaphysical assertions, however, provide an objective basis for developing a modified theory of substance. (shrink)

The Dialectic of Essence offers a systematic new account of Plato's metaphysics. Allan Silverman argues that the best way to make sense of the metaphysics as a whole is to examine carefully what Plato says about ousia (essence) from the Meno through the middle period dialogues, the Phaedo and the Republic, and into several late dialogues including the Parmenides, the Sophist, the Philebus, and the Timaeus. This book focuses on three fundamental facets of the metaphysics: the theory of Forms; the (...) nature of particulars; and Plato's understanding of the nature of metaphysical inquiry. Silverman seeks to show how Plato conceives of "Being" as a unique way in which an essence is related to a Form. Conversely, partaking ("having") is the way in which a material particular is related to its properties: Particulars, thus, in an important sense lack essence. Additionally, the author closely analyzes Plato's idea that the relation between Forms and particulars is mediated by form-copies. Even when some late dialogues provide a richer account of particulars, Silverman maintains that particulars are still denied essence. Indeed, with the Timaeus's introduction of the receptacle, there are no particulars of the traditional variety. This book cogently demonstrates that when we understand that Plato's concern with essence lies at the root of his metaphysics, we are better equipped to find our way through the labyrinth of his dialogues and to better appreciate how they form a coherent theory. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:Schopenhauer and the Nature of Philosophy by Jonathan HeadJudith NormanJonathan Head. Schopenhauer and the Nature of Philosophy. Lanham, MD: Lexington Books, 2021. Pp. xviii + 183. Hardback, $95.00.It is a bit strange to read an overview of Schopenhauer's philosophy that does not center on the obvious and attention-grabbing idea of will, but Jonathan Head has brought a fresh and welcome perspective to the topic by focusing instead (...) on Schopenhauer's notion of philosophy itself. This perspective enables Head to paint a more sympathetic picture of Schopenhauer than is often the case—more coherent in his systematic pretensions, more consistent in his philosophical project over the long course of his writings, and (perhaps most surprisingly) more solicitous for the welfare of his readers.Head's thesis is that Schopenhauer analyzed ('diagnosed' might be a better word) the human need for metaphysics and constructed his own philosophy carefully to address this need. "The need for metaphysics," Head explains, "is a natural desire that all human beings have for explanation and consolation, in the face of the recognition of pessimistic truths regarding the world we live in" (xiv), specifically recognition of the "wrongness of the world" (51) and "the illusory nature of the principle of individuation" (70). Several quite specific metaphilosophical insights and methods arise from this seemingly straightforward statement. [End Page 528] For one thing, Head points out that explanation and consolation are rather different goals for philosophy, uniting theoretical and practical concerns in a way that might not be expected from a self-declared Kantian. But he argues for this dual functionality by tracing the notion of "better consciousness" from Schopenhauer's earliest writings to its evolution into a "denial of the will," a form of consciousness with directly salvific consequences (interestingly, according to Head, not just for the individual but intergenerationally), now rooted in a metaphysics of will.The second and more philosophically fruitful peculiarity about Schopenhauer's diagnosis of the human "need for metaphysics" is the manner in which it arises from "the recognition of pessimistic truths" (xiv). There is a lot packed into the notion of recognition here. Schopenhauer has a distinctive philosophical method that grounds philosophical thinking in intuitive apprehension of basic truths. And, as Head argues, while this intuition functions as the ground for truth-seeking, it also hampers philosophy as a discursive discipline, since the concepts in which truth claims are presented cannot capture or communicate the unique proximity to truth characteristic of intuition. Thus, philosophical truths cannot be communicated directly, and the function of philosophical texts is to inspire an intuitive insight on the part of the readers so that they are able to see for themselves what the philosophy purports to say. (Stoicism, for instance, is for Schopenhauer an admirable but ultimately limited philosophical perspective in that it develops a system that relies exclusively on reason without promoting a grounding intuition.) Head argues that insight into the basic nature of the will is the intuition that Schopenhauer spins his philosophy around.This has both metaphysical and metaphilosophical implications. As for the former, it means that metaphysics is possible as a discipline, even in the wake of (and while by and large respecting) the limits Kant imposed on epistemology. Metaphysics has an empirical aspect, relying on empirical cognitive sources to provide a worldview for which it provides a key. Head emphasizes the irreducibility of this "objective" perspective, for offering both understanding as well as consolation (namely, knowledge that we have cognitive resources that other creatures do not). But Head argues that Schopenhauer gives primacy to the (compatible and complementary) subjective standpoint, and in particular our (quasi-speculative) intuition into the thing-in-itself via insight into our own basic essence as will. This peek into a nonrepresentational reality provides the reader with a guiding intuition (and the text with a central thought) that has an "inbuilt [implicitly] inferential structure" (72) from which an extraordinarily fruitful set of implications follows for constructing a metaphysics of will.The implications for metaphilosophy are no less interesting, and the central claim of Head's text is that Schopenhauer carefully constructed his central work, The World as Will and Representation, to guide... (shrink)

This paper explores the metaphysical system developed in Richard Bentley’s 1692 Boyle Lectures. The lectures are notable for their attempt to argue that developments in natural philosophy, including Newton’s Principia, could bolster natural theology. The paper explores Bentley’s matter theory focusing on his commitment to a particular form of mechanism and his rejection of occult qualities. It then examines his views on the nature of divine omnipotence. Finally, it turns to his understanding of gravitational attraction. While some recent (...) commentators have argued for a “superaddition” interpretation of gravitation in Bentley, this paper argues for an “occasionalist” interpretation. The argument proceeds on the basis of both textual considerations and considerations stemming from the systematic interpretation of Bentley’s metaphysics developed earlier in the paper. (shrink)

Schopenhauer is considered to be the most readable of German philosophers. This book gives a succinct explanation of his metaphysical system, concentrating on the original aspects of his thought, which inspired many artists and thinkers including Nietzsche, Wagner, Freud, and Wittgenstein. Schopenhauer's central notion is that of the will--a blind, irrational force that he uses to interpret both the human mind and the whole of nature. Seeing human behavior as that of a natural organism governed by (...) the will to life, Schopenhauer developed radical insights concerning the unconscious and sexuality which influenced both psychologists and philosophers. (shrink)

The ontology of artefacts in Byzantine philosophy is still a terra incognita. One way of mapping this unexplored territory is to delve into Michael of Ephesus’ commentary on Aristotle’s Metaphysics. Written around 1100, this commentary provides a detailed interpretation of the most important source for Aristotle’s ontological account of artefacts. By highlighting Michael’s main metaphysical tenets and his interpretation of key-passages of the Aristotelian work, this study aims to reconstruct Michael’s ontology of artefacts and present it as one instance, (...) which is perhaps exemplary, of the Byzantine ontology of artefacts. In particular, the study shows that this commentary holds a definite position on the nature of artefacts, according to which they are neither substances nor hylomorphic compounds. Indeed, artefacts lack a form altogether and their forms exist only in thought. As a result, Michael’s commentary provides an ontological interpretation of artefacts as accidental beings, i.e., as matter which acquires a mere property as opposed to a substantial form. While such an interpretation shows originality when compared to the Aristotelian text, it also indicates adherence to the reading established by Alexander of Aphrodisias, despite important departures concerning the status of natural forms. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:Spinoza's Religion: A New Reading of the Ethics by Claire CarlisleSanja SärmanCARLISLE, Claire. Spinoza's Religion: A New Reading of the Ethics. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 2021. 288 pp. Cloth, $29.95; paper, $22.95Spinoza has variously been read as presenting a fully naturalized theology (Steven Nadler), as a secretive Marrano philosopher of immanence cleverly hiding his true allegiances in plain sight (Yirmiyahu Yovel, see also Leo Strauss) and as (...) a God-intoxicated man (Novalis). Rarely have the assessments of a man's religion been so varied and conflicted. In an exemplarily searching spirit, Claire Carlisle explores the issue while keeping the question of what religion is an open one. The book comprises nine chapters—essayistic in form but scholarly in content—devoted to examining the issue from different angles.The leitmotif of Spinoza's religiosity is, for Carlisle, being-in-God, a term of art that denotes at once a metaphysical reality and a spiritual project. We are inevitably in God: This is an ontological as well as a conceptual dependence-relation. Being-in-God is participatory dependence on God's own being. In illuminating the relation between God and non-God, Carlisle draws on the rich Catholic tradition. For example, being in-God means being in another (God) without ever being the other of God, to whom all being belongs. This asymmetrical take on the otherness-relation clearly echoes Nicholaus of Cusa's thoughts about God as non-aliud, and Carlisle cites him, not as an ancestor of Spinozism but as a cotraveler along a certain pathway for understanding God.Although being-in-God is an indisputable reality, it is also a spiritual challenge. Since we are by necessity in-God, the spiritual task will paradoxically consist in becoming what we already are, and thereby gaining freedom-in-necessity.In my view, Carlisle's reading reaps rich fruit from its assumption that ontology and normativity are not, indeed cannot be, sequestrated within Spinoza's thought. Moreover, its study of the affectivity—the qualia, even—of being-in-God presents us with a welcome counterweight to descriptions of Spinoza's system from without. Differently put, for Carlisle, the question "What is it like?" can sensibly be asked about being-in-God. Inspired by Spinoza's earliest work, Carlisle sketches a philosophical diagnosis of the devout person who is compelled ("necessitated") by the work she has to do and therefore enjoys an enviable singularity of purpose: Following Latour and Foucault, Carlisle sees a distinctively spiritual quality in certain modes of attention. Attending to oneself and others as they are in-God instills calm; in other words, on Carlisle's reading, the affective aspect of being-in-God is characterized by being at rest with oneself and others (quies is Latin for "rest"). Her careful reading of the Latin text exposes a network of acquiescentia (and cognate terms) in Spinoza's work, somewhat obfuscated through Curley's English translation, which variously renders the word as "esteem" and "satisfaction": What the text gains in stylistic points, it may lose in spiritual significance. In the Ethics, acquiescentia in se ipso is a kind of self-esteem or self-confidence that becomes religiously poignant when mediated through the insight that one is in God: [End Page 347] Through the realization of being in-God, one's calm yet affective appreciation of oneself becomes indistinguishable both from one's love of God and from God's love of oneself. This is an interesting phenomenal perspective on Spinoza's doctrine of the third kind of knowledge.At times, one could perhaps wish for a more systematic discussion of core concepts, such as that of infinity. For example, Carlisle cites Spinoza's idea that we cannot bridge the infinite distance which separates us from God but does not explicitly discuss how this infinite distance is to be reconciled with ontological intimacy; while we sense the proper response, it is not demonstrated.In the end, Carlisle's work successfully shows that we cannot understand Spinoza's religiosity if we model it after our late-modern concept of religion—a construct that, as the historian Peter Harrison has argued, was... (shrink)

The aim of this chapter is to analyze how Schopenhauer employed and developed the concept of Trieb in his philosophy of nature. It elucidates that Schopenhauer was adamant in distinguishing the Trieb from the will and gave the Trieb an important role in defining some characteristics of his metaphysics of nature—against reductionism and for explaining the complexity of organic life. Moreover, the chapter reconstructs how the Trieb—through Blumenbach’s Bildungstrieb—found its place in Schopenhauer’s philosophy of biology. Finally, it focuses on his (...) criticism of physico-theology and on his most famous application of the Trieb, namely the sexual drive in organic life and its effects in human society as “sexual love”. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:The Argumentative Structure of Kant’s Metaphysical Foundations Of Natural ScienceEric Watkinsone of kant’s most fundamental aims is to justify Newtonian science. However, providing a detailed explanation of even the main structure of his argument (not to mention the specific arguments that fill out this structure) is not a trivial enterprise. While it is clear that Kant’s Critique of Pure Reason (1781), his Metaphysical Foundations of Natural Science (...) (1786), and his unpublished (and incomplete) Opus postumum should in some way constitute the core of this justification, it is less clear how each of these works does so in detail. In this paper I shall first argue that the standard view of the relationship between the Critique of Pure Reason and the Metaphysical Foundations of Natural Science (hereafter simply Metaphysical Foundations) is mistaken. I shall then present my own interpretation of how the Metaphysical Foundations contributes to the justification of Newtonian science. Finally, I shall conclude by considering an important interpretation of the argument of the Metaphysical Foundations developed by Michael Friedman. However, it is first necessary to present briefly Kant’s conception of science (in particular what conditions a body of knowledge must satisfy for Kant in order to be considered science proper) as well as Kant’s own understanding of the relevant differences between his projects in the first Critique, the Metaphysical Foundations, and the Opus postumum.Kant’s conception of science is rather strict if measured by contemporary standards. For in the preface to the Metaphysical Foundations Kant establishes three substantive conditions that a body of knowledge must satisfy in order to be considered science proper.1 (1) It must not consist in empirical principles, [End Page 567] but rather must be obtained solely from pure, a priori principles;2 (2) It must be apodictically certain;3 (3)4 It must be a systematically ordered whole (which means that its various propositions must be related as, for example, antecedents and consequents).5 After stating these conditions, Kant then argues that all natural science proper requires a pure part upon which its apodictic certainty is based. In other words, satisfaction of the first condition immediately implies satisfaction of the second condition as well.6 Accordingly, these three conditions (and the first one in particular) imply that natural science proper requires (or rather presupposes) a justification by something distinct from it that Kant calls a metaphysics of nature.7 But what exactly does a metaphysics of nature encompass? Kant distinguishes two different parts of the metaphysics of nature: a transcendental part and a special part. A metaphysics of nature [End Page 568] is transcendental insofar as it concerns “the laws that make the concept of nature in general possible, even without relation to any determinate object of experience, and [insofar as it is] thus indeterminate with respect to the nature of this or that thing in the sensible world,” whereas a metaphysics of nature is special to the extent that “it is concerned with a special nature of this or that kind of thing of which an empirical concept is given, but so that except for what lies in this concept no other empirical principle is used for knowledge thereof.”8 In short, a transcendental metaphysics, revealing how experience in general is possible, is not supposed to presuppose an empirical concept, whereas a special metaphysics does make such an assumption insofar as it is concerned with the special natures of things.How do the three works cited above relate to Kant’s distinction between a transcendental and a special metaphysics of nature? In the preface to the Metaphysical Foundations Kant clearly indicates that he intends the Metaphysical Foundations to constitute the special metaphysics of nature. Although he does not explicitly refer to the first Critique in the preface, it is also relatively clear that he sees it (or at least the ‘System of Pure Reason’ that Kant foresees as following upon it and as incorporating its fundamental results)9 as constituting [End Page 569] the transcendental part of a metaphysics of nature.10 The Principles of Pure Understanding (‘Grundsätze des reinen Verstandes’) in the Transcendental Analytic argue for what could naturally be described as “laws... (shrink)

This paper considers the largely unexplored relation between Schopenhauer’s metaphysical system of Will and the philosophical therapy offered by Stoicism. By focusing on three key texts from disparate points in Schopenhauer’s philosophical career, as well as considering live debates regarding the metaphorical nature of his thought and his soteriology, I argue that the general view of straightforward opposition between himself and the Stoics is not the correct one. Rather, there are deep parallels to be found between the therapeutic (...) aspects of The World as Will and Representation (WWR) and the ethical recommendations made by the ancient Stoics. I will argue, further, that Schopenhauer recognised these similarities between his thought and Stoic ethics, often defending what he sees as the true essence of Stoicism. I conclude with some thoughts regarding the adoption of Stoic ideals by Nietzsche and Wittgenstein, in relation to their reading of Schopenhauer’s work. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:Hegel’s Idea of a “Phenomenology of Spirit” by Michael N. ForsterGünter ZöllerMichael N. Forster. Hegel’s Idea of a “Phenomenology of Spirit.” Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1998. Pp. xi + 661. Paper, $30.00.Hegel’s Phenomenology of Spirit (1807) has remained an enigmatic and controversial work. Typically it has been studied and appropriated selectively, by focusing on a few topics or sections of this immense opus. There are also several (...) commentaries on all or part of the work that immerse the reader in plenty of detail, but often with insufficient attention paid to the work’s overall design. Forster’s book is thematically focused but has sufficient scope to provide the reader with an overall orientation about the Phenomenology. Moreover, it is written in a clear, accessible language, with plenty of genuinely philosophical material to balance the more narrowly exegetical aspects of the study. Forster’s work stands in the tradition of a number of German and French studies that seek to unravel the “genesis and structure” (Hyppolite) of the Phenomenology as a key to understanding and assessing the import of Hegel’s singular work. Forster discusses those earlier readings, subjects them to a thorough critique, and develops original positions on a number of key issues in scholarship on the Phenomenology.The entire first half of the book (Parts One and Two) is concerned with the “official project of the Phenomenology,” which Forster reconstructs as three sets of philosophical tasks. First are the pedagogical tasks designed to introduce the reader to the superior viewpoint of Hegel’s system and its ability to overcome the ills specific to modern culture. In particular, Hegel is shown to further advance Herder’s and Schiller’s philosophical project of replacing the multiple, unreconciled dualisms of the modern intellectual and moral outlook with a unified, monistic account of natural and social reality. In a strong interpretive move, Forster attributes a naturalism of sorts to Hegel’s integrationist account of mind and body or self and world.Second are the epistemological tasks designed to justify the cognitive claims of Hegel’s [End Page 541] system (“science”) against those of all other philosophical and popular viewpoints. In particular, Forster shows Hegel’s indebtedness to the ancient (Pyrronic) skeptical strategy of equipollence, i.e., the method of setting into opposition equally strong arguments on both sides of any issue and thereby producing an equal balance of justification on all sides of the issue. Of all possible viewpoints only Hegel’s own, which is not subject to any external opposition, eludes the scope of the method of equipollence.The third, specifically metaphysical set of tasks of the Phenomenology centers around the work’s social and (on Forster’s reading) naturalist conceptions of God, meaning and truth, in which transcendent warrants are replaced by communal consensus. Forster concludes the first half of his study with a detailed consideration of the relation between the Phenomenology and Hegel’s system proper. He stresses that the work is only the “appearance” (Erscheinung) of the philosophical science itself and that it remains systematically independent of the latter.Part Three examines the role of history and historicism in the Phenomenology. Forster distinguishes between teleological or normative historicism and intellectual or descriptive historicism, and limits his investigation to the latter as the philosophically defensible of the two enterprises. He argues extensively for a one-to-one correlation between the various “shapes of consciousness” to be found in the core of the Phenomenology (from the chapter on Consciousness through the chapter on Reason) and specific periods in human history. This chronological history of consciousness is shown to be supplemented by two further accounts of the history of consciousness (in the chapter on Spirit and in the chapters on Religion and Absolute Knowledge, respectively), in which the first history’s focus on individual consciousness is enlarged to include supra-individual mind (“spirit”).In Part Four Forster explains the tripling of the history of consciousness with a shift in the plan of the Phenomenology, away from the more limited project of the original or “Ur-Phenomenology”—to lead individual consciousness to the viewpoint of (Hegelian) science—to the more ambitious goal... (shrink)

The essays in this volume, including two published here for the first time, explore various aspects ofKant's conception of the system of nature, the system of ...

The main aim of this book is to discuss fundamental developments on the question of being in Western and African philosophy using analytic metaphysics as a framework. It starts with the two orthodox responses to the question of being, namely, the subject-verb-object language view and the rheomodic language view. In the first view, being is conceived through the analysis of language structure, where it is represented by subjects, objects, and relations. In the second view, there are different variations; however, the (...) common idea is that the world's structure is revealed in the root verb of terms. This suggests a holistic and dynamic conception of being, where everything is in a continuous process of action. The book builds on analytic philosophy and explores metaphysical concepts such as space-time, modality, causation, indeterminism versus determinism, and mind and body. The book shows that in both Western and African thought, similarities in different studies confirm that philosophy is a universal activity, differences within a context and beyond confirm the perspectival nature of human knowledge as individuals attempt to interpret reality, and language influences the conceptualization of being in a particular area. One of the novel aspects is the development of visual and mathematical African models of space and time. (shrink)

This review of books by Niemoczynski and Robinson considers how semiotic processes of consciousness posited by Pierce yield insights into experiences usually categorized as religious. For Niemoczynski, consciousness experiences iconic representation and then disruptions of it. Conscious responds to such disruptions by means of abduction, and this is the seed of transcendence. Niemoczynski develops these processes with attention to Schelling, Heidegger, Deleuze, Corrington, and Badiou. Turning to Robinson's book, we find a deep inquiry into trinitarian logic that considers early work (...) of Christian philosophers in relation to Peirce's new list of categories: firstness, secondness, and thirdness. While both books appear to seek new frontiers of naturalism, Robinson's work is notable for its engagement with an emerging field of biosemiotics. (shrink)

This paper investigates the question of, and the degree to which, Newton’s theory of space constitutes a third-way between the traditional substantivalist and relationist ontologies, i.e., that Newton judged that space is neither a type of substance/entity nor purely a relation among such substances. A non-substantivalist reading of Newton has been famously defended by Howard Stein, among others; but, as will be demonstrated, these claims are problematic on various grounds, especially as regards Newton’s alleged rejection of the traditional substance/accident (...) dichotomy concerning space. Nevertheless, our analysis of the metaphysical foundations of Newton’s spatial theory will strive to uncover its unique and innovative characteristics, most notably, the distinctive role that Newton’s “immaterialist” spatial ontology plays in his dynamics. (shrink)

The main goal of this chapter is to present the basic components of Anne Conway’s metaphysics of sympathy. To that end, I will explicate her concepts of God or first substance and second substance or Christ with special emphasis on the key role that the second substance plays in her philosophy. I argue that one of the keys to Conway’s system lies in her reinterpretation of the Christian narrative about suffering. She combines Christian imagery with ancient and modern ideas (...) in an attempt to create a philosophy that will appeal to people of all faiths and explain ‘all phenomena in the entire universe’ ). Christ’s role as a metaphysical and moral figure is crucial to Conway’s philosophy and helps explain her views about suffering and the importance of sympathy in her philosophy. (shrink)

There is now a considerable body of published work on the epistemology of modern chemistry, especially with regard to the nature of quantum chemistry. In addition, the question of the metaphysical underpinnings of chemistry has received a good deal of attention. The present article concentrates on metaphysical considerations including the question of whether elements and groups of elements are natural kinds. It is also argued that an appeal to the metaphysical nature of elements can help clarify the (...) re-emerging controversies among chemists regarding the placement of the elements hydrogen and helium in the periodic system and the question of whether there exists a best form of the periodic table. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:P. Christopher Smith HEIDEGGER'S MISINTERPRETATION OF RILKE Certainly one of Heidegger's most important accomplishments is to have reminded us of the original unity of poetry and philosophy. The "metaphysical" philosophy which Heidegger calls into question is characterized by its sharp separation of itself from what it calls "unscientific" modes of discourse. But that, Heidegger shows, is a limitation which comes from its narrowed conception of itself as strict, (...) methodical science, and one need only turn to Parmenides before the tradition of metaphysics or Nietzsche at the end of that tradition to see that in fact Heidegger is right: philosophy and poetry are not necessarily to be dissociated. Indeed, the former can and should grow out of the soil of the latter. The point here is one which Heidegger might be said to have learned by experience: he found that the poetry of Hölderlin opened a way for philosophy out of the cul de sac into which phenomenological science had led it. And of course not only Hölderlin: Rilke was obviously important too. In fact to some, myself included, it seems that certainly as much as Hölderlin and perhaps even more, Rilke is the poet who displays the pre-metaphysical unity of poetry and philosophy. But that is not how Heidegger views Rilke. In respect to its philosophical value, Rilke's poetry, we are told, is inferior to Hölderlin's. There is, I suggest, a most puzzling blend of attraction and suspicion in Heidegger's interpretation of Rilke. On the one hand, Heidegger, perhaps better than anyone, is able to make clear the philosophical importance of Rilke's poetry and yet, having done that and having shown thereby the greatest sympathy for Rilke's thought, Heidegger goes on to portray Rilke as "metaphysical" and to claim for that reason that he is not the poet Hölderlin is. Is that assessment valid? And how did Heidegger arrive at it? It is to these questions that the following study is addressed. On my reading of "Wozu Dichter"1 the charge that Rilke persists in "metaphysical" thought has three dimensions. To begin with, the overriding consideration in the whole of the essay is that, like all "metaphysicians," Rilke is oblivious to the Being event. There are in 4 Philosophy and Literature turn two consequences which follow from that obliviousness: first, Rilke grounds all of what is in some highest existent, namely nature taken as will, and second, in turning inwards to consciousness he re-presents the original presencing of existents. The theme of grounding in a highest existent is worked out from page 256 (p. 100) to page 281 (p. 126) and that of the re-presentation in consciousness, from page 281 (p. 126) to page 294 (p. 141). It will become evident, I think, that the discussions of two other apparently separate questions, that of the Open and that of saying and singing, fit respectively into each of these major sections of the essay. Let us now consider the aspects of the charge that Rilke is "metaphysical" one by one. Just what does obliviousness to Being mean? It means obliviousness to the clearing or lighting {Lichtung). Heidegger, it must be kept in mind, distinguishes between what is and the event in which what is comes to be displayed as such. He refers to the event itself as the lighting and it is only in the light of the lighting, he tells us, that what is can be. Obliviousness to Being is obliviousness, not to some highest existent or even to the whole of beings, but to the Being event, to the lighting. "Metaphysics," in seeking the ontos on, the being which in being most truly underlies all other existents, forgets the event in which any being, even the highest, comes to be. Consequently, instead of experiencing temporal presencing, arising out of non-presence, das Nichts, "metaphysics" reduces anything which comes to be to something which always is in steady presence. Obliviousness to Being is, if seen in this way, obliviousness to the nicht-ist, das Nichts from which any ist originates. That shows up in Rilke in that for him beings are not "dissolved in void... (shrink)

In this paper I argue that if one is to do justice to reason's unity in Kant, then one must acknowledge that reason's practical ends are presupposed in every theoretical investigation of nature. Thus, contrary to some other commentators, I contend that the notion of the metaphysical ground of the unity of nature should not be attributed to the “dynamics of reason” and its “own practical purposes.” Instead, the metaphysical ground of the unity of nature is in fact (...) an indispensable and necessary notion for reason in both its theoretical and practical functions, but this need of reason to presuppose such a notion can only find its adequate proof in the practical. By offering a synopsis of Kant's accounts of nature's systematicity in the Transcendental Ideal of the Critique of Pure Reason (Part I), the Appendix to the Dialectic of the Critique of Pure Reason (Part II), and in the Critique of Judgment (Part III), I identify in each section Kant's theoretical and practical arguments for reason's presupposition of the “unconditioned,” demonstrate their structural interdependence, and show a general continuity in Kant's position on this issue throughout his critical system. (shrink)

Schopenhauer is acknowledged as “the philosopher of pessimism” and author of a system that teaches how art and morality can help humans navigate life in “the worst of all possible worlds.” This dominant image has cut off an important branch of Schopenhauer’s tree of philosophy—metaphysics of nature and its constant dialogue with the sciences of the time. Beginning with a reappraisal of Schopenhauer’s system as a whole—which he defined as a “single thought”—this book interprets his metaphysics as a (...) knowledge that brings value and meaning to our lives. More specifically, Schopenhauer’s writings show that he saw science as adding value to metaphysical knowledge. Understanding Schopenhauer’s metaphysics therefore requires both an understanding of the dialogue he maintained with the natural sciences and an appreciation of the role of the natural sciences in his philosophical project. And exploring the relationship between science and metaphysics provides a new perspective on his metaphysics and its development between the first edition of The World as Will and Representation (1819) and 1844, when Schopenhauer added a second volume of Supplements to his work. In 1819, he valued Schelling’s philosophy of nature as a model for establishing a link between metaphysical speculation and science. In the years that followed, he assessed the implications for metaphysics of the transformation of scientific research into a practice increasingly independent of philosophy. Such an assessment also affected his metaphysics, and even the will and Ideas underwent a process of revision. (shrink)

In Necessary Existence and the Doctrine of Being in Avicenna’s Metaphysics of the Healing Daniel De Haan explicates the central argument of Avicenna’s metaphysical masterpiece. De Haan argues that the most fundamental primary notion in Avicenna’s metaphysics is neither being nor thing but is the necessary ( wājib), which Avicenna employs to demonstrate the existence and true-nature of the divine necessary existence in itself. This conclusion is established through a systematic investigation of how Avicenna’s theory of a demonstrative science (...) is employed in the organization of his metaphysical science into its subject, first principles, and objects of enquiry. The book examines the essential role the first principles as primary notions and primary hypotheses play in the central argument of Avicenna’s metaphysics. (shrink)

I argue that Kant's Critique of Pure Reason offers a positive metaphysical account of the thinking self. Previous interpreters have overlooked this account, I believe, because they have held that any metaphysical view of the self would be incompatible with both Kant's insistence on the limitations of cognition and with his project in the Paralogisms. Closer examination, however, shows that neither of those aspects of the Critique precludes a metaphysical account of the self, and that other (...) aspects (namely, the structure of Kant's overall project and the commitments of his claims in the Transcendental Deduction) require such an account. Drawing on a principle of 'effect-relative composition,' I argue that Kant's self is neither an activity, a form, nor a representation, but instead an individual constituted by the thing or things that bring about the unity of a course of experience. (shrink)

It is natural for us — living after the Darwinian Revolution and the neo-Darwinian synthesis — to consider the adoption of evolution by natural selection as unconditionally rational, because it now seems the best theory or explanation of many phenomena. Nonetheless, if we take historical inquiry seriously, as allowing us to probe into the ground of our knowledge, the roots of even this “rational” Darwinism might be unearthed. Darwinian doctrine betrays a deceptive desire for unity and simplicity of principle, and (...) belief that the mechanistic aspect of nature is of the highest significance. Such crucial but questionable presuppositions are more easily discerned historically, insofar as they chronologically preceded Darwin's particular theoretical conviction and were even set off as a metaphysics of divine law.We have seen how Darwin's teaching about nature emerged within that theistic metaphysics. It emerged in a prior metaphysical debate in his mind between the contemporary belief in special creations and the belief in a designed hierarchy of physical laws. One can hardly deny that Darwin favored the superior side in this contest; but the contest was a narrow one whose basic premises he never clearly criticized. On the one hand, of course, his conviction about a lawful genesis inspired him to take a broad view of things and to seek out important general phenomena. But, on the other hand, it ensured that his new empirical notions would be easily drawn into the preferred cosmology. Historically, this seems to have occurred in Darwin's adoption of Malthus' principle of population and his extension of it to the whole account of descent: Malthusianism was readily attached to an ultimate scheme of things. Consequently, the key concepts that Darwin developed out of his Malthusian views — “perfect adaptation” and “selection” — reflect his cosmological prepossession, his desire to express a total and teleological process of creation. Perhaps our most valuable, and most undervalued, token of Darwin's metaphysical orientation is his reliance on a human technique (selective breeding) to explain “Nature's” way. In sum, to understand Darwin's faith in his “grand view of life,” we should not ignore the metaphysics that preceded and structured it, the metaphysics that linked the principles of contemporary science to primordial creation. Nor should we fail to see that such a metaphysics leads natural philosophy into a shadowy realm, where system can come to look like science, and one insight like an absolute. (shrink)

This new, comprehensive study of Leibniz's system of thought reveals a philosopher equally intrigued by the complexity of physical reality and the fascinations of his metaphysical laboratory. Many of his most important, but never previously published papers are evaluated in this book. Too often put down as an arch-metaphysician, Leibniz is seen in these pages as a venturer of breathtaking boldness, his ambition being nothing less than to actually solve the enigma of existence. Accordingly his system embraced (...) science equally with metaphysics; they complement and pollinate each other. The outcome is a view of his system as a double ontology. Reality is the domain of the actual; metaphysics the laboratory of the possible. Metaphysics springs to life with his scintillating detective work on force, motion, time, space, limits, infinity, folds, fractals and many other issues that are 'hot' again today; while in all these a direct line is kept open to their impact on physical existents and our understanding of reality. This book is equally suited to expert Leibnizians as to students of Early Modern philosophy; and it may be read with profit by anyone interested in this thinker, whom Bertrand Russell called "one of the supreme intellects of all time". (shrink)

Kant’s manuscripts of 1796–1803, which the Academic German edition of his works combined in 21–22 volumes of under the invented by H. Vaihinger name ‘Opus postumum’, still attract the attention of researchers. Was there really a significant theoretical “gap” in the system of Kant's “critical”, transcendental philosophy, which built by 1790, needed to be filled, namely, to undertake a conceptual "transition" from the already constructed a priori metaphysics of corporeal nature (metaphysical principles of natural science) to experimental mathematical (...) physics, to the entire scientific empirical investigation of nature? In the last years of his life Kant tried to solve a problem that was really decisive for the fate of transcendentalism, which he had already realized in ‘Critique of Pure Reason’ and concretized in ‘Metaphysical Foundations of Natural Science’, however he found himself in a hopeless situation, which doomed him to the “Tantalus’ torments”. The problem that he was constantly thinking about necessarily arises in the system of transcendental philosophy, but has no solution in it. ‘Opus postumum’ is an important piece of evidence on the insurmountable difficulties faced by the attempt to “save” philosophy as a perfect and complete system of absolutely reliable, "apodictic" science, based on the idea of universal and necessary conditions for the experience possibility. (shrink)

Herder brings the entire human being into focus by tracing its connections with the natural, cultural, and historical world. The first part of the volume examines the various dimensions of Herder’s philosophical understanding of human nature through which he sought methodologically to delineate a genuinely anthropological philosophy. This includes his critique of traditional metaphysics and its revision along anthropological lines; the metaphysical, epistemological, and physiological dimensions of his theory of the soul-body relationship; his conception of aesthetics as the (...) study of the sensuous basis of knowledge; and the relationship between the human and natural sciences. The second part then examines further aspects of this understanding of human nature and what emerges from it: the human-animal distinction; how human life evolves over space and time on the basis of a natural order; the fundamentally hermeneutic dimension to human existence; and the interrelatedness of language, history, religion, and culture. (shrink)

The structural abstract discusses the features of modern post-non-classical scientific discourse, according to which all kinds of scientific and religious knowledge are simplified mental construction of a complex objective reality. All accumulated religious knowledge is a combination of various theoretical models of divine reality, the performance of which was checked by centuries of experience of mystical connection with the Lord. According to the requirements of scientific and religious discourse on incompleteness of knowledge, all religious texts of the Bible, the (...) Koran, the Torah, etc. are not carriers of absolutely probable knowledge. The sacred reality they describe is far more complex. The structural abstract reveals the originality of the subject and object of religious narration and the special nature of the mystical fact. The empirical basis of Christian knowledge is the books of the Old and New Testaments, which set the initial basis of Christian knowledge. The array of interpretations of sacred knowledge, accumulated over two thousand years of the Christianity development, it constitutes the main volume in the system of Christian knowledge. Christian theology provides a comprehensive understanding of Christian doctrine and its historical development. A special role is played by mystical knowledge-management-experiencing, the knowledge of God in the structure of Christian knowledge. The peculiarity of knowledgemanagement-experiencing determines that it comes directly from God. Theology can be achieved in the course of many years of practical work of an ascetic. The mystical side of knowledge-management is the experience of a direct connection with the Lord, which is difficult to convey in words. Secret knowledge-management exists only in real time in the existential reality of sacred experience. The structural abstract distinguishes two types of metaphysical knowledge – Western and Eastern metaphysics. Western metaphysics is considered to be the universal, most developed type of philosophical rational knowledge, the main goal of which is to develop a theoretical model of the fundamental reality, what is the God. It is reasonable to call Eastern metaphysics the metaphysics of the Path originating in the middle of the first millennium BC in India (Brahmanism, Buddhism, Jainism, etc.) and China (Taoism). Orthodoxy is the Christian version of the metaphysics of the Path, while Sufism is in Islam. Everything is subordinated to the liberation of the ascetic from worldly desires and the achievement of a mystical connection with God in Eastern metaphysics. The metaphysics of the Path includes three components – theoretical construction of the God, difficult practical actions (the Path) and the secret knowledge-management of the God, which are considered in inseparable unity. The Orthodox version of the metaphysics of the Path is one of the most developed in Eastern metaphysics.The texts of Western and Eastern metaphysics differ considerably. The works of Western metaphysicians appeal to the human mind and are predominantly speculative. The writings of Eastern metaphysicians try to reproduce the mental reality of the Path of merit of Enlightenment to a large extent. If rational knowledge of the fundamental foundations of the universe prevails in Western metaphysics, then Orthodox metaphysics is guided by the desire to enter the mystical space of divine reality. (shrink)

One of the most peculiar features of Spinoza’s philosophy is his radical interpretation of the notion of freedom. Even though it plays a significant role in his metaethics and political philosophy, freedom is, for Spinoza, a deeply metaphysical notion, rooted in the most fundamental features of his ontology. In this paper, I analyze the internal structure that identifies a being as “free” within Spinoza’s metaphysics. I argue that this structure leads to an internal paradox, entailing that the very component (...) that allows a being its freedom – its essence or nature – is itself externally determined. I further proceed to resolve this issue indicating how Spinoza’s metaphysics of freedom can accommodate this paradox. I conclude by presenting possible solutions for both Natura naturans and Natura naturata, attempting to integrate the notion of metaphysical freedom with more familiar images of ethical and epistemological freedom. (shrink)

Unlike many of his contemporaries John Henry Newman was comfortable with evolution. Newman had also, of course, thought deeply about religion. When, in the late 1850s and early 1860s, he began speculating about the nature of reality he saw the need to combine a scientific understanding of the physical universe with a Christian understanding of the human person. The Notes he left about this difficult topic are hard to make sense of. This book presents a readable version of the Notebook (...) and locates them in the cultural and intellectual context of the age. (shrink)

How to explain the existence of evil if being by its very nature is good? My paper examines an interesting and perhaps signifi cant parallel between two exponents of the metaphysical tradition usually thought to stand widely apart, Thomas Aquinas and Hegel. I argue that Hegel’s system shares certain features of Aquinas’ convertibility thesis, that upon closer inspection will yield a set of interesting refl ections not only about the problem of evil, but also about the limits and (...) possibilities of metaphysical method. I discuss Aquinas’ thesis of the convertibility of being and good and how it determines his treatment of evil. I then construct a Hegelian version of convertibility and argue that Hegel’s system fails for similar reasons to provide a satisfactory account of the problem of evil. This leads to my central question: should the inadequacy of traditional approaches to evil call for a reversal or abandonment of metaphysics, or invite a deeper refl ection about reality that would not subsume the world’s darkness under what Hans Blumenberg once called “metaphysics of light”? (shrink)

Since the first degrees of musicality of mankind, the music became a sphere of investigation for naturalists (Darwin), economists (Karl Bücher), philosophers (Spencer, Schopenhauer, Cioran), who tried to explain, through their theories, the process of the beginning and settlement of this phenomenon as well as its influence on the human being.Schopenhauer will consider art, and especially music, as the only liberating form from delusion and suffering, from the omnipotence will to live. Making a strange parallelism between music and the will (...) to live, Schopenhauer will find between these two a report of identity: “the world is an incarnation of music as well as an incarnation of Will: There is no art besides music that expresses an ideal aspect of Will, the Will itself in its purest essence”.If at Schopenhauer the music expresses the Will itself in its purest essence, at Emil Cioran “the metaphysical madness of the musical experience… weakens the will to live and the vital main springs”.Through music Emil Cioran found the way to himself, to his ego and his profound musical nature.The moments of separating of the delusions world are for the human being moments in which the entire existence feels like a melody and all of the being’s sufferings assemble and melt into “a convergence of sounds, into a musical enthusiasm and into a warm and resonant universal community”, into a “sweet and rhythmic immateriality”. (shrink)

Introduction Reza Davari Ardakni, the Iranian contemporary philosopher, distinguishes development from Western modernity; in that it considers modernity as natural and organic changes that Europe has gone through, but sees development as a planned design for implementing modernity in other countries. As a result, the closedness of development concerns only the developing countries, not Western modern ones. Davari emphasizes that the Western modernity has a universality that pertains to a unique reason and a unified world. The only way of thinking (...) in this world is a philosophical thought based on human self-centered reason, and given the pervasiveness of Western civilization. Therefore, Davari does not consider Westernization as mere imitation of Western customs and methods, but rather as a way of existence in the world. Westernization is a subjective view of the world and beings. Westernization is not optional, enabling non-Western people to avoid it. According to the Westernization scenario, the world today is entirely Westernized, and Davari considers Westernization as the inevitable fate of the people of this era, seeing two alternatives for them, both of which ultimately lead to the same destination, which is to embrace development; either they seize the power of science and technology and join the process of global modernization and participate in it, or they become subdued by this process and accept it without participation. Davari regards the first type of Westernization as active and the second type as passive. Problematique Therefore, underdevelopment is not a concept of the ancient world, nor even of a world between the ancient and the modern, or on the threshold of modernization. Underdevelopment is a condition of suspension and timelessness and being exposed to modernization. To escape the paradox of underdevelopment, which is the inevitable historical fate of non-modernized societies, Davari sees no way out other than embracing development. In other words, Westernized societies, which have become confused due to modernization, have no escape route other than turning to development. Therefore, some critics of Davari accuse the theory of Westernization of being a theoretical rupture. M. T. Tabatabaei, by rejecting the theoretical rupture in the theory of Westernization, believes that in the argument of Davari, we are only faced with a shift from a philosophical to an intellectual level. Tabatabaei, by avoiding providing a philosophical response to the critics of the theoretical rupture, believes that the introduction of active Westernization and collaboration in science and technology as a solution to escape from underdevelopment conditions, is only a shift from a philosophical level to an intellectual level and does not involve a rupture. Therefore, it seems that the philosophical issue of how or the possibility of escaping from underdevelopment conditions is still an open non answered problem. In this study, seeking a philosophical answer to this problem, an attempt has been made to summarize Davari's definitions of development, underdevelopment, participation in the world of science, and the role of humanities and social sciences in development, using his writings and speeches. It is proposed that a way to escape from the clesedness of development based on Davari's views, is to make use of analytical method with emphasizing on concepts and theories of the philosophy and metaphysics of science. Argument According to Davari, the social and human sciences that are responsible for development planning in underdeveloped societies must consider the characteristics of underdevelopment in order to facilitate the transition to more favorable conditions. Davari identifies the following conditions for successful development: 1) replacing tradition with science as the organizing and coordinating principle in society, 2) recognizing the universality of philosophy and science of the Western modernity and the impossibility of blindly imitation and adopting it, 3) inevitability of actively engaging and interacting with development, 4) recognizing the internal dynamics of scientific progress and avoiding authoritarian control, and 5) promoting free participation in the scientific paradigms. Therefore, Davari suggests the following steps towards development: 1) recognizing and understanding the problems of society and the local ecosystem, 2) understanding the philosophical and cultural foundations of Western civilization, 3) understanding the historical context and paradigms of science, 4) understanding the philosophical and metaphysical foundations of science, 5) recognizing the intellectual and philosophical capacities of our own community, and 6) reflecting our own philosophical and metaphysical assumptions in the scientific world in a way that is compatible with scientific methods. Given the motivations for change in science at both the global and national levels, including the emergence of heterodox or indigenous sciences, and the inevitable nature of development, Davari points to the possibility of a path between absolute rejecting or accepting the mainstream social and human sciences. However, this path is challenging and contingent upon the aforementioned conditions and steps of transition. Conclusion It is necessary to seek this path within the realm of the philosophy and metaphysics of science, particularly in the origins and foundations of the social and human sciences. Research in the metaphysics and philosophy of the social sciences provides the opportunity for active scientific engagement in the scientific paradigms and a reconsideration of the foundations of science, allowing for different philosophical foundations while are compatible with scientific methods. Successfully finding a path between absolute rejecting or accepting the existing social sciences will lead to an internal transformation within the field of science and, in fact, will advance the boundaries of knowledge. Therefore, it is possible, while adhering to the conditions of transition and actively participating in the world of science and technology, and accepting the unity of modernity and avoiding selectivity and imitation, to search for a way to overcome the closedness of development through a reconsideration of the philosophical and metaphysical foundations of science, while recognizing our own intellectual heritage and critically assessing Western science and technology. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:Cit: ConsciousnessAlan PretiCit: Consciousness. By Bina Gupta. New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2003. Pp. xi + 203.In his 1988 essay "Consciousness in Vedānta,"1 J. N. Mohanty pointed out that, Heidegger notwithstanding, a metaphysics of consciousness has been the destiny of Indian thought. Indeed, from the earliest Upaniṣadic speculations to the growth of the systems, the centrality of the concept of consciousness to the development of Indian philosophy can (...) hardly be denied. It is even arguable that the nature and function of consciousness was perhaps the greatest bone of contention among the darśanas, with some of the more critical disputes turning on the details of a particular theory of consciousness. The importance of the concept lies in the almost universal agreement among classical Indian philosophers that consciousness enjoys a fundamental epistemic priority regarding the guarantee of any ontological claim; any claim with respect to the existence of such and such, to the way the world is, ultimately depends on evidence that is (or was) in some way present to consciousness. Consciousness is thus the fons et origo of all knowledge; in its absence nothing can be claimed about the world.One of the most recent additions to a growing body of literature concerned with examining the concept of consciousness in Indian thought is Bina Gupta's Cit: Consciousness, the inaugural release of Oxford's Foundations of Philosophy in India series, initiated by the Centre for Philosophy and Foundations of Science in New Delhi. The editors intend for the series "to make available a critical reassessment of the philosophical achievement of the classical Indian tradition in such a way that it contributes to the dialogue between civilizations of the new century"—a prospect most welcome by those engaged in Indian and comparative philosophy. [End Page 619]Cit: Consciousness is a natural extension of Gupta's work in The Disinterested Witness: A Fragment of Advaita Vedānta Phenomenology (1998). While concerned there primarily with the notion of the witness consciousness (sākṣin) in the Vivarana tradition of Advaita Vedānta, in Cit Gupta seeks to provide a more general account of consciousness in Indian thought. Her stated goals are "(1) to demonstrate the profound contribution of Indian thought to the theme of consciousness, and (2) to make Indian thought accessible to my readers, irrespective of whether they belong to the Indian or Western tradition" (p. 11). Consistent with the aims of the series, Gupta's approach is conceptual, rather than historical; her focus is specifically on various theories of the nature of consciousness and on the arguments advanced on their behalf. Concerns regarding the losses incurred by abstracting the theories from their historical context are balanced by the recognition that the historical development of a particular school yields one type of understanding, its conceptual structure another (p. 12). In this connection, one may note that Gupta's emphasis on the arguments and conceptual frameworks could make for greater accessibility to those unfamiliar with the territory; certainly the prominence of philological and historical concerns found in many accounts of the development of the schools can prove distracting to the reader seeking the specific philosophical issues.Cit unfolds dialectically, beginning with an analysis of consciousness distilled from the Upaniṣads, continuing through the Nyāya-Vaiśesika and Yogācāra Buddhist views, and culminating with an examination of Advaita Vedānta, both in its classical form and in its "transformations" effected by the contemporary philosophers Sri Aurobindo, K. C. Bhattacharyya, and J. N Mohanty. The order in which the views are discussed is not arbitrary; Gupta's arrangement of the themes purposefully leads to an analysis of Advaita not only because it is, to her mind, "an amazing case of a sublime metaphysical system, subtle logical discursivity, and detailed phenomenological description" (p. x), but also in order to "show that the conceptual nature of the Advaitic theory of consciousness undergoes transformations in the hands of many contemporary thinkers, which makes the Advaitic theory of consciousness stronger and more responsive to modern philosophic challenges" (p. 13). The book, thus, in effect, seeks to vindicate an Advaitic view of consciousness. The final chapter includes a comparative assessment... (shrink)

At the opening of Spinoza’s Ethics, we find the three celebrated definitions of substance, attribute, and God: E1d3: By substance I understand what is in itself and is conceived through itself, i.e., that whose concept does not require the concept of another thing, from which it must be formed [Per substantiam intelligo id quod in se est et per se concipitur; hoc est id cujus conceptus non indiget conceptu alterius rei, a quo formari debeat]. E1d4: By attribute I understand what (...) the intellect perceives of a substance, as constituting its essence [Per attributum intelligo id, quod intellectus de substantia percipit, tanquam ejusdem essentiam constituens]. E1d6: By God I understand a being absolutely infinite, that is, a substance consisting of an infinity of attributes, of which each one expresses an eternal and infinite essence We are accustomed to think of these paramount definitions as a fixed and settled formulation of the core of Spinoza’s metaphysics, but if we look at the development of Spinoza’s thought, the picture we get is quite different. In the early drafts of the Ethics and in his early works, Spinoza seems to have experimented with various conceptualizations of the relations between substance, attribute, and God. Some of Spinoza’s works make barely any use of the notions of substance and attribute, and the testimony of Spinoza’s letters suggests that, at a certain stage in his philosophical development, the concept of attribute may have been put on the back burner, if not completely dropped. Indeed, another closely related concept—accident [accidens]—was fated to be pulled out of the system (and for good reasons ). The final version of the Ethics makes hardly any use of this notion, but Spinoza’s letters show that in early drafts of the Ethics he used the term ‘accident’ to refer to what cannot be or be conceived without substance. In this paper I will attempt to provide a brief outline of the genealogy of Spinoza’s key metaphysical concepts. This genealogy, like any other, can help us to reexamine and reconsider what seems to us natural, stable and obvious. In the first part of the paper, I rely on Spinoza’s letters to trace the development of his definitions of substance and attribute in the early drafts of the Ethics. The letters, whose dates are more or less established, also provide a temporal grid for our subsequent discussions. The second part surveys Spinoza’s discussion and conceptualization of substance and attributes in the Treatise on the Emendation of the Intellect, the Theological-Political Treatise (1670), and briefly, Spinoza’s 1663 book on Descartes’ Principles of Philosophy, and its appendix on Metaphysical Thoughts, the Cogitata Metaphysica. The third part of the paper is dedicated to Spinoza’s understanding of substance and attribute in the Short Treatise on God, Man, and His Well-Being. I conclude with some remarks on the stability of Spinoza’s final position on the issue, as expressed in the published version of the Ethics . (shrink)

Schopenhauer positions himself squarely within the tradition of Kant’s transcendental idealism, and his first sense of the metaphysical comprises the synthetic cognition a priori that makes experience possible within transcendental idealism. This is Schopenhauer’s transcendental metaphysics. As he developed philosophically however, Schopenhauer devised a second sense of the metaphysical. This second sense also depends, albeit negatively, on transcendental idealism because its central claim—that the thing in itself should be identified with will—looks like precisely a species of transcendent metaphysics, (...) a claim that goes beyond the possibility of experience into the cognitively forbidden realm of things in themselves. I shall argue however that this second sense of the metaphysical can be formulated much more independently of transcendental idealism, following a recent similar interpretation of Kant due to Rae Langton, and that this makes for some surprising connections to contemporary metaphysics. (shrink)