Lev Shestov - Potestas Clavium - Part III

     Husserl takes upon himself the defense of the rights of universals (ideal objects) as equal to those of individuals (real objects). "This is the point where relativist and empiricist psychologism separates itself from the idealism which represents the only possibility of a theory of knowledge that is in agreement (i.e., that conceals no inner contradiction within itself) with itself" (Logische Untersuchungen, II, p. 107. Italics mine - L.S.). And he adds immediately, in order to avoid all equivocation, that his idealism does not presuppose any metaphysical doctrine: "Naturally, in speaking here of idealism, I do not have in view any metaphysical doctrine but the form of the theory of knowledge which recognizes the ideal as the condition of the possibility of objective knowledge in general without giving this term any psychologistic interpretation." These two statements are of major importance for the philosophy of Husserl. He seeks to attain objective knowledge and admits the existence of an ideal world but is convinced that he has no need to betake himself to metaphysics. The father and creator of the theory of ideas was not afraid of metaphysics. Even more: for Plato the theory of ideas had meaning only because it opened to him the way to metaphysical revelations and, conversely, it appeared to him true and eternal insofar as it expressed certain metaphysical visions.

     It was the same for Descartes, whose argumentation and point of departure did not remain without influence on Husserl; metaphysical principles were the conditio sine qua non of his thought. Husserl declares that one cannot relativize thought without relativizing being and, arguing with Erdmann, who defended relativism, he says: "There would perhaps be beings of a special kind, logical supermen so to speak, for whom our principles are not valid but who have other principles such that what is truth for us is error for them. For them it could be true that they do not experience the psychic phenomena which they sometimes experience. That we and they exist would be true for us but false for them, etc. Certainly our own judgment, that of ordinary logical men, would be the following: these beings have lost reason, they speak of truth and abolish its laws, they affirm that they have their own laws of thought and they deny those to which the possibility of laws in general is bound" (Logische Untersuchungen, I, 151).

     When we hear these reasonings we recall quite naturally the reflections of Descartes that led him to his cogito ergo sum. Descartes, it will be remembered, had pushed his doubt to the farthest limits. He had come to the point of admitting that God had set himself the task of deceiving men in all things. But there is one thing about which God cannot deceive us: our own existence. For to be deceived, we must be. Husserl makes in short the same reply to the relativists: deny and relativize all you wish but your existence and the truth of your existence cannot be denied. You are not, then, relativists but "absolutists" just as I am.

     This argumentation appears irresistible: the heritage of Plato (for Descartes also reasons according to Plato) is a great help to us in difficult cases.

     But a very interesting question then arises. I have already indicated that these reasonings appeared to Plato perfectly correct but nevertheless insufficient, whereupon he went to seek the roots of things in another world, different from our own. Descartes did the same. It might seem that having demonstrated that God could not deceive us about everything, Descartes should have glorified the human reason which is triumphant over all the higher and lower powers of the world that had conspired against it. And, indeed, he appears for a moment quite disposed to chant a song of victory. But turn the page and you will find that the lumen naturale, such as we understand it now, is insufficient. The very Descartes who has just demonstrated to us that God could not deceive us, feels himself once again invaded by a feeling of anxiety and, quite like Plato, throws himself toward an asylum metaphysicum which is, according to our ideas, only an asylum ignorantiae or, to use Husserl's language, a flight to wisdom. It is not enough that God cannot deceive us - that is, that God, even if He wished it, found it impossible to outwit man. Descartes affirmed that God does not even wish to deceive us, for falsehood is not worthy of the Supreme Being. And it is on this conviction finally that the philosopher bases his confidence in reason. There is obviously here a true testimonium paupertatis [testimony of poverty]. Descartes well saw that man could not overcome God by means of natural reason and that he must finally, whether he wishes it or not, bend his knees before the Creator of the universe and not demand of Him truth but obtain it from His mercy through supplication. As Luther said: Oportet ergo hominem suis operibus diffidere et velut paralyticum remissis manibus et pedibus gratiam operum artificem implorare [Man should therefore distrust his works and like a cripple, with slack arms and legs, beg the artificial grace of works].

     And again, that same question that I previously raised and because of which we are continually obliged to return to the theory of knowledge: who is right? The ancient philosophers who sought truth only in the metaphysical domain where they found a refuge against all relativism? Or the modern philosophers who, having renounced metaphysics, are obliged to admit relativism under the form that is least offensive for the human reason? Or, finally, Husserl, who demonstrates with all the conviction and ardor of fanaticism that one can, without addressing himself to metaphysics, escape relativism, and that men know few things but what they do know, they know truly, for neither angels nor demons nor gods can deny their human truths? Here is the problem, the only problem that the theory of knowledge tries to solve. And on the solution of this question depends the philosophy of the thinker. Or, rather, his philosophy - if this word also designates a certain disposition of the mind - will lead him toward such or such a theory of knowledge. Such a person who has felt with the totality of his being that life goes beyond the truths that can be expressed by means of judgments obligatory for all and that can be developed by the traditional methodological procedures will not be satisfied either with the specific relativism of Sigwart and Erdmann or with the extreme rationalism of Husserl. He will here clearly discern the desire not to escape outside the limits of positivism - a desire dependent not on metaphysical considerations but on the profoundly inculcated habit of living and thinking in certain conditions of existence already well known and comfortable, a desire determined also at times (though this may appear paradoxical) by an obscure metaphysical need which incites the individual "reason" to take refuge and withdraw into itself and into its own shell. He will then be prepared to allow Husserl's argument in its entire compass to pass as valid.

     No, specific relativism is not in any way distinguished from individual relativism. The one as well as the other transforms the world of our truths into a world of visions and dreams. All the guarantees of solidity and certainty that logic and the theory of knowledge furnished us collapse: we are then obliged to live in constant anxiety and ignorance and to be prepared for everything. Postulates in this case not only do not calm us but, on the contrary, even intensify our unrest. But philosophy since Parmenides has promised us a solid truth and an unshakable heart. And if Husserl has succeeded not only in making us see the relativism of traditional theories of knowledge but also in overcoming the relativism in his own thought, and has made us a gift of that tranquility of mind to which humanity has aspired for thousands of years, was he not fully justified in setting the theory of knowledge before everything else? The expansion of our knowledge becomes almost a question of time, one could say, once it is demonstrated that the truth we perceive imposes itself on gods as well as on men. The postulate of Descartes that God does not wish to deceive us, a postulate as problematic as Sigwart's, now becomes quite superfluous. We also no longer have any need of Plato's anamnêsis, in which we do not have any great confidence: who today would seriously maintain that our souls existed in another world before their birth and still recall in this earthly existence truths previously seen? Even if the human soul is born at the same time as the body, even if God is a liar and an immoral Being, our science and our knowledge would have nothing to fear. Reason will not leave us in the lurch. It possesses all authority.

     How does Husserl overcome relativism?

     The answer to this question is bound to the question of what the object of knowledge is. This is obviously a fundamental question. Plato and Aristotle already affirmed that the object of knowledge is not the individual but the general. The realism of the Middle Ages adopted the same thesis. It is only in modern times that scientific thought has seen the impossibility of speaking of the general as an "object." And it was on the ground of Kant's and Fichte's philosophy that the theory of Rickert, who teaches that the object of knowledge is "that which should be" (das Seinsollende) was born. The philosopher of Freiburg imagined that he succeeded through das Seinsollende in delivering poor human thought from the chains in which it has struggled for centuries. Like Husserl, Rickert tries to escape from the claws of relativism which tear the conscience of the thinker. But Rickert's joy was of short duration. It soon appeared that das Seinsollende is only a weak remedy for doubt; it is at most an anesthetic whose action does not last. As for Husserl, he resolved the difficulty quite differently by re-establishing - under a new form, it is true - the Platonic theory of ideas or Scholastic realism.

     Husserl begins by opposing the act of the individual's true judgments to the truth. I say that 2 x 2 = 4. My judgment is a psychological act and as such can be the object of psychologic study. But whatever the psychologist may do to clarify the laws of thought, he could not in any way deduce from these laws the distinction between truth and error. On the contrary, all his argumentations already presuppose that he has a criterion through which he distinguishes truth from falsehood. The theorist of knowledge is not at all interested in the individual judgments of John or Peter according to which 2 + 2 = 4. What concerns him is the truth of the judgment, 2 x 2 = 4. Judgments carrying such a truth are reckoned by the thousands, but the truth is one.

"When a natural scientist deduces from the laws of the lever, the law of weight, etc., the way a machine acts, he certainly feels in himself all kinds of subjective acts... In this case, to the associations of the subjective thoughts there corresponds an objective unity of meaning which is what it is, whether or not it be actualized by anyone in thought" (Logische Untersuchungen, II, 94). The same point of view is still more clearly expressed in the first volume of the Logische Untersuchungen: "If all the masses subject to gravitation disappeared, the law of gravitation would not be destroyed but would simply remain without any possible application. The law, indeed, says nothing about the existence of gravitational masses but about what is inherent in these masses as such" (Ibid., I, 149).

In both cases Husserl emphasizes that the theorist of knowledge is not at all concerned with the resemblance established between the different psychological acts of a single or several individuals. What is important is not that you, I, and millions of individuals experience the same thing and express it in the same way by establishing the laws of the lever or of gravitation. To understand Husserl rightly we must never lose sight of this. He returns constantly to this point both in the first and in the second volume of his Logische Untersuchungen, where this thought resounds as a kind of leitmotif. I quote again this important passage:

"For example, the meaning of the statement, "pi is a transcendent quantity": what we understand by reading it or think by speaking it is not an individual characteristic but is always individually different, while the meaning of the statement must be identical. If we or other persons repeat the same proposition with the same intention (mit gleicher Intention), each of these persons has his own phenomena, words, and moments of understanding. But despite this limitless multiplicity of individual experience, what is expressed in them is everywhere something identical, the same (es ist dasselbe) in the strictest sense of the word. The meaning of the proposition is not multiplied with the number of persons and acts; the judgment, in the ideal and logical sense, remains one. The fact that we here maintain the strict identity of the meaning (der Bedeutung) by distinguishing the latter from the constant psychic character of the interpretation (der Bedeutung) does not come from any subjective inclination for subtle distinctions but from a firm theoretical conviction that it is only in this way that one can arrive at a true appreciation of the situation that is fundamental for the understanding of logic. Likewise, it is not a question here of a simple hypothesis which must be justified by its explanatory usefulness (durch ihre Erklärungsergiebigkeit); but we consider this as a truth apprehensible immediately, obeying in this the supreme authority for all questions concerning knowledge, i.e., evidence. I perceive that in repeated acts of representation and judgment, I certainly think the same thing (identisch dasselbe), the same concept, i.e., the same proposition, and that I cannot think otherwise; I perceive that, for example, where it is a question of the proposition or truth, "pi is a transcendent quantity," I do not think of anything less than of an individual experience or of a moment in the experience of any person. I perceive that this reflected statement has really for its object what constitutes meaning in ordinary speech (was in der schlichten Rede die Bedeutung ausmacht). Finally, I perceive that what I mean in the proposition in question or what I grasp as its meaning when I hear it is identically what it is (identhisch ist, was es ist), independently of the fact that I think and exist or that, in general, thinking persons and acts exist or do not exist... This true identity that we affirm here is none other than the identity of the species (Identitat der Spezies). It is in this way, but only in this way, that it can embrace in an ideal unity, ksymballein eis en, the scattered multiplicity of individual particularities." (Logische Untersuchungen, II, 99)

And further:

"Ideal objects exist truly... which does not prevent the meaning of this existence and, with it, the meaning of the predicate from being here completely, specifically the same as that, for example, in cases where to a real subject a real predicate is attributed or denied. In other words, we do not deny it but rely rather on the fact that inside the conceptual unity of what exists (or, what is the same thing, of the object in general) there exists a fundamental categorical difference of which we take account through the distinction between ideal being and real being, being as species and being as individual. But this difference does not abolish the supreme unity in the concept of the object." (Ibid., 125)

And finally:

"Every one of these examples lets us perceive that in knowledge species becomes an object and that judgments about species are possible in the same logical forms as about individual objects." (Ibid., 111)