Fundamental Philosophy, Vol. 2 (of 2)

The reader may perhaps think that I am jesting, and that I present Kant's opinion under a ridiculous aspect for the sake of combating it more easily; but it is just the reverse; the exposition which I have just made of Kant's philosophy is more serious than his own. These are his words: "One elastic ball striking another in a right line, communicates to the latter its whole motion, and consequently its whole state (considering only their positions in space). Admit now, by analogy with these bodies, certain substances, of which one transmits representations to another, with the consciousness which accompanies them; we may then conceive a whole series of such representations, in which the first communicates its state, and the consciousness of its state to the second; the second communicates its state, together with that of the preceding substance, to the third; the third, in like manner, communicates the states of both of the preceding substances together with its own, and the consciousness which accompanies them to the fourth. The last of the series will then have the consciousness of all the states of the substances which preceded it, as of its own; because these states, and the consciousness of these states have been transmitted to it. Still it will not have been the same person in all these states."

Kant, in trying to refute the psychological argument founded on consciousness, overthrows and destroys the character of consciousness: a transmitted consciousness is not a true consciousness; it is only the cognition of a previous thought.

These substances, existing successively and transmitting their consciousness from one to another, would be something distinct from the act of consciousness, or they would not. If distinct, we must admit a subject of the consciousness, which in itself, and as subject, does not come under the sensible intuition; and consequently we may argue ad hominem, and retort Kant's objection against himself. If these transitory substances are only the act of the consciousness, when the act ceases, nothing remains of the substances, and therefore, there is nothing transmissible.

Transmission supposes something which may be transmitted; if, then, the act of consciousness is transmitted, it must be something permanent in itself, in the midst of the succession of the substances; and this is a very strange conclusion to which the German philosopher is brought by his theory of transmission. All psychologists had said that the substance of the soul is permanent, and its phenomena transitory; now, on the contrary, we find that the transitory is the substance, and that which is permanent is the phenomenon, or the act of consciousness which is transmitted.

66. Perhaps it may be answered that by transmission is not meant the communication of any thing constant, but merely the succession of phenomena united by any tie among themselves. Thus, supposing the instants A, B, C, D, the acts of consciousness, a, b, c, d, corresponding to them, will not be strictly identical in number, but successive, and connected. But this reply, which avoids the necessity of admitting the permanence of the act of consciousness, explains nothing, and makes it incomprehensible, how, at the instant D, for example, there can be consciousness of the acts c, b, a, which there is an irresistible inclination to believe have at bottom something numerically identical. When d exists there is no longer any thing of c left; there is no substance remaining, because, by the supposition there either is no such substance, or it is something transitory; there is no act of consciousness remaining, because a is numerically distinct from c, and besides, we have seen that the permanence of the phenomena cannot be admitted. Therefore it is absolutely impossible to explain or to comprehend how there can be in the act a the representation of c.

67. To say that the phenomena are united by any tie whatever is to elude the difficulty by a foolish play upon words. What is the meaning, in this case, of uniting, of a tie? They are metaphors which if they mean any thing must express the permanence of some thing amid the variety of the phenomena; the tie, the bond, must extend to the various things which it connects and unites: therefore it must be common to them all; and this something, whatever it be, which remains constant in variety, we call substance.

68. The mere succession of the phenomena or acts of consciousness is not sufficient to transmit the belief of the numerical identity; if it were, all men would be conscious of the previous acts of others. Let a, b, be two successive acts of consciousness: if, in order that the act b, which is numerically distinct from a, may represent the numerical identity of consciousness, it is sufficient that b should succeed a; since this succession is met with in the acts of consciousness of different men, it must follow that all men have consciousness of all the acts of the others. Risum tematis? And yet this conclusion is absolutely necessary: it cannot be avoided by saying that there is a form of the internal sense, and that the succession takes place in each man in his respective internal sense, and that therefore the succession of the internal phenomena of one is in a different time, in a different form from what it is in another. The words, respective internal sense, internal form of each man, have a meaning, if we admit something permanent in our interior; but if there is nothing but successive phenomena, the word respective is absurd, because there can be no respective internal sense if there is nothing to which it can refer. Suppose the man M, and the man N be merely a succession of phenomena, and in each one there is only a mere succession: there is the same reason why the phenomena of N should be connected with each other as with those of M. Therefore, if there is a community of consciousness in the phenomena of M, without any other sufficient reason than the mere succession, this community should be found in all the phenomena, because they all have the same sufficient reason.

69. It must be observed that in all this argument, I abstract the nature of the substance of the soul, and only purpose to demonstrate that we must admit something constant in the midst of the variety of the phenomena, and common to them all. Call it a tie, a form, an act of consciousness, or what you will, it is either something real or it is not. If it is not something real, whoever expresses it, employs a word without any meaning: if it is something real, the substantiality of the soul is acknowledged, because a permanent reality is admitted in the midst of the variety of the phenomena. We, who admit this substantiality, do not pretend that the soul can be given in sensible intuition, nor that we can express in an exact definition its internal properties abstracted from the phenomena which we experience in it. What we say is, that we know its real existence, its permanence, and its numerical identity in the midst of the succession and diversity of the phenomena. Therefore from the moment that it is admitted that there is within us something real, permanent, and numerically identical in the midst of diversity, the substantiality of the soul, which we defend, is admitted. Disputes may arise on the distinctive character of its nature; whether it is or is not a force, as Leibnitz maintained, whether its essence consists in thought, as was the opinion of Descartes: but these questions are foreign to the matter now in hand. Is there something real and permanent amid the variety of internal phenomena? If there is not, the consciousness of numerical identity is absurd; if there is, then the substantiality of the soul is demonstrated.

70. "The opinion of some ancient philosophers," says Kant, "that all is transitory and nothing constant in the world, although it cannot be maintained if we admit substances, still it cannot be refuted by the unity of consciousness; because we cannot even judge by consciousness, whether, as something, we are or are not permanent; for we attribute to our identical me only that of which we have consciousness, and thus we must necessarily judge that we are precisely the same in all the durations of which we are conscious." Kant expressly acknowledges that the judgment that we are the same is necessary, that is, that the identity of the me is for us a necessary fact of consciousness. It would be difficult to imagine a confession more injurious and more conclusive against the arguments of the German philosopher. If we are forced to judge ourselves identical, if consciousness tell us so, can we deny or doubt this identity without destroying the fundamental fact of all psychological investigations, and consequently falling into the most complete skepticism? If the testimony of consciousness is not valid, if the judgment to which it necessarily forces us is not certain, what shall we catch hold of in order that we may not be precipitated into the most absolute skepticism? where shall we look for a solid foundation for the edifice of our knowledge?

71. "But," Kant continues, "from the point of view of another, we cannot hold this judgment valid, because, finding in the soul no other constant phenomenon than the representation of the me which accompanies and unites all the other phenomena, we can never decide that this me (a simple thought) is not as fleeting as the other thoughts, which are respectively connected by it." Do not, then, admit that the representation of the me, although essentially representing an identity, is valid; say that, although transitory it necessarily brings us to the illusion of permanence; but draw also all the consequences of this doctrine, and maintain that human reason avails nothing, absolutely nothing; say that recollection is a pure illusion, that although we are necessarily induced to believe that the thought which we now have is the recollection of another previous thought, that all this is pure illusion; that we are not sure that there is the relation of recollection, and that we only know that at present we have the consciousness of a thought which seems to us connected with another previous thought; say too that reasoning has no validity, for all conviction of ideas is impossible without memory; and that, although an internal representation necessarily produces an assent, we must distrust the judgment which necessity demands: say too that all that we think, all that we perceive, all that we will, all that we experience within us, cannot enable us to know any thing, that we are condemned to a complete impotence of acquiring any certainty of any thing; and that the language of every philosopher should be the following: "This now seems so; I am conscious of it; I know nothing further; I experience a necessity of believing it, but perhaps this belief is a pure illusion; I know nothing of the external world; I know nothing either of the internal world; all knowledge is denied me; I myself am only a succession of phenomena which pass away and disappear; an irresistible necessity impels me to believe that these phenomena have a common tie, but this tie is nothing; because when a phenomenon disappears nothing is before it; if I acknowledge any reality, no matter what, I fall into the substantiality of the soul, which I have resolved not to admit; all is illusion, all is nothing, because, as I am not even certain of the facts of consciousness, I am not certain even of the illusion." Who can encounter such consequences?

CHAPTER XI.

SIMPLICITY OF THE SOUL

72. I have confined myself in the preceding chapters to proving the substantiality of the soul; to do which it was only necessary to demonstrate by the testimony of consciousness that there is within us a permanent reality, the subject of the modifications which we experience. I shall now demonstrate that this substance is simple.

To proceed methodically, let us fix the meaning of the word simple. When many beings are united and form a collection, the result is called a composite being; so that there is a true composition wherever beings substantially distinct are united; the band which unites them may be of different species, which produces the diversity of compositions. Simplicity is opposed to composition; the idea of simplicity essentially excludes the idea of composition; as this last includes a number of distinct things which are united to form a whole, the idea of simplicity essentially excludes the idea of number of things united to form a whole. Therefore the simple is strictly one, and there is simplicity in a substance when it is not a collection of substances.

When, therefore, we say the substance of the soul is simple, we mean that it is not a collection of substances, but one substance.

73. The idea of simplicity thus determined with exactness, let us see if it belongs to our soul. As the soul is not given us in intuition after the manner of sensible things, and we only know it by the presence of the internal sense, and by the phenomena which we experience in the depths of our consciousness, we must examine these two sources to see if we can find simplicity in them.

It is an indisputable fact that in all our acts, in all our internal affections, we perceive the identity of the me.48 There is no identity between things that are distinct: consequently the internal sense at once rejects the multiplicity of the soul. It may be said that this identity does not exist between distinct substances, but that a composite substance is identical with itself, and perhaps the identity revealed by consciousness is only the identity of a composite with itself: but this reply is destroyed by merely examining the testimony of consciousness. That which we perceive as various and multiple is not the me, but that which takes place in the me: we think, we will, we perceive different things; but consciousness attests that what thinks them, wills them, and perceives them, is one and the same, the me. Therefore, the testimony of consciousness alone proves the simplicity of the soul; for it is impossible to explain otherwise how we perceive within us the permanent unity amid the multitude of internal phenomena.

74. Abstracting the testimony of the internal sense, and looking only at the nature of the internal phenomena, it may be demonstrated that the subject of them is a simple substance. If it were not so, the thinking substance would be composed of various substances; let us see what would follow from this supposition. Let the component substances be three, for example, A, B, C; I say that this collection cannot think. To demonstrate it with the most complete evidence, let us take this judgment: metal is a body, and let us see if it is possible for the collection of A, B, C, to form this judgment. Let us suppose the representation of the subject, metal, to be in the substance A; the idea of the predicate, body, to be in B; and the general idea of the relation of the predicate to the subject, or the copula, is, to be in C; can a judgment be the result? By no means. A will perceive the metal, B the body, and C the general idea of the copula, is. Each of these substances will have consciousness of its own; but as it is not conscious of what is in the other two, it can form no judgment, for this essentially consists in the relation of the predicate to the subject.

75. If you say that each of the substances contains the representations of the three things, we shall have three judgments, and there will not be one thinking being, but three. Besides, either of the three substances A, B, C, is composed of others, or it is not. If it is not, is simple, and we have a simple and perceptive substance, why then suppose three when one is enough? If it is composed of others, the difficulty is increased; for supposing A to be formed of two substances, which we may call m, n; the representation of metal which was in A will be distributed between m and n, in which case, far from obtaining a judgment, we should not even have a subject; for it would not be possible to form the representation of metal, supposing it to be divided between m and n.

If it is not possible to form a judgment, or even the idea of one term, it is evident that all reasoning and thought would be impossible; for reasoning implies a connection of judgments from which it deduces the conclusion contained in the premises.

76. Acts of the will are also impossible in a composite substance; there is no will where there is no cognition, and this latter is, as we have just seen, inseparable from simplicity. But we may extend the demonstration still further. An act of the will implies an inclination, tendency, or whatever it may be called, towards an object known. Let us suppose the two substances A and B to compose a substance which has a will; and let us suppose all that is necessary for the act of willing to be divided between them in such manner that the knowledge of the object willed is in it, and the inclination or tendency in B; I say such an act or will is absurd. To feel the force of this truth let us suppose that the act of the will is to be formed of the cognition of one man, and the inclination of another towards the object known by the first; the pure cognition of one is not the act of the will, and the inclination of the other towards an object is impossible unless he has the cognition of the object towards which he is inclined, because this is equivalent to supposing a relation without any term to which it relates. These contradictions must be admitted by every one who denies the simplicity of the substances which will; for either the inclination and the cognition must be divided between the parts of the substances, or all concentrated in one part, and then the others are unnecessary.

Moreover, the substances composing the substance which will are either simple or composite; if simple, then there are simple substances which know and will; if composite, each act of the will would be an aggregate of the action of the parts, and what would an act of the will be which should consist in an aggregate?

77. The union which we conceive in distinct substances is either juxtaposition in space, simultaneousness in time, or the concourse of forces producing a common effect: juxtaposition in space or simultaneousness of time does not help us to explain thought, the act of the will, nor any internal phenomena; and neither does the concourse of forces producing a common effect solve the problem. On this supposition we should have to conceive internal phenomena as the products of an elaboration to which various substances have occurred. Let us for a moment admit this absurdity; we advance nothing by it, for we then ask, where does the phenomenon reside? If in all the substances jointly it must be in itself composite, and its consciousness would also be composite; none of the component substances could say I with respect to this phenomenon; there would, therefore, be a multiplicity of consciousnesses. Either these consciousnesses would be united in a point in order to form a common consciousness, or they would not. If they are united, their point of union must be a simple substance, or we relapse into the multiplicity of consciousnesses: if they are not united, the different internal consciousnesses of each man will be like the consciousnesses of different men; each substance will think its own, without knowing what the other thinks.

78. Finally, this divisibility of substance and of consciousness will extend to infinity, or it will not; if the former, instead of one thinking being, there will be an infinite number of thinking beings within each one of us; if the latter, we must come to simple substances with thought and consciousness, which is precisely what our adversaries are opposed to. Infinite divisibility does not save them from simplicity; the division separates the parts, but it supposes them distinct; therefore, infinite division must suppose an infinite number of simple beings which make the division possible.

CHAPTER XII.

KANT'S OPINION OF THE ARGUMENT PROVING THE SIMPLICITY OF THE SOUL

79. Kant calls the argument, by which we have just proved the simplicity of the soul, the second paralogism of psychology. He gives it in these terms: "Every thing, the action of which can never be conceived as the concurrence of many agents, is simple: the soul or thinking substance is of this nature; therefore the soul is simple." The German philosopher admits that this argument is not a mere sophism, invented by some dogmatist for the purpose of giving his assertions a slight appearance of truth; and he confesses that it seems to defy the most attentive examination and the most profound reflection. Still he flatters himself that he can expose its fallacy, showing that this principal support of rational psychology is a false foundation, and that, consequently, the whole edifice of this science is built in the air.

80. Kant observes that the nervus probandi of the argument is in the fact that many representations cannot form a thought, except inasmuch as they are contained in the absolute unity of the thinking subject; "but no one," he says, "can prove this proposition by conceptions. Where could he begin? The proposition: 'A thought can only be the effect of the absolute unity of the thinking subject,' cannot be analyzed; the unity of thought (and even thought results from many representations) is collective; and as to simple conceptions, their unity may just as well be referred to the collective unity of substances which contribute to produce the thought (just as the motion of a body is the motion of all its parts) as to the absolute unity of the subject. The necessity of the supposition of a simple substance cannot consequently be known by the rule of identity in a composite thought. No one who understands the reason of the possibility of synthetic judgments a priori, as we have explained them above, will dare to affirm that this proposition can be known synthetically, and perfectly a priori, or by pure conceptions." This reasoning is pure sophistry, and will vanish in the light of evidence.

81. In the first place, it is not correct to say that all thoughts result from many representations; in the perception of a simple idea, as of being, for example, there are not many representations; therefore Kant's argument fails at the first step; for if there be even one thought which requires simplicity, it has already been demonstrated that, if the soul is simple in one instance it cannot cease to be so in another.

82. Let us now examine how the diversity of representations enter into those thoughts which admit of this diversity. When these representations form what is called a thought, they are united, as it were, in a point which requires the unity of the perception and of the subject perceiving. In the thought called judgment various representations are combined, that of the subject and that of the object; but these different representations do not constitute the thought called judgment, except inasmuch as they are presented as connected with the relation which authorizes us to affirm or deny the predicate of the subject; therefore at the bottom of the diversity there is unity, that is to say, the relation; therefore the thought by which this relation is perceived is one, and the action of perceiving is essentially one, notwithstanding the variety of the representations.

83. There is no order in our thoughts except as we compare them with each other: all our intellectual acts are reduced to the perception and comparison of ideas; in perception there is simplicity, as there must also be in comparisons, since there can be no comparison of that which is varied, except by reducing the varied to that which is one, that is, to the relation which is perceived in the comparison. Therefore in every thought there is unity; thought can never be conceived as the concurrence of many agents; therefore the proposition, which Kant considered indemonstrable, is demonstrated, – that many representations cannot form a thought except in so far as they are contained in the absolute unity of a thinking subject.